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President Umaro Cissoko Embaló survived Tuesday’s “failed attack against democracy.” But the situation in Guinea-Bissau remains unclear. That the fragile West African country is the fifth to catch the military coup bug in recent times should be disturbing to leaders within the sub-region. Only two weeks ago, President Roch Kabore was toppled in Burkina Faso. […]
Continue ReadingIn ‘The World Game is not Just a Game’, respected British sportswriter, Simon Kuper wrote that soccer (football) “arouses in the rest of the world collective passions that are matched by nothing short of war.” Published in the New York Times on 26th May 2002, shortly before the commencement of the 17th FIFA World Cup […]
Continue ReadingIn the buildup to the last general election, before President Muhammadu Buhari publicly announced that he would seek a second term, a number of politicians were busy selling the idea of a ‘clamour’ for him to return. It is a familiar prank patented under the late General Sani Abacha in the nineties and perfected under […]
Continue ReadingA police officer was arrested in Kwara State for selling his Station Officer’s pistol to suspected cult members less than 24 hours after report of the Auditor General of the Federation, Adolphus Aghughu, revealed that approximately 178,459 different types of arms and ammunition had gone missing from the Police armoury in 2019 without explanation. Unaccounted […]
Continue ReadingWithin days of the passage of the 2021 Electoral Bill, it became obvious that the presidency was uncomfortable with the provision that makes it mandatory for political parties to nominate their candidates only through direct primaries. What followed, however, was an outsourcing of responsibility rather than an attempt to find a solution. First, it was […]
Continue ReadingFormer Osun State Governor and founding national chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief Bisi Akande, released his memoir, ‘My Participations’ last week in Lagos and I have read it. The 534-page memoir, including an 11-page foreword by Nobel Laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka, was apparently written for two reasons. One, to render his own […]
Continue ReadingJames and Jennifer Crumbley, parents of the prime suspect in the recent deadly shooting at a Michigan (U.S.) high school, were charged last Friday with involuntary manslaughter. The alleged crime of the Crumbleys is that despite tell-tale signs that their teenage son could commit murder, a gun was carelessly left within his reach. In addition, […]
Continue ReadingGovernor Sam Ortom is angry with the people of Benue State. And last Saturday, he publicly expressed his feelings at the commissioning of a Pentecostal Church in Makurdi, the state capital. Before we get to what he said about his people, let’s begin with the issue. Ortom accuses Benue people of peddling unfounded allegations about […]
Continue ReadingOne of the more interesting short stories in the Bible can be found in 2 Samuel chapter 23. Bethlehem had fallen into the hands of Israel’s mortal enemies, the Philistines. King David had fled the city when he said in the presence of his loyal aides, “Oh that someone would give me water to drink […]
Continue Reading“When the army announced last week that beginning Tuesday it would commence ‘Operation Crocodile Smile’—not against Boko Haram insurgents in the North-east but rather across the country “to identify, track, and counter negative propaganda in the social media and across cyberspace”—it was obvious to discerning Nigerians that EndSARS protesters were their target. It was also […]
Continue ReadingUntil last week Monday, I had never heard the name Femi Osibona. But within a few hours of the collapse of his Ikoyi 21-storey building in Lagos, I came to learn a great deal about the late proprietor of the ‘360 Degrees Towers’. From the ‘prophetic laying of hands’ that catapulted a man selling shirts […]
Continue ReadingLast Thursday, Information and Culture Minister, Alhaji Lai Mohammed responded to an article in The Economist, ‘Insurgency, secessionism and banditry threaten Nigeria.’ Quite naturally, the minister faulted a number of assertions in the London-based magazine. That of course is his job, and he did it well. But his attempt to make light of the collection […]
Continue ReadingI doubt if there is any Nigerian on WhatsApp who has not watched the short video clip of the Nigeria Customs Service (NSC) officer beating his chest about successful negotiation with bandits in Dutsima local government area of Katsina State. Surrounded by his men and a battery of reporters, he said: “We are not working […]
Continue ReadingShortly before the 2011 general election which he lost to President Goodluck Jonathan, then candidate Muhammadu Buhari (now president) was dismissive of subsidy in the downstream sector of the petroleum industry. “If anybody says he is subsidising anything, he is a fraud. So all these people talking about subsidy, who is subsidising who?” he famously […]
Continue Reading“Sometime in 2008, my late boss, President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua commissioned a study on ‘subsidies and tariffs in Nigeria’ in five critical sectors: Electricity, Petroleum, Education, Health and Agriculture. The main objectives were to determine the effectiveness of subsidies in these sectors, examine the need or otherwise for continuity and finally, suggest the framework for […]
Continue ReadingTomorrow marks Nigeria’s 61st independence anniversary. While we lament about what might have been and politicians play their usual games that contribute nothing to the welfare of people, let me confess straightaway that the copyright for the title of this piece is not mine. But there is an interesting backstory to it. Late in July […]
Continue ReadingWith the way we are running our country, I said in my Platform Nigeria 1st May 2019 presentation, ‘An Economy on Life Support: Time to Pull the Plug’, a convulsion was inevitable at some point. “It’s either we have a conversation about the future of our country in an orderly manner or it is forced […]
Continue ReadingIn September 2018, there was an interesting exchange in Premium Times between Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and his ‘illustrious predecessor’ (as he described him), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar. The issue in contention was restructuring of the country. The latter had taken on the former on his postulation that what Nigeria required was “managing resources properly and […]
Continue ReadingWhen you come to power with a campaign to fight corruption, you cannot afford to be silent when your government is being accused of aiding and abetting impropriety; and certainly not when the accusers are members of your own political party or their agents. It is for that reason that President Muhammadu Buhari may have […]
Continue ReadingThe revelation by the National Law Drug Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) Chairman, Brigadier-General Buba Marwa (rtd) that close to two million Kano residents abuse tramadol, codeine, and other cough syrups, should concern not only state authorities but all stakeholders in the Nigeria project. While the figure may not be as high in other places, it is […]
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