The Nation Newspaper

Category: Columnists

*Adamant Kwankwaso versus Kano Emirate (First published October 20, 2024)

In an interview two Thursdays ago, former governor of Kano State and leader of the Kwankwasiyya movement, Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso, disclosed that the splitting of the Kano Emirate into five emirates in 2019 as well as the dethronement of Muhammadu Sanusi II in 2020 would be revisited. In May 2019, former governor Abdullahi Ganduje had assented to the Kano State House of Assembly bill splitting the emirate. With the assent, the emirate was split into five: Kano, the surviving rump, and Rano, Bichi, Karaye, and Gaya. Barely a year later, Emir Muhammadu Sanusi II was deposed, for, among other things, disrespecting the office of the governor, and land racketeering. Dr Kwankwaso insisted that the former emir was deposed because of Dr Ganduje’s inferiority complex. The former governor, however, countered by flaunting his own PhD and his wife’s professorship, mocking his traducers for not having professorial wives.

The Kano quagmire has become a huge entanglement, punctuated by bitter quarrels, trenchant language, and now almost irreconcilable differences triggered by a spectacular falling out due to unmet expectations of loyalty. Dr Ganduje was twice deputy governor to Dr Kwankwaso (1999-2003; 2011-2015), though punctuated by a two-term interregnum filled by ex-governor Ibrahim Shekarau. (They have rich CVs in Kano: highly educated, urbane, articulate, but cantankerous and unforgiving). Days after the Supreme Court gave judgement in the last governorship election dispute, Dr Ganduje invited Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf, a civil engineer who also brandishes a master’s degree in Business Administration, and Dr Kwankwaso to abandon their party, the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP), and defect to the All Progressives Congress (APC). He, however, sarcastically added that he would automatically become their Jagora (leader). The invitation has incensed the duo, Dr Ganduje’s sense of humour being lost on them. Though Kano’s leading politicians have so much in common, particularly the more than a decade of camaraderie between Dr Kwankwaso and Dr Ganduje, the Kanawa are likely to remain irreconcilable and will continue to bait one another.

It is mainly in this context that the promised review of the Kano Emirate split should be understood. Dr Kwankwaso will remain adamant until it proves politically costly. It is obvious why he is at the forefront of campaigning for the review of the emirate balkanisation, but it is not altogether clear that it makes political sense to champion the cause instead of the governor. Gov Yusuf hails from Gaya, one of the beneficiary emirates consequent upon the Kano Emirate split. Whole new infrastructure and economies have followed the split; reversing history now will be more contentious than before the split. But this has not deterred Dr Kwankwaso. According to him: “Honestly it (the Kano emirates issue) is one of the things that nobody has sat with me to discuss so far, but I am sure we are going to sit and see how to go about it. Is it going to be allowed, demolished, corrected, or whatever? It will be revisited, and what’s supposed to be done will be done. There were a lot of things and this was a trap. All these things were not done in good faith or intention. It was brought with some bad intentions which every one of you here and our listeners are aware of. Sometimes you come with things that are good and they turn out to be bad while sometimes you bring bad things and they turn out to be good…”

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For now, two things seem uppermost in the mind of the NNPP leader. One, he wants the Kano Emirate reunified. The previously monolithic emirate has a nostalgic hold on him and perhaps on many other Kanawa. It was a symbol of bigness, power and influence. But has the rump Kano Emirate become less influential in the cultural and political scheme of things in the state, and indeed in Nigeria where everyone is still besotted to Kano as a thriving and powerful emirate and entity? It is doubtful; for water is finding its level and course, especially after five years. To begin rebuilding the emirate through reunification will probably throw up fresh uncertainties. Will it not be better to let sleeping dogs lie, regardless of the politics that underscored the balkanisation? As the Hausa idiomatically put it, “A bar kaza a cikin gashin ta’. It is, sadly, very tempting not to let bad enough alone. The itch to tamper with things based on sometimes indefensible or untenable sentiments is always high. That the split was also ‘bad intentioned’, as Dr Kwankwaso said, and coming from, of all people, the hated Dr Ganduje, seems especially galling to the leader of the Kwankwasiyya movement and protector of the emirate council.

Two, somehow, either because of the goodness of his heart or for reasons not even he can properly decode, Dr Kwankwaso wants the ‘historic wrong’ done to Emir Sanusi II redressed. The deposed emir was not even Dr Kwankwaso’s first choice when he was appointed in 2014, a year before the former governor’s second term ended. Obviously he has grown to like him immensely. But since the NNPP controls the legislature, the lawmakers can of course be made to do the NNPP bidding. However, the emir wasn’t just deposed for thumbing his nose at Gov Ganduje, he was also probed for unregulated and liberal spending habits, and then queried for land racketeering. The NNPP will have to get all those inconvenient details expunged to legitimately return him to office. Reinstating Emir Sanusi II may not be the chief goal of Dr Kwankwaso, but he will do anything to rub Dr Ganduje’s nose in it.

Targeting and trashing his former deputy, who is now chairman of the APC, may, however, be far easier than managing his new mentee and governor, Mr Yusuf. On both the emirate matter and possible reinstatement of Sanusi II, the more candid and less bashful Dr Kwankwaso has thrust himself forward and spoken more authoritatively than the governor. He forgets that a new sheriff is in town, and his obtrusions will in due course be resisted more and more as state affairs get more volatile. It is inevitable. All it takes is a little more consolidation by the governor, and the new helmsman will begin to assert himself, differ from his mentor in policy perspectives, and eventually strike out from under the shadows of his leader in whose government he was once a Commissioner for Works, Housing and Transport between 2011 and 2015. Sooner or later, Mr Yusuf’s mollifying and conciliating rule will contend with Dr Kwankwaso’s fierce and adamant disposition until something gives. No state has yet balked this trend. It won’t begin with Kano.

January 18, 2026
Discourses on Kwankwaso’s Kano

Last year, this column predicted the parting of ways between Kano’s Governor Abba Yusuf and his mentor and godfather Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, a former governor himself. Both politicians have now acrimoniously reached a point of no return in their relationship. The governor has virtually defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC), tired of his mentor’s dithering, while Dr Kwankwaso has been left stranded in the litigious New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP), angry with his mentee for his impatience and flirtation with the enemy. For more than one year, Dr Kwankwaso negotiated with APC leaders to facilitate his defection, but every time the ruling party met his terms, he shifted the goalpost. Vexed and irritated, the APC separately courted an already disaffected Mr Yusuf who was anxious to avoid the legal pitfalls in the NNPP that threatened his reelection. It turned out that the governor couldn’t wait any longer, while his mentor could afford all the time in the world. The explosion that followed in the last two weeks between the somnolent mentor and his agitated mentee was predictable and inevitable, as this column anticipated in October 2024.

