I Am A Nigerian Voter! I Am Available For Sale To Highest Bidder!

 By Dare Babarinsa

During our one-year National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), between 1981 and ‘82 in Abeokuta, capital of Ogun State, our monthly stipend was N200: 00. Yes N200: 00, which today, cannot buy a standard loaf of bread.

At that time, it was a princely sum as the national minimum wage was N100: 00. After collecting a one-month salary, I approached my cousin, Mr Ayo Olaoye, then a manager with the CFAO, who helped me to buy a giant double-cabin Frigidaire standing refrigerator for N200.00.

Today, N200.00 cannot buy a single vote in Ekiti State, once the intellectual powerhouse of the Yoruba people of the South-west. You will need N10, 000.00 for that, or at least 20 loaves of bread. With that princely sum too, the collector of money-for-vote would be expected to make a pot of soup that is going to last him or her till the next governorship election in four years time.

I don’t know whether it is the electorate that is forcing the politicians to pay to vote, or it is the politicians that have reduced the electorate to the level where they now need to get a pot of soup from the politician before they cast their vote in his/her favour. Or in exchange for power, the politician gives one loaf of bread per week for four years. What a bargain!

High Blood Pressure Can Be Lowered By Simple Hand Exercises

 By Joel Savage

Scientists have shown that after a few weeks of hand exercise, blood pressure returns to normal. A very long time is spent on getting results, while pharmacological activity and the therapeutic effect are contrasted.

As a few simple workouts can effectively manage hypertension, but not provide the purpose of providing quick relief, scientists advise paying attention to hand training to drop the pressure.

It will take a few weeks or perhaps months to stabilize the pressure, so you shouldn't anticipate a one-time effect, but the outcome will still be to your liking. It is even conceivable in some circumstances to decline blood pressure-regulating drugs after consulting with your doctor.

Nigeria: A Sick Society With Unhinged Citizenry

 By Ikechukwu Amaechi

Nigeria  is a sick country, very sick. What is worse, Nigerians have increasingly become unhinged. Many of the things happening in the country are bizarre and it takes only an unhinged population to condone the maladies. 

You are wrong if you think I am talking about the importation of adulterated fuel which has grounded almost the entire country and destroyed many vehicles. In any other country other than Nigeria where there are consequences for actions of state officials, heads would have rolled by now.

The petrol supply chain was disrupted last week when the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority, NMDPRA, otherwise known as The Authority, announced that it discovered methanol quantities above Nigeria’s specifications in imported petroleum products.

Even as the queues get longer at the petrol stations, the noise has lessened and we have all gone back to our pastime – grumbling. Nothing will happen because the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Ltd, NNPC, the regulator and sole importer of petrol in Nigeria, which is busy pointing fingers of blame at four marketers, including its own Duke Oil, is the major culprit.

Nigeria At Intensive Care Unit!

 By Hashim Amao

Across sectors, the tempest in Nigeria had doubled, and in some cases, tripled with the failed regime of the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.). Sai Baba is not the sui generis of Nigeria’s woes, but he has forced Nigerians to tread more throes. Like Umar R.A would smile and sob anytime he remembered the dark days he made his god with Meccan dates, worship and still feast on it when hunger visits; anytime this writer recalls the days of his stellar support for the “godsend Buhari,” the superficial things he did to sell Buhari to his people, laughter and sadness would knock in synchrony. For, we had thought Nigeria was sick then, but now, it is at the intensive care unit, gasping between life and death.

Crippled economy, insecurity, hunger, hike in commodity prices, incessant strikes, corruption and disregard for the rule of law; frankly, in Adipele’s multi-layered dentition, I don’t know how many teeth to count. But one thing so clear is: Baba Yussuf has failed Nigerians, deplorably, that his wife had once vented her vexation as a result of her “sense of justice, and not confrontation or disrespect.”

Nigeria ranks sixth in the 2022 Global Terrorism Index, no thanks to Boko Haram, Unknown Gunmen, killer pastoralists, kidnappers and other agents of doom that have provoked the peace of Nigeria. Sadly, Nigeria is no longer sitting on a powder keg; it is reclining on an atomic couch, while we hope it does not explode. Human lives have been devaluated that, sometimes, people get slaughtered in some parts of the country and there is low media coverage for the attacks.

