The Nation Newspaper

Category: Columnists

  • Agunechemba, Ibom Air and women victims

    Agunechemba, Ibom Air and women victims

    Unknown to the public, more than two weeks before Ibom Air made Comfort Emmanson famous by stripping her of her dignity in the name of enforcing aviation regulations, an even more sordid attack on another woman, a youth corps member, Jennifer Elohor, had unfolded in Oba, Idemili South Local Government Area of Anambra state, on July 23. Where Ms Emmanson was dragged from the Ibom Air plane and stripped naked on August 10, her body becoming public and lasting spectacle, Ms Elohor was not only severely beaten, she was stripped even more stark naked, videoed, and threatened with all manner of gender violence. In the August 10 affair, the country was both puzzled and horrified to hear aviation officials, airport security men, and airline cabin crew attempting to justify their action. Furthermore, the Aviation ministry had expected that by quickly dousing the controversy, further revelations on both the questionable tactics employed by officials to handle the crisis and the antecedents of the affair that appear to exonerate the victim of blame could be avoided. The last has obviously not been heard of the matter.

    But in Anambra State late July – and video evidence exists to confirm the sordidness of the affair – the state-owned Anambra State Vigilante Group, Agunechemba, took the law into their own hands, brutalised the youth corps member, threatened her, and traumatised her colleagues living in the same Corpers’ Lodge. The incident took place on July 23, but it was not until last week that the public became fully apprised of the incident. All the people, authorities and institutions which should have managed the incident and ensured justice and redress were too inured to the victim’s pain and societal morality and standards to be outraged. Governor Chukwuma Soludo uncharacteristically quibbled about compensations involving replacement of phone devices, and Agunechemba operatives suspended and under investigations, and victim’s family reluctant to press charges. His senior special assistant on internal security also waffled about the affair, indicted himself by emphasising that, after all, the incident took place in July, and concluded by saying that the eight offending operatives were under investigations. There was no outrage in his voice or in the responses he gave to the media.

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    Worse, the state police spokesman was tame in his answers to the media. He hinged the law enforcement agency’s pussyfooting on the reluctance by Ms Elohor’s family to press charges. There was no attempt to convince the public that the family in question was not being intimidated. And in the face of Prof. Soludo alluding to the eight Agunechemba operatives as bad eggs in an otherwise effective security outfit which has enabled the state to sleep well at night and helped Anambra to become one of the safest states in the country, it was not surprising that those who should have taken firm and immediate action to deal with the affront to civilisation in the state were lulled into complacency. It took the human rights community leading the battle cry, perhaps after viewing the appalling videos of the assault on the corps member, before the authorities in the state stirred themselves to say a thing or two.

    It is also shocking that the federal authorities, including the police and the NYSC in both Anambra and Abuja, took the matter quite tamely. Had they expressed enough outrage, the matter would have come to light much sooner, and both Anambra State and the state/federal police would have taken decisive actions to punish the errant Agunechemba operatives, take down the offending videos, and propose realistic and reasonable measures to ensure that there would be no reoccurrence anywhere in the country. The brutalisation of women by so-called public officials hiding under the guise of law enforcement, either on a plane or on land is becoming an epidemic. If it is to stop, the state and federal authorities must take much firmer stand and much sterner measures to curb the recurring malady. It was not until the human rights community sensitised the country to the Anambra affront before the state dismissed the eight operatives. State officials cannot defend the tardiness of investigations or the tameness with which they viewed the assault. Have they also become desensitised?

    The Aviation ministry and Anambra State need to revisit the outrages that occurred on their watch. They must be honest enough to admit that they misjudged the situations, allowed themselves to be distracted, empowered shoddy and prolonged investigations, and incompetently tried to downplay the assault on the women. Worse, they have done nothing to ensure that the nude videos of the victims were taken down from the Internet. The videos are still circulating. The Aviation ministry and Ibom Air, which needlessly dragged in the judiciary in the case involving Ms Emmanson, are having a rethink over how they handled the matter, but Anambra State and Agunechemba think that it was enough that they had dismissed the vigilance operatives and ordered their prosecution. No, it should go farther than that. They need to show believable outrage and reassure the public about the lessons they have learnt from the affair and what training and reforms they would embark on going forward. It should never be business as usual. What happened in Anambra last month is unfortunately one more solid argument against state police.