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One more prediction can be ventured on the Kano affair: Dr Kwankwaso has been left holding the short end of the stick, and Mr Yusuf is left with all the advantage. Having tarried so long in trying to negotiate a deal worthy of his stature, the Kwankwasiyya leader will now have to fight for his political life with little chance of stalemating the war or emerging victorious. He faces the unpalatable choice of either migrating to the African Democratic Congress (ADC), where there are covert and cowardly talks of unhorsing the immovable former vice president Atiku Abubakar, or of staying put at the forlorned NNPP. Whatever he does, he faces a veritable Hobson’s choice. To return to the APC suitor is to follow his mentee to the new watering hole while simultaneously losing face. The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is out of the picture, while the ADC, now seething with plots and dreams of utopia, will test his forbearance to its limit. Enjoy the following 2024 discourses that presaged the Kwankwaso debacle.

January 18, 2026
*NNPP will not be outdone (First published October 20, 2024)

No one thinks that the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) state chapters are free of bickering and rancour. If the rancour appears subdued, or if party elders still command respect and exert tremendous influence on quarrelsome rank and file, it is because the party controls the national levers of power and distributes patronage. The opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Labour Party (LP), and the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) are not so lucky. Since they lost the presidential election last year, both the PDP and LP have been at once strident in opposition and wracked by guilt and rage. Last week, this column explored the tangential issue of electoral cooperation between the NNPP and LP, wondering why instead of tackling their identity crises and internal conflicts, they chose to focus on the more ambitious project of taking the presidency in 2027. The PDP, as nearly everyone knows, had sunk into crisis since 2015. It is now the turn of the two other opposition parties to confront their fates.

While the cancer gnawing at the liver of the PDP has festered for nearly a decade, some three weeks ago, the tremor coursing through the body politic of the LP assumed monumental dimension. Now, the NNPP, an otherwise fringe party controlling only Kano State, will not be outdone. Party leaders, led by the pugnacious and vengeful Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, have managed against the run of play to furnish themselves not only an internal crisis but also a war. No party has a monopoly of internal crisis, not even the APC, let alone the naturally fractious PDP; but the NNPP is determined not to be a laggard. The Young Turks in the party, though still scheming in the shadows, and working in concert with a smattering of old and calloused hands, have signaled the start of a rebellion. Their goal is to either dissipate the influence of Dr Kwankwaso or overthrow his suzerainty altogether. They feel his overbearing presence too constraining, and his diktats, not to say his malice, bilious and anachronistic. They also empathise with the ‘helpless’ Kano governor Abba Kabir Yusuf whom they are secretly nudging to extricate himself from the stranglehold of the party leader. But they do not yet have the courage to challenge their mentor in open fight. They know a thing or two about the unappeasable Dr Kwankwaso, with a few of them having at one time or the other been scorched by his fury; and they know quite well that he does not take prisoners. For now, however, they will fight him secretly, and even hide behind the thin flak jacket of the governor.

This is of course not the first time the NNPP, which was founded in 2002 by the Anambrarian Boniface Aniebonam, will be engaged in fratricidal conflict. Since its takeover by the Kwankwasiyya crowd in 2022, the party has been ill at ease. Last April, Mr Aniebonam accused Dr kwankwaso, who is now informally described as NNPP party leader, of hijacking the party, changing its logo and flag, and mutilating its constitution. But that initial fight was half-hearted and stalemated. A new chapter in the fight has now been opened. Unsettled by how the party leader has been riding roughshod over everyone in the party, particularly Gov Yusuf, a few party top shots reportedly schemed to throw off Dr Kwankwaso’s yoke. The alleged rebels refused to confirm the existence of any plot, but the state chairman of the party, Hashim Sulaiman Dungurawa, zeroed in on a few of the alleged masterminds and suspended them from the party ostensibly for disrespecting the party, disloyalty, and abuse of power. They are the Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Abdullahi Baffa Bichi, and the Commissioner of Transportation, Muhammad Diggol.

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The story of the brewing revolt in Kano is, however, not the usual kind. Sources suggest that the so-called rebellion tagged ‘Abba Tsaya da Kafarka’, meaning, Abba stand on your feet, was plotted to put an end to the dominance and dictations of Dr Kwankwaso. The suspension of the two officials has since been rescinded, and both of them have disowned the plot, but the feeling persists around the seat of power in Kano that the party leader is unsparing and megalomaniacal. The party leader himself refused to comment on the matter, especially on the suspension of the two government officials, preferring instead that all inquiries be directed to the party chairman; but no one is deceived that his reticence means absolution. The plotters may have shriveled like worms on a hot plate, but everyone knows that it is a question of time before the silent war breaks into the open. The excesses of Dr Kwankwaso will make an open confrontation certain.

Gov Yusuf is unlikely to join any rebellion now, regardless of how much Dr Kwankwaso needles him. Though it is clear to many Kanawa that the governor does not enjoy as much freedom as he would like, he would, however, continue to walk the tightrope for as long as is humanly tolerable. He has been made to inherit the party leader’s enemies, chief among whom is former governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje. But he has probably seen why his predecessor fell out with the party leader. Whether his education is complete on this issue or not, he will nevertheless be wary of fighting his benefactor openly. Two reasons will account for his restraint. Firstly, he won the Kano governorship poll by a wafer-thin margin, scoring only 52 percent that was controversially upheld by the Supreme Court. If he is keen on reelection, he will try his utmost to accommodate the eccentricities of his mentor and party leader.

Secondly, Kano has an unenviable history of godsons fighting with and alienating their godfathers, as exampled by the late Governor Abubakar Rimi versus the statesman and NEPU legend, Aminu Kano. The end result of that open warfare did not bode well for the former governor’s political career. However, Dr Kwankwaso probably exaggerates his influence and power in Kano, and by overreaching himself too many times, he may already have compromised the reverence in which he is held. But Gov Yusuf will not want to find out whether he would be undone by an open warfare with his party leader. More, seeing how the SSG and Transportation commissioner ate crow last week, no one in public office in Kano will be eager to flex his muscles anytime soon. Discretion, they say, is the better part of valour. Borno, Katsina and Niger States are some of the very few states where godfathers enthroned godsons without acrimony or subsequent interferences. Kano and Rivers States could borrow a leaf from any of those three states had godfathers Kwankwaso and Nyesom Wike been made of subtler and more nuanced stuff.

January 18, 2026
Too many cooks

My mind raced back to 2013 where several videos were captured of scenes where former football federation chieftains took bets openly with the late Stephen Keshi mocking him to beat Congo DR, if indeed he was the sole architect of the Super Eagles‘ third AFCON conquest in South Africa, beating Burkina Faso in 2013. Congo DR beat the Super Eagles 2-0 inside the Stadium of Champions in Uyo.