South Africans Continue To Pay Nigeria’s Good Deeds With Evil

 By Sandra Ijeoma Okoye

There is no denying the fact that South African youths and some elders that may in this context be considered to be accomplices have for the umpteenth time been seen to have marched along the streets with banners and placards demanding that Nigerians, Zimbabweans, and other foreigners of African origin leave their country. The protesters were at each time in their xenophobic display cried out that foreigners are taking away their jobs and committing crimes such as doing drugs and trafficking; the same narratives they often use to attack foreigners and their properties.

Without any iota of exaggeration, there have over the years been growing tension among Nigerians living in South Africa as they are needlessly attacked by riotous South African youths at any point in time. Surprisingly, on the trail of every attack, they would be calmed by high ranking diplomatic officials, such as the South African High Commissioner, and in the same vein urged to dismiss such fears, and assured that the issues will be addressed. But never! The deadly scenario has continued to play out like a vicious cycle.

At this juncture, it is expedient to ask, “How long will the vicious cycle of fears and denials continue to haunt Nigerians seeking the proverbial greener pasture in South Africa?

Permit me to disclose in this context that I was on the night of June 12, Saturday, 2022, through a telephone call from South Africa woken up by a friend. In our tele-conversation, he said, South African authorities on Saturday (the same day he phoned) locked up all Nigerian Shops in Yeoville Market.

Hijab: Why The Nigerian Supreme Court Erred

 By Malcolm Emokiniovio Omirhobo

In a majority decision of six in favour and one dissent, the apex court of Nigeria on Friday in Abuja affirmed the rights of Muslims Female Students in Lagos state public primary and secondary schools to wear Hijab.

The Supreme Court erroneously held that wearing the hijab was an Islamic injunction and an act of worship required of Muslims and consequently, the banning of female Muslim students from wearing Hijab to school is a violation of their fundamental rights to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, dignity of human persons and freedom from discrimination.

The Supreme Court heavily relied on section 38 of the 1999 constitution, which guarantees every Nigerian citizen the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. The justices failed to see the rights contained in section 38 of the constitution as private rights that must be exercised privately in our homes, place of worship, community, religious schools and not in the public or public schools for that matter funded with taxpayers money.

Stop Terrorists Influx Into Nigeria!

 By Tola Adeniyi 

Buoyed by the spectacular achievement of Major-General Muhammadu Buhari in his rabid drive of the undisguised Fulanization Agenda, 16 countries where the pastoral Fulani could be found were emboldened to gather in Abuja recently to perfect their grand design of taking over the Nigerian space by hook or crook. The theme of their meeting, hosted by the Unitary Government headquartered in Abuja, was the Future of the Fulani in Nigeria or better put, Stairs to the complete Conquest and Subjugation of the Indigenous Nationalities of Nigeria. 

Nobody has been left in doubt that President Buhari who is the Grand Patron of the ubiquitous and muscle-flexing Miyetti Allah [which has unabashedly owned up to serial bloodletting in Plateau, Benue and Taraba states] and also the preferred Chief Negotiator for the one of the world’s leading Terrorist Groups, Boko Haram [‘Attack on Boko Haram is attack on the North’—Buhari 2014] is bent on completing the ferocious Jihad of 1848 on behalf of the Caliphate. 

The die is cast! Tens of large trucks, with Dangote boldly written on some of them, carrying heavily armed terror recruits, are seen on daily basis flooding borderless Nigeria with the avowed intent to unleash unmitigated mayhem and mass massacre on defenceless indigenous peoples of Nigeria on a scale never before seen anywhere in Africa. In fact, by the time they finish the execution of their heartless and horrendous crime against humanity, the Rwanda’s better-forgotten genocide would be a child’s play in comparison.

Somalia's Unfolding Famine Catastrophe

 By Mukesh Kapila 

Somalia is on the brink of catastrophe. A recent assessment suggests that 7.7 million Somalis need emergency aid right now, a similar number to those affected by the Ethiopian famine in 1984, one of the worst humanitarian disasters in history. About one million people died then.

