Soludo’s Solemn Submission

 By Chuks Iloegbunam

The Governor’s promise to Ndi Anambra came in the 14^th of his 50-paragraph inaugural address of March 17, 2022: “I feel your pulse,” he intoned. “For your sake I keep awake at night, sometimes having palpitations about not letting you down. Well, since God is the Miracle Worker, I will look up to Him in prayer and faith as we all start the work ahead of us. I see and feel all the humungous challenges… But here’s my promise: I will give it my all. I will work very hard every day, with you, to make Anambra proud. Every kobo of your tax money will be deployed to provide you maximum value.”

*Prof Soludo being sworn in as Governor of Anambra State in Awka on March 17, 2022 (pix: Vanguard)

A cynical listener, whether via the electronic/social media or physically present at the Government House concourse in Awka, would have been forgiven for responding thus: “There’s nothing new in the sight of a bow and arrow carrying Hausa man.” That’s an Igbo way of saying that Nigeria’s politics is like a raft tossed about in an ocean of flowery promises. 

Nigeria’s Decaying Universities: Blame Govt, Not ASUU!

 By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

I have always had this lingering suspicion that apart from representing the deep-seated contempt that has come to define government’s attitude to the   welfare of public sector workers, its shoddy, often, disdainful, treatment of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and its demands for improved working conditions might have been carefully conceived as a long term project to continue provoking ASUU to embark on industrial actions until it fatally hurts its case before Nigerians.

The expectation, it would seem, is that as students continue to spend several months at home due to prolonged strikes, which might sometimes lengthen the duration of their academic programmes, parents and other stakeholders who bear the brunt of these constant disruptions will gradually review their sympathy for the teachers and begin to confront them as the problem instead of the government whose continuous reneging on agreements it freely entered into with ASUU created the mess in the first place.

Nigeria: The Ritual Murder Of Bamise Ayanwale

 By Hope O’Rukevbe Eghagha

As the world marked International Women’s Day last week, news of a missing 22-year-old Ms. Bamise Ayanwale swept through social media, with a video of another woman Caroline Oni wailing frantically in front and around a BRT bus belonging to the Lagos State government. This wailing brought a personal dimension to Bamise’s plight and further deepened the tragic image of loss, frustration, and desperation. 

*Late Bamise 

Caroline Oni, Bamise’s madam and adopted mother wailed loudly that her ward had boarded Bus 240257 that fateful night from Chevron Bus stop in Lekki heading for Oshodi and alerted the family that she was in danger. Apparently, she was right. She could not be reached on phone shortly after. A week later, her body was found in a morgue having been deposited there by the Police. The Police reported that her body had been found on Carter Bridge a week after her disappearance. It beats the imagination for a 21st Century man to believe that the harvested body parts of a human being can fetch them wealth and power!

All Votes Belong To Political Parties In Nigeria

By Femi Falana

On Tuesday, March 8, 2022, The Federal High Court (coram Inyang Ekwo J.) sacked the Ebonyi State Governor, David Umahi, his deputy, Kelechi Igwe, along with 15 lawmakers in the state over their defection from the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC).

In sacking the governor and his deputy, the learned trial judge ruled that the votes polled by a political party could not be transferred to or utilised for the benefit of another political party or member of another political party. In acknowledging that the Constitution was silent on the implication of the defection of a governor or his deputy, the learned trial judge said that “such a lacuna was not to be celebrated or even mischievously flaunted as failure of a remedy for situations of such nature.”

Before the decision was handed down last week, the High Court of Ebonyi State had dismissed the suit filed by the APC and its flag bearers, Senator Soni Ogbuji, Justin Ogbodo in the 2919 governorship election who had prayed the Court to declare them the winners of the election since the PDP candidate had abandoned the mandate of the people by joining the APC. It was the view of the presiding Judge, Henry Njoku J.  that his jurisdiction to entertain the matter had been ousted by section 308 of the Constitution, which has conferred immunity on Governor Umahi and his deputy. 