There was celebration after the loss, especially the way the football chiefs danced and hugged each other openly thanking God for the retributive justice on those who stole their joy after the South Africa 2013 AFCON’s heroics. We haven’t forgotten that the Super Eagles coach announced his resignation in one of the South African radio stations, much to the consternation of top Nigerian officials, including the honourable Sports minister, who heard of the coach’s resignation whilst inside a taxi cab.

In fact, the minister laughed it off as a huge joke because he had just left the coach after a reward session for him in the home of billionaire businessman and chairman of the truly Nigerian telecommunication organisation. The minister was stunned listening to the coach’s voice inside the taxi announcing his resignation from the Nigeria job despite lifting the 2013 AFCON trophy.

The Federal Government delegation liaised with the coach, leaving the serving minister and our football chieftains licking their lips in anguish. The battle line had been drawn between the soccer federation’s chiefs and the coach until he was eased out of the job following a string of bad results. Rather than build on the 2013 AFCON success, the feud arising from the AFCON campaign destroyed the Super Eagles to smitten.

Had the Eagles not been in heavy crises, Nigeria would have done well at the 2014 World Cup. Instead, there was the show of shame over unpaid allowances, with players, coaches and team officials threatening not to play the Round of 16 game against France. The government had to bring in cash of $3.8 million into Brazil to settle the cause of the strike action because the team didn’t train. It won’t be news to read here that the Nigerian contingent spent the night before the game against France sharing the money instead of training. Why were they in a hurry to share the money, even with the cash in their coffers already?

One was, therefore, not too excited with the Super Eagles outings in Morocco because all the features of the 2013 brouhaha stared one in the face, with most of the characters who fuelled the crises in the past being part of the whole drama which unfolded in Morocco. I deliberately refused to talk about the team’s matches in my columns because I had seen the competition’s chart before games began that for the Eagles to reach the finals of this edition, they needed to eliminate the hosts, Morocco, which from my crystal ball amounted to asking anyone to climb with a greasy pole. The Moroccans were Africa’s number one football nation on FIFA’s monthly ranking. They became the first Africa nation to play in the semi-finals of FIFA Senior World Cup, a feat they achieved at the Qatar 2022 Mundial.

Many close people wanted to know my impressions about the Nigerian side in Morocco. I told them bluntly that if the Eagles’ outings have been spectacular, it has been largely due to Alex Iwobi’s immaculate defence splitting passes and the sparkling manner he has marshalled the team, with the strikers the biggest benefactor. I told them that for any country to beat Nigeria, their players must stop Iwobi from spraying those defence splitting passes up front towards Osimhen, Ademola Lookman and Akor Adams. I warned them that Morocco had the talent to stop Iwobi, especially with their vociferous fans rooting ceaselessly for them.

The Moroccans bullied Iwobi off the ball and had the match referee’s indulgent eyes to thank for remaining 11 men on the pitch and not less for the duration of the game.

Indeed, the Super Eagles haven’t distinguished themselves in competitions where there were crises of unpaid wages, allowances and match bonuses. The Morocco AFCON wasn’t going to be different. There were also the gossips in the media of countries such as Tunisia, Guinea, Angola etc scouting for Super Eagles coach even when he has one year left on contract.

Eagles’ coach needs to attend regular coaching courses to update his knowledge of the game. The coach’s mono-track coaching mentality is his biggest obstacle to winning titles anytime soon. One had thought he would have fielded Simon ahead of Onyedika in Ndidi’s position because of his experience and the determination to excel he exhibits anytime he is fielded.

Simon is the best dribbler of the ball in that team and would have created openings in the Moroccan defence like he did for the few times he played on Wednesday night. It was clear that the team needed to truly play differently to make the opposition totter going forward. One is still pinching oneself why it took the Nigerian coach so long to substitute Akor in that game? Truth be told, Akor and Onyedika were lost in that game. A clever coach would have substituted both players, given the quality of stars sitting on the bench.

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Much of how well or how badly a team plays rests with the thinking of the coaches on the bench. Nigeria played well at the group stage, Round of 16 and the quarter-finals. Enough time for coaches to plot counter tactics, which was what the Moroccans did. Sadly, our boys got worked up by the referee’s poor officiating. Our boys must ensure that they beat the Egyptians today in the third-place tie. The Pharaohs play the counter-attack formation, which means our defenders must be very vigilant, especially as Calvin Bassey won’t be qualified to play the game due to two yellow card offences. Pity!

The third-place game is the best opportunity for everyone to see if Chelle has improved the team or not. This game offers us the opportunity to evaluate the depth in strength of the squad’s players, depending on how Chelle deploys those who haven’t played a game in the competition since it began on Sunday December 16, 2025. Chelle was given a semi-final ticket mandate which he achieved. He must pull this chestnut out of fire by beating the Egyptians with some of the new boys he kept on the bench. It will also be Chelle’s best chance to claim ownership of his team, not those interlopers hanging around the team.

Nigeria’s campaign for the 2030 World Cup ticket starts today in Morocco with a bronze medal – no excuses whatsoever. The best two African countries are meeting in the final game of the 2025 AFCON, a confirmation of FIFA’s ranking as perfect. It would be honourable if Nigeria wins today’s bronze medal game and be crowned the third best African football nation. It would be marvellous if we achieve this feat by beating Egypt resoundingly.

Did I hear you ask which nation will lift the AFCON 2025 diadem, dear reader? Too close to call. Please enjoy the game on Sunday. May the better nation lift the trophy, referee permitting.

January 17, 2026
What path to elite consensus?

So alarming and concerning did this column perceive President Donald Trump’s recent threat to invade Nigeria militarily to check what he described as ‘Christian genocide’ that, over the last three weeks, we have examined diverse dimensions of this warning and its implications. Our central contention has been that this undisguised threatened violation of Nigeria’s sovereignty constitutes not just a danger to the incumbent administration of President Bola Tinubu but an indictment of Nigeria’s ruling class as a whole. Those members of the political elite, who thus gloat over Trump’s categorisation of Nigeria as a ‘now failed’ State and feel surreptitious vindication by the American leader’s contemptuous disdain for Nigeria, are as much an object of his scorn and ridicule as those in power at the centre today on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

It is instructive that over the last week in the United States, there have been incidents of fatal attacks on innocent citizens by trigger-happy gunmen, resulting in several deaths. One of such killings took place in the vicinity of the White House, leading to the death of at least one National Guard officer and another being injured. In another instance in California, four school children were said to have died in a mass shooting at a child’s birthday party, with several others suffering from various degrees of injuries. Such tragedies have become routine in America where deaths from senseless mass shootings have become endemic. But such failings do not justify the overgeneralized categorisation of that country as a ‘now failed’ State.

