It is no longer news that lately, publicity secretaries and spokespersons in government offices have made the innocent/well intentioned position become platforms for fierce political and ideological warfare in ways that negates our rationality as human beings. It is equally regrettable that through this process, a great amount of innocent human character has been spilled, wars of words waged, countless souls/ambition persecuted and martyred. Spokespersons have in recent times failed to communicate noble ideas and ideals. This consequence of their failures is responsible for why communication from public officials/offices are ‘self-undermining and often always reputed for encouraging complacency among citizens…
Author: JEROME-MARIO UTOMI
The latest media report that the Nigerian Senate passed a bill that would empower an association of real estate companies to not only regulate its members but also regulate its competitors and others in the industry naturally reminds Nigerians with critical minds of an existing research report carried out by Sydney Finkelstein, a Steven Roth Professor of management at the Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College, United States of America. The research in question was carried out to unravel why leaders make bad decisions. It among other things noted, that the presence of inappropriate self-interest, distorting attachments and the presence…
Among so many bills recently passed or still working on by the nation’s Senate in the ongoing constitution amendment, this piece is particularly struck by the passage of the Local Government financial, administrative autonomy bill which among other provisions seeks that each local government council to creates and maintain its own special account to be called Local Government Allocation Account into which all the allocations will be paid. Aside from seeking to grant full financial and administrative autonomy to local governments, the bills seek to amend the Constitution to repeal the state joint local government account and provide for a…
As the Global community on Tuesday March 22, 2023, celebrate the World Water Day with the theme; ‘Groundwater: Making The Invisible Visible’, the world has a again come to agreement that one of the essential elements of earth, water is the prime necessity of life; that all living animals and plants cease to exist without it. Hence, the proverb says, “Water is life”. However, while the world celebrates, it is by no means a pleasant story/narrative that after months of calls by residents, good spirited Nigerians, development professionals and media professionals, on Lagos state government to address the protracted water…
Regardless of recent onslaughts recorded against the rights of Nigerian women in Nigeria, with the most painful example being the lawmakers in both Senate and House of Representatives rejection of bills which sought to grant special seats for women in the legislature and 35 percent party leadership during the voting on 68 amendments, recommended in the report recently submitted by the Special Ad Hoc Committees on the Review of the 1999 Constitution, Senator (Dr) Ifeanyi Okowa, the Executive Governor of Delta state has however, shown that there exist ray of political and socioeconomic hope for Nigerian women particularly widows in…
For so many centuries, war was considered a lawful violence so far it meets with these three conditions; ‘waged by the lawful public authority in defense of the common good, waged for a just cause, and waged with the right intention, not vengefully nor to inflict harm’. Today, the argument does not hold water and faces a number of embarrassing facts. In fact, emphasis is shifting. Strategic insights from religious and global communities have brought about structural changes in such concept and gradual displacements of this long held view about war. While those with religious inclinations argue that war fare…
Going by Newtonian mechanics, centripetal force is the inward force required to keep an object moving with a constant speed in a circular part. it is a force that makes a body follow a curved path and a direction that is always orthogonal to the motion of the body and towards the fixed point of the instantaneous center of curvature of the path. Centrifugal force on its part is a direct opposite. It is an inertial force that appears to act on all objects when viewed in a rotating frame of reference and directs its way from an axis which…
It is no longer in doubt that the President Muhammadu Buhari led Federal Government has become reputed for clarifying problems without proffering solution, What is however worrying is that their (FG) persistent inabilities to promptly respond to the socioeconomic need of Nigerians has adversely turned public affair commentators, development professional and public policy watchers’ to a bunch that keep repeating one topic. This fact recently played out at a lecture in Lagos delivered by the President of African Development Bank, AfDB, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, Speaking on the lecture, titled, “Nigeria – A Country of Many Nations: A Quest for National…
Back in the days, as an undergraduate interested in nation-building and enthronement of true political leadership in Nigeria; I cherished two leadership recruitment quotes. The first is from the United States of America born Jim Collins, a very strong human resource development expert and the other, from Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli, an Italian diplomat, author, philosopher and historian who lived during the Renaissance and best known for his political treatise, “The Prince”, written in about 1513 but not published until 1532. While Jim Collins believes that the first responsibility of a great leader is to find the right people…
Among many other comments in the recent past, I heard some say that across the globe, funding education now comes with a crushing weight that government alone can no longer bear. To this group, it calls for private public-private partnership and support from good spirited individuals to the rescue. Within this span, I have equally read an argument that our educational system is faulty just like every educational system is faulty. The United State Educational system they added is faulty, if there is no fault in any system, then, there is no improvement. They concluded that what we call fault…
