The Northwest state of Zamfara has been plagued by so many challenges in recent times. Several of such challenges were mostly man-made and it appears that there might not be respite for the state any time soon. Zamfara has been a hotbed of bandits and their senseless killings. In February this year, six months after sacking a military base in the area, bandits had reportedly collected at least N40.7 million as protection levy from residents of Mutunji communities in Maru Local Government Area of Zamfara State. A traditional ruler had said 47 villages in Mutunji are under the control of…
Author: Charles Okoh
The journey to the 2023 general elections is lately becoming interesting or do I say daily appearing like a huge joke of sorts. With about a year to go, all we have been talking about is the 2023 elections. Those who have argued that we should have a single term of five or six years, appear more than justified if what we are experiencing now is anything to go by. Governance, for all intents and purposes, is grounded. President Muhammadu Buhari has been distracted by the motley of politicians who have been visiting him to inform him of their desire…
Come May 29, 2023, it would have been eight years of President Muhammadu Buhari. It would have been eight trying years or a mixed grill of the good, the bad and the ugly. To say those years have stretched the people to the very limit of their existence which has left many despondent, disillusioned, crestfallen and in a state of near hopelessness would amount to stating the obvious. What are the facts? It is a fact that Nigerians have been enduring very harsh and debilitating living conditions as of late. Did the problem begin with the present administration? Certainly not,…
Politics has never been for the faint-hearted or those feeding from hand to mouth. This is even more so in Nigeria, where it is an exclusive preserve of the rich. I mean the very rich. For those who are not either multi-millionaires or billionaires, no matter how intelligent or what they stand to offer, they cannot attain that ambition except, of course, they can locate a godfather(s) with very deep pockets to bankroll it at a cost that leaves little or nothing for real governance when elected. Unlike other climes where you can get support from the rich because of…
Charles Okoh The race to 2023 general elections is gaining momentum and the consensus is that this all-important year may make or mar the growth of the nation. It is hoped that this time, sentiment would take the backstage in deciding who would be spear-heading the affairs of this nation in the next four years. This time, it is expected that the election or choice of who becomes the president of the country or governor of a state would be decided by the electorate employing their brains rather than ceding that critical assignment to their hearts. In 2015, the decision…
By Charles Okoh The rotational system of government which has gained so much currency under this dispensation is a necessary evil given the intricate state of affairs of the nation. It has become so desirable because more and more people and groups are becoming increasingly isolated in the scheme of things in Nigeria. This more than anything else, has given rise to the pockets of agitations and cries of marginalization that have polarized our national polity and national existence in recent times. In fact, the rotational policy especially since 1999 became the only way out after the debacle that…
How many more Nigerians would be killed before we finally put a stop to this mindless wanton destruction of lives and property that has plagued the nation? Daily killing of Nigerians has become a part of our lives. Before now, we read of killings in the Middle East and in the Sahel regions and it was like it will never be our portion, but today we are regularly red-flagged as one of the nations with advisories to be avoided as unsafe and dangerous places to be. The damage this does to this nation is unimaginable. Nigeria may not be the…
Come May 29 2023, Nigeria would have had a new president. We should be looking forward to a fresh start or reset, if you like. Reset because a lot of things have gone wrong with the nation and we have no one but ourselves to blame for this. We have allowed sentiments to cloud our sense of reasoning and this has come at a very great cost to us. Prior to 2015, we all knew what had gone wrong with us, we all knew that there was need to build on the little gains, if any, we have had since…
Finally, Prof. Charles Chukwuma Soludo was last Thursday sworn in as governor of Anambra State, after his victory at the poll in November 2021. Anambra remains one of the luckiest states in the South East, having enjoyed a string of successful leadership since the beginning of the fourth republic. Therefore, with the coming of Soludo, it is expected that his tenure will only further raise the bar and the state will be better for it. Early indications that Soludo meant business was the inauguration in January of a transition committee, which, according to him, restated his vision and manifesto for…
Lagos, the centre of excellence, is grappling with a lot of infrastructural problems stretching it to the very limits with the daily influx of people in the state to seek for the much-touted greener pastures. Lagos, which is the largest city in Nigeria and the second most populous city in Africa, has more than enough trouble for any administrator. According to worldpopulationreview.com, the Lagos State Government estimates the population of Lagos at 17.5 million, although this number has been disputed by the Nigerian Government and found to be unreliable by the National Population Commission of Nigeria, which put the population at…