    More crucially, despite operating a federal constitution, to which the country pays lip service, the federal authorities have not quite shown more than a passing interest when things go horrifyingly wrong in some parts of the country, especially when it involves the right to dignity of defenceless women. If the NYSC in Anambra had paid closer attention to the mistreatment of their corps member, and had escalated the matter to Abuja with a decisive note indicating their outrage, it is inconceivable that it would have taken so many weeks before the erring operatives were dismissed or handed over to the police for prosecution. The debasement of womanhood that happened on Ibom Air and Anambra State in the past few weeks is a terrible embarrassment to Nigeria. Sadly, by their reluctant and hesitant approach to tackling the malaise of public mistreatment of women, officials have not demonstrated the right attitude to ensuring that the debasement would end soon.

  • Tunji Bello, the cheerful donor

    Tunji Bello, the cheerful donor

    • It is only selfless service that could have made TB gift a 550-seater ultra-modern auditorium to LASU

    I had thought I would need speeches delivered by some of the eminent personalities at the formal handover of the state-of-the-art auditorium presented to the Lagos State University (LASU) by the donor, Mr Olatunji Bello (known as TB among his colleagues), the vice chairman/chief executive officer of the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC), to write this piece. But, I changed my mind after reading Bello’s own speech and his wife’s address at the occasion. What they said met every criterion I was looking for to write this column; from the philosophical to the scriptural, the moral, the philanthropic and what have you. You would see evidence of Bello’s journalistic expertise and experience all rolled into one, and his wife’s erudite address just adequate to serve as raw materials for a piece like this. 

    Intentionally or unintentionally, Bello’s speech answered the questions of what we call the ‘Five Ws’ in news writing: What? Where? When? Who and Why! Sometimes we may add the How?  You begin to see evidence of this right from the title of the speech:  ‘Why I built auditorium for LASU’.

    I was at the ceremony, so I could still remember some of the interesting things said by some of the people present, if necessary.

    Permit me, therefore, to begin from the beginning. And that is going to be straight from the horse’s mouth: ” Let it be recognised that we are not just commissioning a chamber to impact knowledge, but also witness, firsthand, the force of faith, the prophetic power of the tongue and what is possible when we all commit to the pursuit of public good.” That was Bello speaking.

    But the auditorium is not his first philanthropic duty to education. When he clocked 50 in 2011, he instituted an annual prize in five disciplines dedicated exclusively to brilliant but indigent students of Lagos State origin in the university, at least so they would not drop out of their academic pursuit simply on account of their parents’ inability to sponsor them. As his wife, Prof Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, who, incidentally is the vice-chancellor of the university noted in her speech at the ceremony, ”This donation compliments his annual N100,000 endowment for the best graduating students in the Faculty of Engineering, Social Sciences, Mass Communication, Law and MBBS Degree Examination at our Convocations.” This annual prize is running till date.

    It was in TB’s quest to do something bigger that the idea of the auditorium came into focus. When his amiable wife mooted the idea of the auditorium, little did she know she would be the vice-chancellor at the time it would be handed over to the university.  So, it is only fortuitous that she is not witnessing the handover as an observer or very important visitor, but as the donor’s spouse and vice-chancellor. 

    Read Also: Tunji Bello salutes Amuka-Pemu at 90

    But it is one thing to have an idea; it is another to bring it to fruition. Because nothing good comes easy, the cost implications initially scared Bello after it was presented to him by the architect. But, as they say, ‘where there is the will, there is a way’. But it is not all the time that even that will comes easy. In Bello’s case, it involved personal sacrifice, which was heavy, too. For TB, there was only one option if he was to reach his goal of delivering a befitting auditorium to LASU; that was to merely mark, (not celebrate) his 60th birthday the way a politician of his status would. Otherwise, he would have spent a fortune just as he would have reaped a fortune that he may decide to keep in his bank account, from the celebration, instead of investing it in humanity.   

    It was at this point that the Miracle Worker intervened and deposited the idea of what to do to raise money for the project in Bello’s mind. Again, listen to TB: ”But when God gives you a vision, God Almighty will also provide the means in miraculous ways. Of course, God’s miracle sometimes comes by having some brilliant ideas suddenly deposited in your mind. After days of wrestling with the architect’s budget in my head, it suddenly occurred to me I could ask those going to buy me gifts for the 60th birthday to monetise such and hand me the cash to do something really dear to my heart.”

