Toxic Dust On Orlu-Owerri Road

 By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

Recently, I visited Imo State and was on the Orlu-Owerri road. It is heartwarming that the road is being rehabilitated because in August when I used it on my way to a wedding, it was in such a dilapidated state.  

But, sadly, the insensitivity of the firm handling the reconstruction work is turning what is otherwise a laudable project into a traumatic experience for the people. The dust that envelopes that road all day is so thick that even though most vehicles switch on their headlights on bright afternoons, it is still very difficult for drivers to see oncoming vehicles just a few meters away.

*Gov Uzodinma flags off the reconstruction of Orlu-Owerri Road

And because of this thick cloud of dust, the motorists practically “drive blind”. One wonders what it is usually like driving at night when the dust and darkness merge to compound the situation. I shudder to imagine the implications of this.  

But this is not even the really scary part of the story.

Slavery In Mauritania And The Shame Of A Continent

 By Osmund Agbo

In November 2017, the world watched in utter disbelief, some cringed-worthy footage aired by CNN where dozens of men in detention facilities were being auctioned off for as little as $400 each in Libya. If you think that was a fluke, the crew was also told of the existence of similar auctions taking place at nine other locations in the country.

The victims? People that look like me that belong in the melanin-rich subset of Africans. The traffickers were our brothers, a shade or two lighter from the north. But that’s just a tip of the proverbial iceberg. Slavery is alive and thriving in Africa by Africans.

What if I tell you that the last country in the whole wide world to outlaw slavery is a country in the continent of Africa. Yes, that is Mauritania, in 1981. To put it in perspective, that was some 116 years after the US Congress ratified the 13th amendment which stated that “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States.”

Soludo And The Challenge Of Managing Expectations

 By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

“She said he made love to her like an intellectual. In the political jargon of those days, the word ‘intellectual’ was an insult. It indicated someone who did not understand life and was cut off from the people.” – Milan Kundera, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, p. 6 (1978)

*Soludo

Months before assuming office, Governor-Elect of Anambra State, Chukwuma Charles Soludo, has done a world of service to perceptions of south-east Nigeria and traditional ideas of politics in the region.

Regenerative Agenda For The Youth

 By Banji Ojewale

"We must never underestimate the potential of our youths. Throughout history, God has called youths to rise up and change their world through the power of the gospel"

—William Folorunso Kumuyi, General Superintendent of Deeper Christian Life Ministry.

After a timidly truculent tea-cup turmoil triggered to truncate the recent Lagos IMPACT 2022 crusade of Pastor W. F. Kumuyi, leader of Deeper Life Bible Church, the event finally held to unexpected success and wild multimedia acclaim and coverage. The programme was planned to spiritually and psychologically reorient the youngsters of our age for a positive influence on society. 

But on account of those Kumuyi invited as ministering guests, the cleric and his church were pummeled, pilloried and pulled down. Those who launched the war argued that by summoning these personalities, the octogenarian man of God was enfeebling the brand the whole world has come to know for its legendary holiness stand.

A Toast To Willie

 By Chuks Iloegbunam

 Chuks Iloegbunam contends that Chief Obiano has acquitted himself creditably as Governor of Anambra State... 

 

Governor Willie Obiano’s direction of Anambra’s affairs will end on March 17, 2022. But his imprint on the state for eight straight years will endure. Not only endure, but also assume legendary proportions with the passage of time. Historians will wax lyrical on his double tenure and ascribe to him the quotable, poetic words Julius Caesar uttered in celebration of one of his famous war victories: “Veni, vidi, vici.” Willie Obiano came. He saw. He conquered.  

                 *Chief Willie Obiano

The man’s story is the stuff of epic fiction. Born on August 8, 1955 to a catechist father (Philip Obiano), and a fish-seller mother, Christiana Obiano (Mama Willie), he took to banking after earning an honours degree in Accountancy in 1979, and a Masters in Business Administration from the University of Lagos. His banking career started at First Bank Plc in 1981. Leaving the bank, he joined Chevron Oil Nigeria Plc as an accountant and rose to become its Chief Internal Auditor. He returned to banking as the Deputy Manager in charge of the Audit Unit of Fidelity Bank in 1991. He rose to become an Executive Director of the bank before he retired, relocating to Houston, Texas, and determined to thoroughly enjoy his well-earned retirement. 

Nigeria: The Dilemma Of The North

 By Sola Ebiseni

In spite of the undeniable clear identity of the Middle Belt and its incomparable gargantuan geographical space, those who still fantasise the old monolithic North would not budge. They keep wallowing in the preservation of the North and would not agree that the empire the British helped them create have long served its useful purpose.

The empire is in a constant state of flux either from the exigencies of statecraft which ensure its fragmentation in state creation or the unchecked influx of tribes of all nations in common brotherhood bound either by religion or cultural occupation which puts the earth and its fullness at the unpartitioned disposal of all. In that situation, it requires no research into history to acquire citizenship.

How Oil-Dependence Truncated Nigeria’s Development

 By Banji Oyelaran-Oyeyinka

It is the devil’s excrement. We are drowning in the devil’s excrement. —Juan Pablo Pérez Alfonso, Founder OPEC.

All in all, I wish we had discovered water. —Sheik Ahmed Yamani, Oil minister, Saudi Arabia

Ordinarily, finding a “treasure” tends to bring joy to the one who found it. Oil discovery has become Nigeria’s developmental Achilles’ Heel: in popular parlance, a Resource Curse. Six decades after independence, Nigeria remains one of the poorest countries in the world. It has evolved into one of the least economically diversified country in the world because of a pathological dependence on oil export earnings. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the dangers of such dependence in ways never experienced in the past. The yoke of Nigeria’s colonial past of being a supplier of raw materials rather than a processor of commodities resulted in a country of a net exporter of crude petroleum and importer of products mired in perennial debate about “fuel subsidy.”