The Invasion O f Ukraine Was Inevitable:

Understanding Russian Concerns And The Folly Of Western Diplomacy

By Arthur G.O Mutambara 

*Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, French President Emmanuel Macron and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Paris

Developing the future of knowledge involves understanding the ‘relationship between what we know and what will happen, for the purpose of improving both, for everyone’.  

This endeavour demands a questioning and contrarian mindset that challenges conventional wisdom. It requires a festival of ideas that cherishes the diversity of views, becoming a crucible for new knowledge and thought leadership. 

Gov Umahi: Impunity Of The Highest Order, Executive Rascality Taken Too Far –NBA

*Gov Umahi 

Statement Of The President Of The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) On The Situation In Ebonyi State 

The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) has noted with utter dismay, the unfortunate and totally unacceptable reaction of His Excellency, Dave Umahi to the Judgment of the Federal High Court, Abuja delivered on 8th March 2022, coram Honourable Justice Inyang Ekwo which inter-alia ordered him and H.E. Mr. Eric Kelechi Igwe to vacate the offices of Governor and Deputy Governor, respectively, of Ebonyi State on grounds of their defection from the Peoples’ Democratic Party to the All Progressives Congress. 

Henry Kissinger On Ukraine: How The Crisis Ends

 By Henry Kissinger  

(PUBLIC discussion on Ukraine is all about confrontation. But do we know where we are going?)  

In my life, I have seen four wars begun with great enthusiasm and public support, all of which we did not know how to end and from three of which we withdrew unilaterally. The test of policy is how it ends, not how it begins. 

*Dr Kissinger and Donald Trump

Far too often the Ukrainian issue is posed as a showdown: whether Ukraine joins the East or the West. But if Ukraine is to survive and thrive, it must not be either side’s outpost against the other – it should function as a bridge between them. 

Russia must accept that to try to force Ukraine into a satellite status, and thereby move Russia’s borders again, would doom Moscow to repeat its history of self-fulfilling cycles of reciprocal pressures with Europe and the United States.

Tribute To Donatus Duru: Late Editorial Board Chairman, Independent Newspapers

 
*Donatus Duru, late Chairman, Editorial Board, Independent Newspapers 

By Ade Ogidan 

It has been most difficult for me to script this mournful message in respect of my darling friend, colleague and confidant, Donatus Duru, who passed on exactly eight days ago, at the General Hospital, Gbagada, Lagos. 

The difficulty has to do with my poor mental disposition in accepting that Duru, the Chairman of Editorial Board, Independent Newspapers Limited (INL), will now be referred to in the past tense. 

When I assumed duties in 2016 as Managing Director and Editor-In-Chief of the media house, I knew very well that the task of repositioning the company would be highly challenging. I had earlier held fort as General Manager, Commercial; and Managing Editor. 

But Duru, in his characteristic candour and valour, came in as a reliable ally in charting the path for the newspapers' sustainable redemption. 

Air Peace, Emir of Kano Tango: Sense Of Entitlement Taken Too Far

 

By Ikechukwu Amaechi

Pondering over the Emir of Kano, Air Peace tango this week, I couldn’t help but remember the wisecrack by Sarah Churchwell, the 51-year-old professor of American Literature, who wrote: “People who are given whatever they want soon develop a sense of entitlement and rapidly lose their sense of proportion.”

That is exactly what is happening in this contrived hullabaloo.

For those not aware, the story is that the Emir of Kano, Aminu Ado Bayero, who was returning from Banjul, Gambia, missed his early morning flight from Lagos to Kano.

Nigeria, A Country With Too Many Sovereigns

 By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

Colonial rule in Nigeria was conducted through Indirect Rule. It was a system of “native administration” patented in Northern Nigeria, which became the model exported by the British across their colonies. For all practical purposes, this system of government gave to most Emirs and other rulers in Chiefly communities, “more power than they had in pre-colonial days.” 