    Bello is not done.

    ”It worked. A very wealthy friend and known businessman had wanted to surprise me with a brand new Toyota Land-cruiser Jeep. I appealed to him to convert it to cash. With donations from other able friends and well-wishers, we got started in 2021.”

    Things appeared to be going smoothly until late 2023 when fuel subsidy withdrawal and the merger of the foreign exchange markets inevitably led to price hikes. In government parlance, they would need to do cost variation. TB was faced with this problem as well. But he persevered, believing that God would never start a thing He cannot finish.

    ”The toughest moment being late 2023 and early 2024 when the Naira went down and inflation upset all previous calculations. It meant that the costs were almost tripled at the point of buying finishing materials. To continue, I had to sell my property at Magodo Estate to keep the workers on site in order that it may not become an abandoned project after three years of construction.”

    As he said, ” To God be the glory, the rest is history.”

    But the rest is not just history; the end-product is the N500 million 550-seater magnificent edifice that is sitting majestically beside the Faculty of Environmental Sciences on the Epe Campus of LASU: the Tunji Bello Auditorium: The reason for the gathering of dignitaries who had honoured Bello with their presence at the handover ceremony on August 20. These included Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, his deputy, his deputy, Dr Obafemi Hamzat, the Minister of Education, Mr. Tunji Alausa, former Governor of Ogun State, Aremo Olusegun Osoba, among others. 

    This piece cannot be complete without some mention of TB’s wife, Prof Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, for two reasons. One is the biblical injunction of ‘what God has joined together, let no man put asunder’. Beyond that is the axiom that ‘beside every successful man is a successful woman’. This is true of Tunji Bello.

    An elated Prof Olatunji-Bello could not but show her gratitude to her husband: ”this facility represents more than architectural beauty; it is a strategic investment in academic excellence and institutional identity. It reinforces the fundamental truth that when we invest in education, we invest in tomorrow’s leaders. Hon. Tunji Bello has, through words and deed, inscribed his name in the permanent record of LASU’s growth story.” She added: ”For a campus housing the Faculty of Engineering, Faculty of Environmental Sciences, and School of Agriculture, this auditorium marks a significant milestone toward achieving Goal 3 of our administration: making infrastructural facilities available and accessible for seamless academic and administrative operations.”

    Expectedly, the vice-chancellor did a lot of advertisement for her university, among which is that today, it stands as Nigeria’s most preferred university, with a diverse student body of over 60,000, brilliant, and ambitious. Of course, she also seized the opportunity to mention some of the university’s needs, top of which is electricity supply. There cannot be a more auspicious occasion to mention all of those needs than when the governor, Sanwo-Olu, is physically around, the first of its kind to the university campus in his official capacity as Visitor.

    True, LASU has seen significant improvements all over since she came on board as vice-chancellor in September 2021. To go beyond these would attract passing a bill to the university to pay. But this is not the time for that.

    At this juncture, the question: who are TB’s models in philanthropy? Usually, people have role models that inspire them to go into the kind of philanthropy that Bello has done. These included his late father, Alhaji Azeez Olatunji Bello who donated a large parcel of land to accommodate what we now know as Ansar Ud Deen College at Isolo in Lagos, in the 1950s. Then, Bashorun Moshood Kashimawo Abiola, the acclaimed winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election, who, according to TB ”on a single day in the late 80s, announced an endowment for universities across Nigeria.”

    We also have incumbent President Bola Ahmed Tinubu who, when he was Governor of Lagos State, donated his salaries and allowances to the cause of charities, including orphanages. About four years ago, he also announced an endowment fund of one billion naira to LASU.

    We have all of these people to thank for their impactful lifestyle on TB. But Prof Olatunji-Bello seems the person to thank most. Most women in her position would have gone for vanity when a crucial decision like the one that led to the donation of the Olatunji Bello Auditorium arose. Many women would have gone for the ‘owanbe’ party that people would long have forgotten about, even if they had served guests with elephants and human flesh. Like my father would always say, the greeting is usually the same: ‘e ku inawo ana’ (congratulations on the success of yesterday’s event), irrespective of what you served the guests! 