The warnings have been coming for some time.

The immediate trigger for the likely famine is three successive years of failed rains leading to the worst drought in the Horn of Africa for four decades. Underlying that are rising temperatures from climate change. Compounding factors include longstanding political and social fractures, with decades of conflict and poor governance.

Somalia is also strongly affected by the Ukraine-Russia war . It gets 90% of its wheat from that region which makes up two-thirds of the Somalian diet. The prices of cooking oil, beans, rice and sugar have also doubled from the conflict's secondary consequences: higher costs for fuel, transport and agricultural inputs like fertiliser.

At 81, Pastor Kumuyi Remains Different

 By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

Pastor William F. Kumuyi, the General Superintendent of the Deeper Life Bible Church, easily stands out as a man of God with an unshaken resolve to please God always and undertake the divine assignment given to him with zeal, dedication, meticulousness and sense of urgency.

*Pastor Kumuyi

He continues to demonstrate a clear understanding of his mission which is to win souls for Christ and teach them to embrace standard Christian living to remain at peace with God and rapturable.

Pastor Kumuyi turned 81 on Monday, June 6.

Although not a member of his church, I have derived illumination and edification from his recorded messages, books and attitude to God’s work. The internet has now made many of his messages accessible – both the old, timeless ones and the more recent ones.

Bianca Ojukwu On Peter Obi’s Supposed ‘Stinginess’...

 
*Mrs. Bianca Odumegwu Ojukwu and Peter Obi

Sometime in 2009, ‘Mr’(as he preferred to be addressed) Peter Obi, Governor Of Anambra State at the time, visited Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu and myself at Dallas, Texas. 

He came to deliver a get well message from Dr Goodluck Jonathan and was billed to attend a black tie event at the Dallas Marriot. Curiously, he flew into Dallas airport with one small carry on luggage which he insisted on wheeling around himself, and on getting to our residence requested to freshen up. 

He opened his carry on, filled with files and paperwork and a few toiletries and an extra shirt, when the Ikemba and I asked if he was expecting another item of luggage, and he said no. 

‘Then, what will you be wearing to the event tonight?’, we inquired. It was at that point that it struck him that he couldn’t show up in his casuals at such a ceremony. 

I insisted on taking him to the luxury men’s emporium at Nieman Marcus to buy a smart black suit. When we got there, he was busy doing the currency conversions. The suit that was a perfect match for him was a dapper Tom Ford suit with a price tag of 3,985 dollars plus tax. He did the calculations and told me ‘do you know how many students this amount of money can train in Nigeria?’ 

Ndigbo: Caught Betwixt And Between In Nigeria (3)

 …Wrong Decisions & Missed Opportunities 

By Ichie Tiko Okoye
According to the source document – recently declassified secret American diplomatic dispatches – “The North was minded to use the civil war as a tool to reassert its dominance of national affairs…The northern section of the Nigerian military was the best equipped in the country. To ensure the region’s continued dominance, the British assigned most of the army and air force resources to the North. It was only the Navy’s they could not transfer. 

“All the elite military schools were there. The headquarters of the infantry and artillery corps were there. Kaduna alone was home to the headquarters of the Nigerian Army’s 1st Division, Defence Industries Corporation of Nigeria (Army Depot), Air Force Training School and Nigerian Defence Academy. (On the other hand), the Eastern Region had seized a DC-3 and a Fokker F-27 from the Nigerian Air Force in April (1967, and) NNS Ibadan, a Nigerian Navy Seaward Defence Boat (SDB) that docked in Calabar Port, was quickly made Biafran.”

Tinubu’s Muslim/Muslim Ticket Obsession

 By Ochereome Nnanna

The chances are that, by the time you read this article, the major presidential candidates – Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP; Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress, APC; and Peter Obi of the Labour Party, LP, would have announced their running mates.

*Bola Tinubu

Of the lot, Tinubu’s matter matters the most. From the distant past when he started developing interest in becoming the president of Nigeria, he has always postulated that a Muslim/Muslim ticket “can work; competence is all that matters”.

If “competence” is all that matters, why not just pick a fellow Yoruba; they also have their share of competent people. Why look for something in Sokoto when you can simply pick it from your Sokoto pocket? But hey, I perfectly understand his situation.

