Nigeria is the most populous country in Africa. In fact, it is the most populous black country in the world. As Africa’s largest democracy and one of its largest economies, Nigeria bears considerable weight for the continent. Historically, given its illustrious history, Nigeria has always taken this responsibility seriously. There have been efforts supportive of other African countries. For example, during the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa, Nigeria was a vocal supporter. As the Giant of Africa, Nigeria also bears enormous responsibility for culture and tradition on the African continent. In a world where civilization and modernization are taking over…
Author: Ike Willie-Nwobu
For all its allure as an ancient city celebrated for its commerce and culture, Kano State has often proven it retains one of Nigeria’s darkest underbelly, with undercurrents that have never really been reluctant to flash their fangs. In 2024, as protests glided across the country reducing the promises of renewed hope by president Bola Tinubu to ruins, Kano State provided some of the fiercest flashpoints. The protesters, many of them out-of-school children, street urchins and vagrants, fell upon public property in the state. It was just one instance. In May, an irate mob descended on the Rano Police Division…
Between 2010 and 2015, when Goodluck Jonathan was president of Nigeria, his wife, Patience Jonathan, became somewhat of a public spectacle. Nigerians, long fed up with public officers in the country, seized on her grammatical gaffes, exaggerated them, and made it a point of duty to needle her endlessly. It did not help that her husband’s tenure coincided with a tumultuous period in Nigeria’s history. As First Lady, a position long loathed by Nigerians for the tendency of its occupants to be overbearing and high-handed, she also did not help the conversation around her with the way she put herself…
In the past few days, as part of President Tinubu’s two years anniversary in office, the Federal Capital Territory led by its Minister, Nyesom Wike painted news media red with announcement that the president will commission a handful of landmark projects. The announcement about the commissioning was ostensibly to show that the administration of president Tinubu has not rested on its laurels in two years. On 10th June 2025, the Federal Capital Territory was agog as the president commissioned the renovated Abuja International Conference center. The cost of the renovation was put at 39 billion naira. It was also given…
It has been two years since the baton of government moved from one administration to the other and while two years consisting of 730 days may seem a lot of time in the context of days, it is little time in governance, especially in a country like Nigeria. On May 29, 2023, Bola Ahmed Tinubu replaced Muhammadu Buhari as Nigeria’s sixteenth president. Though the transition was not preceded by the kind of seismic shock that greeted a similar occasion in 2015, it was still a momentous occasion eight years after Nigeria’s democracy showed its dynamism with an astonishing victory for…
The Holy Father, Pope Leo XIV, is a pope who clearly has a soft spot for Nigeria. It will be no surprise if he visits the country within the next one year. Immediately, he was announced elected as the Supreme Pontiff, fact-checkers dug out pictures showing his previous trips and engagements in Nigeria, a country he has visited no less than ten times previously to commune with the Augustinian order to which he belongs. Thus, during his inauguration on May 18, it came as little surprise that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu was invited to attend, an invitation that was graciously…
At a time when Nigerian students are facing increasing pressure from Nigeria’s rising cost of living and slumbering academic standards, the umbrella body of Nigerian students has decided to put on a show of shame unfit for even the gutters of Nigeria’s politics. Nigerian students have repeatedly shown their worth to the Nigerian project. Even in the heydays of military rule, when the dark forces of military dictatorship threatened the nascent foundations of Nigeria’s democracy, Nigerian students, rallying under NANS, were always at hand to defend their country. Their vociferous protests provided the perfect nightmare for many military dictators. With…
The Independent Corrupt Practices Commission, one of Nigeria’s key financial-and economic crimes fighting agency recently went for the jugular of the Nigeria Education Loan Fund(NELFUND) which manages the Nigerian students loan ecosystem established by the Student’s Loan Act of 2024. According to the ICPC, it had uncovered acts of corrupt diversion running into billions of Naira meant for the fund. However, in a robust statement, surely after the ICPC’s revelation generated the kind of furore allegations of mismanagement of public funds do in Nigeria, NELFUND was quick to clarify that no amount of money under its custody had been misappropriated…
Former vice presidential candidate of the People’s Democratic Party, Ifeanyi Okowa, recently jumped ship to the All Progressive Congress, dragging with him Sheriff Oborevwori, the current governor, and a slew of government appointees with them. The move which apparently has everything to do with political survival clearly has little to do with delivering the dividends of democracy to the good people of Delta State. The odium of opportunism Nigerian politicians are adept at taking self-serving opportunities but same cannot be said about them when it comes to taking advantage of countless opportunities to improve the lives of their people. All…
The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammadu Abubakar III, recently described social media as a terrorist organization. The sweeping remarks from one of Nigeria’s most important religious leaders serve up scrutiny on a space that has become as invasive as it is inventive. However, in a country where terrorist organizations are springing up almost daily with terrorists driving communities and families to the edge, to clothe anyone or anything with the cloak of terrorism is not to be taken lightly at all. Free speech and freedom of expression come with a great deal of responsibility. But they are also some of…
