Since the Nigerian presidency has devoted itself to responding to every criticism of the government and its administrative failings, it is unsurprising that media aide Bayo Onanuga faulted the recent claim by the outgoing President of the African Development Bank, Akinwumi Adesina, that Nigerians lived a better life in the 1960s going by the GDP per capita. Onanuga argued that Adesina should know that GDP per capita is not the only criterion used to determine whether people live better lives now than in the past. Indeed, it is a poor tool for assessing living standards. Its primary usefulness is in giving us the metrics to compare economic output in a country or between countries. Then he adds that today, as we await the NBS’s recalibration of our GDP, we can comfortably say without contradiction that it is at least 50 times, if not 100 times, more than it was at Independence.

What Onanuga has done here is to spill a lot of needless ink to arrive at the same spot where he started. If the GDP is not a reliable marker of economic growth and development, why still wait for a favourable NBS figure to contradict Adesina?

 In any case, the two truths that might be operating here might not be mutually contradictory. Statistics can show growth since 1960, while Nigerians qualitatively live far less than they did 60 years ago. On that score, Onanuga is right that numbers are not the only means of scaling a society’s achievements. Figures objectively calculate how an average person lives (or lived) but do not paint the full picture of the internal substance of such a life. If we want to get to the truth, we must also probe social experience. In this case, we can ask the people who lived in the 1960s what their lives were like and how their experience compares to the present.

Now this is where it gets tricky. If you line up one thousand Nigerians who have lived through the various seasons of the nation’s history and ask them if the country was better in the 1960s, I can bet that there will be far more who would agree that the country used to be better. Why is that so? First, because human memory is prone to recall the past with nostalgia, and that makes for pessimism about the conditions of the present. The human brain is wired to scan the arc of personal history and promote the positive recollections of the past over those of the immediate present. It is sometimes called the declinism bias, and it is not peculiar to Nigerians. You find the echoes of the “good old days” in the “Make America Great Again” politics where a section of United States citizens thinks the old times were better than now when by every parameter, they are a richer and stronger country.

But in the case of Nigeria, people know what they are saying when they look back wistfully at the past and declare that life used to be better. I have older friends in their 70s, 80s, and 90s. Their recollection of how life used to be in Nigeria sometimes feels like the vision of the Nigeria I would love to see. If they are of the formally educated class, these folks would fondly recall the Nigeria where they received a sound education at all levels. Public schools were not as dilapidated; nobody ever recalls where students sat on the floor in their roofless classrooms. Public education was so good that the children of the elites attended the same schools as everyone else. You could be a poor village boy from rural Igbomina and attend Government College with the children of the powerful. Education was not as cheapened through private schools.

Those who made it to the university among them would recall receiving an education in the true sense of the word. Nobody needed to go to school abroad; Nigerian universities offered world-class education. They would recall a university system where the hostels were not crammed with students; the facilities worked, and undergraduates lived like actual human beings, unlike the appalling situation that subsists on most campuses. That was, of course, the generation that also had a quarter chicken for lunch on Sundays. People would also recall that fresh university graduates had jobs waiting for them after school, and you could buy a car with your salary. Whether they are educated or not, everyone can recall a time when the country was safe and secure, and one could travel through its length and breadth without fearing abduction by Fulani herdsmen. While the past might not be as picture-perfect as generally painted, there is enough substance in people’s recollections to demonstrate how much we have declined. The Nigeria some of us dream of living in has already been lived out by our forebears, imagine!

So yes, while the rebased GDP figures will expectedly look better, there is a lot of decline in the quality of our Nigerian life. Why do we even need to go as far as the 1960s to apprehend what has happened to our Nigerian lives? There are closer examples of a lack of progress. We are a country that once produced as much as 7,000MW of electricity in 2014. In 2025 and with multiple grid collapses, we struggle with 5,500MW. The Nigerian population has increased, and with it the demand for electricity, but the supply has only declined. Does anyone really need the GDP per capita to divine how a country that cannot sustain its modest gains would suffer socially and economically? An older relative once told me that the Energy Corporation of Nigeria—the company that supplied power in their youth—used to give an advance notification if there would be a power outage. Tell that to the generation of young Nigerians who have never lived in a world without the crazy hum of a generator bursting through their brains, and they would think you are lying.

