The Nation Newspaper

Category: Columnists

  • History on the run

    History on the run

    I have tremendous respect for Victor Nosa Ikpeba. He is one of the ex-internationals who have not reduced their self-esteem by running errands for people who struggled to touch and take autographs from them in their playing days; the larger majority of who have driven our football into the ditch. It hurts deeply listening to a product from street football run the rule so devastatingly over the domestic game, hiding behind one finger, forgetting that the word best is subjective.

    Nigeria needs a manager with Clemens Westerhoff’s drive for unsung but talented players who will be excited to live in the country to truly scout for talents. How can anyone rationalise that Nigeria with a population of over 205 million people can’t produce a football team of 22 good players with sublime skills to thrill the world? This can’t be correct talk.

    This is the difference. Westerhoff scouted Finidi George, Daniel Amokachi, Uche Okechukwu, Friday Elaho, Ben Iroha et al and took them to clubs in Europe to sharpen the rustic edges of their games. Nigeria thereafter went to thrill the world at the USA ’94 World Cup, qualifying for the Round of 16 stage.

    It hurts deeply that a product of grassroots soccer and a sponsor of local competitions has restricted the hunt for talented players in Nigeria to only our domestic league games. One would be unfair to remind Ikpeba about the exploits of players who rose to stardom using the YSFON platform. Need I list their names?  Have we forgotten players such as the late Haruna Ilerika, the late Thompson Usiyen, Tunde Balogun, Adokie Amiesimaka, Felix Owolabi, Daimen Ogunsuyi, Quicksilver Slyvanus Okpala, Henry Nwosu, Austin Okocha, Patrick Ekeji, Edema Fuludu, Davidson Owumi, Clement Temile, Austin Eguavoen, Friday Elahor, Etim Esin, Adeolu Adekola, Kanu Nwankwo, Wilson Oruma, Jonathan Akpoborie et al who used the school boys’ competitions of yore, such as the Principal’s Cup and the once famous National Sports Festivals to exhibit their talent without necessarily playing in the local leagues before they attained national and international acclaim? It is the myopia of our soccer chieftains and those that they pick to perform scouting roles that have collectively converted the Super Eagles to the seeming exclusive abode of our Diaspora boys. No disrespect for all that they have done to paper the systemic problem with our football.

    How would these ex-internationals honestly feel sitting in the stadium or inside their houses watching Nigeria’s U-17 team, the Golden Eaglets, filled with Diaspora kids under the guise of fielding the best at all times? The pain in this type of setting hits us like a thunderbolt when we watch these kids moping when the Nigerian anthem is being sung before kickoff of games. Shouldn’t the best be scouted from outside of the domestic league? The truth is that those who should protect the domestic game are either agents of scouts of foreign clubs or their shylock managers.

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    This blanket pursuit for the best for our national teams wherever they exist is so brazen that today in the Nigerian transfer system, academies and nurseries now enjoy transfer fees in hard currencies instead of stipends tagged developmental fees for discovering and nurturing them.

    In fact, a very popular former Deputy Governor was aghast when in taking stock of players rightfully owned by the state’s team, it was discovered that most of them belonged to other people under spurious titles. He immediately ordered for a proper investigation of the matter with the misnomer stopped forthwith. He also directed the police to take some club officials away to write statements on all that they knew about the issue. How could the club be paying players whose transfer fees belonged to different people aptly tagged bystanders? Monkey dey work, baboon dey chop, nobi so? No chance.

    Trumpeters of the distasteful slogan of retaining a bronze medal coach should stop thinking through their respective pocket because history never forgets. When our domestic coaches won the AFCON bronze medals, we didn’t waste time in throwing them under the bus. We clamoured for the best coaches, which we zeroed down to recruiting foreign managers. Dear Ikpeba, if you are rooting for the best players in the Super Eagles, you need to be reminded that we also need the best managers, who from the last eight years, have been foreign managers. Truth be told, my brother, Ikpeba, Eric Chelle shouldn’t be the best foreign manager that we can offer to train the best boys to glory.

    Otherwise, how do we explain the refusal to renew the contract of a coach who led us to the runners up position with the silver medal at AFCON last year and the massive clamour to retain the services of a coach who needed the bravery of goalkeeper Stanley Nwabali to berth a bronze medal at the Africa Cup of Nations, barely a year after?

    Are we moving forward with this type of judgment? Of course not. It is just that those who brought the coaches have pressed the right chords in the media to drum up the maddening noise of retaining a coach without a plan B  when his team is boxed off as we saw when Nigeria tottered against the Atlas Lions of Morocco and the Pharaohs of Egypt.

    When I hear and read comments about how the past of Nigerian football is better than today’s, I cringe; because it took us 38 years of waiting and torture from North Africans and Cameroonian teams before Enyimba won the CAF Champions League title for Nigeria back to back in 2003 and 2004, making them the first Nigerian club to achieve this feat.

    The Nigeria league of yore was inscrutable, filled with tragic incidents, such as the death of former Bendel Insurance FC of Benin City’s chairman, Major Jimoh Ojo (Retired). Or have we forgotten the killing of NIGERIA junior international Igeniwari George, Finidi’s youngest brother inside his club, Enugu Rangers FC’s bus as they drove into the Liberty Stadium Ibadan to honour a National Challenge Cup game against Stationery Stores FC of Lagos? Was it not also in those days that fans frequently ran home because of canisters of tears used to disperse irate fans who took the laws in their hands?

     Was is not also in those days that fans died after another Challenge Cup game between Bendel Insurance FC and IICC Shooting Stars FC  of Ibadan at the National Stadium, Lagos due to power failure after the tie? What was so good about the local leagues whose matches were won at the board room from spurious post match protests? The Shenanigans in our football in the past were despicable. Those were the locust years of our soccer. So, when people reference it, I’m always shocked to the bones.

    For our soccer to grow in leaps and bounds,  we must recruit top-rated managers reminiscence of what England did by employing Tomas Tuchel, a German on an 18 months contract and what Brazil did by employing Carlo Ancelotti, an Italian, to guide them through their matches at the forthcoming 2026 World Cup to be co-hosted by Mexico, Canada and the United States (US).

    We must prevent those agents and shylock scouts who have pigeonholed our national teams by picking their ‘best’ players, not ours, from being part of Nigeria’s new quest for excellence.

  • The dynamics of Kano governor’s defection

    The dynamics of Kano governor’s defection

    The Permutations:

    There are new political and power dynamics in Kano State, as Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf defects from the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) and Kwankwasiya group to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC). As we count down to the 2027 general elections in Nigeria, the days and months ahead will be very interesting. However, even though this is a win for the APC, but due to the sophisticated nature of Kano politics, it is not over until it’s over!

