Why Tinubu’s Policy Adventures Will Fail

 By Charles Onunaiju

President Bola Tinubu and his administration bask in the euphoria that they have taken some “tough” and “courageous” measures that would deliver prosperity to Nigerians in the future. The coordinating minister of the economy, Mr Wale Edun, recently stated that despite public uproar at the harshness of the measures and their devastating impact on the lives of Nigerians, along with the more frightening dimension of security meltdown, the administration has been receiving accolades at several international forums, including the World Bank, IMF, and the G20 meetings.

*Tinubu

However, it is not because the measures are tough, courageous, and may have attracted accolades from outside that they may fail to produce any result close to prosperity, but because they are extraneous and largely disconnected from the existential reality of the current condition of the country. The choice of the word “measures” to denote government response is deliberate, even as it is widely called policy.

Nigeria And The Politics Of Hunger

 By Sunny Awhefeada 

My generation's first experience of hunger and its attendant crises was in the mid-1980s. My genera­tion here refers to Nigerians born after the civil war and attained teenagehood from 1983 onwards. We have read in history books of how starvation was one of the major tools that was deployed to fight the Nigerian civil war of 1967-1970.

Pictures abound of chil­dren, youths and older people who suffered from the affliction of hunger. Not even the efforts of humanitarian agencies that tried to alleviate the hunger in the refugee camps that littered the secessionist enclave of Biafra alleviated the crisis. Hunger engendered dis­eases which in turn yielded deaths. Many still believe that starvation more than bullets and bombs was what made Biafra to capitulate when it did.

The Many Contradictions Of Muhammadu Buhari

By Reno Omokri

President Muhammadu Buhari has blamed everybody but himself for his problems and now that he has gotten to the end of his tenure, he has run out of human beings to blame, so he has now been reduced to blaming inanimate objects.

*Buhari 

I mean, on Christmas Day he told the visiting Federal Capital Territory Christian community that his anti-corruption war had not really taken off because the Nigerian system was slow. Well, he does have a point, because if the Nigerian system had been working, Muhammadu Buhari would have faced a firing squad for overthrowing the democratically elected civilian administration of President Shehu Shagari on New Year’s eve of 1983.

Buhari And The Petroleum Trust FRAUD

By Ray Ekpu

It is not known to this column how close Brigadier Sani Abacha was to Major General Muhammadu Buhari by December 1983. It was Abacha who announced at the end of a few minutes of martial music on New Year ’s Eve that the government of President Shehu Shagari had been thrown into the dust bin of history. Buhari became the fulcrum of that history as Nigeria’s head of state. On August 27, 1985, there was another game, the Revolving Doors’ game. Buhari was out, thrown out, while Ibrahim Babangida, was in, thrown into the pinnacle of political power in Nigeria.

Babangida clamped Buhari into the dungeon for some months where he cooled his feet, while his colleagues were bestriding the Nigerian political and military firmament like they owned the world. Babangida left or was forced to leave the throne after eight years of dangerous foot work. He called Chief Ernest Shonekan, a successful private sector entrepreneur, to come and take the baton of leadership.

The 1985 Coup In Nigeria

By Ray Ekpu

The August 1985 coup in Nigeria was regarded as a palace coup, a smooth changing of the guards. I have no idea if anyone died in the operation but the event itself has refused to die, thanks to President Muhammadu Buhari. The victim of that coup, Buhari, has reminded us from time to time that he was unfairly removed as the head of state and kept in detention for three years by the Ibrahim Babangida boys. Let us roll back the tape a little bit. On December 31, 1983 as Nigerians were at various prayer venues asking God to make 1984 a better year than 1983, they had no idea that Buhari and his co-conspirators were on the verge of removing a legitimately elected civilian government headed by President Shehu Shagari.

*President Buhari

Many Nigerians may have been amazed at the scale of rigging in the October 1983 Presidential elections but may not have expected a return of the military to the presidential podium after 13 years of brutal military dictatorship. Nigerians woke up on January 1 not knowing whether to say to each other a ‘Happy New Year’ or a ‘Happy New Government’ since they were uncertain what was in the belly of the coup. One year and eight months later, Buhari was overthrown by the same Babangida Boys who put him on the throne. Babangida now took over the presidential chair and kept Buhari in detention for about three years. Apparently, Buhari has not been able to bring himself to forgive or forget since then.