Nigerians have known insecurity for most of the past ten years. In rural areas which used to know tranquility and serenity even amidst poverty, insecurity has shattered the atmosphere forever, painting the environment with blood. Two devastating security breaches in Wase and Bokkos Local Government Areas of Plateau State this month alone have demonstrated just how far away from security the country is. In this time, for many families and communities around the country, pain has become the name of the game. Since the late 90s,deadly insecurity has somehow managed to hang on to the coattails of Plateau State. Since…
Dr. Tope Fasua, the special adviser to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on economic affairs, was recently on Channels Television where he made some striking observations. He cast doubt on the data which puts Nigeria’s poor at about 100 million before adding some interesting insights on the Naira to Dollar exchange rate, particularly as it in implies value. The greatest dilemma facing the Tinubu presidency right now is not to be found in the disquisitions or dissertations of his bevy of economists and technocrats. It lies in a simple distillation: that Nigerians are hungry and need to eat. They need food.…
These days, for many Nigerian public office holders, distance is survival, and shrouding their identity is the difference between safety and vulnerability. They veil the plate numbers of their official vehicles whenever they are outside their homes so that Nigerians will not know that they are around or passing; they move from one tinted vehicle to another with carefully orchestrated moves designed to ensure minimum contact with Nigerians who elected them. It begs the question of how much can be private in public service. While many public office holders have maintained the tradition of leaving the plate numbers on their…
Maharazu Tsiga, who was once the Director General of the National Youth Service Corps( NYSC), recently spent fifty-six days in the hands of his abductors. His chilling experience reminds Nigerians that no one is really safe. On February 5, 2025,Maharazu Tsiga who was one time Director-General of the National Youth Service Corps was picked up from his house by bandits. He spent about fifty-six days in the bush as his captors kept his family on edge while launching minatory demands for outrageous amounts of money as ransom. Following his release, he has continued to share his experience with the media,…
The heinous crimes perpetrated against sixteen hunters in Uromi Edo State on March 25 have continued to highlight the massive challenges Nigeria faces in healing the many wounds it has as a country. While there is a near consensus that the hunters who were traveling from Port Harcourt to Edo before a murderous gang of vigilantes mistook them for vultures should never have met such a gruesome end, the conversation especially on social media has fetched out Nigeria’s historical faultlines, fastening them to the national fabric at a time when healing rather than ethnic histrionics should be the headlines. In…
From 1989 to 1993, General Ibrahim Babangida ruled Nigeria as military president with an iron fist. Under the gap-toothed evil genius, many Nigerians, including high-ranking military officers, were executed before they knew what hit them. Despite all his many evils, Babangida had promised to return the country to civil rule. To achieve this, he appointed Professor Humphrey Nwosu as chairman of the National Electoral Commission in 1989. He was to oversee the 1993 presidential elections. To work under a military government is to have a gun pointed at one’s head round the clock. Life under Babangida’s military junta, which had…
An old rivalry was renewed with bloody consequences on Friday when the Nigerian military disrupted a protest by members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria(IMN) in Abuja. About five persons were killed and scores arrested when the protesters clashed with Nigerian soldiers. A security operative was also lost in the skirmish. The group has a history of confrontation with security agents. In 2015, Zaria, Kaduna provided the theatre for a titanic confrontation between members of the movement sect and Nigerian soldiers. Hundreds of its members were killed while its leader, Sheikh Ibrahim Zakzaky was put on trial. The trial ended…
Nigerians are no strangers to hunger. In many ways, the stomach siren has been an existential companion for many Nigerians, especially since the country faltered and frittered away the great promise it showed at independence. It has not always been hunger for food, anyway. There has been a real hunger across Nigeria for good governance, security, dividends of democracy and economic development. This hunger has largely been unmet for many years leading to a catastrophic loss of face for those who have ruled Nigeria and for Nigerian institutions as whole. In the past few years, hunger has taken an even more forceful…
As the crisis in Rivers State swelled to a crescendo, Nigerians waited with bated breath. Nigerians love a theater, especially when it features some of those who have been responsible for their trauma and torture over the years. Thus, when Siminalayi Fubara who had played a prominent part in the administration of Nyesom Wike on his way to becoming governor, reneged on their agreement after he was sworn in, it was good to see on many levels. As both men pulled the state here and there, dragging local government chairmen this way, and legislators that way, it was pleasurable on…
These days, while the Federal Government prefers to distract itself with the excesses of illegality and lawlessness, grave breaches are happening all over the country in places where they used to frequent and in other places where they are breaking new ground. While the federal government dances distractedly on the grave of democracy in Rivers State, residents of some parts of the Benue State are on the run from killers posing as bandits and herdsmen, who are so confident in their ways that they would strike at any time of the day. Strike they did a few days ago when…
