From Chibok Girls To Deborah: Any Lessons Learnt?

 By Ayo Oyoze Baje

“Thou shall not kill” (Exodus 20:13, Deuteronomy 5:17)

*Deborah Samuel 

“Where has our humanity gone?” 

“Does human life really matter here?”

 “Is religion no more your personal relationship between you and your creator?”

 “Can we really judge others on behalf of God or Allah?”

“What shall we tell our maker about our actions on the Judgment Day?”

These were few of the burning questions that troubled my humid heart on the recent cruel, callous, crude and conscienceless murder of a female student, who was a Level Two student of Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto, Ms Deborah Samuel, by her school colleagues for alleged blasphemy.

According to credible media reports, the late student had cautioned those who posted what she considered as “useless information” on a Whatsapp Group platform created basically to share information about their studies as she was said to have asked the sender, in a voice note shared by her fellow students, to send important information, pointing out that “this group was not created for you to send useless information.” So, how did her traducers react when she traced her good grades to the salvaging power of Jesus, the Christ?

The Iconic Exit Of Chinua Achebe

 By Uzor Maxim Uzoatu

Chinua Achebe died at exactly 11:51pm (US time), that is 4.51am (Nigerian time), on Thursday, March 21 at the Harvard University Teaching Hospital, Massachusetts, USA, aged 82. It was one death that shook the entire world as tributes came pouring in from all the continents of the world, from presidents down to paupers. 

      *Pix by Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye (2013)

For some of his admirers, the world stood still, yet for orders events moved at a frenetic pace, culminating to the Thursday, May 23 interment of the icon in his native Ogidi, Anambra State. The one-storey home of Chinua Achebe looks quite modest from the outside but it has a lift inside. The building for me captures the essence of the great progenitor of African literature: the quality of what is within is greater than any showiness outside.

 The mausoleum constructed to the side of the frontage of the building bears the heavy burden of the memory of Mother Africa in the buried remains of Professor Albert Chinualumogu Achebe, the inimitable author of Things Fall Apart. 

Achebe was interred at 4.30pm in a marble tomb in his Ikenga village ancestral home of Ogidi town in Idemili North Local Government Area of Anambra State. He was given an elaborate Christian funeral service at St. Philips Anglican Church, Ogidi, as opposed to the African mores he championed in his novels.

Nigeria: Nomination Forms And Looters' Ticket To National Treasury

By Tola Adeniyi 

I really no longer consider it worthwhile for me to waste my time writing, talking or thinking about Nigeria.  It is not helpful to my sanity to dwell in or on a building about to collapse, even though I am worried stiff about the calamity knocking at the door.   

Nigeria is irredeemably in ruins; it is only those who are benefitting from the cracks and crumbs that are still living in self-denial.   

Regrettably there are millions entrapped in the Contraption who simply don't know what to do or where to go or who to turn to. And my heart is in there with them.  

Nigeria Is Very Sick And Urgently Needs A Qualified Physician!

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye
President Buhari’s regime has about a year to hit its expiration point. Perhaps, the only thing that still retains the capacity to squeeze out some smiles on a couple of faces today is the faint hope that the president might fulfill his pledge to firmly resist the deadly attraction of that poisoned fruit called “tenure elongation.” Indeed, many Nigerians are willing to take the risk of entertaining some optimism about this. 

Despite the blizzard of outrageous claims roughly thrown at Nigerians every other day, it has become just impossible to muster any bit of expectation that the Buhari regime might still be able to shock Nigerians with any edifying impact on their lives before it exits.  

Perhaps, the only reassuring feeling out there emanates from the palpable wish that the days and months might develop wings and fly away so fast so that with brightened faces and deep relief, Nigerians can happily embrace and congratulate one another that, eventually, the nightmare is over. 

The relief alone will be highly therapeutic, in fact, capable of increasing many lifespans. 

2023: When APC Treads The Path To Doom With Northern Agenda

 By Abdulsalam Muhammed Kazaure

The All Progressives Congress, APC, appears intent on snatching a sure defeat from the jaws of a likely victory with its baffling ‘all-Northern’ strategy.  