Electricity is one aspect; the general state of public infrastructure is another. A generation has never witnessed a Nigeria where public utilities worked. Ask the young person living in Nigeria, where the GDP is supposedly 50 to 100 times better—a la Onanuga—if they know that we used to get water supply from a public water corporation, and they would perhaps be genuinely surprised. Look at places like our hospitals, especially the public ones, where people complement the paltry services they receive there with prayers and tell us how much better we have it. Even our leaders cannot entrust their lives to the public hospitals they fund. The slightest malady, and they are already on their way to France or the UK to receive proper healthcare.

In 2023, I visited the University College Hospital, Ibadan and what I saw there is a story best not told. Yes, the GDP must have multiplied about a hundred times since UCH was first founded in 1952, but nothing in that hospital currently reflects it. You can say the same for every aspect of our Nigerian lives. We have added many more zeroes to our national statistics, but our lives remain internally empty. Whereas countries like China and the UAE that lifted a huge percentage of their population out of poverty do not rely on media aides like Onanuga to sàlàyé progress on social media with spurious figures. Unlike our own situation, their results speak for themselves.

Punch

I worked at a financial magazine for much of my 20s, and for the most part I pulled down a very modest salary compared with many of my peers. 

I always tell people it was worth it, because I got an education. Writing and fact-checking that publication gave me access to a level of financial literacy I might never have found had I taken an internship at “Garden & Gun” or “US Weekly.” 

The people I worked with had spent decades in newsrooms and had forgotten more about personal finance than I’ll likely ever learn. They showed me how to write leads and headlines, as well as how to pick stocks and mutual funds. I owe my career — and my competitive salary — to those people. 

That’s likely why I found the career advice Warren Buffett gave at Saturday’s meeting of Berkshire Hathaway shareholders so heartening. “Don’t worry too much about starting salaries, and be very careful who you work for because you will take on the habits of the people around you,” the legendary investor said.

It’s advice he delivers regularly, and it seems to come from experience. Buffett didn’t know the salary he was agreeing to when he took a job with his mentor and value investing legend Benjamin Graham. “I found that out at the end of the month when I got my paycheck,” he told Gillian Zoe Segal for her book “Getting There: A Book of Mentors.”

It helped, in Buffett’s case, that the people he admired were some of the sharpest financial minds of all time — and that he is, too. But no matter your passion, Buffett says, prioritizing people over profits should serve you well over your career. 

“Who you associate with is enormously important,” Buffett said. “Don’t expect that you’ll make every decision right on that, but you are going to have your life progress in the general direction of the people that you work with, that you admire, that become your friends.”

CNBC

The Nigerian stock market maintained its bullish momentum on Tuesday, with investors recording substantial gains of ₦1.045 trillion on the Nigerian Exchange Ltd.

Market capitalization increased by 1.56% to reach ₦68.105 trillion, up from Monday's close of ₦67.060 trillion. Similarly, the All-Share Index (ASI) climbed by 1,662.60 points or 1.56%, settling at 108,361.10 from the previous day's 106,698.50.

This upward trend was fueled by strong investor interest in medium and large-cap stocks, particularly in the financial sector, including Access Corporation, Guaranty Trust Holding Company, and United Bank for Africa.

The market showed positive breadth with 42 gainers outpacing 25 losers. Among top performers, Ecobank Transnational Corporation and Northern Nigeria Flour Mills both surged by 10%, closing at ₦25.85 and ₦82.50 per share respectively. Nestlé Nigeria also gained 10% to finish at ₦1,210, while Beta Glass rose 9.98% to ₦132.80 and Austinlaz increased by 9.94% to ₦1.88 per share.

