India: Celebrating An Economic Giant At 73

By DAN AMOR

India has been celebrating since penultimate week its 73rd independence anniversary as a democratic nation having been juristically established on August 15, 1947 after several decades of British colonialism. But the great Indian nation did not begin only about seven decades ago. Rather, it is the proud beneficiary of several millennia of great and memorable history, culture and civilization. Indian independence movement began in 1857 spanning 90 years before achieving self rule in 1947. 

As the enterprising people of India celebrate their bold attempt at shaking off the yoke of British imperialism and economic strangulation, yours sincerely is pleased to join millions of people, nations and organizations all over the world to congratulate this wonderful and spicy nation on her march from poverty and despair to a position of preeminence, respect and pride. It would not be an overstatement to say that the transformation of India is not only a challenge to the sub-continent of Asia but has also provided a shining example for most other countries still battling with the vagaries of underdevelopment, militarism, poverty and corruption.

Kidnappers And Ritual Killers In Lagos

By Hope Eghagha 

Kidnapping and ritual killing seem to be on the increase in Lagos and around the country. Another way to express this is that there are more reports of abductions for ritual killings these days than we used to have them. Red Cross says that it has received reports of 10,480 missing persons in Nigeria. Every other week or even day, we read reports about ‘ritualists den’ in Nigeria. Two channels, social media and personal testimonies do a better job reporting the incidents than mainstream media. 

While mainstream outlets can be controlled not to report the incidents (to give a good albeit false image of security) no one can really control reports in social media. The latter presents gory pictures of dismembered bodies. The most recent was that of a 200 level undergraduate at the University of Port Harcourt who butchered a neighbour’s seven year old daughter for ritual, removed parts of her body and attempted to dispose of the body in a garbage heap. Shocking! Horrifying!

An Apple Nigeria Needs To Eat

By Reno Omokri

For the second time in her existence, Apple Inc, the company founded by the two Steves (Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak) has been certified as the world’s most valuable company with a market capitalization of $772 Billion.

As I read the news on various news platform, I was struck by the comparisons of Apple with Nigeria and lessons we as a people could learn from this intellectual behemoth.

The first comparison would be that Apple is a company built on ideas. So for instance, while an American company like Ford is an epitome of the success of the industrial revolution age, Apple on the other hand is the poster boy for the knowledge worker age.
And nothing depicts this as dramatically as the fact that the former most valuable company, ExxonMobil, has a market capitalization that is only half of Apple’s ($382 Billion).

The first lesson for Nigeria then becomes that if our hopes for the growth of our economy is dependent on oil, ExxonMobil, the biggest oil company in the world, is a glaring example that we will continue to play second fiddle to those nations whose hope for the future is based on knowledge. Oil gave birth to ExxonMobil, knowledge gave birth to Apple. Go figure!

And when you look at the math, you would see that the numbers are preaching to Nigeria in a way that words cannot.
For one thing, Apple, today employs 115,000 people who together are paid more than all the approximately 40 million employed people in Nigeria make in a year.

The above should probably put Nigerian Governors on notice that their plan to reduce the minimum wage from ₦18,000 is an intellectually lazy idea that will cost them more than it would cure them.

Secondly, in 2015 Apple has made $215 Billion so far. This figure looks set to increase with the expected sales boost from Christmas. In comparison, Nigeria has made 10% of that amount in the same period.