Nigerians in an online poll conducted by SaharaReporters have rated President Muhammadu Buhari’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic as ‘poor’. Buhari has in recent weeks come under increasing criticism for his handling of nationwide lockdowns, decision on inter-state movement, palliatives and more. Of the 15,100 respondents on Twitter, 75 per cent stated that he had done a poor job in… Read More

Chinua Achebe, in Things Fall Apart, tells a story of Okonkwo, the main character, who was banished from his village of Umuofia for accidentally shooting a young man. When it was time for Okonkwo to return, after seven years in exile, he instructs his wives and children to prepare a huge feast for his mother’s kinsmen in a gesture to… Read More

We Africans at home and in the diaspora quite recently had to react with righteous indignation at the effrontery of two French doctors, who on TV in France, suggested that a possible vaccine for COVID-19 be tested in Africa on Africans.  The reaction was immediate; it was strong and unanimous from the world of the black peoples from around the… Read More

The Kanem-Borno Empire is one of the ancient empires on the African continent. As far back as the 10th century AD, it got to the zenith and was an extremely prosperous city which attracted traders and tourists to its city walls. The reigns of Mai Idris Alooma, Mohammed El-Kanemi took the empire to its apotheosis as wealth untold poured into her.… Read More

I must confess to having been once possessed of the intellectual indolence required to embrace the asinine belief, that Nigeria’s problems, and more particularly, my interests as a “Yoruba” man, would be resolved by a breakup of the “Nigerian federation”. I was ideologically committed to the creation of a Yoruba nation, and at a minimum, I was happy to accept… Read More

The COVID-19 pandemic has reshaped the entire world – the future of everything and the world of work, but perhaps the most visible effect of this disruption is most felt in the financial services sector, the markets and the global economy. In this regard, the banking sector is one of the most gravely impacted. It would be useful to reflect… Read More

In my last piece under the headline: Merchants Of Nation, I encapsulated our troubles in the hands of money mongers who masquerade as leaders. People whose motive in bending over to ameliorate the challenges of the vulnerable members of our society must come at a price. Everywhere you turn, their grandiloquence stares you in the face. They litter the entire… Read More

Three things are happening in quick succession. The Organised Private Sector including but not limited to Nigerian Employers’ Consultative Association and the Lagos Chambers of Commerce and Industries,  the fledging big business Assembly in Lagos,  the commercial nerve centre of Nigeria ,jointly and severally opposed the proposal for fresh total lockdown in Lagos State in particular and Nigeria in general.The… Read More

Nigeria has always been an interesting case. It’s the richly endowed country that is also home to some of the world’s poorest . It is where sprawling mansions exist in close proximity to slums. For some unexplainable reason, we have struggled to transform the mineral and human endowment into a better quality of life for all Nigerians. Inequality has been a permanent feature of our nation, the rich-poor divide being one of the… Read More