Following the nudge of certain Northern figures who are blinded by self-interest and an inflated sense of their political prowess, the party looks to be plotting the emergence of a Northerner as its presidential aspirant, an audacious betrayal of its agreement with its Southern bloc on ceding its ticket to the zone in honour of the power-sharing arrangement key to Nigeria’s political stability. 

*Buhari and APC Chairman, Adamu

It was the agreement, brokered by leaders of the party from the two regions, that shaped its national convention held in March where Senator Adamu Abdullahi, a Northerner from Nasarawa State, emerged as the consensus choice for the position of National Chairman. 

The Blood Of Deborah Cries For Justice!

 By Rotimi Fasan

In 1989 the Iranian spiritual and revolutionary leader, Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeni, issued a fatwa that was to be executed by any Muslim anywhere in the world on the Indian-born British novelist, Salman Rushdie, following the publication of his book, The Satanic Verses, which some Muslims considered blasphemous.

*Deborah Yakubu Samuel 

Not only did the British government and other Western powers at the time rise up in defence of Rushdie’s right of free expression, these countries were very unambiguous about the extent they were prepared to go to defend the right of just one man who was not even a Christian to say nothing of being White to hold personal views of religion and religious figures no matter how obnoxious.

The Conspiracy In Sokoto

 By Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa

There is need for genuine reconciliation in this matter.  

The criminal charge Criminal Conspiracy and Inciting Public Disturbance as framed by the Sokoto State Government against hardened murderers is an insult to the sensibilities of the parents of the deceased, the people of Nigeria and God who created Deborah.

* Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa

This crime took place in an enlightened environment in a higher institution, under the watch of security men, who were said to have been overpowered. 

It all started from a WhatsApp group, which has identified leaders. There are students who sent messages and threats of death on that platform. Their phone numbers are registered with NIN identification. They belong to a class in the school so they are known individuals. 

Deborah’s Immolation: All Religion And No Faith

 By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

Cordelia Ego Ejiofor died like no one should, clobbered to death by her employer. Her dead body was never found. Around December 3, 1972, Alhaji Rauph Gaji, a senior lawyer in Kaduna beat Cordelia to death in his own house.

Late Deborah Yakubu

He drove her remains to the outskirts of the city and disposed of them at a location along Kachia Road, where, months later, scanty human remains were located after Alhaji Rauph led Police to where he said he disposed of her body.

Mamman Nasir, like Alhaji Rauph, a Muslim, prosecuted the case to a conclusion, securing a conviction for manslaughter, which the Supreme Court affirmed on Friday, May 23, 1975.

If this case happened today, Cordelia’s killer would never have been brought to account. Her scanty remains would not have drawn any attention. Cordelia’s killing would hardly have merited the attention of the justice system and Mamman Nasir would have come under unbearable pressure not to prosecute a fellow Muslim for this killing.

There’s Just No Killing The Igbo Beetle!

 By Tiko Okoye

Several years back, the Lagos-based Volkswagen vehicle assembly outfit noticed with considerable apprehension that its gigantic in men and machinery as well as dominant leadership position in the low-end car market in Nigeria were being significantly imperilled by the burgeoning demand for the Kaduna-based Peugeot automotive assembly plant’s Peugeot 504 saloon car. 

*Igwe Achebe, Obi of Onitsha 

Volkswagen didn’t push back with a price cut as many had expected given that the Beetle’s target market is highly price-sensitive. The car assembler knew only too well the possible traps attendant with such a pricing-cutting strategy. While a lower price may buy market share, for instance, it hardly buys brand loyalty as customers would easily shift to Peugeot 504 should its price be cut lower than the Beetle’s.

Besides, there’s the more worrying probability of Peugeot having longer staying power by virtue of having deeper cash reserves, should a pricing war ensue. 

2023 Presidency: Why Jonathan Should Not Contest

 By Ifeanyi Maduako

Lagos Lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana, SAN, recently argued that Dr. Goodluck Jonathan is not eligible to contest for the presidency of Nigeria again having spent five years as president between 2010 and 2015.