On the declining side, Guinea Insurance led with an 8.70% drop to 63 kobo, followed by DAAR Communications which fell 6.78% to 55 kobo. VFD Group decreased by 6.59% to ₦17.00, while WAPIC Insurance and Regalins shed 6.07% and 4.69%, closing at ₦2.01 and 61 kobo respectively.

Trading volume stood at 475.46 million shares valued at ₦13.899 billion across 17,575 transactions, compared to Monday's 569.041 million shares worth ₦18.934 billion in 18,612 deals.

Access Corporation dominated trading activity with 103.92 million shares worth ₦2.2 billion, followed by Guaranty Trust Holding Company with 37.99 million shares valued at ₦2.422 billion. United Bank for Africa, Sterling Bank Nigeria, and Zenith Bank rounded out the top five most actively traded stocks with transactions worth ₦1.04 billion, ₦147.24 million, and ₦1.234 billion respectively.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Nigeria has approved a $652-million China Exim Bank funding package for construction of a road to move goods from a sea port and petroleum refinery on the edge of its main city Lagos to its southern states, the public works minister said.

The financing was approved by the federal executive council chaired by President Bola Tinubu on Monday, David Umahi said in a statement.

The road will be an evacuation corridor from the Lekki Deep Sea Port, the Dangote Petroleum Refinery - Africa's biggest with refining capacity of 650,000 barrels per day - and its adjoining fertiliser plant to at least a dozen southern states.

China has been providing billions of dollars in funding for power, rail and road projects in Nigeria, the continent's most populous nation and Africa's biggest oil producer.

Nigeria's debt to China - its largest bilateral creditor - stands at over $5 billion, the most recent data from the country's Debt Management Office showed.

Reuters

No fewer than six persons were killed in renewed attacks in Marit and Gashish communities of Barkin Ladi Local Government Council of Plateau State on Monday by gunmen.

The gunmen stormed the communities and started shooting sporadically, leaving several persons injured.

The Chairman of Barkin Ladi Local Government Council, Stephen Pwajok Gyang, in a statement signed by Mercy Yop Chuwang, his Press Secretary, confirmed the news to journalists.

According to the statement, the Council boss condemned the attacks that resulted in the loss of six innocent lives in Marit village and Gashish district.

During a visit to those injured in the attack at the Barkin Ladi General Hospital, Pwajok expressed profound sadness and disappointment over the resurgence of violence in the area, especially when the local government administration is working tirelessly to promote peace and stability.

Pwajok acknowledged the efforts of vigilantes and security agencies in maintaining law and order, while urging them to be more proactive and vigilant in preventing further attacks.

He emphasized that the cycle of violence must be brought to an end and called on all relevant stakeholders, including security agencies, community leaders, and residents, to join hands in promoting peace and security in Barkin Ladi.

The Guardian

Israel hits Yemen's main airport in airstrike against Houthis

The Israeli military carried out an airstrike on Yemen's main airport in Sanaa on Tuesday, its second attack in two days on Iran-aligned Houthi rebels after a surge in tensions between the group and Israel.

Three people were killed in the strike, according to Houthi-run Al-Masirah TV.

Israel warned people to leave the area around Sanaa International Airport before Tuesday's attack, which it said targeted Houthi infrastructure and "fully disabled the airport". Witnesses later reported four strikes in the capital.

Tensions have been high since the Gaza warbegan, but have risen further since a Houthi missile landed near Israel's Ben Gurion Airport on Sunday, prompting Israeli airstrikes on Yemen's Hodeidah port on Monday.

"A short while ago, IDF (Israel Defence Forces) fighter jets struck and dismantled Houthi terrorist infrastructure at the main airport in Sanaa, fully disabling the airport," the Israeli military said.

"The strike was carried out in response to the attack launched by the Houthi terrorist regime against Ben Gurion Airport. Flight runways, aircraft, and infrastructure at the airport were struck."

