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Opinion

Thursday, 27 April 2017 02:50

Nigeria Police endangered - Tola Adeniyi

The Nigeria Police Force is no doubt endangered specie. And there is also no doubt that policing in Nigeria is the most dangerous job in the world. It is almost like if you enlist with the police you are signing your death sentence. It is not an exaggeration that the Force’s personnel are the most uncared for in the country if not in the world. Their living conditions are appalling while their self esteem arising from the shabby treatment meted to them is at its lowest ebb. I must have written about the Nigeria Police more than twenty times dating…

Thursday, 27 April 2017 02:48

A word for Ibrahim Magu - Olusegun Adeniyi

Against the background of what has been happening in recent weeks regarding the war against corruption, I am compelled to break my self-imposed censorship on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) under the chairmanship of Mr Ibrahim Magu. People close to me, and those in a few groups with whom I share online discussions, know why I don’t write on EFCC or Magu but I want to make the reason public today before I delve into the beef of my intervention. Sometimes in 2008, my late boss, President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua invited me to his office and asked me…

Wednesday, 26 April 2017 03:00

Turkey Referendum: Lessons for Nigeria - NIG

New Independence group (NIG) noted President Muhammadu Buhari’s commendation of the Prime Minister of Turkey, Erdogan, and the people of Turkey on the successful conclusion of the country’s referendum. In the President’s words, “the Turkish referendum showcased the democratic credentials of the country and reflected a willingness of the Turkish people to live together and jointly pursue a better future”. While we agree with the thrust of the President’s remarks, we are taken aback by the inherent glibness and hypocrisy, as the realities unfolding in his country, as informed by his worldview and pantomime to governance, represent the antithesis of…

Wednesday, 26 April 2017 02:59

Democracy, opportunism and the formation of APC - Buba Galadima

The Weekly Trust of Saturday 4th March 2017 (Page 39) carried an interview with Chief Okoi Obono-Obla in which several misleading accusations bordering on my political convictions and engagements in the formation of the All Progressives Congress (APC) were made against my person. Chief Obla made the claims in his bid to promote his new book titled ‘All Progressives Congress: The making of a Change Agent’. Chief Obla is at the moment Senior Special Assistant to the President on Public Prosecutions. Prior to that, he was first Interim National Legal Adviser; Deputy National Secretary of the defunct CPC and finally…

Tuesday, 25 April 2017 03:33

Who is the Presidency? - Reuben Abati

When last week, President Muhammadu Buhari decided to suspend the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Babachir Lawal, and the Director General of the Nigeria Intelligence Agency, Ambassador Ayo Oke in order to allow unfettered investigations of both public officers, the most striking immediate reaction was the SGF asking: who is the Presidency? State House correspondents had accosted the then SGF as he left a meeting with the Vice President. It is standard practice at the State House for correspondents to lay ambush. Babachir Lawal obviously did not know that he had been suspended from office. If the Vice…

Sunday, 23 April 2017 16:01

Corruption: Why Buhari may lose the battle - Martins Oloja

I am fully persuaded that what President Muhammadu Buhari needs at this juncture is not sycophancy – that not a few are offering through the social and traditional media at the moment. The Nigerian leader who is not enjoying robust health needs encouragement by way of honest critique of his policies and suggestions on how to succeed on apparently two-point agenda of his government generally believed to be very slow almost two years on. There is nothing in the convoluted APC-Buhari manifesto that is being implemented apart from security especially in the North East and war on corruption. Though resurgence…

Sunday, 23 April 2017 02:37

Provide effective leadership, NIG tells Buhari

Very early in the life of the Buhari administration, a crisis broke out in the presidential Villa over who should be responsible for the president's safety. The disagreement led to an exchange of memos that found their ways into public domain, between the Aide de Camp to the president and his Chief Security Officer. While the general public was so eager to move beyond trivialities as it anticipated the promised change, it was nonetheless an early sign that the transition period hadn't been enough to sort out simple internal issues such as who should do what, talk less of setting…