*Allen Onyema 

The result was the establishment of “native states” at the top of which sat these local potentates, many of whom enjoyed powers of life and death over their kinsfolk. The end of colonial rule did not much change this as they reached working accommodation with the post-colonial elite for self-preservation. Powered by twin failures of both leadership and nation building, the result in Nigeria, where it all began, is one country with a multiplicity of sovereigns.

The on-going dispute between the Emir of Kano, Alhaji Aminu Ado Bayero, and Air Peace, a private airline in Nigeria, dramatises this. The claim on behalf of the Emir is that he flew Air Peace from Banjul, The Gambia to Nigeria, on February 24, landing in Lagos about 05:45 hours. He was at the head of a ten-person traveling party who had a connecting flight to catch to his home in Kano, north-west Nigeria scheduled for 06:15 hours the same morning, a mere 30 minutes after they landed. Five out of the ten members of the Emir’s traveling party were business class passengers.

Donald Burness, Writer And Scholar, Dies At 80

Donald “Don” Burness, a 52-year resident of Rindge and a global citizen who inspired students and fellow travelers with his teaching, writing and love of art and literature the world over, died Feb. 23, 2022, from abdominal cancer. He was 80 years old.

Nigeria: Emerging Ray Of Hope In Igboland

 By Jude Asike

One possible approach to look at the incoming government of Chukwuma Soludo in Anambra State is to look at it as an account of the change of many things in Igboland, Nigeria. This is invariably to say that with the emergence of Soludo as the next Governor of Anambra State on March 17, 2022, things will positively change for the better in Igboland.

*Soludo

The failure of leadership, lack of genuine goal and vision for Igbo persons in Nigeria will be corrected through a proper understanding of good governance and development initiatives in Anambra State. Anambra is always gifted in producing great leaders of thought, and Soludo is here to move the people of Anambra to the next level.

What, Exactly, Does Nigeria Want From Ndigbo?

 By Ikechukwu Amaechi

The usual refrain on the lips of Nigerian leaders, particularly those who successfully prosecuted the brutal civil war against the breakaway Biafran Republic is the indivisibility of the country.

One of them, General Ibrahim Babangida, in an interview with Arise Television on August 7, 2021 to mark his 80th birthday anniversary, put it rather bluntly: “When we were in the military, we talked about certain issues concerning Nigeria: the unity of Nigeria as far as we were concerned was a settled issue.”

Understanding Nnamdi Kanu’s Trial

 By Adebayo Raphael

Since Nnamdi Kanu’s abduction in 2021 by Nigeria’s transnational Gestapo, the consequential rage of members of the Indigenous People of Biafra has been, to a considerable extent, not up to scratch. Instead, there seems to be a diminishing rage, IPOB itself on the brink of becoming another fossilised group in the graveyard of reactionary opposition.

My suspicion is: It is either the IPOB has not fully understood the gravity of its historical position in the struggle against feudal fanaticism in Nigeria, or the group is beginning to suffer an entropic decline due to the sudden, perhaps unexpected, abduction, detention and phoney trial of its supreme commander, Nnamdi Kanu.

Who Will Save Nigeria From This Impending Implosion?

 By Lillian Okenwa

Well-known for his intellectual and legal sagacity, Hon. Justice Chukwudifu Oputa is a man greatly admired. His sense of style was impeccable but near bohemian sometimes. I still remember nearly half of his face covered by a huge pair of dark designer sunglasses he wore on the day we went to locus in quo (Latin, for a place where the cause of action arose) at Zango Kataf in the Southern part of Kaduna State during the famous Oputa panel in 2001.

It’s unlikely you’ve seen anything like those sunglasses. I also remember how peeved he was with my cameraman in 2005 when we went to interview him in Lagos for a video documentary I produced for the Supreme Court Nigeria. After introducing my team and exchanging pleasantries, he took a look at Leke’s skin cut and said he doesn’t understand what is wrong with young men these days. He told us how young men in his days took time to groom their hair, and truly although His lordship was already balding, his well-groomed hair stood out.