Nigeria: A Nation In Darkness

 By Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa 

For the umpteenth time, the epileptic national grid collapsed over the weekend again, resulting in blackout in most parts of the country. A terse statement from the Ministry of Power attributed the collapse to “the partial shutdown of the Oben gas plant to address the repair of critical gas processing equipment. The incident unfortunately occurred at a time when other power plants on other gas sources are undergoing planned maintenance and capacity testing.” 

You cannot fault this empty logic, can you? This has been the story of power supply in Nigeria and it is unlikely that things will change. In times past, we used to look forward to the rainy season because it births a temporary moment of stability in electricity generation. It is possible that this year, some supernatural forces have blocked the flow of water in all the dams, especially now that diesel sells for about N800 per litre.

Power generation is the main issue with regard to the socio-economic development of any nation. In Nigeria however, successive governments have deployed it for political gains, knowing the importance that Nigerians attach to it. Thus in 2015 when it was canvassing for votes from the electorate, the All Progressives Congress stated as follows:

Buhari, APC And Freedom For The Abductees

 By Sonnie Ekwowusi

It is obvious that securing the freedom of the abductees of the Abuja-Kaduna bombed-train is not the priority of the APC ruling party. Neither is it a priority of President Buhari nor former Transportation Minister Rotimi Amaechi nor the APC Presidential aspirants. The only priority of President Buhari, the APC ruling party and APC Presidential aspirants at the moment is to re-capture political power in 2023. They have no human feeling for these abductees. I hate to address them as abductees.

*Buhari

They are not unknown abductees: they are our fathers, mothers, sons, daughters and, above all, our brothers and sisters who were victims of the Abuja-Kaduna-train bombing and abduction on March 28 2022 and who have been abandoned to be sorrowing and agonizing in the dungeon of their abductors. Had the Abuja-Kaduna train bombing and abduction occurred, say, anywhere in the western world or even Asia or other parts of the world, the CNN, BBC and the world media including the Nigerian media by now would have been bombarding us with the minute-by-minute analyses about the fate that had befallen the abductees and the efforts being made to secure their freedom. But this is Buhari’s Nigeria where life has become so cheap. This is Buhari’s government where the death and suffering of our fellow Nigerians do not matter to the government.

PDP, Peter Obi And The Corrupt System

 By Luke Onyekakeyah

The exit of Mr. Peter Obi from the main opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) is a bold, patriotic and commendable move to save the country from imminent collapse. Peter Obi took a very wise decision to leave PDP, which has proved to be discredited and corrupt. He refused to join the Ghana-Must-Go money sharing bazaar that overwhelmed delegates at the PDP’s presidential primary election. By his decision, Peter Obi has become the first Nigerian to reject/shun the evil money for vote politics. He is also the first Nigerian politician to demonstrate true anti-corruption crusade by action.

*Peter Obi

Everybody knows that Peter Obi has his zero corruption integrity to protect. He would have been swept away by the corruption tsunami if he had remained in the PDP and that would have damaged his not-easy to earn enviable reputation. He wouldn’t have been happy to be the presidential candidate of a corrupt party that Nigerians are fed up with. What else have the two major parties got to offer Nigerians after spending sixteen and nearly twenty-four solid years in power and squandered the golden opportunity? There is no doubt that Peter Obi’s move to the Labour Party (LP) is fast gathering huge momentum for an unprecedented historic victory and turnaround in this unfortunate country.

Feasting And Laughing As Nigerians Mourn Victims Of Owo Massacre!

 

While many Nigerians mourned the heartless massacre of innocent men, women and children at a Church in Owo, Ondo State, Nigeria, on Sunday June 5, 2022, the President, Major Gen Muhammadu Buhari (rtd), gathered the leaders of his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), to a session of joyful feasting, laughing and back-slapping at the State House in Abuja. 

In other countries where leaders are a little more compassionate, caring and sensitive to the feeling of the citizenry, the dinner would have been put off.    

But, unknown to these APC leaders, the sumptuous banquet they devoured with immense relish that Sunday evening during the bacchanalian reveling hosted by the president a few hours after the Owo bloodbath  was seasoned with the blood of the victims of the Owo mass murder!