    As a matter of fact, a colleague of mine and I saw at least two examples of the vanity that life or excessive material accumulation could become, especially when the original owner dies, when we were returning from the handover event on Wednesday. We could not but help bemoan the plight of the deceased owners of those edifices, seeing all they laboured for becoming desolate only a few years after their passage. I want to become this; I want to build an empire on four football fields; it’s all vanity when death comes. That person would be taken out of the mansion when he dies and sometimes people who did not know how he made it would start struggling with the children for the mansions.

    But Olatunji Bello Auditorium will continue to speak long after TB would have gone because many generations are going to sip from the well that would dispense knowledge in the place for the benefit of the country and humanity at large. What he has done for LASU and people that have had cause to cross his path would be the legacies that he would leave behind.  

    Bello has benefitted so much from Lagos and it is good he realised the importance of giving back to Lagos and even beyond, part of what he benefitted. Nigeria would be a better place if our wealthy people invest in education rather than frivolities.

  • ADC: Failure at first test

    Politics is a game of numbers and strategies. It works best when the players focus on doing good for all and not on a mission to hunt fellow players like games.

    For the now rebranded African Democratic Congress (ADC), the party’s leadership seems to focus mainly on how to shoot down the ruling party’s leading lights. Their antecedents, actions, and utterances show a lack of depth. The party’s outing in last week’s by-elections proved disastrous. Despite its effusive self-congratulations ahead of the polls, ADC could not fly.

    It has no identifiable programme. Its leadership has been grandstanding. Nigerians are not taking the political experimenters in the coalition very seriously. There is no impact yet. ADC is not new. What is striking is that it has been loaned to new investors who have acquired its liabilities. But the returns on the investment are not forthcoming.

    During the recent by-elections in two senatorial districts, seven federal constituencies, and eight state constituencies, the party lost its deposit, despite the bravado of its loquacious leaders.

    ADC was off the radar on poll day. The noise-making briefly subsided. Then, after the announcement of the election results, the party’s leaders cried foul. But its lamentation did not elicit any sympathy from observers.

    The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which they decimated through self-imposed ostracism, still exhibited some strengths. It won a critical federal seat in Oyo State, which it had lost in previous elections, thereby affirming the indisputable leadership and influence of the governor, Seyi Makinde.

    The PDP also came second across the board, which means that despite its weakness, its structures are not dead. They are only ailing, fragile, and fragmented.

    The All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) of Anambra State Governor Chukwuma Soludo tried to maintain dominance in its sphere of influence, unlike the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) of Senator Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, which seemed to have lost its grip on some constituencies in Kano State. While APGA won the Anambra South senatorial seat, NNPP could not win the House of Assembly seats in its supposed stronghold. The party, in utter dejection, is threatening litigation.

    APGA recognises its limitations. It is not a national party. It is the legacy of the Great Ikemba Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu of Nnewi. Its ambition is limited to maintaining dominance in Anambra, and nothing more.

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    The NNPP is a one-man party woven around the personality of the Kwankwasiya leader, who is really not looking for an ally, as long as the party remains in control of the poll-confident Kano.

    The crisis-ridden Labour Party (LP) of former Anambra State Governor Peter Obi and his adversary, Julius Abure, was nowhere to be found during the election. Its chances were sacrificed on the altar of internal division, protracted conflict, and glaring self-destruction, which no court judgment on the leadership tussle can avert.

    Why the coalition’s curators cannot spy on the APC blueprint and replicate its fusion strategies by bringing together PDP, LP, APGA, NNPP, and ADC to form a formidable mega party is confounding. The corollary of the situation is that former Vice President Atiku Abubakar lacks the semblance of political stamina and bridge-building acumen, sagacity, persuasive talent, and leader-servant virtues that have made Asiwaju a towering figure in the polity.

    ADC’s motive was the liquidation of the All Progressives Congress (APC). Its intention is to  displace the ruling party in the 2027 presidential poll, and with last week’s by-election as a dress rehearsal.

    But the ruling party never slept on guard. National Chairman Nentawe Yilwatda led the inspiring campaigns. All APC governors supported the chapters involved in the by-elections. Nothing was left to chance.

    At the close of polls, the ruling party checkmated ADC’s planned incursion to the chagrin of the boasters. APC won the Edo Central senatorial seat vacated by warrior Governor Monday Okpebholo, and the Ovie Federal seat vacated by his deputy, Denis Idahosa. Overall, APC consolidated as the ruling party through its huge victories, sending signals about its capacity to repeat the feat in future contests.