Retooling Igbo Language In Era Of Digital Pedagogy

 By Chris Uchenna Agbedo

Today, the 21st day of February 2022, the United Nations through its organ, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) marks the International Mother Language Day (IMLD) originally proclaimed by the General Conference of UNESCO in November 1999, a special day which the UN General Assembly ratified in its Resolution of 2002. 

Following that landmark proclamation, the United Nations General Assembly, had in its resolution A/RES/61/266 of 16 May 2007, enjoined Member States “to promote the preservation and protection of all languages used by peoples of the world”. The UN General Assembly, by the same resolution proclaimed the following year, 2008 as the International Year of Languages, to “promote unity in diversity and international understanding, through multilingualism and multiculturalism,” thus designating UNESCO as the lead agency for the Year.

Biafra, Or An Oasis Of Prosperity?

 By Obi Nwakanma

 Let me be on the record, and say that I align myself ideologically with those who seek the right to self-determination as a fundamental human right. This right is enshrined in the charter of the United Nations of which Nigeria is a signatory.

*Odumegwu-Ojukwu taking the oath of office as Head of State of Biafra

These facts are so clear that it begs the question, why is the Nigerian government persecuting, and criminally violating the rights of those like Nnamdi Kanu who has devoted his life to the pursuit of what he sees as his right to be free of the Nigerian enterprise? The answer is: the word, “Biafra” gives Buhari and his ideological fellow travellers the excuse to wallop the Igbo.

Soludo’s Challenge

 By Obi Nwakanma

Charles Chukwuma Soludo is a brilliant economist. He made a Nsukka first in the years when to make a first-class at the University of Nigeria was like a camel passing through the eye of a needle. These days the University of Nsukka is poorly run, and badly situated/oriented, and there is a narrowness to its own self-image that degrades it radically.

One hopes that the rise of its great alums, like Dr Soludo, a former student, and former Professor of Economics at the University of Nigeria might help push a “Nsukka renaissance.” In a sense, Nsukka gave Soludo his first rodeo.

*Soludo

One returns to the fountain of one’s intellectual growth to fetch the waters of life. But though Soludo might have been taught by the likes of Okwudiba Nnoli, I’m a little worried about his centrist, middle of the road politics: Charles Soludo was known among his fellow students in those years of Students Union Politics at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, as something of an “establishment figure,” who ran with the hares as a student member of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) in the 1980s as an undergraduate student.

As Electric Bill Is Now More Than The Minimum Wage…

 By Abolade Ademola

The electricity tariff of Laaga residents (in Ikorodu, Lagos) has gone so high that everyone cannot afford it. As a resident of the community, I will like to add my voice to this challenge and bring it to the notice of Ikeja Electric and NERC.

In Laaga community, located around Ewu-Elepe, a suburb of Ikorodu, residents have been made to pay an estimated bill that is more than the minimum wage of the entire country, Nigeria.

The steady rise in the bill is very discomforting in a country where the rate of inflation keeps rising without a commensurate rise in income.

The residents of a community with few pre-paid meters have been suffering in silence for some months now but it has become very unbearable with the bill sent for January 2022 in the last few days, a whopping sum of N23,000 only! It is such an exasperating amount that everyone is lamenting this outrageous amount that was sent.

Nigeria: Government As Purveyors Of Fake News Today

 By Emmanuel Onwubiko

“A few lines of reasoning’s can change the way we see the World.”— Steven E. Landsburg.

I was actually ruminating on a very important theme that traverses all of humanity and indeed already indulged in my compulsive lifestyle of deeply reflecting on my newly acquired books (75% of my annual income go into buying freshly minted, topnotch books, hard copies) and one of the most recent copies occupied my consciousness because of the opening quotation aforementioned.

*Information Minister, Lai Mohammed

Titled Basic Economics: A Common sense Guide To The Economy, this quotation rather led me to think much more about the threats to the Nigerian economy by the widespread use of fake news by all kinds of government officials with dominant reference to Federal Government officials. Lies, misinformation and outright fake news are increasingly being forced down the throats of millions of Nigerians by those who run the government and therefore have seamless access to our humongous commonwealth and patrimony which they misapply as their whims and caprices dictate to them.