By Nick Dazang
There is an apocryphal story animating the social media. And it is doing so with a frenzy. It is to the effect that the Presidency had since allegedly acquired two jets via the Chagourys; and that the jets were being allegedly configured in lieu of their delivery to Abuja.
By Dele Sobowale
“The DMO said as of March 31, 2024, the country’s domestic and external debts stood at N121.67 trillion ($91.46 billion). Nigeria’s debt rose by N24.33 trillion within three months – from N97.34 trillion ($108.23 billion) in December 2023 to N121.67 trillion ($91.46 billion).” Channels Television.
Nigerian government leaders, Presidents and Governors, are addicted to loans the same way drug addicts cannot kick the habit; and become increasingly hooked. What Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala persuaded Obasanjo to do in 2004, that is paid off Nigeria’s external loans was so alien to our government leaders that one late former Governor called her “stupid”.
By Tonnie Iredia
After twenty-five years of unbroken civilian governments in Nigeria, one can easily imagine that the country is getting settled as a democracy. But whereas a civilian government rather than a military regime is more likely to be democratic, civilian rule in Nigeria and indeed in several parts of Africa are far from adhering to democratic practices.
In truth, what obtains in many African countries is authoritarian democracy. The causative factors are many. Poorly organized political parties, prevalent poverty, commercialized politics, election rigging and the tendency for those in power to decimate opponents so as to remain in power perpetually.
By Adekunle Adekoya
Earlier in the week, there were reports of massive protests in Kenya, an East African country. The protests were actually not new, having begun in 2023, in reaction to bids by the government of Kenya to raise taxes. According to the 24-hour English news channel, Al Jazeera, the protests signify a major shift in Kenya, where, previously, most people accepted the inadequacies of government.
By Banji Ojewale
When God could no longer stand the overthrow of the good order He established on earth, He stepped in with the Noah's Ark solution. The upset Creator said since man had allowed his depravity to flush out His benignity, He would respond with a heavier rain flood to wash away man and his iniquity.
But not all earthlings would go; some humans, along with pairs of the lower primates, would be sheltered in a huge vessel to be constructed by a good man called Noah. He and some members of his household together with the animals would take refuge in the boat during the deadly deluge. The storm did come, sweeping off evil men and women and the children and youth who took after them.
By Charles Okoh
The senseless crisis in Rivers State has continued unabated and from the looks of things, it might just continue until common sense prevails or until those who are fueling it run out of firepower. I call the crisis senseless because there can only be one captain in a ship and as it is in Rivers, the State Governor, Mr. Siminalayi Fubara, is the captain in the state and whatever may be happening out of the state is irrelevant, immaterial and inconsequential.
*Fubara, Wike, Tinubu
The crisis last week following the expiration of the tenures of Local Government Council Chairmen in the state, took another dimension, as police, youths and other citizens occupied 21 council secretariats, resisting the outgoing chairmen and their supporters from gaining entrance to the offices.
By Olu Fasan
There are two forces contending for the future of Nigeria. One is the force of change and progress. The other is the force of conservatism and status quo. The former argues that Nigeria’s political and governance structure is deeply flawed and not working, and that Nigeria must be restructured to make progress.
The latter posits that there’s nothing wrong with Nigeria’s structure; so, there’s nothing to restructure. If anything, it submits, what Nigeria needs is good leadership, as if there is any serious country that puts its faith solely in the goodness of a leader and not in the robustness of its institutions, particularly the constitution, which is the central determinant of how a country is governed.
By Ikechukwu Amaechi
In his 1961 book, The Theatre of the Absurd, Martin Julius Esslin, a Hungarian-born British journalist and professor of drama, lamented what he called absurdism, “the inevitable devaluation of ideals, purity, and purpose.”
Esslin, who died in London,
United Kingdom on February 24, 2002, aged 83 years, couldn’t have had the
oil-rich state of Rivers, Nigeria, in mind when he wrote his famed book 63
years ago.
But nothing captures the state of affairs in Rivers State today more profoundly than Esslin’s “theatre of the absurd”.
By Dan Onwukwe
No matter the clouds of controversy that trailed how he won the Feb 25, 2023 presidential election, one year has passed since Bola Tinubu was sworn in as Nigeria’s President. But the manner in which he has governed the country in the last one year still generates intense public debate. The following questions remain top of public discourse: Is Nigeria better now than Tinubu met it?
Are the lives and livelihood of the citizens better or worse now than before Tinubu came to power? And how will history judge him and the policies he has implemented in the last one year ? Of course, opinions differ, but the general consensus is that history will not be kind to most of the policies that he initiated unless he changes course. On that score, it’s not unkind to say that his administration still carries more baggage than an ocean liner.
By Tonnie Iredia
In developed democracies, citizen patriotism is exceedingly high because the right to life in such countries is a priority both in theory and in practice. For example, the US government would take every possible step to stop whatever can bring harm to any American citizen. Indeed, the death of one American citizen especially outside the country ’s shores is enough to lead to war.
Commendably, they generally don’t wait for a calamity before action is taken. This is why the country’s embassies by convention issue periodic advisory releases to serve as early warning signals for their citizens wherever they are. It is therefore not by accident that such citizens are able to develop a high degree of affection for their country.
By Oseloka H. Obaze
Deciphering Nigeria can be depressing. Interrogating her history and present political trajectory can also be disconcerting. That awkwardness is further complicated by the fact that, in a nation where governance is now rife with propaganda, the truth is always a conspiracy; and truth-tellers, traducers.