It is paradoxical that while the nation’s educational institutions are deliberately allowed to decay and degenerate to such a level that the products of the schools cannot compete with their counterparts from even the neighbouring countries, those charged with the responsibilities of fixing these anomalies are excused to send their children to private institutions or send them to schools abroad. This is not a matter of whether it is a constitutional right or not that such political appointees are free to seek the best of education for their children in whichever country that catches their fancy. There is also a…
Perhaps, the greatest drawback to the nation’s march to economic and political prosperity can be blamed to a very large extent on the enormous powers which the state governors wield. They have held this nation back because they have too much power that when aggregated you cannot but wonder if they do not really have more powers than the president. They have used this power often to arm-twist, sometimes blackmailing the president into granting their every wish. In June 2010, Nigeria’s state governors voiced opposition to having a sovereign wealth fund manage the country’s oil wealth. Then Finance Minister Olusegun…
The Minister of Interior and erstwhile governor of Osun State, Rauf Aregbesola, is on the loose and prancing around like a fascist leader. He has also been conducting himself like loose cannon without bounds in a manner that suggests that he would rather have Osun burn than allow the incumbent, Gboyega Oyetola, have a second term. The face-off between the minister and Governor Oyetola is as old as the reign of the incumbent governor. The trend usually is that governors after serving out their tenures would still want to be seen and regarded as the leader of the party in…
For the erstwhile governor of Imo State, Owelle Rochas Okorocha, this is not the best of times. He has since laving office been facing battles on many fronts. His reign as Imo governor twirled around controversies, owing to his proclivity for making controversial policy pronouncements and taking actions that sought essentially to attract media blitz to his over-estimated self-worth. In 2018, a few months to his exit, after over seven years as governor, he unabashedly told the people of the state that acidic rains were responsible for the damage of roads constructed by his regime In Imo State. He had…
The die is cast. The countdown to 2023 has begun. Who would be Nigeria’s next president? Who will succeed Muhammadu Buhari come May 29, 2023. To be sure, the task before the next president would not be a child’s play and will be a herculean and daunting task to surmount. This is clearly because the nation is barely held together by a thread and the way things are now it can snap at the least pressure. The Aso Rock villa is a Mecca of sorts for aspiring presidential hopefuls. Visiting Minna to see the Maradona himself, or if you like…
It is difficult to think of any other society where life is becoming worthless daily and where no premium is placed on life or where its sanctity is not upheld like ours. Ours is a society replete with mindless killings and wanton destruction. There can only be one explanation for the ever-increasing spate of killings: failure by the society to punish offenders and the immediate consequence is that anybody can be killed and nobody is safe. As has been the case in our country, every day we wake up to another spectacle of some mindless and egregious story of killings…
Rice remains a staple food in Nigeria. It’s a mystery how a nation with such a fertile environment and clement climate has almost forever depended on importation of rice to feed its people, thereby depriving us of scarce foreign exchange. Before now, attempts by various governments to return the nation to the farm have remained a mirage as we virtually import everything we eat. Calls for or attempts at diversification of the economy through agriculture have remained only a topic for seminars, symposia and talk shops with several tons of seminal papers decorating various shelves in the country. However, it…
Barely two months ago, November 16 to be precise, the Gernot Rohr-led Super Eagles playing against Cape Verde at the Teslim Balogun Stadium, put up a lackluster performance that summed up his about six years run-of-the-mill outings as coach of Nigeria. Between November and January 11 when the Eagles reduced almighty Egypt to schoolboys footballers, the team had only eight training sessions under interim manager Augustine Eguavoen (aka Cerezo), and the Super Eagles put up a performance that has left a lot of lessons for us to learn from, especially in the area of leadership, that once the leadership is…
Your Excellency, please permit my choice of medium to communicate with you, but it is practically impossible for a commoner, like yours sincerely, to think of any better way of doing this. First, let me wish you a happy new year and pray that the year 2022 will be the year you will take the decision that will not only etch your name in the annals of this nation, but will also cement your new status as an apostle of democracy not only in the country, but also Africa and the world at large. I pray God to give you…
The Nigerian Football Federation has remained a microcosm of the Nigerian malaise. As a subset of all that is bad with the Nigerian nation, the then NFA and now NFF has continued to be a cesspit through which the political class continues to drain the nation. As it is with the NFF so it is with all the sports associations in the states. Merit has always taken the back stage while considerations for appointments are made. For that reason growth has remained stunted in sports because for as long as corruption persists, we shall never get it right. How is…