Three airport sources told Reuters that the strikes targeted three civilian airplanes, the departures hall, the airport runway and a military air base under Houthi control.

The Israeli military said the airport had been "a central hub for the Houthi terrorist regime to transfer weapons and operatives."

In a statement carried by al-Masirah, the Houthis said:

"The operations of our armed forces will continue and the support by Yemen to Palestine will only end with the end of the aggression and siege against Gaza."

The United Nations Special Envoy to Yemen Hans Grundberg said on X that the latest hostilities "mark a grave escalation in an already fragile and volatile regional context".

An official at Yemen's flag carrier Yemenia Airways told Reuters that three of its aircraft were destroyed according to an initial assessment.

'AXIS OF RESISTANCE'

The Houthis have been firing at Israel and at shipping in the Red Sea since Israel began its military offensive against Hamas in Gaza after the Palestinian militant group's deadly attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

The Houthis say they are doing so in solidarity with the Palestinians and have pressed on with attacks in response to Israel expanding its military operations in the Gaza Strip.

The Houthis said on Sunday they would impose a "comprehensive" aerial blockade on Israel by repeatedly targeting its airports.

Sixty percent of Yemenis live under the control of the Houthis, a resilient group that withstood years of Saudi-led bombing during the country's devastating civil war.

The Houthis are part of Iran's "Axis of Resistance" against Israeli and U.S. interests in the Middle East, which also includes Hamas and Lebanon's Hezbollah.

While Israel has weakened those groups by assassinating top leaders and destroying military infrastructure since the Gaza war began, the Houthis are still a force to be reckoned with.

The Israeli strikes around Hodeidah on Monday killed four people and wounded 39, the Houthi-run health ministry said.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had vowed to retaliate after the missile launched by the Houthis landed near Ben Gurion Airport and led to European and U.S. airlines cancelling flights.

Reuters

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Russia launches missile attack on Kyiv, mayor says

Ukraine's air defence units were trying repel a missile attack on Kyiv, the mayor of the Ukrainian capital said early on Wednesday after a series of explosions shook the city.

Reuters' witnesses said they heard a series of loud blasts soon after 1 a.m. local time.

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Russia has returned 205 servicemen from the territory controlled by the Kiev regime, in return handing over 205 Ukrainian prisoners of war, the Defense Ministry reported.

"On May 6, 2025, as a result of negotiations, 205 Russian servicemen were returned from the territory controlled by the Kiev regime. In return, 205 Ukrainian prisoners of war were handed over," the statement said.

According to the ministry, the UAE provided mediation efforts to ensure the return of the Russian servicemen.

Reuters/Tass

Maybe the greatest problem in Nigeria today is the way in which the nation has lost its moral compass, and with it, civic culture. When our youth look at our leaders, they see clearly that there is no good example to copy. Yes, they see what is today called success. The bad guys are very successful. Success is here reduced to its most crass elements, they have stolen massive amounts of money from the treasury and can drink the most expansive whiskies and champagnes, travel round the world and move in convoys of dozens of cars although sadly for that successful Nigerian, he or she can only travel in one car at a time. I read the society pages in the press and this week, there are stories of how a “big boy” has spent hundreds of millions of naira on a party for his latest girlfriend. And as my readers know, Nigeria is indeed the most “religious” country in the world in competition with number two, Afghanistan. It is religion without God, values, love for the other and morality. They know not God because they are too deep into the worship of mammon. They have lacked the philosophical depth to understand the philosopher of our time: “Some people are so poor that all they have is money” Bob Marley.