    Essentially, Senator Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso a former Governor of Kano State and the national leader of the Kwankwasiya group has overreached. So, obviously, the die is cast. He has lost his key political godson, who, coincidentally, is his son-in-law, to his political arch-enemy, former governor Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, and APC. In my view, this type of politics of sense of entitlement of the political class, and the vicious cycle of transactional political godfatherism in Nigeria is timing out. For instance, we are witnessing what is playing out, which is at a crescendo in Rivers state. We are witnessing what is happening in Kano state. Not long ago, we saw what played out between Governor Uba Sani, and his predecessor, Governor Nasir El- Rufa’i.

    This is a lesson for political players that sometimes you need to play the long game. And indeed, for those that have the stay power in politics, they play for the long game.

    Potential Implications:

    However, with this development, trouble is waiting to happen amongst the political titans within the APC in Kano State.  This trouble has been brewing subliminally before the arrival of Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf. Power brokers like a former Governor of Kano State and immediate past National Chairman or the APC Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, who was hitherto the leader of the APC in Kano State; the Deputy Senate President of the Federation, Senator Barau Jibrin, who has been nursing the ambition and has been investing heavily to emerge as the APC Governorship candidate l  to contest against Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf, and other political juggernauts in Kano he already been scheming for supremacy build to the APC congresses. Therefore, it will be interesting to see how these strange bedfellows will fully align with Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf, who has practically no political structure, especially build up to the upcoming  ward, state, regional, and national Congresses and Convention.

    Kano State politics is peculiar. The fact that Mr. President intervened is true. The fact that the Convention will play a role is true. But as you come down the political structure, the disposition and the consciousness is not the same. The cunningness of the politicians iand voters, including those ones that Mr. President has marshalled, is different. They will go in the night and say, do this.”Shebi” it’s the President. I want to hold on to what he’s given me. But when the day is cast and it’s too late, everybody will answer his name.

    The litmus test for his excellency Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf will start having is during the upcoming APC Congress. Because that is when he will start setting up his own political structure. Even though the APC stalwarts may like to “donate” or “rent” their structure for Governor Abba Kabir in the interest winning the elections for President Tinubu and the APC, none of the APC political gladiators is ready to remain political subordinated for the next five, six years.

    Therefore what remains to be seen is if the APC political titans will be 100% loyal to Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf. What also remains to be seen if of the Kwankwasiya structure that Governor Abba has taken to APC will get a strong holding within in the APC. Or if they return to the NNPP if they do not feel full accommodated in APC. Or if they will remain in the APC and sabotage the APC at the critical time of elections.  This is because the Kano APC is it constituted now is a conglomeration of sworn and bitter political enemies whose rivalry and long term interests are hardly negotiable. Of course in the face value, the words of President Tinubu may sink in and be effective only for a while. But the political gladiators know that the current arrangement only serves the interest of Mr. President, while their respective mid to long term political structures and ambitions are in jeopardy. This is especially so given the fact that the 2027 general elections will determine the political structures and future of these politicians.

    Furthermore, it is clear that Governor Abba Kabir’s defection to the APC is for self preservation and to consolidate his quest for second term in office which is not really guaranteed even with the defection to the APC. This is because, the Kwankwasiya movement is still solid at the grassroots level in Kano. Whoever underestimates or overlooks the love for the Kwankwasiya movement under the leadership of Senator Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso is doing so at his own peril! Indeed the masses love Senator Kwankwaso and if anything the defection of Governor Abba Kabir has triggered more attention and sympathy for Senator Kwankwaso and the Kwankwasiya movement.

    Meanwhile, it is worthy of note that , due to the alleged overbearing influence of Senator Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso on Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf, a few months into the administration of Governor Abba Yusuf, the protagonists, started a mantra in Kano, saying, “Abba tsaya da kafafunka”, or “Abba tsaya da kanka” , meaning, “Abba Kabir, stand on your feet” (Abba be independent). And that mantra was the beginning of what we have seen that has happened today. Consequently, some members of the cabinet of governor Abba Kabir who were also members of the NNPP and the Kwankwasiya movement, including, the former Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Dr. Abdullahi Baffa Bichi, started moving away to the APC, claiming  that there is an overbearing hold on the governor by Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso. Further down the line, that continued to crystallise. And, obviously, like I said in my opening remarks earlier, this is a typical template of godfatherism,  playing out between a godson and godfather.

    Well, having done that now, Governor Abba Kabir was able to use this opportunity of his bosse’s overbearing influence, and at the same time, his overreaching with regards to the political dynamics at the national level.

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    It’s not over until it’s over!:

    The defection of Governor Abba Kabir from the NNPP to the APC has certainly dealt a blow on Senator Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso’s political structure- the Kwankwasiya movement, in the short term. However, it is highly likely that in the mid to long term, Senator Rabi’u  Musa Kwankwaso and the Kwankwasiya movement could resurge stronger, far as potentially Kano state politics is concerned, if anything. This is especially so if we go back to history. Kano politicians and voters are masters of this protest vote game we play.

    Let remind us of what happened during the 1991 Gubernatorial elections in Kano State between when the Gubernatorial candidate of the then Social Democratic Party (SDP) candidate, late Engineer, Magaji Abdullahi, and the Gubernatorial candidate of the National Republican Convention (NRC), Arc.  Kabiru Ibrahlm Gaya. Members of the two factions of the defunct Peoples Redemption Party (PRP)  were members of the SDP. The PRP had two factions: the faction loyal to late Mallam Aminu Kano, the former national leader of the PRP, that we call the “Tabo” group, and the faction loyal to late Alhaki Abubakar Rimi, a former governor of Kano State. This is akin to what we have now in the APC in Kano state, and with governor Abba Kabir group and the APC team under the leadership of Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje which is know in Kano as the “Gandujiya”.  group. When push came to shove, and late Engr. Magaji of the PRP “Tabo” faction emerged as the SDP Governorship candidate, the “Santsi” group kept quiet. But during the election, guess what they did? The “Santsi” faction and their supporters, in protest gave their votes  to the NRC candidate, and that is how Arc. Kabiru Ibrahlm Gaya emerged as the governor of Kano State. This political calculus, is typical of Kano politics notwithstanding Presidential intervention or interference or directive.

    All being said, how Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf continues to deliver the dividends of democracy to the masses in Kano state between now and 2027 and beyond, will determine how the massive Kwankwasiya movement will sway in terms of voting pattern. Now we have seen how the political elites in the cabinet of governor Abba Kabir have moved to the APC.  What is important to note is that the defections have not significantly impacted the value of the Kwankwasiya at the grassroots, What remains to be seen is how it plays out in the voting pattern.

  • Preventing gridlock on Lagos-Ibadan expressway

    Preventing gridlock on Lagos-Ibadan expressway

    Anyone who frequently travels on the Lagos-Ibadan expressway which also leads to the northern states and which branches eastward to Benin and the eastern parts of the country to  Delta, Rivers and important cities like Port Harcourt,  Aba, Calabar, Enugu  etc. would know this is the arterial road that links the rest of Nigeria with Lagos.  This easy access is very important in the overall economy of Nigeria. This means that the road should not be seen in its importance to the southwest alone but to the geo-strategic significance of the road to Nigeria.

