What is it about South African President Jacob Zuma and statues? Two statues in one month- generating controversy from the streets of Pretoria to the streets of Owerri in Nigeria. In the first week of October, a 30-feet monument was unveiled in honour of President Zuma in the North West region of his country. South Africans had opposed the idea [...]
You never know the next foolish thing from any of our governors in Nigeria. You think you’ve seen the worst until a new decision or action completely unsettles one’s sense of propriety and you are left rationalizing that after all the previous one is somehow better than the new one.Owelle Rochas Anayo Okorocha went higher on the infamy index of [...]
There are the Buharis who are not Buharists. Credit to Nasir el-Rufai, the most recent and most persistent proponent of the term ‘Buharism’, ‘Buharists’ can be used loosely without guilt — in this case to mean the political heavyweights or followers in whose eyes Buhari can do no wrong and must, therefore, never be criticised.As there is still no [...]
Today, let us briefly shift our attention from the damning stories emanating from the political and shuttle into the social. Unfortunately, we can hardly divorce ourselves from the political as it dictates the social; reason why we must constantly interrogate the political. That probably was why great Peter Tosh, at the One Love Peace Concert held on April 22, 1978, [...]
Two weeks ago, or a little more than that, I was at the midweek service in my church when the testimony of a member was read on the pulpit. The budding entrepreneur said something like: since he won a $10,000 grant from the Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF), his story had changed. I wouldn’t normally use my phone during service but [...]
Glory is due to none other than to the learned Guided are they and proofs to the seekers of guidance Everybody is honoured proportionate to his knowledge But the illiterate are disgraced, as the enemies of learned Acquire knowledge, you will be immortal All men are dead, only learned are alive ---Iman Ali bn Abi Talib The above poem was lifted from Imam Ghazzali’s magnum opus, [...]
The reaction from Jim Yong Kim’s statement that President Muhammadu Buhari asked the World Bank to focus on the North – of course, the North-East – is a shocking display of a gross misunderstanding of the present administration’s foreign policy thrust, as regards demands made to international development organizations.The uncoordinated reactions generated from Kim’s statement have obliterated the debate the [...]
Fela's musical excursion in which we are juxtaposing his messages of yesterday with the reality of today cannot but lead us to two of his unreleased but Afrikan Shrine electrifying numbers - Country Of Pain (COP) and Government Of Crooks (GOC), although we've briefly touched on the later in the second part of this series.While COP comes off as a [...]
I believe everyone has a redeeming quality. Yes, nobody is impervious to change and influence. This is the reason I have always given President Muhammadu Buhari the benefit of the doubt. I think he deserves it.Before I go into the entrails of my opinion, let me take a traipse in the past.Responding to a question from Dr Pauline Baker, the [...]
I crave your indulgence to preface this speech by reiterating what all of us already know: that corruption is the number one enemy of our country, and, therefore, the main reason Nigeria remains underdeveloped. It is generally agreed that corruption is the canker that is destroying the foundation of our society and that if no drastic measures are taken to [...]
