More than ever, the president now needs to inspire
Judging from the way he talks, gestures and ruminates, sometimes angrily and at other times dismissively, President Goodluck Jonathan often gives the impression his pressing problems should be laid at...
View ArticleState of emergency superfluous
It requires a huge dose of optimism to trust President Goodluck Jonathan’s instinct in declaring a state of emergency in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa States. I confess I do not have such an endowment, and I...
View ArticleAmaechi and the NGF: An election so disgraceful, so contemptible
If anything indicates very starkly the hard temper of Nigerian democracy, last Friday’s election of chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) showed why and how. A day to the election, indeed...
View ArticleDetails of emergency proclamation deepen anguish
Riding on the crest of a wave of popular approbation on the declaration of emergency, President Goodluck Jonathan is all the more convinced that he took the right step in his effort to pacify the...
View ArticleThe deductive death of Boko Haram’s Shekau
Just before it yielded command to a new army division expected to take over its functions in the Northeast, the Joint Task Force (JTF), which has been combating terrorism in the region, announced to a...
View ArticleAPC and 2015: PDP is truly exhausted
As the months grind on towards the 2015 general elections, the true nature and character of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) will begin to unfold. I expect the party to endure, of course, and if...
View ArticleWe’ll miss Ngige/Soludo showdown
In spite of the regrettable back and forth over the selection of the APC candidate for November’s Anambra governorship poll, I had hoped for the sake of Anambra State and the good of Nigerian politics...
View ArticleKidnappers and the demolition policy
It is not clear what logic is behind the thinking that demolishing kidnappers’ properties would be an effective deterrent to kidnapping. But whether it is a deterrent or not, a few states have...
View ArticleSense and nonsense in Taraba
Governor Danbaba Suntai was obviously in pains as he disembarked from the aircraft that brought him back to Nigeria last Sunday. He is doubtless still recuperating, perhaps agonisingly slowly, from the...
View ArticleIwu’s troubled conscience
There is no indication Maurice Iwu, former chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), will read this piece. He says that having learnt from former President Olusegun Obasanjo the...
View ArticlePDP crisis: No room for neutrality
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has not yet imploded; but it could do so in the coming months if the cracks in the party are further widened by insensitivity and mismanagement. As a few of its...
View ArticleArming ‘Civilian JTF’? Nothing can be sillier
If not checked on time, the silly campaign to arm the ragtag militia formed by young, unarmed civilians in the Northeast to fight the Boko Haram Islamic sect could reach a crescendo and even persuade...
View ArticleJonathan goes for broke
Last Wednesday, President Goodluck Jonathan suddenly and unexpectedly axed nine of his ministers, all of whom, it appeared, were appointed through those now ranged against him in political battle. It...
View ArticleIt turns out CP Mbu is actually governor of Rivers
Since the officious Rivers State police commissioner, Mbu Joseph Mbu, began to lend himself for political uses, neither he nor victims of his insubordination have slept peacefully. His career seems...
View ArticleASUU: A most irresponsible Fed Govt argument
UNTIL a few days ago, the federal government had done fairly well sustaining its unthinking indifference to the plight of tertiary education in the country and the ongoing Academic Staff Union of...
View ArticleAkpabio’s prayers
Fresh from his pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and still overwhelmed by what he saw in the Holy Land, Governor Godswill Akpabio of Akwa Ibom State has called for a day to be set aside as the National Day of...
View ArticleSalami: Injustice carved in stone
On October 15, Justice Isa Ayo Salami retired from the Appeal Court as its fifth president, thus finally bringing to a close what many describe as the most infamous case of injustice perpetrated by the...
View ArticleOduahgate: Beyond sophistry
Given the combativeness with which the House of Representatives Committee on Aviation began its probe of the overpriced bulletproof cars bought by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) early...
View ArticleOsun, sukuk (Islamic bond) and relentless critics
The plan by Osun to issue N10bn Islamic bond called sukuk has predictably come under fire from Christians in the state and, as expected, the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). By some global...
View ArticleG-7 governors, the police and Jonathan presidency
Last Sunday, the Divisional Police Officer (DPO) of Asokoro Police Station, Abuja, CSP Nnanna Amah, disrupted a meeting of the G-7 governors holding at the Kano State Governor’s Lodge in Abuja. He...
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