Ethnic Profiling In An Imperiled Republic

 By Hope O’Rukevbe Eghagha

Nigeria is currently plagued by a myriad of debilitating problems – insecurity, hunger and poverty, rights of minorities, economic mismanagement and exploitation, corruption, myopic leadership, and a weak governance structure. Some of these directly threaten the corporate existence of Nigeria.

There are too many unsettled issues about the conditions for mutual coexistence of the different ethnic groups in the country. There is a perception that the basis for national unity has not been negotiated and accepted. A master-servant relationship between a parasitic majority and the minorities is troubling the new generation of Nigerians.

Still In Bewilderment, Gazing At Yakubu

 By Amanze Obi  

There is no beating about the bush here. The cold, hard fact is that Nigerians have just received the deepest cut. They have been stabbed in the neck by someone who promised them life. They have been hit below the belt by a man they thought was harmless. Now, the people are writhing in pains. The country is convulsing in its death throes. 

*Yakubu 

We trace all this to the grand betrayal by Mahmood Yakubu, the infamous chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). Yakubu, in life and death, will go down in history as the master dissembler who took his country through the mine field of treachery and deceit. The people believed him till the last hour. They only woke up overnight to discover to their chagrin that he has given them the worst election in the annals of history. The most ironical is that Yakubu’s trenchant assault on the country’s democracy took place at a time the people were expecting to have the freest, fairest and most transparent election in their country’s history. 

70 And Smiling: Hard Facts About Life

 By Ayo Baje

 “Always remember that you are absolutely unique. Just like everyone else.” – Margaret Mead 

What is this life all about, anyway? Why are we here in this world, for God’s sake? What lasting lessons does our all-wise, all-knowing, all-powerful, all –gracious and all-merciful creator want us to glean from the hustle and bustle, the grate and grind of our everyday encounters? What lasting lessons are we here to learn from the hands of history-for individuals, communities and countries? Let us begin with the common ones. 

*Baje

Why, for instance, is there so much hatred, so much anger, crises, agitations, anxieties, selfishness, greed, graft, power-poaching and thorny matters all leading into wasteful wars, which are supposed to be clearly avoidable? But that is not all. 

133m ‘Multidimensionally’ Poor: Buhari’s ‘Gift’ To Nigeria In 2022

 By Olu Fasan

President Muhammadu Buhari has a victim mentality. He takes absolutely no responsibility for anything that goes wrong under his watch. Instead, he treats legitimate and fair criticisms of his leadership failure as harassment.

*Buhari 

More likely, he’ll see this piece on the shocking levels of multidimensional poverty in Nigeria, fostered under his government, as harassment. To mimic Shakespeare: He does protest too much, methinks!  Last week, in a documentary shown at a private event to mark his 80th birthday, President Buhari was asked whether he would miss anything about the presidency.

Peter Obi And Wise Men From The East

By Ozah Matthew

The biblical tales of the wise men project moral lessons to believers especially the three who visited Jesus Christ at birth. Nowadays, it is difficult to find wise men from the four corners of the globe with good intentions. Therefore, in many ways, the Eastern leaders’ comment the other day on Peter Obi’s choice as Vice President to Abubakar Atiku in the next year’s elections is to say the least, shocking and undeserving of real and genuine leaders. 

*Peter Obi at the 2016 Democratic National
Convention (DNC) in Philadelphia

Their improper act has once again, exposed some ugly nature of politics from that region. Indeed, politics of self interest seems to be very important to Igbo leaders whose ‘sophisticated’ thought now brings conflicting views into the Atiku’s running mate choice.

Dele Giwa: Lingering Echoes Of A Murder

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

“Now, I think no riches can compare with being alive…”

–      Achilles, Homer’s Iliad.

“One life taken in cold blood is as gruesome as millions lost in a pogrom.” – Dele Giwa

*Dele Giwa 

Death is one appointment which every being must keep. And as we know, appointments can either be brought forward or moved to a later date or cancelled altogether. In the matter of life and death, any changes in appointment schedules should be the exclusive prerogative of the Creator. No man, therefore, has any right to arrogate to himself the role of bringing forward any other person’s appointment with death. In fact, it is abominable to even use one’s hands to hasten one’s own appointment with death. Laws of God and man hold such actions highly condemnable. So, suicide bombers and their sponsors, supporters and cheer-leaders should, therefore, get it into their heads that they have no mandate whatsoever from the Creator of man to either take their own lives or that of another, no matter the beliefs that fire their unholy zeal and action.

Death, however, is unavoidable, though loathsome. There is hardly anyone that wishes to die. Not even the most valiant of men would embrace death so willingly. Even those people who had been compelled by very harsh, unbearable circumstances to wish for death have had to shudder, cringe and shrink back when the icy hands of death sought to grip their throats. Deep down the heart of every man and every woman, and beyond the facade of all apparent fearlessness and bravery, lie this cold loathing and resentment for death. The survival instinct is there and also the desire to avoid danger and death, and the longing to postpone one’s date with death, temporarily at least, if not forever, hence the struggle and fight at many a deathbeds.