A couple of days ago, a corps member, Rita Uguamaye, walked into stormy waters when a video she made went viral. In the video, the corps member serving in Lagos State lamented the rising cost of living in the country. While she decried the fact that she could no longer afford the things she ordinarily should be able to afford, she also had some stern words for President Tinubu. The video unexpectedly went viral. Her revelation that some officials of the corps were calling her to threaten her only added fuel to the fire as Nigerians waded in on whether…
It must be the death of Rev. Fr Sylvester Okechukwu of the Catholic diocese of Kafanchan in Kaduna State that has again restarted conversations about insecurity in Nigeria’s rural areas, where the poor are especially vulnerable. With the administration of US president, Donald Trump stepping in and showing that it is not shy about rolling out a string of sanctions for the killings, the federal government has been forced to step in. While the United States has been forced to step in and brand the killings as targeted at Christians, the Federal Government has been at pains to clarify that…
As challenges in Nigeria have mounted, everything the country holds dear has come under vicious attack. Family life, societal values, communal living, education, national ethics, and indeed everything the country cherishes has been mercilessly scrutinized. Perhaps, as Nigeria has struggled to adjust to the rising dysfunction, nothing has come under more pressure than education. In these days when many people are questioning the value of education, with music artistes, many of whom are dropouts, coining hit songs to further question the place of education, the Nigerian government at different levels have continued to do embarrassingly little to reverse the ugly…
The grouse Nigerians hold against their government has never been limited to the executive arm of government despite the abundance of evidence that it is the most powerful arm of government which usually dictates the direction other arms of government will take. While democracy predicts and prescribes separation of powers and checks and balances as necessary preservatives for democracy, these lines as salutary as they are or promise to be become easily blurred or pale into insignificance, especially when the executive is a bully, which bludgeons other arms of government into submission. Thus, over the years, as much as Nigerians…
Nigeria’s difficult security situation has put Nigerians into the perpetual yet unenviable positions of looking over their shoulders every hour of the day, from one month to another, all year round. Because hardwired and heavily armed criminals have invaded the country, exposing the fragility of Nigeria’s security architecture and picking off Nigerians at will, Nigerians have been forced to adapt. Sleeping with one eye open and walking on eggshells have become national pastimes. In turn, these have drained the quality of life in the country. While Nigerians in urban areas fear for their lives because of insecurity, the unpalatable situation…
As he served the dually disgraceful roles of accused and judge in considering a recommendation to suspend Senator Natasha Uduaghan-Akpoti from the senate, Godswill Akpabio, Nigeria’s senate president, quipped that she had brought the Senate into public opprobrium. What opprobrium, many Nigerians asked immediately, even before the hammer fell on the fearless Senator representing Kogi Central? As one livid male senator after the other took turns to attack Senator Natasha, the thunder on their faces belied the tremor in their hearts. A tremor caused by the trouble a first-time senator from Kogi State had caused their leader, one who is…
It is always said that great men are made by even greater women. These women come either as wives or mother, or as both, on very rare occasions. Nigeria’s patriarchal prejudices and paternalistic tendencies also make certain to paint the failure of a child as a failure of the mother and cast a man’s failure as that of his wife. With these extremely narrow prisms, everything that happens to a man or boy is cast as a woman’s failure, with the buck ultimately stopping at the woman’s table. This kind of mentality precludes personal responsibility, harms women, and ensures the…
In 1999, a moment to remember came upon like childbirth. After an incomparably awful stretch of military rule which saw Nigeria groan under the iron boots of Ibrahim Babangida and Sani Abacha for thirteen years, Nigeria managed to wriggle free and make a painstaking return to democracy. Led by the 1999 constitution like a compass, the country has been able to stick to that road ever since despite overwhelming odds. It has been twenty-six years now and Africa’s most populous country and economy is not showing any serious signs of wear, telling enough to indicate that a return to military…
Everything that happens at the National Assembly usually generates a lot of attention for Nigerians, and for good reason. Beyond the insularity of the executive And the clear lack of autonomy of the judiciary in Nigeria’s bent and blighted federalism, it is the legislature that is most open to the public. The transparency the legislature maintains as a key feature of legislative autonomy makes it possible for Nigerians to penetrate the assembly occasionally and monitor what goes on there. It has been frankly difficult to monitor given what is served there every now and then as Nigerians have come to see…
Nigeria is in its season of loss—loss of national values and national heroes. But, without a doubt, the loss that will prove the costliest is the loss of its national heroes. Nigerians recently received the news of the death of Pa Ayo Adebanjo and Chief Edwin Clark, two stalwarts of the Nigerian project and exceptionally unwavering believers in the Nigerian dream. Nigeria mourns indeed. Shortly before Pa Adebanjo and Chief Clark joined their ancestors, former FCT Minister Jeremiah Timbut Useni quietly slept for one last time, slipping away on 23rd January 2025, many years after he was minister, during which…