Friday, 21 April 2017 16:12

Buhari chronically ill – Perry Brimah

Popular columnist and convener of Every Nigerian Do Something, Perry Brimah, has said that President Muhammadu Buhari is “chronically ill” and in need of urgent rest. Brimah, in a statement on Friday, alleged that the President was being kept locked up in Aso Rock by some “selfish cabal” instead of receiving best therapy. The columnist flayed Nigerians for their uncompassionate reaction to Buhari’s health status despite seeing his “asthenic figure now no more than skin-and-bones as he sat down for the Jummah service” with Kaduna state governor Nasir el-Rufai last Friday. He wrote, “There can be no denying how chronically…

Friday, 21 April 2017 16:02

Found but not lost - Opeyemi Agbaje

Nigerians are incredibly gullible! They believe anything they read in a newspaper; they believe anything their government tells them; and they believe anything their Pastor, Imam or Ifa Priest (make that last one dibia or marabout depending on geography!) tells them! I may ignore for today’s conversation the propensity to believe our religious intermediaries since faith is supposed to be the “substance of things hoped for…the evidence of things not seen” but what of the unquestioning swallowing of any information from journalists and government? Unlike Almighty God, both of these institutions and the individuals comprised therein are nowhere near divinity,…

Friday, 21 April 2017 02:35

Are you considering a career as whistleblower? - Jideofor Adibe

There is a very funny cartoon trending in the social media. It is about a teacher who asked some pupils what they would like to be when they grow up. The pupils all replied they would want to become whistleblowers. The federal government launched its whistle-blowing policy in December 2016 to help expose financial crimes and concomitantly strengthen its fight against corruption and impunity. Domiciled at the Federal Ministry of Finance (FMF), it is hoped that through the policy, more looted funds will be recovered. The policy has three key components- the channels for reporting information and the type of…

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Friday, 21 April 2017 02:34

Plato’s allegory of the cave - Pius Adesanmi

I was fourteen years-old and in Form Four when I first encountered the Greek philosopher, Plato. No, I did not encounter him in the classrooms of Titcombe College, Egbe. I encountered him through Baba Adesanmi’s disciplinary regime: a hybrid of Roman Catholic, African-traditional, and Spartan colonial disciplinary methods. Depending on the gravity of your offence, if he spared the rod in favour of a long-winding sermon (pure torture for us at the time), then you were in for two hours of philosophies, wisdom nuggets, and anecdotes drawn from a vast arsenal of Yagba, Yoruba, Christian, and Greco-Roman resources. Your rebuke…

Thursday, 20 April 2017 03:16

This empty life - Tola Adeniyi

I am not going to talk about heroic figures whose names have continued to resonate in public discourse and in spaces far beyond their places of birth. This piece is not about the lives of legendary names like the great Nnamdi Azikiwe, the Sage Obafemi Awolowo, the titan Sir Ahmadu Bello, the immortal Nelson Mandela, the enigma Michael Jackson or the most recognizable face on the planet, the unstoppable Mohammed Alli. These were individuals, and a lot more whose deeds on earth impacted greatly on their communities and perhaps the world at large. These were individuals who are probably being…

Thursday, 20 April 2017 03:14

Dear Kim Jong Un: Watch out for Trump. He’s even crazier than you - Dana Milbank

Supreme Leader Marshal of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea Ryongsong Residence Pyongyang, North Korea Dear Mr. Kim, I write to congratulate you on the occasion of your late grandfather’s 105th birthday. I heard about the difficulties you had with the missile this weekend, but be assured that the launch was cheered by thousands of Muslims in Jersey City. Please forgive the impersonal nature of this correspondence, but a matter of this urgency cannot be left to the North Korean postal system. The world is the closest it has been to nuclear war in 55 years, and I wanted to…

Wednesday, 19 April 2017 16:51

Lord Lugard and his dirty shoes - Dare Babarinsa

Long before the railway lines were built and the Emir of Kano bought a motorcar, Frederick Lugard travelled from Lagos to Sokoto on foot. Before coming to the area around the River Niger and Benue, he had heard so much about this area of the Sudan as Central Africa was called in the 19th Century. Born in India in Madras (now called Chennai), but brought up in England, Lugard was a diehard imperialist for the Empire which Winston Churchill called the Empire on which the Sun never sets. The aim of imperialists like Lugard was originally to create market for…

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