In the same vein, Nigeria’s challenges with insecurity do not necessitate its being depicted in derogatory and pejorative terms. This is particularly so as the accusation of ‘Christian genocide’ in Nigeria completely misses the mark and successive Nigerian governments have not been indifferent or insensitive to the need to tackle the assorted acts of insurgency threatening the country’s territorial integrity and cohesion. It is instructive that various Nigerian groups and individuals in the diaspora actively peddled the propaganda of ‘Christian genocide’ in the country, which President Trump and other far-right Republican ideologues enthusiastically bought into. The harm which disaffected members of the political elite can inflict, directly or indirectly, on their own country reinforces the imperative of forging a viable and enduring elite consensus as a necessary condition for national stability, peace and progress.

Incidentally, America today also suffers from the plague of a lack of elite consensus. The greatest military and economic power on earth today, despite evident signs of a gradual weakening, is described in the media, academia and other platforms of public discourse in that country as a badly divided society torn right through the middle between the liberals and the more conservative Republicans. Indeed, the degree of polarisation in America may be far deeper than the variant of elite fractiousness in Nigeria as is evident in the bitterness of recent electoral contestations in that country with President Trump instigating an insurrection at the Capitol, a symbol of American democracy, protesting his loss in the 2020 presidential election, which he described as a fraud.

However, America has the advantage of strong and resilient institutions capable of safeguarding democratic tenets, principles and values, particularly through Judicial intervention, as is the case during Trump’s ongoing second term, when he has stretched the constitutional limits of Presidential powers to their utmost bounds. So far, various courts at the lower levels have blocked the Trump administration’s policy idiosyncrasies and acts of executive over-reach even though he has generally had his way on appeal at the Supreme Court, where he succeeded in getting a majority of conservative judges appointed during his first term. Yet, this has not prompted anyone to label America as a ‘now failed’ State, nor have aspersions been hurled at judges who understandably base their Judicial decisions on facts before them, interpreted within the context of their worldviews and value-orientation.

But the central point of this piece is the urgent imperative for the political elite in Nigeria to forge the necessary class consensus across political party, ethnic, regional and religious divides without which there cannot be any basis for stability, peace, progress and development. This does not mean that the various factions, factions and tendencies of the Nigerian elite should forget their differences and create an artificial and unnatural commonality. That would be the perfect recipe for a one-party State, which would be detrimental to the continuous nurturing and consolidation of a genuine democratic order, which is a necessary condition for economic development and national cohesion. Rather, forging an elite consensus involves members of the elite recognising their differences and identifying those areas where they must work in unison and accommodate each other, even while vigorously maintaining their differences as regards ideological orientation, policy articulation and philosophical disposition or worldview.

One area of critical importance for cultivating viable elite consensus among the various factions and tendencies that constitute Nigeria’s ruling class is reaching a common agreement on the indispensability of a transparent, credible and efficient electoral process as a cardinal element of an inclusive democratic system. This implies that both elected officials and their ruling parties, as well as those in opposition, develop a common commitment to the sustenance of democracy. Those who lose elections will not clamour for military intervention or external invasion because of their disenchantment with electoral outcomes while those in power will not undermine or render the opposition ineffective. The elite in power and those in opposition are two sides of a coin that are both critical to the sustenance and continuous development of democracy.

But then, those in opposition cannot expect the party in government to enforce cohesion within their ranks or help them to devise political strategies to strengthen their parties. That is a responsibility they must undertake on their own. Thus, the continued lamentations of leading opposition politicians on the plight of their parties such as the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Labour Party (LP) and the New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP), which they blame on deliberate destabilization by the ruling APC, is unnecessary and unproductive. There is absolutely no basis for former Vice-President, Atiku Abubakar, to have deserted the PDP with his supporters for the emergent All Democratic Congress (ADC), all in a quest for a platform on which to contest the next presidential election. In further bifurcating the PDP, which already has roots in all 774 Local Government Areas across the country as well as the 8,809 Registration Areas/Wards, Atiku has weakened the possibility of a stronger, more viable opposition arising to effectively challenge the APC at the 2027 polls.

The ADC is still largely inchoate and is unlikely to become a political machine capable of effectively challenging for power at the centre come 2027. It will also be recalled that it was Atiku ‘s intransigent refusal to allow the PDP national championship to revert to the South after his emergence as presidential candidate of the party in 2023, in violation of its zoning principle, that provided for rotation of power between the North and the South, created the grounds for the fragmentation of the PDP, its loss in the 2024 election and it’s unfolding catastrophic implosion. Indeed, the concession of the presidential tickets of the defunct Alliance for Democracy (AD) in alliance with the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) and the PDP to the Southwest in 1999, to compensate the Yoruba for the annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election won by Chief MKO Abiola is the kind of elite consensus necessary to stabilize democratic governance to promote economic progress and political stability in Nigeria.

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In the case of Mr Peter Obi, he has proven to be utterly clueless in resolving the protracted crisis in which the LP has been immersed. Surprisingly, even his running mate in the 2023 presidential election, Mr Datti-Ahmed, appears to have deserted his erstwhile boss and aligned with a different faction of the LP. Part of the problem is that Obi, just like Atiku, is more interested in finding a platform to actualize his presidential ambition rather than helping to build a solid opposition front irrespective of whether or not he emerges as the presidential candidate. With this kind of individualistic approach by these key opposition leaders, it is unlikely that they can build a formidable front to meaningfully challenge the ruling party for power at the centre in 2027.

Another area where there must be a consensus on the part of Nigeria’s political elite is the need to join hands across partisan divides to fight the deep-seated and long-standing endemic poverty and grossly unjust inequality that are at the root of Nigeria’s current chronic insecurity challenge. This will entail elite unanimity on fighting the industrial -scale corruption that pervades our national life such that humongous funds criminally diverted into private pockets can be made available to boost food production, provide affordable but qualitative healthcare, generate jobs for millions of our youth, improve access to qualitative education and properly as well a equip and motivate our security agencies in the ongoing do-or-die struggle against diverse forms of terror against the Nigerian State.

•This page was first published December 6, 2025

January 17, 2026
The consultant who saw tomorrow

Politicians have many consultants. Since they battle with executive stress, those who are high up usually have paid personal physicians.

Some have advisers, or political aides domiciled in the universities and human rights enclaves. Others tap the media for problem solving

Many patronise pastors, sundry spiritualists, including babalawos and other seers who claim to see tomorrow.

The last category is more relevant during electioneering. It is because they can predict victory and failure, and they can also appease some supernatural forces to avert failure or convert it to success.

To one of those who claim they can read the signs of the times went four politicians. The four are A, B, C, and D. One of them, A, was jostling for the position of party chairman. B was eyeing vice chairman. Since B was the only candidate for vice chairman, it was certain that he would be vice chairman unopposed. B did not need prayers again.

