Nigeria: The Poor Shall Not Die!

 By Sunny Awhefeada

Delta State born gospel singer, Harold Ikuku, re­leased a popular album that was the rave of the moment in the tough and horri­ble years that the 1990s were. The song’s motif is “I shall not die”. Although a gospel song, it reso­nated with both Christians and non-Christians as a result of its affirmative message of survival in the face of brutal economic and psychological assault on the citizenry. 

It was this song that a man sang with so much gusto on hearing of the new pump price of petrol about three weeks ago, the second of such astronomical increase within two months of the present regime. When Presi­dent Bola Tinubu said, in his in­augural speech, that petroleum subsidy was gone, his handlers must have thought that it was a masterstroke in view of the fact that petrol subsidy had become an albatross for the Nigerian polity. 

Our Beloved Country Is Bleeding

 By Sunny Awhefeada

 I do not know why countries or na­tions are thought of in feminine forms (she/her). Perhaps, it is a strategy to endear us to the place of our nativity and create a bond, the kind that exists between a mother and her child. Growing up, we sang songs that endeared Nigeria to us. Our young and impressionable minds glowed with no­ble ideas to which our sonorous voices gave clarion utterances. Men and wom­en who lived generations before this era also thought of their place of birth in endearing terms and they went to war in defence of their homeland.

*President Tinubu and Senate President Akpabio

Empires and kingdoms rose and fell in battles to defend the homeland. Even Nigeria’s national anthem and pledge have mem­orable and endearing words to configure our allegiance and love for “our beloved country”.

As Gov Akeredolu Steps Aside

 By Dan Agbese

The centre did not quite fall out in Ondo State. Governor Rotimi Akeredolu has done the right thing even if reluctantly. He persuaded himself to end the needless crisis and take another medical leave and very reluctantly leave the state in the hands of the deputy governor, Lucky Aiyedatiwa, as acting governor.

*Akeredolu 

The State House of Assembly has formally confirmed him in that position. This was the eventuality the governor had risked his health to fight. I join the people of Ondo State in heaving a huge sigh of relief. 

Taking Rocky Path Of Struggle With Kokori

 By Owei Lakemfa

I was a young Labour Reporter when I had my first encounters with Frank Ovie Kokori in 1984. He was a 41-year-old trade unionist who had been more of an industrial relations personnel. He had attended the University of Ibadan and worked with an industrial relations company owned by socialite and former trade unionist, Alhaji Babs Animashaun.

*Kokori 

The latter had set Kokori on a life-long path of trade unionism when he assigned him to service the now defunct British Petroleum Workers Union. When the house unions were reorganised in 1977 into industrial unions, the union he serviced was scrapped and infused into the new National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers, NUPENG.

COP28: Tinubu’s Hypocrisy On Climate Change

 By Olu Fasan

So, Bola Tinubu, Nigeria’s new president, believes that climate change is a Nigerian problem after all. In fact, so much does he believe Nigeria has a climate-change problem that he led a delegation of 1,411 people to this year’s United Nations climate summit, COP28, which took place in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, from November 30 to December 12. Yet, just a few months ago, Tinubu was cynical and dismissive about climate-change mitigation in Nigeria.

*Tinubu with some members of the large Nigerian delegation to COP 28

In October last year, during the presidential election campaign, Tinubu spoke at the interactive session of the Arewa Joint Committee in Kaduna. Asked about climate change, he responded: “It’s a question of how you prevent a church rat from eating poisoned holy communion.” He then added: “We need to tell the West, if they don’t guarantee our finances, we are not going to comply with their climate change.”

Tinubu’s First Six Months: Redemption Way Or Road To Golgotha?

 By Kalu Okoronkwo

President Bola Tinubu’s assumption of office on May 29, 2023, marked a critical moment in Nigeria’s political landscape, evoking both expectations and scrutiny.  His landmark speech during his inauguration that brought about the much-touted oil subsidy removal was a turning point in the country’s economic policy.  This is because many perceived the issue of subsidy removal as a hard nut to crack hence previous administrations only paid lip service to it.

*Tinubu 

Six months in the life of a new administration is very much early day for a four- year tenure but the augury mirrors what lies ahead.

An unbiased and dispassionate assessment of Tinubu’s first six months in office can only return one verdict: it has bought unmitigated hardship and thrown more Nigerians into multidimensional poverty. Food inflation is at its highest ever that even a bulb of onion has become a gem stone to be pampered and cherished.

Tinubu Renewed Or Delayed Hope?

 By Dele Sobowale

“History does not repeat itself; man does” – Harvard Prof. Barbara Tuchman

My heart sank after reading the summary of the 2024 Budget and the promise by the Tinubu government to create a $1 trillion economy in ten years. Now, I am inclined to believe that Nigeria will never become the global economic power we yearn for as long as we continue to elect men seventy years and above as Presidents.

*Tinubu 

They all belong to the same generation making empty promises; thinking that they were inspiring their listeners.