In recent times, precisely in the last one year, many events birthed in response to the various challenges plaguing the people of the Niger Delta region, and aimed at ensuring that the people of the region benefit maximally from their wealth, through promoting infrastructural developments, environmental remediation and local content development has taken place. Take as an illustration, the Petroleum Industry Bill or PIB which had been under review in the National Assembly for nearly two decades, beset by disagreements, including over how much revenue should go to local communities in oil-producing regions was finally in 2021, passed and signed…
I believe that when plundering and debilitating hands of the military are removed from governance and the country’s infrastructure, educational and health systems are reconstructed, Nigeria will enjoy a boom of creativity and productivity -Mr. Ola Vincent, Former CBN Governor, . Prior to May 1999, when democracy re-emerged on the political surface called Nigeria, there existed so many reasons why Nigerians yearned for, and preferred democratic system of government to the military regime. First, .many believed that in democratic governments, political leaders will be elected as against military regimes where members of the administration are not elected. To others, in…
Even though previous opinion articles, commentaries and interventions by this author favored/supported policies and decisions of the Delta state Government, it will however, for reasons, be considered very logical, rational and practical to say that the same state government will definitely feel hesitant as to why they should read this present piece. Or accept the content of solution it proffers as beneficial and helpful to the real development in the state education sector as the piece stoutly opposes the state government’s inconsiderate decision, and describes as ill-timed, the recent hikes in students’ fees in virtually all the state owned institutions…
The Nigerian’s version of democracy shares common features with the human brain and immune system. The two in my views had something important in common. First, medical professionals believe that neither the brain nor immune system is fully formed at birth, but continues to develop rapidly during infancy. Humans have the longest extended period of infancy of any creature in nature- with profound implication/ tendency for absorbing vast amounts of culture, tradition and belief into the operating system of our brains. Likewise, democracy in Nigeria has recorded over two decades of unbroken practice, yet, like the brain and human immune…
Ika nation, going by information available at Wikipedia, world information engine, is a recognized tribe that is found in both Delta State and Edo State- and share similarities between the Igbo and the Benin but are a recognized tribe on their own. While the above is validly true and important, it is however, important to underline that the historical account of the Ika Land is not the objective of this piece. This piece was inspired by two separate but related events that recently offered a roadmap for restoring the educational and cultural health and vitality of Ndi- Ika and proposed…
Aside from the painful fact that public offices in Nigeria erroneously view their positions as an opportunity for private gain/personal enrichment instead of an avenue for public good, there exist in my view, two other constraints that explain why Nigeria’s democratic experience remained nascent, socioeconomically stunted and devoid of democracy dividends after over two decades of unbroken practice. The first and very fundamental has to do with the fact that public office seekers/holders are usually laced with set vision/agendas which are at odds with the general inspirations and motivations of the citizens. And even when such visions are in consonance…
If there is any comment in recent times that reminds Nigerians that they are still victims of broken promises and blasted hope, as well as points how off-track the Federal Government’s poor electricity/power roadmap has taken Nigerians, it is the declaration by Olorogun David Edevbie, a frontline aspirant for the ticket of the Peoples Democratic Party ahead of the 2023 Delta State Governorship election, that the nation Nigeria still operate old-schooled and out-fashioned electricity regime/system we inherited from the colonial masters. Speaking at the Delta NUJ Council Television platform, Meeting Point, Edevbie going by media reports pointed out that without…
There are two recent exciting events in the country that provided side light to this particular piece. Fortunately also, both are education sector-specific. First, the recent in Abuja while receiving members of the Nigeria Inter-Religious Council (NIREC) led by the Co-Chairs, the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar, and the President of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Revd. (Dr.) Samson Olasupo Ayokunle.In that meeting,Mr President Muhammadu Buhari among other things stated that that the Federal Government remains committed to honouring promises made to the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) to prevent disruptive strikes, engender uninterrupted academic programmes and…
At the run-up to the general elections in March 2015, President Muhammadu Buhari campaigned on the platform of addressing the challenges of security, the economy, power, and infrastructure and fighting corruption, Nigerians on their part, concluded but hastily that the coming of President Buhari would sincerely announce the arrival of a brand new great nation where peace, love security and development shall reign supreme. Nigerians were particularly happy when Mr. President underlined that, removing the cancer of corruption from the system is the key not only to restoring the moral health of the nation, but also to freeing our enormous…
I read with much relief two expositions on the electricity crisis in Nigeria. And I must confess that any interested observer of the critical appraisal of the issue will agree that those submissions were factual and patriotically expressed. While the first came from a reader who reacted to my initial intervention ‘Still on Nigeria’s Electricity Crisis’, the other and very revealing submission came from the government quarters-the Delta State Commissioner for Energy, Engr. Jonathan Ukodhiko. Beginning with the first, it reads; the manifest failure of the poorly executed power sector privatization by the discredited Jonathan administration is a pointer to…