    Comparing the development of the road in the manner of Apapa gridlock should give palpitation to the planners of the development economics of Nigeria. Apapa is the major entrepôt of Nigeria in the sense that 90 percent of the goods coming to Nigeria come in through the port. This in itself is due to bad planning and lack of bold imagination of Nigeria’s leaders since independence.

    I am not going to blame the British, our colonial masters who left this place 66 years ago. This is long in time for us as inheritors of bad colonial planning to help ourselves and not blame those who came for their own reasons and after having finished with us, left us alone when our leaders pushed them out perhaps because the nature of imperialism in this part of the world did not require physical presence before their economic rewards could still be realized.

    I think I have made my point that power in the hands of innovative and imaginative leadership would have seen us make hop step and jump to what is required in these days of knowledge economy.

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    From Lagos up to Sagamu and onward to Iperu in Ogun State on both sides of the so-called express road are to be found industries haphazardly located on both sides of the road. This development definitely makes the government of Ogun State happy and other Nigerians in other states of the federation probably envy Ogun State for attracting this bevy of industries which must be good for the internal revenue of Ogun State and the federation as a whole. But at what expense?

    Now this express road where millions pass through daily is being turned into parking place like Apapa port. In this place, long articulated trucks turn anyhow against the run of traffic and many escape head-on collision through the grace and mercy of God.  Admittedly, we have not reached the situation of Apapa where for lack of movement drivers spread mats under their vehicles and sleep their time away! This need not happen if we plan very well before action.

    We should always factor into whatever action we take the sociology of the Nigerian people. Our people do not think about others when they drive on the roads. This is why slow moving trucks drive on the inner side of the road for fast driving leaving the outside part of the road for wrongful overtaking. Could it be our drivers get driving licences without test? In any case, many of the trailer drivers are absolute illiterates. 

    I honestly believe that the whole country needs to be taught the ordinary ideas of civics. Perhaps thieves in government need to be taught that stealing is not only bad but it is also a corrosion of the society. Why should a single person in society build a house for a single family at the cost of billions of naira and declare it open for poor people to gawk and look at while religious leaders are invited to pray for further prosperity of the owner knowing as we all do, that the mansion is a manifestation of the stealing going on in the oil industry while the people in the oil producing areas languishing in want and poverty?

    I congratulate the president of this difficult country, Nigeria for having the vision to embark on the Lagos – Calabar road; he should also at the same time focus on the Badagry – Sokoto road which is equally important. Whenever these two roads are finished, whether in our times or not, history will celebrate those who execute a vision that many of us egg heads have had for a long time.

    The Lagos – Ibadan express road linking the port city with the rest of the country remains in my own estimate, a scandal to forward planning and imagination. I shudder to think about what happens to our economy if the bridges over Ogun River were to collapse thereby cutting the road off from Lagos. If we plan for the above scenario, we should have put the road to Abeokuta and Ibadan to excellent and ready state and perhaps the Epe-Lagos alternative road in a state of readiness through federal government take-over of any of the sections of these roads not presently under federal jurisdiction.

    I remember when I was in Germany as ambassador of our potentially great country, the German Chancellor Herr  Helmut Kohl created what he called “the ministry of the future “and put it under a young lawyer to dream about the future and what would be needed to cope with it. I will like this innovative approach be made to the future development of Nigeria. For defence purposes we need easily motorable roads for the defence of Lagos in case of enemy seizure of the city and its ports. The Lagos – Abeokuta to Ibadan express easily recommends itself and so does the Lagos – Epe – Ibadan branching off in Ijebu-Ode to link the Benin and the eastern provinces of Nigeria. This is the way to plan for a future scenario that goes beyond our expectations that what we have now will always be up to the mark of securing the country against possible enemies. The way we do things now take life too leisurely. We must begin to think out of the box as they say.

    To come back to where we began, efforts must be made to prevent the gridlock of Apapa being repeated on the Lagos – Ibadan road because of our search for local and external investment. We must prevent this by all means why we begin serious planning to having alternative link roads to the hinterland of Nigeria from Lagos and not put all our eggs in the fragile Lagos – Ibadan  express way.

  • By their fruits

    By their fruits

    Before they became politicians, they were the people’s nemesis. It was themselves first and everything centred around them. The good things of life must be for them and their family members only. They have lived on the state for eons and are not ready to let go. These days, they parade themseoves as lovers of the people, the same people they oppressed and suppressed in the eighties.

    Now in the political era that started in 1999, these mean men masquerading as the best things to happen to the country since the return to democracy over 26 years ago have come to see themselves as social crusaders. Can you imagine the tormentors of yesterday becoming the crusaders of today? Do not be deceived. Their crusading is all for power.

    They desperately want power. It is not that they were never in power before. They wielded power not too long ago, but did nothing to improve the lot of the same people that they claim are now “hungry”. Some of them even say they too are “hungry”, even after being in power for 24 years at a go! If the masses are indeed “hungry” to borrow their word, these fat and well-fed ‘hungry’ politicians should search themselves and come up with the truth of when the ‘hunger’ started.

    The masses of Nigerians have been hungery for years. Hungry for the good things of life, such as well-equipped schools, hospitals, decent homes and companies where they can work and make a living to take care of themselves and their families. Oh! May be the people were not hungry when David Mark, then a military officer and Minister of Communications, said ‘telephone is not for the poor’. Since he joined politics, he has tried to rephrase the statement. He claimed he never meant it that way. So, how did he mean it?

    Why did he not make the denial then in the eighties? Why wait till the return of democracy to correct his Freudian slip? The people cannot be deceived. They can see through his gimmick to sweeten things now in order to get them to his side. He now heads the lowly fancied, African Democratic Congress (ADC), a coalition of spent politicians, who are never tired of trying their luck for power in every election year. Mark was Senate president for eight years under the now disintegrated Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). His eight years in office was half of the 16 that PDP held power. The party had vowed to rule for 60 years before it was brought down to earth in 2015.

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    Since then, the party has been comatose, with many members like Mark; its presidential candidate in 2023, Atiku Abubakar, and his Labour Party (LP) counterpart, Peter Obi, seeking solace in ADC. With them in their new home is John Odigie-Oyegun, a former governor of Edo State, who hit the limelight in the famous 1984 case of Saidu Garba versus the Federal Civil Service Commission (FCSC) when he on several occasions disobeyed the orders of Justice Yahya Jinadu of the Lagos High Court.

    Jinadu was no ordinary judge. He was courageous and bold  as they come. He brooked no nonsense and was not ready to allow any person no matter how powerful to trample upon his court. Oyegun was then the permanent secretary of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. His ministry oversaw the fire service. Garba was divisional fire officer at Onikan, Lagos when the nearby 32-storey Nigeria External Telecommunications (NET) building went up in flames on January 24, 1983.