All our Presidents, since 1999, including Jonathan, are far less informed about economics and social trends than many of their own citizens with good Master’s Degrees from reputable universities.

75 Years Of The Universal Declaration Of Human Rights

 By Chidi Odinkalu

On this day 75 years ago, on December 10, 1948, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights “as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations”. Forty-eight of the 58 countries eligible voted to approve the Declaration. The Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Soviet Union, South Africa, Ukraine, and Yugoslavia abstained, while Honduras and Yemen absented themselves from the vote altogether. There were no votes against its adoption.

  The previous day, on December 9, 1948, they had adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and just three and a half years earlier, in June 1945, 50 countries had signed the Charter of the United Nations establishing the foundations for a new global order at the end of a profoundly ruinous war. In the three years separating the adoption of the UN Charter from the Universal Declaration, more countries emerged to independence, including Korea, India, Indonesia, Philippines, Myanmar, Pakistan, Syria, and Vietnam. In the decade that followed, the cascade of decolonisation arrived Africa.

Journalism’s Future At Risk

 By Ray Ekpu

Last week my colleagues in the media industry bestowed on me the treasured trophy of honour twice, first on Thursday in Lagos and next on Friday in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State. The Lagos event was organised by the National body of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), led by its president, Mr. Chris Isiguzo.

About 20 of us were given what was elaborately called media icon awards. And the awardees included such a renowned journalist as Senator Bala Mohammed, Governor of Bauchi, a former minister and a former Senator, Mr. Henry Odukomaiya who in addition to being a well-known practitioner was also a creative manager of the newspaper business and Professor Ralph Akinfeleye, an eminent teacher of journalists, among others.

Methodist College Uzuakoli: 100 Years Of Excellence In Education

By Chima Mbubaegbu

On December 10, 2023, a thanksgiving service in the College Chapel will kick-start the  year-long centenary celebration of Methodist College, Uzuakoli (MCU), that will culminate in a week of activities in December 2024.

Why should this celebration matter to anyone other than MCU students and alumni?
It matters in this case because, established in 1923, MCU was the first secondary school in the present South East of Nigeria and the third or fourth, east of the Niger.

Henry Kissinger: A Curse On Africa, Asia And Latin America

 By Owei Lakemfa

Henry (Heinz) Alfred Kissinger, the most infamous United States Secretary of State and National Security Advisor, passed away  peacefully  at 100 on November 29, 2023 and is guaranteed a marked grave. Not so for the tens of thousands Africans, Latin Americans and Asians who experienced violent deaths in their youth and had no tomb stones in their names due to the policies formulated and implemented by Kissinger.

*Kissinger 

A prolific author, brilliant academic and highly cerebral intellectual, he, like his fellow German, Adolf Hitler, used his knowledge and skills to perpetuate unspeakable crimes against humanity.

The Sick Continent

 By Dan Agbese

Africa is a baffling continent sitting on mounds of paradoxes. The paradox of rich but poor continent is a familiar theme. It is rich in human and natural resources; yet its 54 independent nation-states are dependent on other less divine-favoured countries to even feed their own people.

Africa is a sick but lucky continent. Its paradoxes attract economic and other experts who periodically diagnose its ailments and go on to offer sane expert prescriptions on how to heal it. The problem, and this is one of the many paradoxes, is that the continent continues to get sicker. It is either the failure of the diagnoses or the ineffectiveness of the prescriptions or both. The question is why?

Liberia Practises True Democracy, Why Can’t Nigeria?

By Olu Fasan

Nigerians are quick to react to events in other countries and draw parallels with realities at home. But, despite such inquisitiveness and international awareness, Nigeria never learns the right lessons from other nations. A case in point is Liberia’s recent presidential election.

Everyone hailed President George Weah for conceding defeat in a remarkably close election instead of using his incumbency to rig the election. Indeed, President Weah deserves kudos for conducting a credible election and allowing a peaceful transition of power. But here’s the main lesson: Liberia’s political system allows the will of the majority to prevail.

The Phenomenal Growth Of Higher Education In Nigeria: My Strategic Role

-------------------

The Chairman's Opening Remark At The 11th Convocation Ceremony Of The Michael Okpara University Of Agriculture, Umudike, Umuahia, Abia State

On

NOVEMBER 24,  2023 

BY

SIR PROF. IHECHUKWU MADUBUIKE, OON

Former Minister Of Education 

Former Minister of Health 

FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA

 Protocols: 

A Historical Perspective

 Before the  Justice Cyril Asquith Commission of August, 1943, a compliment of the Elliot Commission ( June1943) and much later, the Ashby Commission on Higher Education in Nigeria in 1960, the educated elite in Lagos and other parts of West Africa had, as far back as the 1920s began a clamor for higher education in Nigeria under governor Dealtry Lugard. Lord Alfred Dealtry Lugard, imperial governor of Nigeria,1914- 1919, refused to accede to the request, insisting that the local elite must fund such a higher institution.[1] The taste for higher education further triggered the setting up of these commissions. 