Governance therefore has been turned in a mad rush to empty the treasury for private use. This means the core business of governance has disappeared for decades and the outcome has been a State that does not do its work. As I have repeated so many times in this column, the Nigerian state is undergoing a three-dimensional crisis. The first one affects the political economy and it is generated mainly by public corruption over the past four decades that has created a run on the treasury at the national and state levels, threatening to consume the goose that lays the golden egg. The second one is the crisis of citizenship symbolised by ethno-regional and ethno-religious crisis generating violent conflicts including the Boko Haram insurgency, farmer-herder killings, widespread bandit-terrorism, agitations for Biafra, militancy in the Niger Delta and indigene/settler conflicts. The third element relates to the frustration of the country’s democratic aspirations in a context in which the citizenry believes in “true democracy” but is confronted with a reckless political class that is corrupt, self-serving and manipulative to ensure electoral outcomes often do not reflect the choice of the people.

These challenges have largely broken the social pact between citizens and the state. That is why today, Nigerians find themselves in a moment of doubt about their nationhood. It is similar to the two earlier moments of doubt we have experienced, 1962-1970 when we went through a terrible civil war and the early 1990s when prolonged military rule created another round of challenges to the National Project. We survived those two moments but there is no guarantee that we shall survive the third. Nonetheless, there is a possibility that the current crisis as an opportunity to surge forward in fixing Nigeria.

Our national duty is to get our leaders to listen to Bob Marley: “The greatness of a man is not in how much wealth he acquires, but in his integrity and his ability to affect those around him positively.” This is one of the deepest insights on the purpose of leadership and governance. Will they listen, no, so engage plan b.

Every day, we discuss in homes, offices, bars, religious gatherings, the mass media, social media, professional associations and all other fora in Nigeria today that there is a real and imminent threat to the corporate existence of Nigeria. In addition, there is an on-going rapid slide into anarchy, precipitated by the most serious collapse in security provisioning in our country, which is confronted by an almost complete lack of leadership or governance response to a multipronged crisis. Maybe our leaders are too far gone to be saved as suggested by our leading poet, Niyi Osundare, while describing the judiciary which was once a pillar of justice and integrity. Some excerpts below:

“My Lord, Tell me Where to Keep your Bribe?”

Do I drop it in your venerable chambers

Or carry the heavy booty to your immaculate mansion

Shall I bury it in the capacious water tank

In your well laundered backyard

Or will it breathe better in the septic tank

Since money can deodorise the smelliest crime

My Lord
Tell me where to keep your bribe?
The “last hope of the common man”
Has become the last bastion of the criminally rich
A terrible plague bestrides the land
Besieged by rapacious judges and venal lawyers”

Increasingly, scholars are describing the Nigerian State as a failed one. My position is that it is teleological to describe the state as having failed because it is never about the end game, it is always about on-going processes of construction and deconstruction and above all, the direction of movement. The same Ghana that was once described as the clearest example of a failed state in Africa is today being described as the opposite. I fall into the category of believers in the Nigeria project and I track the evolution of the Nigerian state to see how we can pull back from the brink. If you seek evidence of failure you find it and if you seek evidence about the resilient Nigerian state you will find it. The Bible says, “seek and you shall find”. Our evil ruling class remain in power and destroy our country because they have found ways to rig elections, increasingly through the judiciary and stay on. We can stop them if we plan and organise well. My message to Nigerians is that it is not too late to save the country. Concerted citizen action can create the basis for offering Nigeria a new lease of life, provided proactive measures are taken to redress the crisis. Democracies persist and grow because they have citizens who have agency and use it to exercise their power.

Our greatest fear today should therefore be that of a self-fulfilling prophesy. The major outcome of the crisis facing the country has been the erosion of public trust. A toxic atmosphere has developed in which different actors are suspected of developing plots to destroy others. Actions of whatever type, as well as non-action or late action by governments and institutions are no longer taken at face value but are re-interpreted within narratives of coordinated plots by some groups to destroy or eliminate others or to take their land. There is no effective counter-narrative to create hope. The other challenge is negative agency. With over half the country living in extreme poverty, a generation of young Nigerians has emerged with nothing to lose but their poverty. They are procuring arms and engaging in violence, banditry and insurrectional acts to mimic the rich ruling class, thereby precipitating the march towards anarchy.