    He was interdicted over the incident. His interdiction ended up in Jinadu’s court. The judge ordered Garba’s reinstatement. Oyegun flatly refused to obey the order.Oyegun’s lawyer from the Federal Ministry of Justice, who also later became a judge, indulged him.

    Jinadu was shocked to his marrows. He wonderd at the lawyer’s attitude, and disrobed him not once,  but twice in open court. Sadly, in the end, ‘big manism’ won, as Oyegun disobeyed all the court orders. Though, Jinadu’s orders were set aside on appeal  by 2-1, the judge laughed last at the Supreme Court where the verdict was unanimously (5-0) restored. But, before the victory, he had been forced out of work. His six-month notice of resignation to allow him conclude part-heard cases was rejected by the Buhari junta which directed him to go immediately.

    It is quite interesting to see the same Oyegun and his ilk today calling themselves respecters and upholders of the rule of the law. How can anybody be that if they do not obey court orders? What kind of manifesto and policy will someone like Oyegun who is the chairman of his party’s committee of the same name fashion for the association? The morning, it is said, shows the day. If you were once a disrespecter of court orders, you will always be one. Democracy cannot change that. How can it change an innate attribute mastered as an art as a top civil servant?

    The combination of  Oyegun and Mark at the top echelon of ADC is unholy. It is forged in chicanery and it cannot get the party anywhere. Oyegun might have gotten away with disobeying court orders some 42 years ago, but he and his party are unlikely to escape the people’s wrath at the polls in 2027 for past indiscretions. What have they got to offer than their legacies of disobedience of court orders and telephone is not for the poor? Voters are waiting at the polls to remind them of those legacies.

  • Their craze for ‘number one’

    Their craze for ‘number one’

    It is in the character of politicians to be in front, to be the number one. Even, where they are not the numero uno, they still see themselves as such. Rivers State Governor Siminalayi Fubara started what can be called the game of number one when he picked up his membership card of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

    Apparently to silence mockers that he has no political base, he brandished his card and with a smile intoned: “My membership card is 001. I am now number one in APC in Rivers State”. Then, came ADC’s Peter Obi’s turn to play the same card. While campaigning for a LP candidate in the forthcoming council elections in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Obi said he would be contesting for “number one” in 2027.

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    Obi might have done that to impress the Obidients, members of the amorphous group behind his political ministry. They supported him in 2023 when he contested on LP platform and have warned him against joining ADC if he won’t get the party’s presidential ticket in 2027. Is there any elective post called number one? I am contesting for president is I am contesting for president. Any reason for the cryptic signal?

  • Nigeria’s digital plague

    Nigeria’s digital plague

    The ‘hustle’ is neither gross nor cruel when the commodity is the whore ─ or video vixen, if you like. Profit is neither sinful nor inhumane when the exploited is an underage child presented as a piece of flesh.

    Free enterprise is fair game when creatives defy religious and tribal strictures to commercialise genitalia for your viewing pleasure. The new pornography is democratic and interestingly daring. 

    Consider, for instance, the curious case of a Nigerian skit-making duo─mother and her son─who have become popular among high school children.

    Just recently, a widowed neighbour sought my attention, urging me to counsel her grandsons and “set them straight.” She had stumbled on the 12 and 13-year-olds, respectively, while they watched videos of the Nigerian mother and her teenage son dry-humping each other.

    The mother, presumably in her late thirties or early forties, is seen frolicking with her son in a sexually suggestive way in a series of videos. The woman, evidently driven by her taboo sex fetish, has produced a series of videos in which she is playfully groped, smooched and dry-humped directly on the butts by her teenage son.

    The boy, apparently in his early teens, goes after his scantily clad mother as she performs house chores or reclines in bed, hops on her back and dry-humps her buttocks with feverish gusto. This takes place in a series of skits in which the mother parades in a flimsy wrapper or shorts.

    And as is often the case with purveyors of decadent media fare, they have gotten more daring. A more recent video shows the mother bathing with her son, naked, in the bathroom. The boy is seen sponging her back with delight. Predictably, her timeline gets flooded, as you read, with the commentary of viewers egging them on, some applauding their closeness, some pleading desperately for a video in which the mother eventually has sex with her son.

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    Apparently, the ‘hustle’ is neither abominable nor gross when the Nigerian mother molests her adolescent son, subjecting herself to playful, intense smooching─anything to generate online engagement, while sating netizens’ unconcealed and hidden sex fetishes.

    Forget the mother-son duo; there are more daring skit-makers masquerading as “content creators” in Nigeria’s virtual space. Just this morning, a skit-making couple posted a video of themselves. In the clip, the male’s head is buried between the naked thighs of his female partner. A few seconds afterwards, he lifts his head to show his mouth and nose dripping with milk-like fluid suggestive of female ejaculation.

    And you must have encountered perhaps more daring videos of married couples self-identifying as “content creators” even while producing soft porn. The new porn arena features the participation of the Nigerian family men and women, boys and girls, grannies, wives and husbands.

    The rise of sexually suggestive video skits in Nigeria is linked to content commodification, digital sexual objectification, and the pursuit of viral popularity on social media platforms. This trend is the new pandemic, corrupting youths and clashing with traditional mores.

    Porn is the new plague across Africa, as evidenced in the number of lewd content produced by Africans and broadcast on Facebook, Tiktok to mention a few. There is a current viral narrative of a Zimbabwean girl who flashes her bare genitals before the camera to the viewing pleasure of her numerous fans on Facebook.

    The newfound erotica, fondly dubbed “soft work,” is a vast virtual graveyard where morality has gone to die. Nigerian “content creators” personify more than a mere change in taste or a rebellion against prudishness. They constitute a civilisational signal flare, showing how moral imagination is being commercially repurposed, to the detriment of personhood.

    In Nigeria and much of Africa, the human body is constantly remodelled as a punchline. Sexual humiliation is rebranded as humour, and intimacy, once a modest human affair, is commercialised. The public sphere has been turned into a decadent peep show all in the name of skit-making, satire, and digital entrepreneurship. This did not begin with the internet. The internet simply removed the gatekeepers.

    Skit-making now revolves around simulated sexual acts, voyeurism, and the theatrical violation of boundaries. Couples perform intimacy for clicks and families appear as ensembles in productions that blur the line between play and exposure. Privacy is monetised and defended as hustle; even children are sometimes used as props and participants in skits that should never require their presence.

    It’d be lazy to simply describe this as moral decay and move on. Decay implies passivity, as though something simply rotted on its own. What is happening here is more deliberate. It is a new economy of attention that feeds on shock, rewards extremity, and punishes restraint. It is capitalism stripped of shame, mining the intimate zones of the human body for a profit.

    Pornography has always been political. Not because it shows sex, but because it shows power. Andrea Dworkin once argued that porn is not about pleasure but possession—about reducing the human being to an object that can be consumed without consequence.

    That argument may sound old-fashioned to a generation raised on filters and fast data. But its relevance has only deepened in an era that dresses filth as empowerment. Women are told that they are choosing visibility and matching their male peers in relevance. Youths are told they are choosing “survival” through “ingenuity.”