    Predictably, it was wailing galore in ADC as its leaders regressed to defence mechanisms, attributing their failure to imaginary malpractices and other forms of inexplicable irregularities.

    Morning shows the day. The beginning, particularly a false start, can predict a future doom.

    A month after hijacking the ADC from its original members, the Atiku forces have not broken new grounds. Its membership drive has been hectic as split followers at PDP chapters in some states only reluctantly gravitate to the ADC. The few that left for ADC did so with  reservations.

    If ADC claimed to have an ideological background or leaning, it has either been damaged or polluted as there is no unifying idea other than fighting President Bola Ahmed Tinubu without tendering sound, objective, constructive, and reasonable alternative solutions to the socio-economic and political challenges. The motive of the prime mover is not nation-building or development. It is the desire to fulfill the ego of getting power and occupying the coveted seat by all means and at all costs.

    Neither has the ADC found internal peace since the invasion of the party by the new tenants. Apart from the cracks within, as exemplified by the bitter struggle between the divided old handlers and the newcomers, there is also a suspicion between the acclaimed intellectual wing responsible for the spade work and the ageing politicians itching to fulfill their long-standing presidential ambitions.

    A crisis is also brewing in the crawling party over the disagreement on zoning. The general feeling in the country is that the South deserves four more years after 2027. The puzzle, then, is: which bloc zone of the country should take the ADC presidential slot – North or South?

    Lacking the courage, foresight, strategy, and wherewithal to raise a new party or mobilise successfully for fusion or alliance of political parties, the only option left to the Atiku forces and their tiny club of collaborators was the adoption of ADC as a borrowed platform.

    Former Rivers State Governor Rotimi Amaechi, a former Transportation Minister, was said to have unveiled himself as the visioner and missioner of the feeble opposition crusade in a video last week. He is indirectly throwing a challenge. The early disclosure may be a signal that an internal rift is imminent over the presidential ticket, which ADC chieftains from the South have the legitimate right to demand, based on the subsisting agitation for zoning.

    Unlike the open consultations among the like-minded legacy parties that formed the APC in 2014, the ADC coalition settled for the style of a secret cult. The party was not a product of group mobilisation but an alliance of aggrieved and disgruntled individuals in the PDP who were locked in the supremacy battle, and a few stalwarts of the APC who have an axe to grind with the President.

    The main grievance of the few APC collaborators was that they were not picked as ministers by the Commander-in-Chief.

    What have the ADC leaders done for Nigeria to make them think that Nigerians would see the party as a credible alternative? Were the ADC leaders not part of past PDP governments that were rejected by voters in 2015, 2019, and 2023, after 16 years of profligacy, ineptitude, and maladministration? Have they repented?

    With Atiku in ADC are politicians of his time: they may be finding it somehow difficult to penetrate the nooks and crannies of the vast country, apart from battling with fading influence at home. In the past, they were big names in the polity. Now, they cling on to an old reputation and the glory of their illustrious past.

    Senator David Mark, Army General, former military governor, ex-minister and Senate President for eight years, is from Benue State, which is now controlled by the APC. His disciple or mentee, Senator Abba Moro, who objected to the balkanisation of the PDP, has vowed not to jump ship along with his former leader.

    Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, eminent public servant and Third Republic governor of Edo State, is a former national chairman of the defunct All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP). He became APC National Chairman after the Tinubu/Akande/Osoba forces prevailed on the late Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, following a serious protest and resistance to his candidature. It is doubtful if he or his compatriot, Chief Tom Ikimi, can now be a factor in political mobilisation in Edo State and the Southsouth region, where ADC was routed by Okpebholo’s APC. It is the same awful picture in the Southwest, where the ADC Interim National Secretary, Rauf Aregbesola, is now complaining of being hunted.

    The only harm ADC has done is to further reduce the chance of the PDP at the polls, following the split.

    APC has not lost any members. It operates in an advantageous position. It has less headaches than the PDP and ADC.

    Serial defectors who left the PDP are now hibernating in ADC. After the 2027 poll, they are likely to retrace their steps to the PDP, as usual, and work out a reconciliation plan.