 

How did we end up with these kind of leaders? 

After the usual ritual of condolence messages, will the remorseless killers be apprehended? Will anything be done to ensure a safer country? 

Another election is around the corner and Nigerians will still be stampeded by primordial instinct to vote uncaring leaders like these ones into office...  

Open Memo To President Muhammadu Buhari On The Impending 2023 APC Presidential Primary

Your Excellency, 

It isn't my intention to bother you with details of the drama of the absurd that attended the emergence of another Fulani - not even the majority Hausa ethnic nationality in the North - as the candidate of the major opposition party, the PDP. It happened because of two factors:  

First was the betrayal by prodigal Southern governors. They were the same ones disturbing our peace with threats of an Armageddon that would engulf the nation if the presidency doesn't rotate to the South in 2023. But each of them bought the pie in the sky of being made the running-mate. After all, in their world view, it is better to be servants in Paradise than rulers in Hell. 

Second, it was a bitter lesson for under-age school-boy politicians in the South to be tutored in the art of deception and betrayal by Fulani masters of the game. 

Ndigbo: Caught Between And Betwixt In Nigeria (2)

By Ichie Tiko Okoye 

The congeniality of the still morning air along the Nsukka-Gakem-Ogoja and Nsukka-Oturkpo bifurcation was shattered by the thudding sound of mortar fire and the cacophony of exiting bullets sounding as if the demons of hell were on a rampage. 

A lingering bank of smoke, thick and vile-smelling, rolled across the highway. Sleeping birds protested the intrusion by flapping angrily up from the trees and wheeling overhead. The long-anticipated war had commenced in full earnest. Time was exactly 5a.m. on Friday, July 6, 1967. 

According to a declassified American diplomatic dispatch, three days after Nigeria’s ‘First Girlfriend,’ Edith Ike had been securely ensconced in West Germany, Gowon addressed the attendees of the 3 July 1967 Supreme Military Council meeting as follows: “Gentlemen, we are going to crush the rebellion.” It was hardly a reconciliatory message, and although he added that “But note that we are going after the rebels, not the Ibos,” those the message was intended for knew fully well that the speech had two parts. 

Pastor Kumuyi At 81: Peeping Into The Years Ahead

 
By Banji Ojewale

The fire shall ever be burning upon the altar; it shall never go out. –The Holy Bible

If you have forensically studied Pastor William Folorunso Kumuyi, General Superintendent of Deeper Christian Life Ministry, DCLM, through his one thousand and one books and sermons and you have also read everything about him in the newspapers, or if you have spent days and nights trafficking the internet to track him, there are two old ‘discoveries’ you’ll make again and again: the venerable cleric’s intrepidity to defy the odds for the sake of the Gospel of his Lord, Jesus Christ, and his endless search to uncover untrodden  grounds in evangelism. This man of God will dare death, devils, demons, destiny, disabilities and distractions to "seek…first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.’’

These twin preoccupations have profiled the DCLM founder since he became born again on April 5 1964. At 81 on June 6, 2022, he has behind him narratives of a man of flint who would dwarf obstructing giants of any hideous shape to proclaim his faith in every word of the Bible, even if it would take his life.

Once, in the United Kingdom for a course in October 1974, a maturing Kumuyi trashed the postgraduate programme he went for in London and dashed off to Birmingham to seek the power of the Holy Ghost he believed he needed for a result-yielding evangelical work. 

Peter Obi: I know Nigeria’s Problems, I Can Fix Them Easily!

 
*Obi

I can’t sleep because I know what to do! I have gone round the 36 states of the country like I have gone round 31 countries of the world, I know the problems of Nigeria and I know I can fix them easily! Because I can see them, I can fix them! 

Hunger takes people to the streets! Job and food will obviously take them out of the streets and crimes! That’s my specialty, creating jobs and wealth! I have not come out for myself! 

I have come out for the millions of youths that are losing hope in our beloved country! I have come out for the millions of women who are afraid of tomorrow and what it holds for them and their children! I have come out for the poor who are asking whether it’s a sin to be a Nigerian! For them, I have come!