    Yet, choice without morality belies freedom; it accentuates drift. This drift had gotten so bad as far back as 2023, when a Nigerian teenage girl made a sordid show of riding a cucumber─cowgirl style in her mother’s kitchen till she orgasmed. Afterwards, she waved the cucumber thick with her milky discharge in front of the camera, before sauntering off.

    One of the most uncomfortable truths in this moment is that many women and girls are not merely victims in this economy but also its drivers, anchors, and beneficiaries. This fact is often avoided for fear of appearing judgmental. But avoiding it only infantilises women and strips them of moral agency. Participation in one’s own commodification does not erase the harm; it intensifies it.

    The themes that dominate most skits are telling: simulated rape, voyeurism, incest, adultery, and transactional sex. Power games are played for laughs as violence softens into farce. What has shifted is not merely who plays the villain but the thrill of playing one. Transgression is now marketed as equality and progress.

    This is why the argument that “youths are just being creative with the tools available to them” is unjustifiable. Creativity is not value-neutral. Every creative act intones an ethic or vice, whether acknowledged or not. The same mentality that justifies digital smut as survival justifies drug trafficking, cybercrime, ritual violence, and other predatory economies as means to preferred ends.

    The internet, in this sense, is not the cause but the amplifier; a glittering façade, like the casinos and brothels of older empires, promising escape while numbing society to its cost.

    A 2025 study by Raymond Asuquo of Nasarawa State University, Evaluation of Social Media Skits and Emerging Behaviours among Youths in Nigeria, examined widely shared skits across major platforms and found a clear pattern: sexually explicit content and risky portrayals are increasingly normalised, driven largely by the quest for monetisation and online visibility. The study warns that such content reshapes youth behaviour, blurs ethical boundaries, and raises urgent questions about responsibility, regulation, and cultural survival. Creativity, the research notes, has become entangled with harm.

    And that is as bad as the story gets.

  • Retreat on improving polytechnic education

    Retreat on improving polytechnic education

    It was acknowledged at the outset that polytechnic education had been in recession for decades due partly to low investment in the sector and partly to emphasis on university education. That’s why chairpersons of polytechnics, rectors, registrars, bursars, and state commissioners of education throughout the country attended a retreat on ways to improve polytechnic education. For 6 hours a day over two days (January 21-22, 2026), in the tech-resourced TETFund Auditorium, eight papers were presented and discussed, four per day, each for a full hour. The following summary is infused with my own reflections on the presentations and discussions.

    In his opening address, the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, drew attention to the renewed goals of polytechnic education under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and the need to align polytechnic education with the national manpower needs and development goals: “Innovation must be the heartbeat of our polytechnics; therefore, I urge you to foster entrepreneurship centres, research hubs, and industry partnerships that turn ideas into prototypes, inventions into enterprises, which will graduate students into job creators. Polytechnics should lead in areas like renewable energy, agriculture technology, digital manufacturing, and climate-resilient solutions directly contributing to Nigeria’s sustainable development goals.”

    Seven major issues:

    •Leadership and governance

    Typical governance problems in polytechnics were discussed and various approaches to solving them were highlighted. The problems range from funding shortages and poor infrastructure through inadequate lab and teaching facilities to undue external interference in internal affairs. The problems notwithstanding, effective governance and leadership accountability are necessary for sustaining the mission of the polytechnic.

    2 Social cohesion

    Emphasis was placed on (a) the need to foster collaboration and good relationships among governing council, management, and unions; (b) the need to foster effective relationships among management, staff, and students; and (c) the need to maintain harmonious relationships among institutional management, staff, students, and the host community, realising that a good number of staff and students reside within the host community.

    3 Financial management

    Financial prudence is critical to achieving the mission of the polytechnic, more so in the face of funding shortages. One area in which fiscal management could be optimised is procurement. There was an exhaustive presentation on procurement procedures, based on compliance with the Procurement Act. I strongly recommend this presentation to all procurement officers and members of the Tenders Board throughout the federation. Equally important is the presentation by an ICPC official on how to identify pitfalls in financial operations and how to avoid corrupt practices in fund utilization.

    It must be noted, however, that the procurement procedures are too cumbersome for efficiency. No wonder specially trained officers are required to be in charge. Yet the complicated procedures involved often leave gaps for oversight managers to exploit. There are over ten such groups from various ministries and both Houses of the National Assembly looking into various aspects of polytechnic management. In addition to visiting the campuses, oversight managers often invite one or more members of the polytechnic management to Abuja to explain or defend this or that. But even where there are no clear complaints, these managers often have to be settled. The expenses incurred by the polytechnics on accommodation, transport, and settlement fees amount to a drain on the inadequate resources of the polytechnics with little or no impact on quality assurance.

    • ICT and digital transformation

    In keeping with presidential directive on ICT compliance, polytechnics should adopt digitization across the institution to enhance efficiency in governance, teaching, learning, and research. The presentation and discussion of this topic highlighted the need for polytechnics to prepare candidates for the fourth industrial revolution, spurred by the Internet, digitsation, and the adoption of AI tools for enhanced efficiency.

    • Quality assurance

    Quality assurance enhances efficiency, reduces costs, and boosts stakeholders’ confidence. It is necessary to ensure standards in governance, teaching, fiscal management, and ethical practices. Quality assurance in polytechnics is diffuse, if there is any at all. The so-called oversight managers appear to be after collection rather than correction and after quantity rather than quality. It is unclear how the planned establishment of a Polytechnic Commission (after National Universities Commission) will provide desired quality assurance, which the NBTE appears unable to provide.

    •Human capital development and staff welfare

    The renewed focus on polytechnic education requires the upgrade of the lecturers’ skills, slaries, and allowances as well as clear owed allowances. In was, therefore, good news that the federal government was negotiating with polytechnic unions for salary upgrade and unpaid allowances. TETFund has been helpful to the polytechnics for faculty and staff training. However, polytechnic lecturers have not been tapping enough into available funds for research.

    •Polytechnic-industry linkage

    It is important to establish and strengthen linkages with local industries to establish or enhance internships, practical training, and apprenticeships. Where there are no industries in the area, construction companies, reputable roadside mechanics, welders, plumbers, electricians, and other artisans at work can provide practical training for students.

    Major challenges

    • Irregular and grossly inadequate funding for capital projects and recurrent expenses. Moreover, statutory intervention funds are delayed or not disbursed at all. The rigmarole before approved funds could be accessed often causes unnecessary delay. This has ripple effects across the institution, including dampened morale, lowered quality, and, sometimes, loss of funds.

    •Poor and inadequate infrastructure and deficiencies in workshop and laboratory facilities. The minister announced a special TETFund intervention fund for upgrading engineering schools with modern, industry-standard equipment. But what about the other programmes?

    •Teaching and technical staff shortages and limited opportunities for staff development and career progression.