Falana premised his argument on a 2018 constitutional amendment which purportedly bars Jonathan from contesting because if he (Jonathan) becomes the president of Nigeria in 2023, he will spend a cumulative nine years as president whereas the amended constitutional provision on which Falana relied on limits the occupant of the position to two terms of eight years.

*Buhari and Jonathan 

I am not conversant with the amended constitutional provision that Falana relied on but I dare say that he got his interpretation of that provision wrong. A law does not take a retroactive effect and the 2018 constitutional amendment does not affect Jonathan. It can only affect a fresh president from the date it was signed into law. What if Jonathan had won the 2015 presidential election, didn’t Falana know that he would have been in office for nine years by 2019?

Goodluck Jonathan Rejects Presidential Form

 Press Release 

It has come to our notice that a group has purportedly purchased Presidential  Nomination and Expression of Interest forms, of the All Progressives Congress APC, in the name of former President Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan.

We wish to categorically state that Dr. Jonathan was not aware of this bid and did not authorize it. 

Pastor Kumuyi In Ogun State: Encountering The Potentates

 By Banji Ojewale

Pastor William Folorunso Kumuyi, General Superintendent of Deeper Christian Life Ministry, isn’t a stranger in the club of men and women of weight and power in our society. Being himself a personality of position, presence and princedom, he is easily at home in the assembly of other lords, temporal or spiritual. But Kumuyi’s power is ecclesiastical, leaning on a lever outside him, outside man, outside this world.

*Pastor Kumuyi during a courtesy call on former President Obasanjo during the Deeper Life Global Crusade in Abeokuta, Ogun State...

So when he stormed Abeokuta, capital of Ogun, a state southwest of Nigeria, last week for the April edition of the Global Crusade series of his Deeper Life Bible Church, there was also a gathering of the galactic around him. In addition to the heavy presence of bishops, pastors, denomination founders, and Deeper Life State Overseers, the programme attracted top civil servants and politicians. The governor of Ogun State, Prince Dapo Abiodun, was there with the top brass of his cabinet. On the last day of the crusade, ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo showed up to complete the retinue of the high of the society who reported at the event.

Nigeria: The Conversation We Don’t Want To Have About Biafra!

 By David Hundeyin

Fourteen years ago, when I was a 19-year-old fresher at the University of Hull, I met Ify. She was at that time, probably the most beautiful girl I had ever set my eyes on. I immediately tripped, hit my head and went into an infatuation coma.

Ify was the quintessential social butterfly – witty, friendly, distinctly intelligent and culturally Nigerian, with a few notable modifications like her South London accent and a slight tomboy streak.

*Biafran children... 

I think my eyeballs actually turned into heart emojis every time I saw her, and within a week of starting university, my mission in life was to get Ify to be my girlfriend. The problem was, it didn’t matter how much time and attention I dedicated to her – Ify was not interested in me.

We were very good friends, but as time went on, it became clear to my great dismay that she and I as an item, was just never going to happen. Eventually, I gave up on Ify and retired to lick my metaphorical wounds, completely assured in my 19-year-old wisdom that I would never love again.

Same Country, Different Worlds

Nigeria: The Burden Of Untrained Leaders

 By David Osiri

“E go better” is a common phrase used in Nigeria to affirm our inner aspiration of a better future. Popular artistes turned it into songs. We say it when we want to reassure ourselves of a better tomorrow, hoping that the nation will live up to its potential one day.

*Nigerian leaders

The wise are beginning to realize that hope is not enough, a byproduct of faith. Faith is a risk, and we need to put it in the right leaders who can lead the nation into a prosperous future. We need leaders who are trained and prepared for a moment like this. We need to identify such people to escape the burden of untrained leaders that has beguiled Nigeria and Africa at large.

A little disclosure before I proceed: this article might read like leadership 101. Learning new things without mastering the fundamentals is like building a house on a sinking foundation. If the foundation is destroyed, what can the righteous do? A nation’s destiny and its people depend on its leadership; therefore, it is serious. And in critical moments like one where our nation has found itself today, we cannot afford to hand the steering of our wheels to an untrained leader.