Inflation Is The Worst Economic Evil, Yet Tinubu Fuels It!

 By Olu Fasan

The first test of any government is its ability to manage the economy. For without a strong economy, a government can’t improve people’s lives; it can’t generate jobs, reduce poverty or tackle insecurity. Hence, a former British prime minister said: “The economy is the start and end of everything”, and an American political strategist coined the phrase: “It’s the economy, stupid.”

*Tinubu

However, this universal truth eludes Nigeria’s new president, Bola Tinubu. His overall economic orientation, dubbed ‘Tinubunomics’, smacks of economic illiteracy. My focus here is not ‘Tinubunomics’ itself, a subject for another column, but Tinubu’s attitude to inflation, the worst economic evil. 

Supreme Court Verdict: Tinubu Is The Diego Maradona Of Nigerian Politics

 By Olu Fasan

Professor  Wole Soyinka, Africa’s first literature Nobel laureate, published his critically-acclaimed novel, Chronicles From the Land of the Happiest People On Earth, in September 2021. So, he probably didn’t have the 2023 presidential election and Bola Tinubu, who emerged president, in mind when he wrote the book. However, reading the novel, one gets the impression that Professor Soyinka foreshadowed the election and its aftermath.

*Soyinka and Tinubu 

In a post-publication interview with the Financial Times, Professor Soyinka said he wrote the book “to confront Nigeria with its true image”. Indeed, Sir Ben Okri, the recently knighted Nigerian-British writer, described the book as Soyinka’s “magnus opus on the state of his homeland”. Of course, when someone writes a novel, he or she has no control over how the reader interprets it, more so when the novel is verisimilitude, having an appearance of reality. Therefore, for me, Professor Soyinka’s novel provides a powerful framework for analysing the 2023 presidential election, the Supreme Court verdict and Tinubu. 

Active Citizenry: If Nigerians Don’t Hold Their Leaders Accountable, Who Will?

 By Olu Fasan

Nigeria is one of the very few countries where politics is the most attractive human endeavour, where holding a political office is more profitable than running a business. In Nigeria, politics is the quickest route to wealth, thanks to outrageous salaries and allowances – Nigeria’s federal legislators earn far more than their American counterparts – and corrupt self-enrichment.

In Nigeria, politics is largely a quest for private gain rather than public good. But nothing entrenches these perversities more than the lack of strong institutions and active citizenry. For not only do the system and the citizens allow wrong politicians to get to power, there’s virtually no institutional or societal pressure to hold elected politicians accountable. 

The Terror Of Being Nigerian

 By Obi Nwakanma

Last year my son made plans to buy a ticket and fly down on his own to Nigeria, and spend the summer with his uncle in Abuja and in the village, East of Nigeria. He was twenty, young, and raring to go. He wanted to explore Nigeria on his own.

It was I that stopped him from traveling to Nigeria, much to his chagrin. I had to beg him to stop. News coming out of Nigeria scared the bejesus out of me. Still does. Kidnappings. Assassinations. Disappearances. The sheer terror of being Nigerian today is so overwhelming that just thinking about it gives one a headache. My son, needless to say, was very disappointed.

Buhari ‘Bankrupted’ Nigeria, But Who ‘Made’ Him President?

 By Olu Fasan

Last week, I wrote about the lack of accountability in Nigerian politics. I submitted that most Nigerians are unquestioning about their leaders, and uncritically accept whatever they’re told. Nothing proves this better than the self-serving narrative that Bola Tinubu’s government pushes about what it inherited from the Buhari administration, and the sympathy some Nigerians profess for Tinubu.

*Tinubu and Buhari 

Recently, Nuhu Ribadu, National Security Adviser, said the Muhammadu Buhari government bankrupted Nigeria. “We have inherited a very difficult country, a bankrupt country,” he said. Governor Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State later said: “Tinubu inherited an administration that was almost comatose.” Tinubu himself set the tone earlier in a speech titled “After Darkness Comes the Glorious Dawn”, saying: “We are exiting the darkness to enter a new and glorious dawn.” Unmistakably, the Buhari administration he succeeds is “the darkness”. 

Malawi’s Path To An ‘Award-Winning Judiciary’

 By Chidi Odinkalu

Joyce Banda, Malawi’s fourth (and first female) president, was in Nigeria earlier this month as guest of the Nnamdi Azikiwe University in Awka, Anambra State in South-East Nigeria, where she spoke at the 12th annual lecture in memory of the man after whom the university is named. It was also the 119th birthday of Nnamdi Benjamin Azikiwe, Nigeria’s founding president, and the month of the 26th anniversary of the death in 1997 of Malawi’s founding president. 

 At the lecture, Joyce Banda described Malawi’s judiciary as “award-winning” and many Nigerians in the audience, embarrassed by the contrast with theirs which wallows in infamy, broke out in spontaneous acclamation. The story of how Malawi’s judges became “award-winning” should be of interest to Nigerians.