    • Outdated currcula that are out of alignment with needed industry skills and current technologies need urgent upgrade.

    • Despite policy emphasis on ICT compliance, ICT infrastructure is limited or lacking. As a result, there is limited digital teaching capacity and low e-learning readiness. TETFund is one of a few institutions in Africa to have invested heavily in Blackboard, an online learning tool, but it has hardly translated to use beyond Abuja.

    • There are serious security concerns and safety issues on many polytechnics, especially newer ones without perimeter fencing. This requires urgent intervention in view of rampant security breaches in educational institutions.

    • There are serious constraints on institutional autonomy worsened by delayed release of statutory approvals and external interference in management processes. The menace of numerous “oversight managers” from various ministries and the National Assembly is particularly aggravating to the polytechnic management. Unfortunately, polytechnic Governing Councils have been rendered too ceremonial to be of help to the management.

    Key recommendations

    Federal and state governments should increase funding for polytechnic education and ensure regularity in the release of statutory allocations and intervention funds.

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    Federal and state governments should also take measures to enhance the autonomy of polytechnic institutions to encourage effective compliance with their mission.

    Polytechnics should be encouraged to collaborate with security agencies and community stakeholders to develop campus security protocols and emergency response plans.

    New curricula are long overdue to align polytechnic education with national development goals and industry needs.

    Finally, Governing Councils should cease to be a ceremonial haven for political jobbers. Rather, they should be empowered to hire, promote, and discipline management and staff, maintain quality, and raise necessary funds to carry out the polytechnic’s mission.

    Conclusion

    The zeal with which the present Minister of Education is implementing the administration’s Renewed Hope agenda on education is commendable. But a level playing field is assumed for all universities and polytechnics, which makes it difficult to achieve excellence. It is necessary to identify selected universities and polytechnics and develop high performing ones into Centres of Excellence through special funding for which development goals would be set with measurable kpis. Turkey has joined China and India in doing so.

    Today, Turkey has at least 23 institutions in the top 500 in Europe. In the forefront is Turkey’s Middle East Technical University (METU) which “secured its position as the national leader by scoring highest in academic reputation, employer reputation, and international research network indicators.” Excellence does not result from wishful thinking or funding alone, but from careful planning and achieving set targets.

  • Sim the Tragic

    Sim the Tragic

    Some historical monikers are sane.  Others, by contemporary temper, absolutely insane.

    Alexander the Great (256-323 BC), formally Alexander III, King of Macedonia, was not only the greatest warrior-king in Greek history.  He also counts among the greatest military strategists of all time.  At 30, he had carved out an empire, which stretched from Greece to the western part of India’s north.

    If ‘Alexander the Great’ made sense, William the Bastard (1028-1087) made little sense – or did it? William the Conqueror – as he was otherwise called – sure earned his stripes: from the Duke of Normandy and eventually, the first Norman King of England.

    But not even all his accomplishments, in war and in peace, could blot the sobriquet: William the Bastard. His parents, Robert I, Duke of Normandy, and Herleva of Falaise, both in France, were unmarried.  Medieval temper was much starker and far less filtered!

    If we pivot from ancient wars to the eternal war that is the Rivers’ present politics, how would you brand the leading dramatis personae?  Riled godfather, ex-governor, and now explosive Abuja Minister, Nyesom Wike: Ezenwo the Brash?

    Or foxy but extremely annoying godson, with a gubernatorial term of one day, one trouble, Siminalayi Fubara: Sim the Tragic?  He goes on dabbing himself with petrol, knowing full well the Wike camp won’t blink from lighting up the fire that could burn him to ashes!

    By the way, given the political straws now posturing with Fubara, in his meaningless, yet explosive grandstanding, the Rivers six-month emergency debacle seems to have taught the governor nothing.

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    One is Daniel Bwala, a Tinubu loyalist from Borno State, North East – until the issue of a Muslim-Muslim ticket.  Pronto, he bailed from the winning boat, in a blind splash to the losers’ camp – whatever the northern Christian minority fears, which pushed the sheer panic of his jump.  But later, he would pivot back from the failed Atiku Abubakar camp, landing the visible sinecure of the presidential special adviser on Policy Communication.

    Does Bwala think his posturing, on Fubara’s account, would weigh more with the president – who seeks a second term – when the chips are down?  Bwala, who bailed out at the first hint of ticket danger, would weigh more than Wike – hate him or love him – who grinded everything out, when the danger was red-hot, though he belonged to the rival PDP?

    What hubris!  Folks who enjoy the grace of second chances should learn to be humble!

    The other is Ajibola Basiru, PhD, eminent lawyer and a former senator to boot, from Osun, South West!  Did former Senator Basiru think national visibility, as APC national scribe, equate a full grasp and control of local politics?

    Well, if he did, he has learnt nothing from his predecessor, Iyiola Omisore! Once-upon-a-time, Omisore enjoyed that exact klieg light.  But it proved utterly useless when issues returned to the realpolitik of Osun politics.  Pray, how did national secretary-emeritus help Omisore’s umpteenth bid for Osun governor 2026?

    Just as well Basiru is walking back his talk!  He and Bwala ought to have been far more circumspect.  If they cannot ease their principal’s bid for a second term, they should avoid empty noise that could make it tougher.

    But back to Rivers emergency rule and its plus-and-minus for embattled Governor Fubara.  Yes, it could have been worse: that emergency shunted him aside for six months. But it also preserved his battered office.  Had emergency rule not come as some contrived wonder-machine, which froze his looming impeachment, he would probably have been history by now.

    True, no one could have predicted the political thunder to follow that interregnum, including the Armageddon his famed “Ijaw youths” could have unleashed in the creeks.  But no meltdown could have restored him to office, except the courts fault his impeachment processes.  It’s the grim beauty of the rule of law!

    That is why it is tragic that the governor seems to have forgotten the baleful, shrieking, if impotent, voices that last pushed him to the brink, while he committed impeachable offences that would have made his political guillotining a breeze.  He seems repeating the same mistake, post-emergency.  Sad!

    Between Wike (warts and all) and Fubara (all guile, little gumption), is a huge study in contrasts.

    Wike’s politics, no matter its rough exterior, shows a sure-footed mastery of his environment, mastering the push before they come to the shove.  Outside politics qua politics, he has also proved a brilliant policy boss.  That is clear from his records, both as Rivers two-term governor, and as sitting FCT minister. 

    That’s why it’s such a laugh: the clearly sponsored media hysteria, calling for his sack – for what exactly?  For showing, so far, a near-complete mastery of his Rivers political environment: morphing from a strict PDP partisan to cobbling together a cross-party ensemble he dubs the Rivers Renewed Hope Ambassadors, for Tinubu’s reelection in 2027?  Or: for brilliantly delivering on his FCT ministerial mandate?