But upon getting to the man in an Ijebu town of coastal Lagos, the powerful consultant picked another person, B, out of the four, saying that the crystal ball has told him he would be chairman. The three – B, C and D – protested, reminding him that they came because of A. The man shook his head, meaning ‘no way.’

He insisted that B, who was not contesting for chairman, would be the chairman. They went back disappointed because B never bought form for chairmanship position.

Upon request before they departed, the man reluctantly prayed for A. But as they were departing, he still pointed his finger at B, saying that he would still be party chairman. They ignored him and left. They doubted his capacity, competence and claim. They regretted consulting him. They lamented that they gave money and other things to a fake.

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The party congress came. A was defeated by his rival from another camp or caucus within the big party. But B was elected unopposed as vice chairman.

However, suddenly, the chairman resigned, and since the state chapter could not hold a new congress, the party asked B to step into the shoe of chairman immediately.

It was at that stage that the three of them remembered the prediction of the Ijebu man who claimed to see tomorrow.

Trust replaced doubt. Henceforth, he became their permanent spiritual consultant in whom they were well pleased.

January 17, 2026
Opposition and the phobia for taxation

It is strange that the new tax laws, and the motivation behind the structural reforms, are being twisted by armchair critics and opposition figures who know the truth but prefer to deny it.

But the resistance is futile. The law became operational in the first week of the year, and the general public is not fooled by the falsehoods from detractors, saboteurs and fraudsters who prefer “business as usual”.

Having failed to halt the passage of the legislations by the National Assembly, opposition leaders, who may not have even bothered to study and digest the Act, have curiously regressed into manipulative propaganda aimed at whipping up emotions in a bid to incite Nigerians and discredit the government.

Ahead of the electioneering, the opposition is losing ground and destructive criticisms have replaced civilised scrutiny. They, therefore, seek short-lived collaboration with their confederates in the business environment. These lackeys perceive that their interests are at risk because the curtains are being drawn on long years of their mindless economic sabotage.

In the coordinated attacks, a lawmaker stood up during plenary to allege a gap between the Bills passed by the National Assembly and the one assented to by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Up to now, he has not provided the proof of doctoring, alteration, or padding in the law to reinforce his allegation.

Shockingly, African Democratic Congress (ADC) leader Atiku Abubakar seemed to have taken up the fight from there, alleging that the gazetted laws contain unauthorised alterations, which, in his view, amounted to forgery and a “grave constitutional issue”. He called for a fresh legislative vote rather than re-gazetting to correct what has paled into imaginary discrepancies.

When the former Vice President alluded to a compromised or flawed process that undermined legislative authority, Nigerians knew that he was playing his peculiar brand of politics.

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The 2027 electioneering, to political actors outside power, is nearer than imagined. In Nigeria, there is hardly a demarcation between politics and governance. Politics has ceased to be a vocation. It is now a full-time occupation of economic value. This has its implications for the ballot box war, often fought with bitterness and desperation.

The concern of the former Vice President may not be whether or not the combined tax laws conform to the cardinal principles of fairness, certainty, convenience and efficiency. The fear among the political foes of the government is that the success of the bold and brave reforms may enrich the scorecard of the administration and increase its popularity ratings among the voting public.

The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) may have also turned itself into a partisan party when it rejected the laws, which it grudgingly labelled a “distorted,” regressive, and unpatriotic enactment that can cause further hardship for workers. NLC President Joe Ajaero demanded a review, alleging lack of consultation and calling for the suspension of the “unpatriotic” tax policies that lack the face of justice. The union leader omitted the benefit of exceptions. He also failed to explain how renaming the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) to Nigeria Revenue Service (NRS) can affect workers’ welfare.

But the attention of Nigerians, particularly those from the financial sector, was arrested by the KPMP’s analysis, which alluded to what it called multiple errors and gaps in the consolidated laws, which the reputable firm apparently failed to point out earlier during the consideration of the Bills at the parliamentary hearings and perusals.

To the extent that the firm could not adequately avail itself of the opportunity of pointing out those hidden gaps and errors, particularly during the public hearing organised by the National Assembly, some observers tend to argue that the firm’s post-assent observation is an afterthought meant to perforate an iron-cast legislation designed for the benefit of the masses.

Certain professional firms are indeed entitled to engagements with policymakers and drivers to foster an understanding of the scope, focus, and limitations of the legal frameworks and the basis for improvement. Since society is dynamic, such interactions may be essential to the evolution of new ideas in aid of the current law, thereby making strategic amendments imperative in the future.

As the implementation of the law was about to commence, business barons and other tax evaders, who perceived themselves as the targets of the visionary and revolutionary initiatives, became weary to stand on the way until their propaganda overwhelmed the low-income earners, taking along the gullible.

The trick was to mobilise the poor and the indigent and expand the scope of feeble resistance to the pieces of legislation that do not have the potential to hurt even the middle class.

But the gap in constructive criticisms remained open due to the deliberate omission by subjective critics of the N800,000 annual tax-free threshold. If an intervention by a tax regime does not bridge or close the gulf between the rich and the poor, it is not meaningful and progressive. Here lies the friendliness of the law, its captivating beauty, its human face, its human heart and milk of human kindness.

The significance of the tax reforms is the relief to the masses – the average worker – through the increased disposable income achieved through the exception. Taxes on rent and essential electronic transfers below ₦10,000 and multiple taxation on small businesses have been removed. The goals is to lower inflation, foster equity by taxing high earners more, and boost infrastructure investment.

As small companies with lower turnover are exempted from certain taxes, they are allowed to grow, and the threshold for company income tax is increased to ₦50 million yearly. If all these are properly explained to the average worker, the propaganda of those enlisting them into an unnecessary battle against the Federal Government would be futile.

If, in pursuance of harmonisation and greater efficiency, the small taxes at federal, state, and local levels are merged, would the burden on small traders and informal workers not cease?

If stamp duties are removed for many, and electronic money transfers below ₦10,000 are also exempted, would daily transactions for the average person not be smooth?

If higher taxes on large corporations and wealthy individuals are designed to fund efficient public services, infrastructure, and social amenities, is it not in the national interest?

If the projected five-year tax exemption for companies in the agricultural sector is achieved, would it not lower food prices and boost food security?

Since these tax reforms are designed to shift the focus from taxing poverty to taxing prosperity, the burden on the average Nigerian is reduced while national economic stability is enhanced.

The fear of taxation, right from the beginning, has always motivated individuals and organisations to dodge the patriotic duty of payment. A great advantage is the push towards economic formalisation, and the large informal sector, which often made revenue collection a herculean task, is tracked. The expansion of the net is bound to reshape the economy.

To many analysts, the Tinubu administration has effected a paradigm shift by halting the fragmented, old-fashioned, and inefficient tax system that has not yielded optimal revenue and continued to sustain the poor fiscal environment that frustrates growth.