Similar to History which according to historians, is an unending dialogue between the present and the past through a continuous process of interaction between the historian and his facts to assist the anxious enquirer improve the present and future based on a clearer understanding of the mistakes and achievements of the past, the conversion on electricity power supply challenge in the country has like history, become neither unending nor abating. Essentially, the first half of this recurring circle was captured recently in my piece titled FG’s Assurance on Generation of 25,000MW Electricity, as it explains why Nigerians are no longer…
History does matter and has shown clearly that ordinary calculation can be upturned by extraordinary personalities. Working under this assumption, it will not be considered an overstatement to conclude that the People Democratic Party (PDP), is set to upturn the present political calculation in Nigeria. For the sake of clarity, it is important to underline that the above assertion is not anchored on, or a function of the below average performance of the current Federal Government which daily manifests in areas such as; ‘continued state of insecurity in the country, the persistent and ceaseless flow of Nigerians blood on a…
The debate on the interrelatedness of equity, justice; peace and development is among the most presently discussed topics on the surface of the earth. The reason for this unending debate stems from the time-honored belief that without equity and justice, there will be no peace. And without peace, no society, group or nation should contemplate development. For Nigeria to achieve the above feat there exists the need to think over the marriage of two unwilling brides who had no say in their forced and ill-fated union- amalgamation of the northern and the southern protectorates on the 14th February 1914, by…
It was Orji Uzor Kalu, former Governor of Abia state and presently, Chief Whip of the Nigerian Senate, that at a time stated thus; a good businessman sees where others don’t see. What I see, you may not see. You cannot see because that is the secret of the business… the entire world is a big market waiting for anybody who knows the rules of the game. The above thought came flooding recently not necessarily because Nigeria and Nigerians are at present witnessing politicians queue behind each other to declare/express interest in the nation’s 2023 presidency. Rather, it stemmed from…
It is a common knowledge that President Muhammadu Buhari during an exclusive interview with Channels Television, reportedly made the following remarks; that state police is not an option for the nation. “Find out the relationship between local government and the Governors. Are the third tiers of government getting what they are supposed to get constitutionally? Are they getting it? Let the people in the local government tell you the truth, the fight between local governments and the Governor.” The role of traditional rulers must not be undermined, because in their areas they know who is who, even by families, not…
Understandably, the major factor, says a report, that daily abbreviates the seriousness with which communication from public officials/offices are taken by the people is that generality of such information often makes the grade of ‘self-undermining’. They are recurrently reputed for encouraging complacency as constituents perceive issues raised by the government as already being handled or the priority often always not in conformity with the will/opinion of the people on the action later taken. As expected, similar feelings greeted the recent reassurance by The Minister of Power, Mr Mua’azu Sambo, that the federal government is ready to generate 25,000 megawatts of…
The bitter truth is that presently, no nation best typifies a country in dire need of peace and social cohesion among her various sociopolitical groups than Nigeria. Over the years, myriads of sociopolitical contradictions have conspired directly and indirectly to give the unenviable tag of a country in constant search of social harmony, justice, equity, equality, and peace. In view of this fact, particularly as it is said that once the boundaries of the brain is adjusted by new knowledge, it will never regain its original shape, as we begin the year 2022, there are important actions/steps that the nation…
For Nigerians that have their thinking divided between the present and the future, with part of it dedicated to finding solution to current nagging challenges in the country, and the other, concerned with what becomes the future of the country, if the present administration fails to get its leadership priorities right, President Muhammadu Buhari’s Christmas and New year messages to Nigerians were received with mixed feelings. Essentially, there is no doubt that the country recently made some political and socioeconomic progress. But looking at the Federal Government performance in the out-gone 2021, it becomes evident in my view, that Mr.…
There are clear thinkers, muddled thinkers and people that fall in between. Clear thinkers – the ones that can cull everything down into the right points-are very hard to find. But if you get yourself a team of clear thinkers, the possibilities are endless. These are men who see tomorrow, trailblazers and high level executives, but most often misunderstood by some fellow countrymen still stuck in the old normal of yesterday. Without any shadow of the doubt, Samuel Loraer Ortom, the incumbent Executive Governor of Benue state, and the only PDP Governor in the North Central Geopolitical Zone of the…
Torrent of criticism/knocks from good spirited Nigerians has trailed the bogus budget proposition of N305 billion for the 2023 general elections by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) recently submitted to the National Assembly. It is equally not surprising to see some supporters of the government argue that in a democracy, government agencies and commissions such as INEC are at liberty to take or discard advice and public opinion as public opinion does not always provide clear-cut policy guidance. It is also not impossible to see in the coming days, Nigerians who will advocate that even in situations where public…