After the 30 days window within which to act on the Electoral Act Amendment Bill sent by the National Assembly to President Muhammadu Buhari lapsed on December 19, as the lawmakers sent the bill to the President on November 19, the president on December 20, refused to assent to the much anticipated bill. In his 19-paragraph letter to the assembly, President Buhari amongst others hinged his objection on the direct mode of conducting party primary, which is one section of a bill of about 158 sections, for the rejection of the bill. He cited cost, security, financial crimes, existing party…
I must confess that I remain an ardent fan of Governor Rotimi Akeredolu (SAN), of Ondo State. As a two-term governor of Ondo, Governor Akerdolu has proved that his election in office was not a fluke and his second term ticket was only a confirmation that the people of the state are pleased with his stewardship. My first encounter with Akeredolu was not exactly pleasant. At that event during his first attempt at governing the state, which did not materialize eventually, he exhibited such temperament that left me wondering how he hoped to govern a state with such a temper…
Recently, Jurgen Klopp, the manager of Liverpool Football Club came under savage attacks by some Africans from across the continent and the globe for uttering a statement that appeared derogatory and which seems to have played down on the significance and importance of the African Cup of Nations (AFCON). He was quoted to have described the AFCON as a little tournament. A journalist, speaking via video link to Klopp, demanded an apology and believed that Klopp would never say a ‘little tournament in Europe’. He was complaining that by the statement, Klopp was not regarding the tournament as worth the…
The much anticipated White Paper by the Lagos State government was released last Wednesday, November 30, as promised by the Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Sanwo-Olu. Not many had expected, at least not me, anything else. Not with the show of shame by the Federal Government through the Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, even before the due date of the release. This is a nation, especially under the present dispensation of the President Muhammadu Buhari, where denial and conceitedness are the hallmark of government functionaries. A government that is living a lie, populated by blackmailers, who bullied and undermined the…
The November 6, 2021 Anambra governorship election has been won and lost. There were so many uncertainties around the election. There were many questions if the poll will be or not. There were also worries if the election will be crisis and conflict-free. However, to the joy of all who insist, pray and hope that elections should never be do or die, or that elections must not be seen as a war where lives are lost, its outcome was a welcome relief. Thankfully, it went well and left many heaving sighs of relief that indeed, it was not only conflict-free…
No matter how far falsehood travels; the truth must always catch up with it. Everybody, that should be telling Nigerians who gave them the mandate they exercise, lied concerning the issues before, during and after the unfortunate development on October 20, 2020, at the Lekki Toll Gate, when defenceless Nigerian youths were shamelessly mowed by wicked uniformed personnel of the Nigerian Army and the Police. Since then, there have been tons and tons of lies to mask the truth, but the truth cannot be buried forever. The Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, who before then enjoyed tremendous goodwill among Nigerian…
Sheikh Ahmad Abubakar Gumi is an Islamic cleric, scholar and former military officer with the rank of captain in the Nigeria Army. He served in the Nigerian Army Medical Corp (NAMC) as a medical officer. He is by no means a riff-raff or an irritating semi-literate cleric who barely understands the implications of what he says, preaches or does. He is well-connected and has links within and outside of government. Ignore him at your own peril. There can be only one explanation for the longevity of his devil-may-care outbursts and reckless utterances on issues threatening to destroy the nation. He speaks…
It is difficult to fathom whose interest Governor Simon Lalong of Plateau State, is out to serve. Governor Lalong for some inexplicable reasons has chosen to look away while the once peaceful state has been turned into a huge killing field. Lalong’s personal ambition, it seems, has left him satisfied with the albatross he carries around in the name of being the chairman of the Northern States’ Governors Forum and his desire not to upset the presidency, even in the face of a clear threat to exterminate the people of the state. June 2018, over 100 people were killed in…
Corruption is the single reason Nigeria has remained underdeveloped. Corruption has eaten so deep into the fabric of the nation, so much so that it has become a threat to the very existence of the nation. Talking about corruption is almost like wasting precious time on an issue that has come to stay and not in any hurry to leave. Everywhere you turn, the story is the same. Sometime in May 2016, the Prime Minister of Britain, David Cameron, described Nigeria and Afghanistan as “fantastically corrupt” in a conversation with the Queen. Cameron had said, “We’ve got some leaders of…
Last Tuesday, the upper chamber of the National Assembly gave Nigerians what would perhaps end up as one of the greatest achievements of the 9th National Assembly. This is more so given the fact that there has never been any dispute as to the real cause of the nation’s comatose state other than the failure of governance. Nigeria is a nation that cannot be ignored or glossed over in the comity of nations. We have all that is required to rise to the level of playing in the big leagues of the first world countries; we have the human…