The hidden Value Added Tax (VAT) is removed from consumer prices, but input VAT on assets and overheads is reviewed. The VT rate, still at 7.5 per cent, presents a more competitive outlook than the 15 per cent in Ghana, 16 per cent in Kenya, and 15 per cent in South Africa.

Also, the moderate cut in corporate income tax rate to 25 per cent is more favourable than the 30 per cent in Kenya, 27 per cent in South Africa, and 25 per cent in Ghana. Also, the five per cent excise tax on airtime in Nigeria has been reversed, compared to 15 per cent in Kenya and five per cent in Ghana.

Accordingly, the top marginal tax rate for high-income earners is 25 per cent in the country. It is lower than the 35 per cent in Ghana and Kenya or 45 per cent in South Africa. Nigerian small-scale businesses pay a zero per cent corporate tax rate compared to about three per cent of turnover in Kenya and Ghana. A feature of the VAT design is the widening of the input VAT recovery to assets and overhead as tax administration and compliance become more digital, with much reliance on tax intelligence and risk-based audit.

Another advantage is the introduction of clearer guidelines for taxation, which would encourage businesses and individuals to register formally. The path to formal financial services, credit facilities, and government support programmes is open to individuals and small organisations. The beauty of formalisation reflects in the resultant transparency, the reduction of bureaucratic bottlenecks, and greater opportunities for wider participation in the economy. The overall result is the anticipatory increase in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) through a proper focus on production in a conducive economic climate.

If over 90 per cent of micro and small businesses are out of the “tax-paying” bracket for major taxes – Companies Income Tax (CIT), Capital Gains Tax (CGT), Withholding Tax, VAT, and Development Levy – leading to lighter compliance expectations, and big businesses pay more, there is a reduction in gaps that tend to promote fairness and equity. By ensuring that higher-income individuals and profitable corporations pay more, the pressure on low-income earners is removed.

As wealthier citizens contribute proportionally more to national development, resources are redistributed without the regression to subsidy, which is appropriated by the rich.

Also, the opportunity for investment and business growth is enhanced through incentives to investors in many sectors, such as technology, manufacturing, agriculture, and renewable energy. Indeed, as anounced by the tax curator, Taiwo Oyedele, all investors in the capital market are eligible for capital gains tax exemption with over 99 per cent exempted unconditionally based on a threshold of N150 million proceeds and N10 million gains in any 12 months’ period.

Nigerians can now track how tax revenues are utilised, thereby holding both government and corporate bodies accountable. The added benefit of transparency is that projects that benefit citizens, such as hospitals, schools, and other public infrastructure, can better be funded by the government.

However, public enlightenment about the essence of taxation should be intensified. This will puncture the misinformation and disinformation machination of opposition figures who, for long, have been the major parasites on the economy and the nation’s astute biggest tax evaders.

January 17, 2026
Bad times for bandits as Trump’s example catches on

These, surely, are not the best of times for bandits, terrorists and other heartless anti-social elements who for years have made life unbearable for innocent Nigerians in Borno, Yobe, Katsina, Adamawa, Niger, Benue, Kogi, Kwara and other parts of the country. Their cup is full and the security agencies, aided by unprecedented support from America, are poised to return their ‘favours’ in the same measure as they had dished out to hapless citizens. They gave no quarter in the execution of their evil agenda and would get none from the military.

From Sokoto and Niger to Kogi and Kwara states, the marauding beasts are finally feeling the heat. Their camps are in disarray from ground and air offensives launched by security agents. If the age-long submission of famous physicist Isaac Newton’s Third Law of Motion was previously lost on them, they must by now have embraced the reality that every action must necessarily provoke an equal and opposite reaction.

In the perspective of a patriot, the optics from the nation’s security situation in recent weeks can hardly be more gratifying. It all began with American President Donald Trump’s famous social media post in which he threatened that American forces would invade Nigeria “gun-a-blazing” to end what he called genocide against the Christian population. While the debate raged on his flawed claim that only Christians were being killed by terrorists and bandits, the American President made good his threat in the night of December 25 last year with the launch of precision strikes on terrorist camps in Sokoto State. The American President would later announce the gesture as his Christmas gift to bandits who a few days earlier had vowed to make Christmas a moment of grief for the hapless Christian population.

Trump’s action became a shot in the arm for the nation’s security agents who have since taken the fight to the terrorists in their enclaves in Borno, Kogi, Kwara, Niger and elsewhere. In Kogi State, for instance, the residents could heave a sigh of relief for the first time in many months after a recent invasion of some forests in the state where Ayere and Obajana, two previously obscure communities, suddenly became household names on account of their notoriety as hotspots for kidnapping. The two communities, which are gateways between the northern and southern parts of the country, had become nightmares for travellers.

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A day hardly passed without a heart-rending story of commuters waylaid by dare-devil bandits who goaded them into the bush and subjected them to untold torture while also demanding as ransoms from their anxious relations sums huge enough to build a modern stadium. In a particularly pathetic instance, the bandits abducted a nursing mother from a passenger bus on her way from Lagos to Abuja, forcing her to leave her teething baby in the commercial bus they were travelling while they marched her and other travellers into the bush.

The foregoing considered, it is difficult not to be excited by the will Kogi State Governor Ahmed Ododo has demonstrated in the fight against banditry in the state. Announcing government’s breakthrough in a press statement, the Kogi State Commissioner for Information and Communication, Hon. Kingsley Fanwo, attributed the success of the sustained war against banditry and terrorism in the state to series of highly successful precision operations carried out by coordinated joint security forces including the Nigeria Army, the Nigerian Navy, the Nigerian Air Force, the Department of State Services (DSS) and the National Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) with support from the Nigeria Police Force.

He said: “The coordinated strikes and ground battle led to the destruction of several bandits’ camps, the dismantling of their criminal networks and the neutralization of many criminals with several others sustaining varying degrees of injuries. Initial feedback from affected communities has shown renewed confidence in the capacity and commitment of our security forces to decisively end banditry and kidnapping, not only in Kogi State but across the country.”

Besides Kogi, there have been reports of precision air interdiction operations in Zamfara State, striking Turba Hill and Kachala Dogo Sule’s camp in Tsafe Local Government Area, which, according to the Director of Public Relations and Information of NAF, Air Commodore Ehimen Ejodame, engaged multiple active structures, “triggering intense fires that destroyed bandits’ facilities, neutralized many of them and crippled the group’s IED production and deployment capacity. In Sokoto, troops of the Lakurawa terrorist group are being forced to migrate towards Niger Republic as the heat from air strikes becomes unbearable.

Unfortunately the security agents have not only the bandits and terrorists to contend with but also the army of cynics who see nothing in the successes being recorded against the anti-social elements. The cynical reactions, especially on the social media, are such that leave one wondering who their authors are supporting between terrorists and the nation. In extreme cases, many of them serve as informants to bandits and even supplied food, fuel and weapons to them in their hideouts. Even the traditional media is complicit in many cases. They gleefully report every incident of killing or kidnapping by terrorists but look away when security agents turn the table.