  • TB, LASU and the grace of selfless giving

    TB, LASU and the grace of selfless giving

    On Wednesday, this week, friends, associates, colleagues, government officials including the governor of Lagos State, Mr Babajide Sanwo-Olu and Minister of Education, Dr Olatunji Alausa and critical stakeholders in the education industry gathered at the Epe Campus of the Lagos State University (LASU), on the invitation of respected journalist, editor, columnist, lawyer, environmentalist, politician and public administrator, Mr Olatunji Bello. The occasion was the formal unveiling of a spectacular new physical structure donated to the institution by the Executive Vice-Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC).

    The 550-seat sprawling building is an architectural masterpiece. It once existed only in the thought and imagination of the man fondly called TB by large numbers of his mentors, mentees and admirers. Thought translated into action, mutated into vision and is today a phenomenal material actuality, adding value to LASU and by extension Nigeria’s beleaguered educational landscape. In his speech on the occasion, TB traced the genesis and trajectory from idea to concreteness of the project.

    In his words, “At my 50th birthday in 2011, I had committed to instituting an annual prize in five disciplines, namely, Law, Mass Communications, Social Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. I was very intentional about the criteria to qualify. Academic brilliance was one. Two,  coming from a poor background. And three, the beneficiary must be an indigene of our dear state of Lagos. The whole idea is targeting those brilliant minds at the risk of dropping out of academic pursuits on account of poverty. To the glory of God Almighty, we have been able to sustain that scholarship programme to date.”

    Fast forward a decade later as TB’s narrative continues, “So, as my 60th birthday approached in 2021, the concern was how I could do more. For me, the idea of throwing a big party to mark the occasion was completely off the table. My darling wife, Professor Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, the very able Madam Vice-Chancellor of this great university, is the one who initially mooted the idea of building something for LASU to mark my 60th birthday. She was not yet the Vice Chancellor then. I never gave much thought to her suggestion immediately until a few days later. Eventually, after much reflection, l agreed it has to be an auditorium, truly befitting and fit for purpose”.

    Although the architect, Mr Kunle Ayinla, came up with an impressive building plan, the projected cost, TB found staggering. Yet, he remained undaunted, ploughing on with determination and fortitude. Did not the Lord Jesus say that he who puts his hand on the plough and looks back is not worthy of the Kingdom of God? He put his fertile mind to work. According to him, “After days of wrestling with the architect’s budget in my head, it suddenly occurred to me I could ask those going to buy me gifts for the 60th birthday to monetise such and hand me the cash to do something really dear to my heart. It worked. A very wealthy friend and well-known businessman had wanted to surprise me with a brand new Toyota Land Cruiser Jeep. I appealed to him to convert it to cash. With donations from other able friends and well-wishers, we got started in 2021”.

    It was a tortuous journey filled with unanticipated challenges such as the drastic fall of the Naira’s value and the attendant inflationary spirals of 2023 and 2024, but TB’s trust in the faithfulness of God to facilitate the completion of the dream never wavered. In the process, he had to sell his property at Magodo Estate in Lagos to keep the project going. Thus, Mr Olabode Opseitan writes, “It is not the size of the gift that stuns – it is the source. By every reasonable measure – whether by asset declarations, Forbes rankings, or real estate holdings – Tunji Bello is not among Nigeria’s wealthiest citizens. Yet, he has done what perhaps fewer than 10 Nigerians have ever done: build a legacy structure for a public university – not with surplus, but with scarcity…What emerged is not just an auditorium – it is a monument to moral courage, a structure built not on concrete alone, but on conviction”.

    TB’s life has been built on the foundation of compassion, kindness, generosity, selflessness and a commitment to justice and the pursuit of public purpose. Myriads of those he has touched within and beyond the journalism profession over the years readily testify to his all too many acts of self-sacrificial giving, mostly getting nothing in return but gratitude and prayers.

    For instance, in the book, ‘In Pursuit of the Public Purpose’, a collection of reminiscences, memories and reflections onTB’s life, published to commemorate his 60th birthday in 2021, a journalist and former Chairman of the Concord Chapter of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), Ogbeni Goke Odeyinka wrote, “I remember also how he assisted his first PA to study for his Master’s degree in Law in England. I know because the man involved happens to be my in-law.

