Edo Sham Poll: UN Must Safeguard Nigeria’s 2027 Presidential Election

 By Olu Fasan

Outrageous! How dare you say the United Nations should help run elections in Nigeria, a sovereign state? That’s how some will react to this intervention. But leaving aside the fact that countries often seek United Nations electoral assistance, what’s truly outrageous and utterly shameful is that Nigeria, so-called “Giant of Africa”, cannot conduct free, fair and credible elections, something less endowed African countries do routinely and successfully.

*INEC Chair, Yakubu and Tinubu

This week, on October 1, Nigeria turned 64 as an independent nation. Sadly, it’s 64 years of sham elections and hollow democracy. As John Campbell and Matthew Page said in their book, Nigeria: What Everyone Needs to Know, “massive election rigging has been characteristic of Nigeria since independence”.

A Thief Is Not A Thief If He Is Powerful

 By Owei Lakemfa

Four female students of the Zamfara State College of Arts and Science, abducted by bandits six months ago, may know their fate this week. Their abductors have given the parents of the young ladies, one week within which to pay N12 million ransom or the victims will be married off. This may be an euphemism for selling the young women into sexual slavery.

What to do about these soulless bandits who maim, rape, murder, loot and visit arson on many states, especially Zamfara, Sokoto, Katsina and Niger, is no straight forward matter.

There are vested interests. For instance, with the new service chiefs vowing to destroy these bandits who in the last eight years have murdered about 65, 000 Nigerians, there are urgent petitions and campaigns that the might of the military should not be used against them.

Why The Health Of Presidential Candidates Matters

 By Dan Onwukwe

Every election has a story. So is every person who offers himself or herself to high public office such as the presidency. It’s not for nothing. The presidency is the hardest job anybody can give his brain. The enormous responsibilities placed on the shoulder of a President are so huge that the occupant of the office should have a sound mind, among other attributes. His health status should not be a matter of conjectures.

That’s why the counsel, ‘if you can’t stand the heat, don’t get close to the kitchen’, is very instructive. It is also because, to paraphrase Gerald R. Ford (38th U.S. President) the ‘presidency is not a prize to be won, but a duty to be done ‘. The office is not an entitlement, but a trust. It means using great power for great purposes for the country and its citizens. 

Is Goodluck Jonathan A Beautiful Bride?

 By Ray Ekpu

The crowd that is chanting Run, Jonathan, Run is a composite contingent made up of greedy and hungry fellows, rented fellows, political flunkeys of the basest type and those who think that Nigeria may be ready for any kind of political tomfoolery at this time.

*Jonathan 

Ordinarily, a man who had risen from the position of a Deputy Governor, Governor, Vice President to the apex of his country’s administration, the presidency, ought to be happy that he had done, without being harmed, a marathon that most Nigerians only dream about.

In that case, he would be expected to play only the role of a statesman who would seek to contribute his ideas to the resolution of his country’s and continent’s existential problems, some of which had haunted his country since the days that he grew up in his village without the adornment of even the cheapest pair of shoes. Now he is in a position to acquire the most expensive pair of designer shoes ever made.

Whither Nigeria?

 By Odia Ofeimun

Each time it was discovered that the ship of state was foundering, without compass, and no one seemed to have a handle on how to navigate with a proper goal-orientation, the question, Whither Nigeria?, has been asked as a way of giving expression to where we are as a country, where we are going or where we should be going. Mostly, the issues have emerged from trying to think beyond the scramble by the various nationalities in the country. In a multi-ethnic society, reality tends to be resolved around levels of perception in the practice of governance.  

                *Odia Ofeimun 

I am interested in how we’ve been fixed by history, and how we’ve always managed to have so many unresolved issues, so embarrassingly many, even now, when the most intense marker of dissension in the Nigerian firmament is the Boko Haram Insurgency in the North-East which has sought many times, unsuccessfully, to declare a Caliphate over parts of the country. Take the other issue around MASSOB (Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra) and the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB). They have raised the Biafran secessionist flag contentiously and ambitiously over what used to be the Eastern Region. Successive Federal Governments have pursued them with punitive measures as if the civil war of 1967-70 did not quite come to an end. Now, look, the clouds are gathering, as fractions of the Yoruba, at home and in the Diaspora, are angling for a secessionist binge of their own, unless, as it is stressed, ethnic nationalities are allowed to become self-governing within the Nigerian Federation.

Why President Buhari And June 12 Can Never Meet

By Jesutega Onokpasa

Apart from his recent June 12 gimmick, President Muhammadu Buhari had hitherto never mentioned MKO Abiola or even June 12 in any positive light. In any case, since Gen Sanni Abacha who stole Abiola’s mandate and whom Buhari happily, thankfully and gratefully worked for remains Buhari’s hero, then that same Buhari cannot deserve any moral credit on account of anything he does about June 12, however laudable.

*President  Buhari 

The bitter truth is that the only viable explanation for his sudden volte face is that Buhari, seeing his Northern hegemony in tatters in the Middle Belt thanks to his rampaging cattle herding kinsmen and clearly perceiving himself to be a drowning man, now finds himself clutching to Abiola (whom he hitherto never showed any regard for) and to June 12 (which he hitherto never expressed any fidelity to) for sheer survival.

