The Game of Thrones at First Bank Nigeria

 By Ijeoma Nwogwugwu

Billionaire businessman, Femi Otedola, must be excreting bricks. In recent weeks, the often-ebullient businessman has told anyone who cares to listen that he is about to emerge Chairman of FBN Holdings Plc (FBN Holdco) – one of Africa’s largest diversified financial services groups and parent of First Bank of Nigeria Limited, the country’s oldest lender. Otedola, from all indications, was recently nominated a Non-executive Director of FBN Holdco, subject to the approval of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), as is always the case with all financial institutions regulated by the banking system regulator.

His hope was that after his nomination is approved by the CBN, at the next annual general meeting of FBN Holdco slated for August 15, 2023, other shareholders/directors of the group will elect him chairman. It remains uncertain how Otedola intends to be elected chairman, given that the current holdco chairman, Adamu Abdullahi, is an appointee of the central bank, albeit on an interim basis. 

Nigeria Cannot Defeat The Igbo And Yoruba At The Same Time!

 By Akinyemi Onigbinde 

The greatest thing Nigerians accomplished in the last thirty years was electing Muhammadu Buhari as president. If he had lived and died without being president, no one would push back when politicians fall over themselves to deliver tributes and call him the greatest president that Nigeria never had.

  *Pa Adebanjo 

After six years of Buhari’s administration and with only two more years to go, all is settled about the rhymes and stanzas of Buhari’s elegy. Some thirty years from now, people will stone anyone who attaches “greatest ” to any tribute at Buhari’s funeral.  

You may ask if anything is worth the cost of having Buhari as president?  

Before you do, there is another reason why his election was the greatest accomplishment of the Nigerian electorate in the last 30 years. If Buhari had not been president, if his incompetence had not been exposed to the uninitiated, Nigeria would have continued its zigzag path. The one-step-forward, two-steps-backwards trajectory would have continued unabated.