    Put Fubara on a similar podium and what do you see?  A 21st century Greek, Icarus, in the thunder of Rivers politics!  Daedalius had warned his son, Icarius, not to fly too close to the sun, lest the heat melt the wax that grafted his wings!  But in the euphoria of the moment, Icarus soared too high, got his wax melted, and plunged into the sea!

    The classic making of Sim the Tragic: this running, gripping, all-riveting tale of self-doom?  Yet, with a tad of political gumption, it just might have been doom avoidable!

    Still, is Wike’s own politics all that immaculate?  Hardly!  Wike seems deaf to the wails of the drum he beats, ever so violently.  As the drum wails, he beats it even more.  That the drum might tear hardly ever occurs to him! Wike’s hamartia? He never knows when to stop!  But until that drum tears, he holds the ace!

    Let Fubara change tack, if it’s not already too late.  He should renounce any pretence to a second term.  He has made enough bungle of his gubernatorial tour of thorns.

  • IPOB: Not again

    IPOB: Not again

    A rump of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), has threatened to resume the enforcement of the Monday sit-at-home which was started over four years ago as a way to force the federal government to heed the call for the release of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, then detained by the government of late President Muhammadu Buhari. IPOB grew out, from the Movement for the Actualization of Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB). IPOB has itself mutated, even though the mutants have no new name, known to the public.

    The recent threat is a reaction to the effort by the governor of Anambra State, Chukwuma Soludo, to stop the wasteful sit-at-home on Mondays which IPOB used to draw attention to the trial of Nnamdi Kanu who has now been jailed for terrorism related charges. The group initially enforced the order on the days Kanu went to court, but eventually included every Monday, to push their campaign. According to Aloy Ejimakor, Kanu’s lawyer, his principal had since ordered a stop of the sit-at-home, but some of his followers remained defiant.

    One of the leaders of the mutants, Simeon Ekpa, has been jailed in Finland for terrorism. This writer was particularly irked about Ekpa’s style of making light the consequences of his messages in the region. In one video, he was dancing and said he was enjoying himself, while his detractors were claiming he was under detention, which showed the so-called fight for Biafra was a joke for him. The cavalier manner he treated the grave issue of the deaths and mayhem in the southeast resulting from his actions showed he didn’t care a hoot about the so-called struggle.

    Before they were jailed, Ekpa had openly defied Kanu over the latter’s order to end the sit-at-home. With Kanu in detention, Ekpa had assumed leadership even while pretending to be acting in the interest of the Kanu. Of course, there appears to be cells operating independently of the leadership, dishing out instructions and countermanding orders from the IPOB leadership. The results have been killing of the ordinary persons, by what came to be regarded as the unknown gunmen.

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    At the height of his confrontation with the Nigerian state, Kanu with tremendous gift of garb, framed the fight as one between the quest for an independent republic of Biafra, and the hegemonic powers that ruled Nigeria. A bombastic fellow, Kanu held his followers captive, with eloquent denunciation of the challenges bedeviling Nigeria. Courted and cult-ed, he became a folk hero, amongst the downtrodden and disposessed, in the region. Soon, some members of the intelligentsia and the business class also warmed up to him and that made him more daring.

    Like Ralph Uwazurike of MASSOB, to tantalize his supporters, Kanu began to make promises he had no way of keeping. He gave dates and events that will culminate into the birth of Biafra republic. As if in a conspiracy, the government of late President Muhammad Buhari, in rhetoric and in action, gave the impression that Igbos of southeast were dispensable in determining the future of Nigeria. And as if in concert, terrorism by herdsmen under Buhari, added a new dimension to the Nigerian fault lines.

    Those who hitherto were dismissive of a purported ethnic/religious agenda, under the government began to believe that something was really afoot. In remote villages across the southeast, and of course other parts of Nigeria, herdsmen clutching AK47 rifles, became the symbol that Armageddon was near the gate. So, when Kanu said that there are plans for the Fulani ethnic group to take over other parts of the country by force, even the doubters believed. Like a prophet whose last prediction came to pass, Kanu was emboldened to make more predictions and issue more threats.

    With Kanu’s image getting far larger than those elected to govern at the federal and the state levels in the southeast, it was definite, as the pre-eminent Tatalo Alamu, of this newspaper would say, that something had to give. There are several conspiracy theories as to how Kanu was rendered back to Nigeria from Kenya by the Buhari regime. There are many political leaders in the region, who have been smeared with the tag of saboteur, for allegedly rendering Kanu back to Nigeria.

    The Buhari regime despite its best efforts could not bring the trial of Kanu at the Federal High Court Abuja, to an end. Kanu was able to outfox the regime for about four years, with all manner of legal gymnastics, as some have called it. He changed his lawyers many times, defended himself a few times, and forced changes of judges at other times. While that was going on, the economy of the southeast was haemorrhaging profusely. The economic loss is projected in several billions of naira, the loss of life in monumental proportions, and the dislocation of social life, very substantial.

    With the Buhari regime and its concomitant idiosyncrasies ending in 2023, many thought the challenges associated with the crisis would dissipate. Leaders of the southeast tried to outdo each other, to position to claim credit, believing that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu would release Kanu from the gulag. Kanu even toned down his rhetoric, in the earnest hope that the new regime’s renewed hope agenda would grant him freedom. Instead of a political solution, the courts went for a legal solution as Justice James Omotosho ignored all legal mischiefs, and went ahead to conclude the trial and jail Kanu, for life. 

    With a mischievous obiter dictum that Kanu should be jailed in any prison that pleases the powers that be, he was sent to the Sokoto Correctional Centre, the seat of the Caliphate that he had been lampooning in his rise to prominence. In a tinge of irony, like a youth corps member, it seems he was sent to learn the ways and means of Fulani, so he can become a better pan-Nigerian. With Kanu put away in faraway, Sokoto, many have been wondering whether IPOB would continue to dissipate and eventually disappear.

    But the ever loquacious spirit-man, Emma Powerful, the spokesman of IPOB, seems to have a different agenda. He is giving the impression that IPOB is a phoenix. He has called for renewal of the sit-at-home agenda, which has never augured well for the region. This writer urges those pushing for the sit-at-home order to continue to please abandon a strategy that has hurt the southeast more that it has benefited it and hope that President Tinubu would release Kanu and help the region to recuperate. The southeast has suffered enough, from the Buhari-era crisis.    

    Of course, while the southeast was haemorrhaging, the national economy was bleeding.  Governor Soludo, who made the contested order, has threatened traders with grave consequences if they fail to resume on Mondays. This column hopes he has put plans in place to secure those willing to work on Mondays from criminals masquerading as liberation fighters.

  • PDP and the price for impunity

    PDP and the price for impunity

    Impunity is PDP’s other name. With the party’s latest act of impunity ending in a fiasco in Ibadan High Court last Friday, the question on the lips of Nigerians concerned about the health of our democracy and party system are asking is what next?

