Cry Not For Northern Nigeria!

 By Yakubu Mohammed

Apparently, the North deserves pity. But is it worth crying for?  Whichever angle you want to look at it, and through whichever prism you want to look at the Hobbesian state of its conditions today, the inevitable conclusion is that the North has nobody to blame but itself.

In its heydays, with good leadership that was imbued with sound vision, the North was united and monolithic in more senses than one. And relatively, it was more economically viable, self-confident, arrogant even.

But today, it is at war with itself, thanks to rabid ethnicity and religious bigotry with a system that wallows more in mediocrity than merit. Home to soulless insecurity with Boko Haram and other assorted criminals, armed bandits, kidnappers, cattle rustlers and herdsmen, both local and foreign, unhinged, the once united and peaceful North has turned into a hot bed of grotesque abnormality.

Nigeria: The Problem With Gov El-Rufai’s Gonin Gora Demolition Threat

By Moses Ochonu

The problem with El-Rufai is not that he is a bad Governor. The problem, rather, is that he tries so hard to be seen as a good governor, so hard that he ends up undermining his own good works, causing unnecessary controversy, and exposing his bigotry and lack of executive governing temperament. He is a much better technocrat than he is a wielder of executive authority.

*President Buhari and Gov El-Rufai 

He threatened to demolish an entire community, Gonin Gora, in the middle of an ethno-religious crisis. It is a terrible idea to threaten or to actually demolish an entire community whatever crimes some members of that community may have committed. For one, it amounts to collective punishment, a primitive punitive action incompatible with modern, enlightened notions of justice, correction, and recompense. Second, it is a rather lazy, knee-jerk, thoughtless, and ultimately counterproductive response.

Atiku Will Make A Far Better President Than Buhari, Any Day, Any Time!

By Femi Aribisala

One of the biggest mistakes this country ever made was to allow APC to come into power in Nigeria. It must be sent packing in 2019...

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) dodged a bullet; a bomb even with the conduct of its presidential primaries a few days ago. This was conducted in a calm, serene and collected manner. There were no riots. No bombs went off to mark the process as “do or die.” Nobody got killed, maimed or injured. The party did not find it necessary to insult the intelligence of Nigerians by boasting that it now has millions upon millions of fictitious members. Everything was as smooth as silk.

*Atiku and Buhari 

The same could not be said of the All Progressives Congress (APC). There is one word that comes to mind describing APC politics today: “shambolic.” APC primaries are characterised by violence, tear gas and acrimony. At the presidential level, the party virtually prevented other aspirants from competing against Buhari. It then showed its contempt for Nigerians by claiming the president, as a sole candidate, obtained a bogus 14.8 million votes.

Before Supreme Court Finally Kills PDP

By Steve Nwosu

The dizzying pace at which mundane things are elevated to national prominence has since made me lose sense of what is right and what is wrong. So, to keep my sanity, I’ve since concluded that every one is right. All correct, sir!

If you say the economy is in recession, you’re correct. If you prefer to live in denial and insist that there is no recession, you’re also correct. Hameed Ali versus the Senators? Magu versus the Senators? Hospitalised El-Rufai versus convalescing Buhari? All correct!

But there is one thing I have a fairly clear head about. And that is what is the mess the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has brought upon itself.

Now, if there is anything the PDP is very good at – apart from impunity, it is the uncanny ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory (apologies: Chinua Achebe). Of course, I don’t expect the All Progressives Congress (APC) people to gloat at that, because everything that was wrong with PDP is beginning to appear in APC.

However, the PDP is a master of the art of self-destruct!
When it was in government, it was fighting itself, providing opposition to its own government. And now that it is out of power, it has contrived to produce a most fractious split right down its middle. And even as the simple solution to its problem stares it in the face, it’s looking with eyes wide shut.

It is fixated at a Supreme Court that does not hold any promise of good news.

Yes, soon after the Appeal Court verdict that upheld Sen. Ali Modu Sheriff’s claim to the party’s chairmanship, the Sen. Ahmed Makarfi faction appealed the judgment, and is now expecting a favourable ruling from the apex court.

But, irrespective of whatever direction the pendulum swings at the apex court, the PDP would still be the loser. But we’ll return to that later.

Modu Sheriff: The 'Chairman' At Bay

By Dan Amor

You must be aware of the current travails of Senator Ali Modu Sheriff, the former governor of Borno State and immediate past Acting Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), whose lot we no longer envy. At first, this politician was seen by a section of the PDP Governors Forum as a messiah who would help recoup the glory of the party having lost out in the intricate power calculus that was the 2015 general election. Indeed, he had a cult following in these matters.

*Sheriff 

The followership comprised awed admirers of this controversial politician as well as those decidedly unfamiliar with the man but adored him for his proven intrepidity, his loquaciousness and his heroic willingness to speak truth to power no matter whose ox was gored. Everybody knows how Sheriff, a master in the art of political defection or what one humourist called “jum- pology” (the art of jumping from one political party to another) emerged as chairman of the party. Despite the disdain with which many party faithful held him, some thought that, given his enormous financial energy and his ethnic affiliation, he would help stabilize the party within an interim period of three months during which his committee would superintend a national convention.

That was not to be! Due to his legendary loudness and implacable capacity to advertise his ego coupled with his incredible personal ambition and intellectual as- sumptions, party stakeholders especially the Board of Trustees members, former governors, National Assembly caucuses, state chapters and youth councils started suspecting his subterranean moves as he was incapable of uniting the diverse forces to- wards one direction. The fear was that Sheriff had planned to maintain a vice grip of the party till 2018 and then turn himself to a phony presidential candidate. This resulted in the stern opposition Sheriff encountered by party members who did all they could to redeem their party’s image by invoking its constitution to organ- ize a fresh national convention in Port Harcourt, the Rivers state capital last May at the expiration of Sheriff ’s interim tenure.

The convention attracted all the notable members of the party including Sheriff who agreed to the convocation of the convention in tandem with the party’s constitution. He was to bolt out of the convention venue when he sensed that all his permutations would not hold water. As a party determined to redeem its battered image and forge a united front towards providing alternative platform for Nigerians to effect lasting changes in all ramifications, there was an amazing bout of consensus.

The outcome was the emergence of Senators Ahmed Makarfi and Ben Obi as Chairman and secretary, respectively, of a new Caretaker Committee that would pilot the affairs of the party and conduct another convention after ninety day. Having lost his interim National Working Committee chairman- ship, Sheriff returned to the drawing board to plot some divisive means of throwing spanners into the works of the party. Whereas the Makarfi-led Caretaker Committee’s effort at reaching out to stakeholders is gathering momentum, Sheriff emerged from his co- coon, broke into the party’s national headquarters and declared himself the national chairman. Even erstwhile protégés and fanatical admirers of this Borno-born politician began to shudder. Outraged, the massed punditry of the vibrant and ever-crusading Nigerian press came out in full cry. A spectacle, this: the “Chairman” at bay! And since the new caretaker committee chairman, Makarfi and his secretary, Ben Obi have the sympathy of the Press, having been accorded full mandate by all stakeholders in the party according to its constitution, the world now knows that Sheriff is a spoiler. On Wednesday June 15, all the papers in the country circulated Makarfi’s revelation that Sheriff is a pimp who has made himself a willing tool in the hands of the ruling All Progressives Congress to destabilize the PDP.