That disposition did not prevent two recent unvarnished and non-salutary New York Times assessment of the state of Nigeria. Both pieces represent a reality check and the proverbial writing on the wall. Despite the pushback by the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) government, what is dawning stealthily on Nigerians is that Nigeria’s long-forecast implosion might actually be self-fulfilling. Put differently, Nigeria is not too big to fail.
By Adekunle Adekoya
When we move forward by a mile, it seems we always do something that will make us take backward steps for 10 miles. And so, it was alarming and distressing to read reports of cholera outbreak in our country again, especially in Lagos, our most sophisticated showpiece of urbanisation. Many have died, and more are hospitalised as a result. I thought we’d heard the last about cholera; I remember the epidemic that raged in our country in the early ‘70s.
No less than six people fell to the cholera epidemic in my little village of Gbawojo, nestled in the forested plains of Ijebu North-East Local Government Area of Ogun State. It was 1971 and I was in primary school in Sagamu, at Wesley School, Oko1. From our school gate we could have glimpses of the courtyard of the Akarigbo’s palace. The Akarigbo of Remoland then was the late Oba Moses Awolesi, Erinwole II.
Last week, Bola Tinubu,
Nigeria’s president, tripped and fell as he climbed the steps of the
parade vehicle during this year’s “Democracy
Day”. Characteristically, Tinubu dismissed the incident, saying he “dobale”, that is, prostrated for
democracy. In truth, Tinubu’s tumble is a perfect metaphor for democracy in
Nigeria.
For, let’s face it, Nigerian democracy is so inherently wobbly that it’s prone to tripping and falling. Indeed, Nigeria is not a true democracy, and to celebrate annually a failed system, instead of admitting and tackling the failure, is to entrench and perpetuate a lie.
By Ayo Oyoze Baje
“Truth crushed to earth shall rise again;/ The eternal years of God are hers./ But error, wounded, writhes with pain./ And dies amongst his worshippers” – Willian Cullen Bryant (1794-1878)
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By Dr Sota Omoigui
When I wrote my words for the anthem, in 1978, it was my dream for the country to move forward and take its place among the great nations of the world. But all that potential has been hijacked and degraded by a political leadership that constitutes a criminal enterprise. Many of our people now wonder if we were ready for independence.
The regressive reverting of our anthem to the colonial anthem is a betrayal of our independence. It is a symbol of a political leadership that is clueless and has so lost its way that it goes crawling on its hands and knees back to kiss the ring of its colonial master to adopt its anthem – music and lyrics.
Less than a decade ago, the detention centre of the International Criminal Court, ICC, in Scheveningen on the outskirts of The Hague could easily have been mistaken for a committee meeting of leaders of the African Union. One of its long-term guests was Laurent Gbagbo, a former president of Côte d’Ivoire. From neighbouring Liberia, Gbagbo’s contemporary, Charles Taylor, kept up a punishing schedule on the tennis courts of the facility. With them there also was former Vice-President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, DRC, Jean-Pierre Bemba.
By
Hard Times, published in 1854, is the title of the tenth novel by Charles Dickens, the English novelist. Like most of Dickens’ novels, Hard Times is a searing indictment of a corrosive and morally atrophied society on the brink of disaster.
Set in Victorian England, which was
touted as a prosperous epoch, the novel reframes the socio-economic turmoil
that undermined the entire fabric of the English society of that time. The
reality of what was configured as prosperity was acute deprivation and hunger
for the common man as a result of the dislocation occasioned by the Industrial
Revolution.
By Kenneth Okonkwo
President Barack Obama said, democracy will win if we fight for it. Benjamin Franklin, one of the founding fathers of American democracy, arose from a meeting with his colleagues, where they deliberated on the preferable system of government for America, and was questioned by a woman outside the meeting to reveal to America their choice. He quipped, we have a republic, if you can keep it. Eternal vigilance is the price to pay for democracy, certainly not a fall.
Democracy is worth fighting for, it’s not worth falling for. The reason democracy is failing in Africa is that the people who ought to be the fighters for democracy, are busy falling head over heels for the crumbs that fall off from the table of these half baked, incompetent and corrupt leaders. So nauseating is the level of sycophancy that even the leaders now make a joke when they fall that they were doing obeisance to democracy.
By Uzor Maxim Uzoatu
Today has been declared a public holiday by the Nigerian Government to mark Democracy Day. May 29 used to be Democracy Day until then President Muhammadu Buhari put forward June 12 as the real McCoy.
The greatest piece of fiction written in Nigeria
since the publication of Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart back in 1958 was the
fantastic yarn that promoted May 29 as Nigeria’s Democracy Day.
Some of us are even hard put coming to terms that there is civil rule in Nigeria let alone democracy. At the very least, to practice democracy a country has to first boast of democrats.
By Tonnie Iredia
In 1987, the then Federal Military Government led by President Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (IBB) set up an electoral body – the National Electoral Commission NEC to midwife a robust transition to civil rule political programme. This columnist was deployed from the Nigerian Television Authority NTA, to serve as the pioneer Director of Public Affairs of the Commission.
*Chief Abiola casts his vote
during the 1993 election
This positioned me to observe a number of things about politics and elections in Nigeria. I once came across a pamphlet titled ‘future heroes of Nigeria’s democracy’ compiled by a non-governmental organization identifying some well-known politicians that would likely succeed the military. But from my interactions with several politicians, I had huge doubts that many of the listed political leaders would readily choose to undergo danger and pain for the sake of democracy.