Hello, Buhari Is Beatable In 2019

By Sufuyan Ojeifo

In 2015, serial presidential contestant, Muhammadu Buhari, emerged victorious through the instrumentality of enclave politics to which the north adroitly resorted in the face of plans by Goodluck Jonathan to ensconce himself in power for another four years. Had Jonathan succeeded, the north, barring any unforeseen circumstances, would have been out of presidential power for ten unbroken years following the demise of President Umaru Yar’Adua.

*Buhari 

 That cold fact apparently nudged the north to throw everything into the mix of 2015 presidential power politics. Many key northern elements in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) deployed political brinkmanship, dismantled loyalty that characteristically underpins leadership-followership construction, betrayed trust and deceived Jonathan in the utilisation of campaign and election funds in order to ensure the defeat of a sitting president, for the first time, in the annals of Nigeria’s presidential election.

Nigerian Army Must Re-Brand Itself

By Ochereome Nnanna

If the current Nigerian leadership still has any conscience, it must be shocked and sobered by the reaction of the people of the South East over the unfounded “Army vaccine” rumour that took place last week.

It was a conclusive proof that due to the prevailing unsavoury atmosphere foisted by the regime on major national institutions, a section of the Nigerian populace no longer sees the Nigerian Army as their own. They are now feared and despised, rightly or wrongly, such that even when they are involved in noble activities in the interest of the common man, they are suspected.

Following the outbreak of the monkey pox virus epidemic, the story, manufactured from devil knows where, made the rounds in the theatre of Operation Python Dance, that some individuals dressed in army uniform had invaded schools in Imo and Abia States forcibly administering vaccines to spread the monkey pox diseases within the Igbo population. Unfortunately, people believed this story, even though no one had any evidence to that effect.

Nigeria: Re-Structuring Again?

By Oshineye Victor Oshisada  

Lately, the call for the country’s re-structuring is unbridled. The clamour for it rents the air as if without it , the country shall go asunder. The issue is over-dramatised to the point of nausea, and to such degree that every Tom , Dick and Harry is climbing on the bandwagon of the agitation for re-structuring whether or not they understand re-structuring, its processes and implications.

If it is examined critically, it shall be discovered that the agitation for re-structuring is from disgruntled elements; those whose political horizon is bleak and their influence, not to mention affluence, is progressively ebbing. For an example, if a person like Atiku Abubakar, with 954 votes compared with Muhammadu Buhari’s score of 3,430 votes in the 2015 APC primary election, was successful to be the sitting President today, would he be calling for re-structuring? Definitely not. Therefore, the callers for re-structuring are not sincere.

None of the callers for re-structuring except Chief Emeka Anyaoku who once suggested that the country should be collapsed to six geo-political zones has explained what they really want. This is physical re-structure and not power re-structure. In my piece on March 2, 2016, titled “Of Buhari’s Critics, Counsellors”. I opposed this, because I doubted if any of the existing states could be prepared to surrender its hard-earned autonomy. 

In the past 53 years, states were created. In 1960, there were three regions – West, East and North ; in 1963 , Midwest was created ; in 1967 , it increased to 12 states ; 1976 produced 19 states ;1987 witnessed 21 states ; in 1991 , it increased to 30 states ;1996 ,36 states ,with the Federal Capital Territory of Abuja , meaning that seven times , the country was re- structured . Therefore, if someone suggests the collapse of 36 states to six, it is to put back the hand of the clock. The reasons for the creations were to enhance holistic competitions and bring governance to the door of the people. A collapse has the opposite effect of suppressing competition and governance.

Is President Buhari A Sectional Leader?

By Jide Ojo

The composition of the Government of the Federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner as to effect the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity, and also command national loyalty, thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few states or from a few ethnic or other sectional groups in that Government or in any of its agencies”

– Section 14 (3) of 1999 Constitution of Nigeria, as amended.

*President Buhari with new IGP Tukur

Love him or hate him, President Muhammadu Buhari is a man of destiny. The trajectory of his life’s odyssey clearly points to that. Mr. President has held different public offices from his youth to old age. He has been a military governor, petroleum minister, chairman of the Petroleum Trust Fund, Head of State and now an elected President of the most populous country in Africa.

Many will vouch for the President as an honest man hence the appellation of “Mai Gasikiya” which means one who always says the truth in Hausa language. He is seen as an austere man who lives a Spartan life despite having held many privileged positions. However, many others have also alleged that the President is a religious bigot and a provincial leader. In trying to puncture the accusation of bigotry, for the four times he ran for presidential office, he always chose a Christian running mate and twice even chose clerics – Pastor Tunde Bakare in 2011 and Pastor Yemi Osinbajo in 2015. However, The President has yet to fully dismiss the allegations that he is a provincial leader.

On his assumption of office, all the major appointments President Buhari made were from the north with the exception of, perhaps, his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, and the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Dr Ibe Kachikwu. At the time Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu was touted as being likely to be made the Secretary to the Federal Government, the President decided to pick Babachir David Lawal from Adamawa State. The President’s Chief of Staff is also from the North. Now, news making the rounds shows that a chunk of the national security and defence sector is dominated not only by people of northern extraction but also Muslims. Let’s take a count: The National Security Adviser; Chief of Army Staff; Chief of Air Staff; Comptroller General of Customs; Comptroller General of Immigration; Comptroller General of Prisons; the Director General of the Department of State Services; the Commandant-General of the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps, and now the Acting Inspector General of Police appointed last week.