    Following a suit filed by some aggrieved members of the party’s factional leaders late last year, Justice James Omotosho had ordered their Ibadan convention to be halted until the party complies with the statutory requirements of its own constitution, the Nigerian Constitution, and the Electoral Act. He therefore directed the PDP “to go back and put its house in order, and to give the statutory 21-day notice to INEC before it can proceed with the proposed convention.”

    Similarly, Sule Lamido, an elder of the party claiming he was denied the opportunity to purchase a nomination form to contest for the party’s chairmanship, in violation of the PDP constitution and guidelines, also secured a Federal High Court injunction suspending  the convention.

    But without first vacating any of the judgments, PDP sought and secured the help of an Ibadan High Court which, on November 4, 2025, cleared the party to proceed with the national convention.

    When Kabiru Tanimu Turaki’s attempt to enforce his faction’s Ibadan phyric victory was resisted by the other faction that had taken control of their Abuja Wadata national secretariat, he sought recognition of the Ibadan convention and validation of the NWC that emerged at the convention from another Ibadan Federal High Court presided over by Uche Agomoh. However, instead of the relief sought, the court last Friday nullified the November 15 -16, 2025 convention on the ground it was conducted in flagrant disobedience to two subsisting judgments of the same court. Turaki and other officials purportedly elected at the convention were barred by the court from parading themselves as national officers of the party forthwith.

    Predictably, Turaki’s faction was defiant declaring “We are aware of the judgment of the Federal High Court” but, “Notwithstanding this judgment, the Turaki–led Peoples Democratic Party, which emerged from the Ibadan convention, remains legally intact and unshaken, as we await the authoritative pronouncement of the appellate courts”.

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    It is often said those destined for ruin, are often out of sheer pride driven to act irrationally. With timetable for the 2027 election already released by INEC and with otherwise loyal PDP party members in search for alternative platform to escape a PDP sinking ship in droves, one would have thought these times call for sober reflection with reason prevailing among PDP warring factional leaders.

    It is not as if PDP deserves tears of Nigerians if its fate is now sealed. Nigerians, except those playing the ostrich, still remember their ongoing nightmare was a direct result of 16 years of PDP deliberate and calculated assault on our economy and the general health of our nation. It was their confiscation and conversion of our national resources to personal use of their members that brought our nation to ruins  With air of invulnerability, they went on to share the nation’s national patrimony kept in their temporary care for our grandchildren  and great grandchildren. If death is the wages of sin, that PDP deserves s to die is not debatable.

    But Nigerians, a much forgiving people did not want PDP to die. They want it to live even if not totally out of altruism. It is on record that for the first 16 years of the fourth republic, PDP became a threat to our budding democracy achieved through intense struggle, sweat and blood. It was an era of thriving anti-democratic elements such as Olusegun Obasanjo, David Mark  Atiku Abubakar, A Ali,  men who purely for sadistic humour irreverently danced on the tombs of those who made the supreme sacrifice that democracy may thrive in our land.

    Of course there are other reasons Nigerians should have no restraint singing the traditional night prayer- Nunc Dimittis for the passage of PDP if that is its ordained fate.  For instance this is a party of warring factional leaders for whom honour counts for little when they are engaged in war of attrition over illegal sharing of our national resources. It was PDP leaders that told Nigerians which of them stole what.

    It was Obasanjo’s PDP children including Atiku Abubakar and Dino Melaiye who first attempted to disrobe their father on the street by accusing him of alleged corruption. The former alleged his principal directed him to deploy state resources to buy a car for his concubine and the later asking the following rhetorical question following their principal’s labelling of the National Assembly as an assemblage of ‘pen robbers’: “Has Baba forgotten it was not the 8th assembly that collected ‘Ghana must go bags’ from him for his failed third term debacle?

    It was Bukola Saraki who became the whistle-blower in the fuel subsidy scam through which PDP stalwarts and their siblings defrauded the nation of billons of naira. It was also Saraki who personally confessed that he literarily ‘stole’ the presidency of the 8th assembly. It was David Mark who betrayed his greed by going to court to pre-empt EFCC that had raised question of impropriety in his process of buying the senate mansion, a national patrimony which did not fall under items for sale under government monetization policy.

    PDP alive is probably as dangerous as the one that will ultimately end up in hell. But for our own selfish interest, we need it alive to give legitimacy to our budding democracy which thrives better under a multi-party system. This is why in spite of PDP capital sins, Nigerians have quietly prayed and hoped it stops digging itself into the hole.

    Unfortunately neither Nigerians’ past fervent prayers nor its envisioning of better future for PDP has stopped it from self-destruct.

    It is for instance on record that in 2013, Atiku Abubakar, ever in search of presidential platform at every election season , along with Usman Bugaje, his adviser, pulled out of PDP to join forces with Bukola Saraki and some PDP governors to form nPDP. They eventually joined forces with newly formed APC. That betrayal of their party was all untested APC needed to collect power from weakened PDP.

    In 2019, with  characteristic display of air of invulnerability of the Obasanjo and Tony Anenih’s  era of ‘do or die elections’, Atiku, Saraki and their group  headed back to PDP. But with APC now consolidated in power, PDP was roundly defeated by President Buhari in spite of his-first term’s lack-lustre performance

    A leopard does not change its spots.  In 2023, PDP leaders including Atiku Abubakar, Iyorchia Ayu, David mark and Tambuwal jettisoned their party’s time-tested power rotational policy. They treated party members that disagreed with them with disdain.

    Tambuwal was Wike’s trusted ally. He, however at the last minute, came out to play the ethnic and religious card by supporting Atiku Abubakar. They did not stop hitting Wike when he was down. Despite winning 14 of the 17 votes cast by PDP leading lights for the VP slot, Atiku by-passed him and settled for Ifeanyi Okowa, the governor of oil-rich Delta State notorious for generous donations towards successive PDP presidential campaign war-chest.  Wike’s answer to Atiku’s impunity was to disallow him from campaigning in which he went on to secure for candidate Bola Tinubu.

    It was also curious that PDP did not weigh the consequences of ignoring the legitimate demand of the southeast that was the most important harvester of votes for PDP outside the north. It equally ignored the nuisance value of an opportunistic Peter Obi who, emerging from being a two-term APGA governor, quickly rose to become PDP VP candidate in 2019.

    Realising he stood no chance against Atiku in the 2023, PDP presidential primary, he migrated back home to exploit the ethnic and religious sentiments of his equally aggrieved Igbo people. Obi later moved to Lagos and other Nigerian cities with huge Igbo urban immigrants to harvest group Igbo and Christian votes that placed his Labour platform third in the election. His gain was PDP’s loss.

    It is apparent the only people that have continued to benefit from impunity since the birth of the fourth republic are its perpetrators. Everyone else including members of party oligarchy, political office holder and seekers, at the end has been a loser. Group interest and personal ambitions of party members, best achieved through compromise are frittered away through zero-sum intra-party struggle. The result is threat to the survival of party system, abuse of the judicial process and a culture of fear and heightened tension. And the cheapest solution according to Justice Omotosho of Abuja High Court is PDP putting its house in order.