Category: Leaders

Sometimes when you hear certain things about Nigeria’s public tertiary institutions, you cannot help but weep for this country. You just keep asking yourself how things got so degenerated and why helps seem far away. That was exactly the anguish I suffered reading the story of the Dean, Faculty of Engineering, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Prof Emeka Obe, and his… Read More

Three years ago, it was a war spiced with condiments and paste over a dish of grain. Nigeria’s Information Minister Lai Mohammed was answering a question by CNN’s Richard Quest about who makes the tastiest jollof rice in West Africa.  But Mohammed heard the question wrong. He thought Quest’s question was about the origin of jollof rice and answered Senegal. The… Read More

While efforts are being made to save the life of a 22-year-old Muslim singer, Yahaya Aminu-Sharif, who was sentenced to death for blasphemy, the world should not forget Umar Farouq. The international community should pressure the governor of Kano state, Abdullahi Ganduje, to free this 13-year-old boy from prison because he committed no crime. Like Aminu-Sharif, Farouk was accused of… Read More

I met a young Nigerian the other day at the gym dripping with passion about Biafra. Oh wait, let me take that back. I met a young Biafran. I had to rephrase that statement out of respect for my friend who would rather identify as a Biafran and liked to be addressed as such. Few months ago, Chinedu and I… Read More

Sixteen years ago, many assumed that building a road from Gashua to Yusufari in northern Yobe state was an impossibility. There are 31-kilometres in between the two towns. The idea of impossibility was born out experiences of traveling on that desert and dusty path, with vehicles and people, often moving, as if on a wild guess or a game of… Read More

Major General Muhammadu Buhari has again resurrected the National Water Resources Bill that was overwhelmingly rejected by Nigerians in 2018. Renamed National Water Bill 2020, the National Assembly in collusion with Buhari has referred the bill to a “committee of the whole” for third reading and passage. As expected, the bill was vehemently attacked by prominent Nigerians including Nobel Laureate… Read More

The former Aviation Minister, Femi Fani-Kayode (FFK), could be described as a glorified social critic, who thinks that the rest of us owe him the entitlement of national recognition. In a nation where big executive fools comport themselves as gods and demi-gods, nothing less is expected from the Fani-Kayodes of this world in their pompous haughty heights. Nigeria presents an international image of… Read More

When God sees your motives and sincerity, he elevates you beyond the ordinary. A man’s character is his fate. Thomas H Jefferson, the third president of the United States of America(US) said, “nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.” People self-sabotage… Read More

The Nigerian health sector is underfunded. While this is no new development, the COVID-19 pandemic brought this to the fore once again. In a previous article, I observed that the allocation to the health sector in the past five years had averaged less than five per cent of total budgetary allocation in flagrant disobedience to the 2001 Abuja declaration made… Read More

Of late, former Aviation Minister, Femi Fani-Kayode, has come under heavy media flogging from various persons, journalism unions and top columnists, condemning his attitude towards a Daily Trust journalist, Eyo Charles, during a press conference. Without attempting to belabour the issue, I wish to recall how the incident happened as well as the attendant media backlash. First, it is instructive… Read More