To say the least,the attitude of our courts in cases bordering round party membership have been far from satisfactory since the new Electoral Act came into being on 25th February 2022.They appear totally oblivious of the fact this is a new law and court cases springing up in the first electoral cycle will form precedence.Courts have made very controversial decisions with regards to the mandatory and explicitly clear requirements of the Act that a party maintains a register of its members and that the register be presented to the Independent National Electoral Commission at least 30 days before the party…
Author: Umar Sa'ad Hassan
The Minister of State for Police Affairs,Imaan Suleiman Ibrahim on Monday at a 2-day retreat at the Ministry said the police high command will execute President Tinubu’s directive for the withdrawal of all policemen on VIP special duties.No one will be blamed for taking his statement with a pinch of salt because that is not the first time Nigerians have been promised such.Muhammadu Buhari shortly after being sworn-in as President in 2015 issued the same directive which was never really complied with. Three years later the AIG of the Zone 5 Police command in Benin,Rasheed Akintunde was in the news…
“Don’t doubt me,I go bring home grammy” These were the words of Abolore Adegbola Akande better known as 9ice. Any avid lover of Nigerian music when 9ice recorded Street Credibility with 2face Idibia would agree there was really nothing special about these lines because just about every one of his peers was promising or aspiring to a Grammy in their own words.It was so coveted a prize the wins of ‘Foreign Nigerians’; Seal and Sade Adu were celebrated as ours.We rooted hard and were heart-broken each of the 4 times Femi Kuti was nominated and lost in the World Music Category.…
Soon after the 2011 general elections which the PDP won by a landslide,Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu was in the media calling on all opposition parties to form a mega party.By 2013 he had reached out to every component of what is today known as the APC and sold to them the idea of a coalition that would produce the most popular opposition figure and perennial contestant; Muhammadu Buhari as presidential candidate.That singular move cemented his status as one of the greatest politicians in the history of this country and not a few of those that voted him into power in…
President-Elect Tinubu and his people started preparing for the 2023 elections just months after President Buhari was sworn-in for a second term in 2019.He was choosing allies,building bridges and assessing strengths and weaknesses before most of the candidates had even made up their minds to contest.That speaks volumes of the man’s ability to prepare adequately for a task.That quality along with how President Buhari made a mess of the National Assembly Leadership elections in his first tenure by sitting idly and refusing to choose a path early for his party by rooting for the candidates he felt he would work…
I remember the only time i had ever seen deposed Emir Sanusi Lamido Sanusi in person.I had just discovered a mechanic in April 2017 who told me of a work-around i had never before heard of to elevate the rear of my car. The whole process cost just a fraction of what i would have ordinarily spent and i was ecstatic. I left the car with him and couldn’t wait because i had some where else to go so i boarded a tricycle.I didn’t notice anything special happening along the Murtala Mohammed Jumaat Mosque Road in Hausawa,Kano though they actually…
The growth of social media has succeeded in making the world a much smaller place but that hasn’t at all meant a good thing through and through.An easy point of reference is the conventional media.Following a number of sensational victories at elections by opposition candidates that have enjoyed massive support from the online community in Africa,the foreign media has grown lazy and instead of analyzing forthcoming elections on the continent based on concrete on-ground reports,they are doing so based on online polls.It is imperative these lot stick to their figures on internet accessibility in Africa and let that serve as…
If there is anything the indictment of suspended NPA boss,Hadiza Bala Usman by the panel set up to investigate her for failing to remit N165bn into government coffers has highlighted,it is the need for Nigerians to rigourously pursue a government that will go about recovering the humongous sums looted under the Buhari administration.Nigeria has effectively been reduced to a borrowing country over the last 7 years not by a government providing massive infrastructural development but by one that plunders what it brings home content in the fact that it can always go and borrow more. The revelation by Rotimi Amaechi,the…
Removal of fuel subsidy has become the Buhari administration’s way of announcing an impending increase in fuel price. Before coming into office,his official position regarding subsidy was made categorically clear when he said- “Whoever says he is subsidizing fuel is a fraud”. Buhari himself is calling Buhari a fraud. When the news was all over the place days ago that there would be a N5,000 transport allowance for the poorest Nigerians next year; the same class of Nigerians that were promised the same amount every month by this same administration, it was obvious we were looking at a huge ‘subsidy…
No one right now is deceiving themself President Muhammadu Buhari is an anti-corruption crusader and man of integrity. Even his minions find other ways of defending him without it having to come down to that. There is simply no way to justify the fact that cronies who have stashed away trillions of our money that he has had to sack perhaps because he had no other choice are walking around free enjoying their loot. In a half-sane clime, the President would bend over backward if not for anything the optics of endlessly borrowing billions of dollars overseas every few months,…
From as ‘early’ as 6 months after the death of immediate past Chief of Defense Staff, Air Chief Marshal Alex Badeh it was obvious something wasn’t right and this is the 3rd time in 2 years I am writing to ask this question-‘WHO REALLY KILLED ALEX BADEH & WHY ARE HIS ALLEGED KILLERS NOT IN COURT?. Whether or not Badeh was murdered to prevent him from disclosing the alleged shady dealings of Current Chief of Army Staff, Gen.Tukur Buratai who before becoming COAS had already bought 2 houses in Dubai while Jonathan was President or whether or not he was…
“Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it”-George Santayana The killing of notorious Benue bandit, Terwase Akwaza alias Gana hasn’t drawn much sympathy.No one expected it to. However, an article in last Saturday’s Vanguard Newspaper which quoted sources as saying he told his foot soldiers to stay in the forest and avenge him if he is killed further justifies the one fear most people had when details of how he died became public; the fear of having to deal with another Boko haram situation. The military is saying it won’t expantiate on its position that…
Famed journalist, Dele Momodu told The Punch in an interview published in Sunday’s edition of the paper, that Nigeria’s foreign policy was at its weakest ever and that President Buhari needs to practice diplomacy of reciprocity otherwise countries will exploit that weakness. Foreign policy in a few words is the sum total of measures put in place by a nation to promote and safeguard its interests in interactions with other nations. To put it very simply, Nigeria has no foreign policy under Buhari. It just lives every day as it comes. Urging Buhari to employ diplomacy of reciprocity against nations…
It was disheartening to read the Minister of Power Resources’ carefully spun narrative on securing a $6.1bn ‘funding’ to improve power supply with the World Bank, the AFDB and JICA named as ‘partners’. They very carefully omitted the word ‘loan’ because of the backlash it would attract and I must say that was a deft touch considering that just a day before, the President’s Special Assistant on New Media, Bashir Ahmad was passing off our polio-free status as a Buhari achievement when in fact the whole of Africa was polio-free for almost a year before Buhari became President. It was…
All the ‘Acting’ MD of the NDDC, Prof. Kemebradikumo Pondei had to do was appear before the House of Representatives’ probe committee and ‘faint’. Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila was waiting in the wings to announce that he will no longer appear before the committee while the public was busy reacting to what happened. It’s a lot like when the Buhari administration ignored several calls to place travel restrictions when coronavirus was forcing far more advanced countries to shut down and he refused. When they were too embarrassed to announce 5 new cases at the same time from the UK and the…
Most people seem to under-estimate how profound the yahoo yahoo problem actually is. Two serving members of the House Of Representatives and a Court Ordained governor of the Federal Republic are said to have quite a reputation in the world of fraud. We already know that one Chika Odionyenma who was on Former Imo State Governor, Emeka Ihedioha’s inauguration committee appeared on FBI’s list of 77 Wanted Nigerian fraudsters and despite Ihedioha’s denial of Odionyenma sponsoring his election, most people think he did along with a host of other wire wire exponents. Internet fraud is not just a crime for…
About a week ago, a video and several photos of armed bandits riding into a town in Katsina surfaced on social media. They not only arrived at a very frightened people who resorted to cheers to escape their wrath, but the bandits also mingled freely; individually in some cases on their motorcycles without any sign of discomposure. What that video and photos prove more than anything else is the extent to which those in rural communities have been abandoned to their fate. There were no reports of any police station being sacked or of any law enforcement agents on patrol…
Over the last 5 days, the football world has been rattled by the allegations of 2 former Eagles’ players, Chinedu Obasi and Taye Taiwo. Both claim there was corruption going on in the national team during the era of late Stephen Okechukwu Keshi as head coach. Former team media officer, Ben Alaiya has come out to strongly deny Obasi’s claim of being asked to pay to be in the 2014 World Cup team while former assistant coach, Ike Shorunmu’s disavowal included that of Taye Taiwo who said he left the team because Keshi was involved in ‘dirty dealings’. The denial…
Amidst the revelation that Nigeria had conducted a dismal 11,426 Covid-19 tests and recorded 1,337 confirmed cases,250 recoveries and 40 deaths, President Buhari’s address to the nation formed the main talking point of Monday 27th April. The Buhari administration’s response to the Coronavirus pandemic has been very disappointing and asides the pronouncement of 50% of health care workers’ basic salaries as hazard allowance, nothing else was inspiring about his speech. Below are some of the highlights. EXPERTS PROJECTED 2,000 CASES IN FIRST MONTH AFTER INDEX CASE This may have been a plan hatched by President Buhari’s handlers to absolve him…
In 2018, President Buhari hurriedly withdrew $496M from the excess crude account without the approval of the senate as is stipulated by the Nigerian constitution to pay for 12 Super Tucano planes. In a letter sent after the money had already been withdrawn, Buhari deliberately left them in the dark as to the model of the planes and told the senate that he was rushing to meet a deadline. That is the first red flag as far as the purported $496M purchase of 12 Super Tucano light assault airplanes is concerned. Was our President being duped by fraudsters? The US…
Expecting Abubakar Malami,the Attorney-General of the federation to satisfactorily defend the Buhari administration’s handling of the Process and Industrial Development Limited situation is no different from giving him a chance to explain how Section 174 of the constitution allows him to disobey court orders-he won’t make any sense. President Buhari was sworn into office on May 29th 2015 and precisely 3 weeks 5 days earlier on May 3rd, PI&D had offered to drop its right to challenge the breach on the part of the Nigerian government of a contract to supply gas for a settlement sum of $850M. Jonathan then…
I have searched without any luck for an exact location and precise date in every news report on the jewelries and customized gold iPhone allegedly belonging to former minister of petroleum, Diezani Allison-Madueke sought to be forfeited to the Federal Government. That will answer a lot of questions. Going by the Buhari administration’s reluctance to extradite her to face charges and the failure of the UK government to also do so after it had promised, the Diezani situation is one that needs to be observed very closely. Without a date those items were recovered and a precise location, then those…
A lot of people have always believed Alex Badeh was killed by the Buhari government and that a cover-up was in place. There couldn’t be more justification than the Badeh family coming out to dismiss the recorded confession of one of the alleged killers in custody as a mere charade. A close look at the story surrounding his death will reveal some quite intriguing questions but what has lent more credence to the notion that Alex Badeh was murdered and that a cover-up was hatched is the refusal of the authorities to charge his alleged murderers to court. On the…