But whether they like it or not, Nigeria is winning the war against banditry and terrorism. Only last week, Nigeria took delivery of new weapons from America; a reassuring development after Trump’s pledge to work with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for an end to the dare-devil groups.

January 17, 2026
IBEDC: When will this pain be over?

The title of this commentary reflects a question asked wherever people gather – on buses, in bars, and at parties. Modern life revolves around the reliable provision of electricity, water and mass transit. Without power, the simple task of pumping water becomes nightmarish; relying on handheld pumps is a physically exhausting struggle.

Dealing with our so-called electricity distribution companies is like living through a series of ‘tales of the unexpected’. It is a tragicomedy of the highest order! Many have endured the harrowing frustration of failing to load prepaid meters for days, even after payments have been cleared on their apps. And when the credit finally loads, there is zero guarantee that the power will actually follow. It is utterly ridiculous!

In effect, the consumer is forced to ‘gift’ these companies with interest-free loans for services they may never see. Unlike almost any other industry, these firms enjoy the luxury of idling on hundreds of millions in ‘prepaid’ funds while the customer is left unserved. The chance to squeeze easy profits out of these idle, trapped funds is irresistibly mouthwatering. Any business handed such an unusual windfall should, by all rights, be running at peak efficiency.

To put it in context, no one pays for goods at a supermarket or fuel at a station only to return a month later to finally collect what they bought. Yet, this is the ‘Eldorado’ these power companies enjoy – a dream scenario that any other business would kill for.

The Ibadan Electricity Distribution Company (IBEDC) is having a field day, acting with the typical arrogance of a monopoly that knows its customers have nowhere else to go. Right now, the consumer is holding the short end of the stick, forced to grin and bear it simply because Nigeria lacks the kind of small-claims courts that Margaret Thatcher so famously championed in the UK.

A court like that would finally give ‘David’ – the everyday consumer – the stones to take on the Goliath of monopoly power. Under that system, the state actually backs the little guy with legal aid, trials are wrapped up in weeks, and justice is swift. With the threat of heavy punitive damages hanging over their heads, these high-and-mighty firms would quickly realize that pocketing money for services they don’t deliver is a gamble they can no longer afford to take.

If, for instance, hundreds of consumers were to file individual claims or join forces in a massive class-action suit, IBEDC could find itself facing crippling liabilities that would threaten its very survival. Sadly, only Lagos and perhaps one or two other states have bothered to set up these small-claims courts. We don’t yet know how effective they’ve truly been, but their very existence is a hard-won victory for the everyday person. Every state in Nigeria must follow suit. It is the only way to finally put these broken monopolies and cartels under the microscope and hold them to account.

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In a country like Nigeria, where institutions are often weak, inept, or outright corrupt, taking on Goliath is a Herculean task. The average consumer simply doesn’t have the funds or the legal aid to survive a judicial process that can drag on for fifteen or twenty years. He or she is up against a behemoth with the cash flow to hire the priciest lawyers – experts who know every trick in the book to keep a case stuck in court for decades. It is a system that breaks the faint of heart and, frankly, is a total waste of time.

This is exactly why monopolies like the IBEDC don’t bother themselves with the fact that they are meting out such blatant injustice to people who have already paid for services they never receive. What we are seeing is a clear, painful confirmation: the entire electricity ‘privatization’ remains a catastrophic policy failure!

Take Australia, where the debate keeps circling back to public ownership as the only way to ‘reboot’ a broken system. You don’t just flip a switch; it takes years of gutting the rot from the inside before any kind of private market can actually function. In Nigeria, however, that kind of disciplined turnaround feels like a pipe dream, for reasons we all know too well! The political will to act for the people – or the consumer – is nowhere to be found.

This means the radical surgery needed to save the patient is simply not on the table. Instead, the country will keep stumbling over obstacles to real growth and job creation, held back by an electricity framework that is as incompetent as it is laughably inept. No amount of foreign investment can help a nation achieve true progress under such conditions.

While the Federal Government has made commendable strides in stabilizing the macro-economy, it must now pause and face the rot in our electricity market. It must summon the courage for the brutal, inescapable surgery the system requires. It is better late than never!

Electricity providers also subject consumers to unfair billing practices through crumbling grid maintenance and sheer operational sloppiness, leaving us to suffer through frequent, soul-crushing blackouts. In a cruel twist, we – the consumers – end up paying for this unreliability through our tariffs, effectively subsidizing the provider’s own failure to deliver the power they promised and we paid for. Worse still, these providers pass the bill for their own waste directly to us.

Whether it’s the cost of running ancient, gasping power plants or the massive amounts of electricity lost through leaky, broken transmission lines, the consumer picks up the tab through opaque regulatory loopholes. These losses – where energy literally evaporates before it even reaches your door – become a hidden tax on every monthly bill. It is a scandalous arrangement: the Nigerian customer is forced to pay for ‘ghost’ energy they never actually touched, saw, or consumed.

This exploitation isn’t an isolated incident; it is a nationwide epidemic that raises ugly questions. Why isn’t IBEDC issuing official receipts for the massive sums squeezed out of communities under the guise of ‘replacing’ equipment? Are these levies even recorded for auditors to see? We don’t see this nonsense in the telecoms sector. MTN, Airtel, and Glo face constant vandalism, often in remote and dangerous areas. Yet, has anyone ever seen a telecom giant text customers in Ijebu-Jesa, Kontagora, or Umudike asking for contributions to fix a vandalized base station? Of course not. So why does IBEDC get a pass?

Why are consumers forced to pay for fixed assets like transformers and cables – items that belong to the company, not the people? When communities bow to these demands, they are essentially ‘gifting’ infrastructure to a private firm. They are paying for the very tools the company will use to bill them later. It is a blatant double-taxation on the poor that has no place in a civilized economy.

This isn’t just a grievance; it’s a practice that raises grave questions about regulatory compliance and consumer exploitation. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) must be granted a federal mandate to forensically audit community levies collected over the last five years.

When audits do occur, the paper trail for these unrecorded contributions remains suspiciously opaque. No reputable firm would gamble its global standing on such murky financial channels. If a functional state truly exists in Nigeria, the regulators – and mutatis mutandis, Parliament and the police – should have demanded answers years ago.

May the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, grant us peace in Nigeria!

January 17, 2026
Nyesom Wike’s zero-sum game in Rivers state

‘He will win, who knows when to fight and when not to fight.”.. Sun Tzu, Chinese Military General, Strategist and Philosopher’

Look before you Leap!