ASUU In The Age Of Nastiness

 By Tony Afejuku

Let me enter my column straightaway with these observations: I did not think of dwelling on the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) at this point in time after the series of straight five weeks series I terminated but did not conclude not long ago on the universities’ dons’ abject take-home remunerations. Of course, I knew that I would revisit the subject of our universities’ lecturers’ contaminated and adulterated remunerations – but now is not the time.

For a minute or two let me keep you in abeyance with respect to the current engagement. But the title is influenced somewhat by an ardent reader of this column who is himself a first-rate columnist penning for an equally very popular tabloid.

2023 And Southeast Presidency: Quislings Beware!

 By Ikechukwu Amaechi

This is an election season like no other. Everything is defying logic. For instance, how does one explain the fact that when the All Progressives Congress, APC, decided to sell its presidential nomination form at a whopping N100 million, an amount so outrageous in an economy where the minimum wage is N30,000, and many thought the only reason for the ridiculous hike was to scare aware “unserious” aspirants, that was when every Tom, Dick and Harry, joined the fray.

With the latest declarations on Wednesday of Senator Godswill Akpabio, Minister of Niger Delta, in Akwa Ibom, and Dr Kayode Fayemi, Governor of Ekiti State, in Abuja, there are now at least 14 aspirants jostling for the APC ticket.

Does APC Deserve Another Tenure In Abuja?

 By Hope O’Rukevbe Eghagha

One of the strengths of democracy is the power of the people to determine who leads the country. Fixed tenures are a way of making politicians subject themselves to the will of the people at the end of a cycle. As a result, in countries where democracy is practised, the average politician is often conscious of the next elections. The electorate must be satisfied with performance before voting a party back to power. In some jurisdictions, for example, in most African countries, the electorate is often confronted with making a choice between the devil and the deep blue sea, between the lesser of the two evils.

At the national level, the APC government has been in power for seven odd years, led by President Muhammadu Buhari. If we were to judge the national government on the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of Security, Education, Employment, Social Security, Business climate, Inflation, Infrastructure, Corruption Index, the party should stand no chance of winning the elections in 2023.

Do You Want Nigeria Buried? Southern, Middle Belt Leaders Ask Ango Abdullahi, Others

 

*Clark 

Press Release

The Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum (SMBLF) has cautioned Political Parties and political Stakeholders not to tinker with the issue of zoning and rotation of political offices especially, the presidency. Warning that doing so would further threaten the bear threads of the Nation's unity.  

SMBLF particularly took exception to a recent statement credited to the Chairman of the Northern Elders Forum, Alhaji Ango Abdullahi that zoning is “dead and buried”. 

SMBLF says it is rather unfortunate and absurd that Ango Abdullahi and his Northern Elders Forum would make such twaddle.  Are they now ready to dissolve the country? What has happened that zoning, which has been a _sine qua non_ in the nation’s political progression has now become a “dead and buried” issue, in the irrational contemplations of Ango Abdullahi and his co-travellers? Could it be due to the incapacity, insipidity and disastrous performance of the Buhari administration or the narcissistic desire to perpetuate  Hausa/Fulani Hegemony? 

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.

Buhari’s Parting Gift To Nigerians

 By Charles Okoh

Come May 29, 2023, it would have been eight years of President Muhammadu Buhari. It would have been eight trying years or a mixed grill of the good, the bad and the ugly. To say those years have stretched the people to the very limit of their existence which has left many despondent, disillusioned, crestfallen and in a state of near hopelessness would amount to stating the obvious.

*Buhari

What are the facts? It is a fact that Nigerians have been enduring very harsh and debilitating living conditions as of late. Did the problem begin with the present administration? Certainly not, it is the culmination of many years of poor leadership and a continuous downward slide, but it is also sad to note that rather than fashioning a plan to halt this trend it had become a free fall. The government of President Buhari has only helped in exacerbating the nation’s slide into the abyss.

Just as his actions have not helped matters in any way, his inactions at several occasions when the nation needed him to wield the big stick has further paved the way for a multitude of cataclysms on the ragged nation that is barely held together by a strand.