Driverless trucks are officially running their first regular long-haul routes, making roundtrips between Dallas and Houston.

On Thursday, autonomous trucking firm Aurora announced it launched commercial service in Texas under its first customers, Uber Freight and Hirschbach Motor Lines, which delivers time- and temperature-sensitive freight. Both companies conducted test runs with Aurora, including safety drivers to monitor the self-driving technology dubbed “Aurora Driver.” Aurora’s new commercial service will no longer have safety drivers.

“We founded Aurora to deliver the benefits of self-driving technology safely, quickly, and broadly, said Chris Urmson, CEO and co-founder of Aurora, in a release on Thursday. “Now, we are the first company to successfully and safely operate a commercial driverless trucking service on public roads.”

The trucks are equipped with computers and sensors that can see the length of over four football fields. In four years of practice hauls the trucks’ technology has delivered over 10,000 customer loads. As of Thursday, the company’s self-driving tech has completed over 1,200 miles without a human in the truck.

Aurora is starting with a single self-driving truck and plans to add more by the end of 2025.

Self-driving technology continued to garner attention after over a decade of hype, especially from auto companies like Tesla, GM and others that have poured billions into the tech. Companies in the market of autonomous trucking or driving, tend to use states like Texas and California as their testing grounds for the technology.

California-based Gatik does short-haul deliveries for Fortune 500 retailers like Walmart. Another California tech firm, Kodiak Robotics, delivers freight daily for customers across the South but with safety drivers. Waymo, a subsidiary of Google parent company Alphabet, had an autonomous trucking arm but dismantled it in 2023 to focus on its self-driving ride-hailing services.

However, consumers and transportation officials have raised alarms on the safety record of autonomous vehicles. Aurora released its own safety reportthis year detailing how its technology works.

Unions that represent truck drivers are usually opposed to the driverless technology because of the threat of job loss and concerns over safety.

Earlier this year, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration rejected a petition from autonomous driving companies Waymo and Aurora seeking to replace traditional warning devices used when a truck broke down with cab-mounted beacons. The Transport Workers Union argued the petition would hinder safety.

CNN

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has revealed a disturbing surge in personnel costs, with expenses ballooning by a staggering 104% compared to 2023, according to the bank's recently released audited financial report.

In a concerning development for Nigerian taxpayers, the bank burned through an astronomical N595.9 billion on personnel expenses—more than double the N291 billion spent the previous year. At the group level, this personnel cost explosion was even more pronounced, jumping from N295.4 billion to a massive N608.5 billion.

The financial report exposes an equally troubling increase in total operating costs, which soared by 78% to reach N1.2 trillion, up from N673.4 trillion in 2023. Personnel costs alone devoured nearly half (49.7%) of the bank's entire operating budget, raising serious questions about fiscal responsibility and management priorities.

Despite claims of a "bullish performance," the CBN's deepening relationship with the International Monetary Fund raises red flags about Nigeria's growing financial dependence on external institutions. The bank's debt to the IMF has doubled to a concerning N5.07 trillion, while IMF's allocation of special drawing rights ballooned to N8.07 trillion.

More worrying still is the 37% increase in deposits, climbing from N38.23 trillion to N52.4 trillion—a jump that financial experts warn could severely crowd out private sector activity and stifle economic growth.

The CBN's attempts to paint a rosy picture by highlighting "improvements" in external reserves and cost efficiency ring hollow against the backdrop of these runaway expenses. While the bank touts its "strategic financial management," the numbers tell a different story—one of unchecked spending and questionable priorities during a period of economic hardship for ordinary Nigerians.

Even as the bank celebrates its exit from last year's N1.27 trillion loss to a surplus of N165.7 trillion, taxpayers are left wondering: at what cost? With personnel expenses more than doubling and operating costs spiraling upward, the CBN's financial management appears anything but "strategic" or "efficient."​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​