The recent escalation of imbroglio between the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike and his political godson, Governor Siminalayi Fubara of Rivers State, with the resumption of impeachment proceedings against Governor Fubara, by the Rivers State House of Assembly; is a Zero-Sum Game by Nyesom Wike. This will most likely be the defining moment the power tussle between the political godfather and his political godson.

The imbroglio has taken a new dramatic dimension, as Minister Wike has unleashed verbal attacks and threats on the National Secretary of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Ajibola Basiru and anyone who shows any form of support for Governor Fubara, or anyone that calls for reasoning, logic or political solution to prevail.

With the verbal attack on the APC Scribe, Mr. Wike has opened a new front to add to the growing number of fronts in his ongoing numerous political battles. For Minister Wike to openly declare a political war with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s political party leaders and members while Wike remains in the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), is an indication that Minister Wike is unraveling with no holds barred. This is especially so given that, in the past 3 years Wike has practically destabilized the PDP, while burning political bridges in his wake. It appears that this latest fight by Nyesom Wike is a fight to finish. Indeed how Wike handles this episode of his multidimensional political battles will define his political future – he will either re-assert himself as a political leader to be reckoned with, or he will experience a bitter political anticlimax that could potentially end his political relevance in the politics of Rivers State and at national level.

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As I stated in my previous analyses and opinions on this topic (eg. The 4th of April 2025 episode of this Column), I also partly blame the political crisis in Rivers State on the initial strategic mistakes made by Governor Fubara. However, Governor Fubara’s deft defection to the APC and how he executed the move was strategic and it has changed the game for him so far.

In one of his lessons on strategy and warfare, Sun Tzu also stated that, “No nation survives from prolonged warfare.” And to that extent, for the past 3 years since the resumption of his political godson Siminalayi Fubara, the people of Rivers State have not enjoyed good governance and the full benefits of having a democratically elected Governor. I believe that this protracted and continuing fight between the Minister Wike and, Governor Fubara will continue to deny the people of Rivers State the good governance.

In my view, the impeachment proceeding is a calculated attempt to oust Governor Fubara is a zero-sum game played by Minister Wike’s camp to ensure that the incumbency and political career of governor Fubara are upended. Sadly, initial attempts by President Tinubu to resolve the impasse have not worked out, and I am not sure other entreaties will work.

“Roforofo” fight is not strategy:

It is true that Minister Wike played crucial roles to the success of President Bola Tinubu during the 2023 Presidential elections. But it is also profoundly true that President Tinubu has been adequately compensating Minister Wike and his Allies. The rhetorical question is what will be enough for Nyensom Wike? Your answers are as good as mine.

As it is today, I dare say that Mr. Wike is overplaying his hands. He cannot fight everybody at the same time and expect to win all the time. Therefore, Wike should smell the coffee, face the realities, recalibrate his strategy, and readjust his position.

Furthermore, Minister Wike’s behavior, to the leadership of the APC, with the insults and the threats he is showering on the principal actors in APC, particularly the National Secretary, Senator Ajibola Basiru, is an indication of what will happen even if Nyensom Wike decamps into the APC. I reckon that even if Nyensom Wike decamps to APC, he will carry this toxic behavior and style into the APC, and that will certainly be a disaster for the APC. This is because, even though Wike may be tamed by Mr President, he is creating too many distractions for Mr. President and unnecessarily heating the polity. Indeed, Minister Wike’s behavior if unchecked, could be contagious and it may likely permeate into other power blocks within the APC at states and the national level. This will be a very bad influence at this particular time when there is the need for more cohesion to manage the power blocks and power dynamics within the APC as new entrants and support build up to the 2027 elections. Indeed, managing these power blocks is already a big task for Mr President and for the managers of the APC.

Emotional Intelligence and political sagacity are key to sustainable political stay power as demonstrated by President Tinubu in the over 30 years of his political career. Love him or hate him, President Bola Tinubu has a high level of emotional intelligence. That is how, for decades,he has been able to make and keep friends and allies across Nigeria, and even work with his enemies and/or those that hitherto fought against him. I hope that Minister Wike will learn some emotional intelligence and political sagacity from Mr. President.

APC unity and discipline must be sustained:

President Bola Tinubu is also a core party man, who believes in political party discipline and loyalty. Therefore I do not expect President Tinubu to allow Minister Wike to take the “roforofo” fight mentality to the APC or to continually fight and insult the APC leadership at the highest level while claiming he is loyal to Mr. President. As it is today in Nigeria, Mr. President is the APC, and the APC is Mr. President! Therefore attacking the APC leadership is attacking Mr. President.

Consequently, I totally align with the position of the National Chairman and the National Secretary of the APC, because any political party that intends to consolidate power and be sustainable MUST imbibe and entrench political party unity and discipline. Over the years President Tinubu has been able to maintain the discipline that has been responsible for the level of cohesion, unity and successes of his political structure over for many years in Lagos, the entire southwest and across Nigeria, including the build-up to the APC merger in 2014. Minister Wike should also learn from that.

Therefore, commend the unanimous position take by the garrison commanders of APC, i.e, the National Chairman of APC, Professor Nentawe Yilwatda, the National Secretary of APC, Senator Ajibola Basiru, have taken positions, at the national level to protect the APC from the emerging toxic narratives and actions by Wike, lest his actions could permeate into the APC and cause cracks and disaffections, and also set a bad leadership example to the members of the APC across Nigeria.

By the way, Minister Wike has been meddling into the politics of other States as he clearly stated himself in his verbal attack of Senator Ajibola Basiru, when he spoke tacitly about Osun politics. There are also news about his unsuccessful attempt to meddle into the politics of Imo State. His activities in the national, regional and state levels in the PDP are in public domain. Yet Minister Wike is threatening that “nobody” can or should meddle in Rivers State politics, as if Rivers State is his private property. Certainly, the National Chairman and/ or National Secretary of the APC or any other political party will always be involved in political party activities in ALL the 36 States in Nigeria and the FCT. Certainly Mr. President has and will continue to lead the entire country and intervene on matters of States including Rivers, if and where necessary. In fact, it is President Tinubu’s interventions that prevented Rivers from descending into anarchy.

It is also noteworthy, that the importance of Rivers State in the permutations and combinations build up to 2027 elections, has changed from the 2023 elections scenario. Because the APC currently has about 30 incumbent governors as members. So the numbers and power dynamics that were critical in 2023, will not be the same in the 2027 elections.

I also don’t expect the APC under the leadership of President Bola Tinubu to allow an APC lead State House or Assembly to impeach the Rivers State Governor who is a brand new entrant of the APC. That is not how the APC operates.

Please let the people of Rivers State Breathe:

I hope that this Wike Versus Fubara power tussle will be ended so that the people of River State, and by extension the people of Nigeria, will have good governance in Rivers State . That should be the real objective of any well meaning politician in Rivers State.

January 16, 2026