    Incidentally, TB’s gesture of altruistic philanthropy at LASU is coming at a time when the world is entering a new phase of chronic individualistic selfishness and self-centeredness. Seek ye first the kingdom of your individual greed and personal egotism, and all other things shall be added unto you, seems to be the new human credo, especially with the advent of President Donald Trump and his ‘Make America Great Again’ mantra. Consequently, America has turned inward particularly during his ongoing second term, terminating its financial contributions to the World Health Organization (WHO), scrapping the USAID, turning its back on the gripping poverty and immiseration that grips much of humanity despite the world’s wealthiest and most powerful country’s capacity to do much good and help fashion a fairer, more equitable, just and compassionate world.

    This seems a far cry from the spectacular manifestation of amazing generosity of the spirit and overflow of the milk of human kindness exhibited by some of the world’s richest persons in the early years of this century. In his essay on different dimensions of this revolution in altruism, titled ‘What Should a Billionaire Give – and What Should You?’, Peter Singer writes, “In the same world in which more than a billion people live at a level of affluence never previously known, roughly a billion other people struggle to survive on the purchasing power equivalent of less than one US dollar per day”. Writing in 2007, Singer noted that most of the world’s poorest people were undernourished, lacked access to basic health services, including safe drinking water and could not send their children to school, with the result that at least 10 million children died yearly, according to statistics by UNICEF.

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    Responding to this dismal and desperate situation, Singer states that “Last June, the investor,  Warren Buffett, took a significant step toward reducing these deaths when he pledged $31 billion to the Gates Foundation and another $6 billion to other charitable foundations. Buffett’s pledge, set alongside the nearly $30 billion given by Bill and Melinda Gates to their foundation, has made it clear that the first decade of the twenty-first century is a new “golden age of philanthropy”. On an inflation-adjusted basis, Buffet has pledged to give more than double the lifetime total given away by two of the philanthropic giants of the past, Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller, put together. Bill and Melinda Gates’ gifts are not far behind.”

    What is intriguing is that many of the world’s billionaire philanthropists are atheists or agnostics, not excluding Bill Gates and Buffet. TB is a Muslim married to a Christian and pastor of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG). Compassionate kindness is thus not limited to religious inclination or orientation. In their book, ‘Greed is Dead-Politics after Individualism’, published in 2020, two eminent economists from the United Kingdom, Paul Collier and John Kay, contend that the world, despite Trump, is moving from an essentially narcissistic individualism to a return to a more communal, cooperative ethos without which human survival in the long run cannot be guaranteed. This is because “humans are first and foremost social animals and our successes always depend on cooperation”.

    TB has shown the light for many more privileged persons to find the way to compassionate giving for the communal good. There are all too few affluent Nigerians, such as Aliko Dangote, Femi Otedola, Afe Babalola, Wole Olanipekun, and Tony Elumelu, among others, following this path relative to the number of Nigerians of considerable means. I am told that Anambra State, for instance, has the largest collection of billionaires in the country. How has that benefited their state? TB announced to the audience that, courtesy of another friend, Mr Biodun Omoniyi, Managing Director of VDT Communications, there will be free WiFi at the auditorium to enhance the learning experience of students. Moreover, the maintenance of the auditorium will be handled by another private management company for one year.

    Tracing his orientation to philanthropy and public service to the examples of his late father, Alhaji Azeez Olatunji Bello, his late boss and mentor, MKO Abiola and President Bola Tinubu, TB stressed that “this auditorium is my own token of appreciation to God Almighty for his grace and to my dear native Lagos State for the great opportunities given me. First, I have also been one of the beneficiaries of the Lagos State Government’s scholarship award as an undergraduate at the University of Ibadan in the early 1980s. And later the privilege to serve in public office in various capacities”. TB has obviously never forgotten that to whom much is given, much is expected. All too many of us disdain this truism all too often to the detriment of the collective good.

  • BAO and self-indictment of sacked agency boss

    BAO and self-indictment of sacked agency boss

    Soon after the unanticipated sacking of some members of the Ekiti State Executive Council on August 11, the unassuming and surpassingly modest Governor Biodun Abayomi Oyebanji (BAO), has removed from office the former Chairman of the state’s Microcredit and Enterprise Development Agency, Akogun Abayomi Olumide. A terse statement by the Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Mr Olayinka Olabode, issued on 16-08-2025, simply described the sack to be “as a result of gross misconduct and dereliction of duty” and “was with immediate effect’. But in a statement released to the press, the sacked agency Chief asserted that it was untrue that he was sacked over “corruption”.

    Read Also: Tinubu assures Nigerians of fairness in new tax laws

    Elaborating on the reason for his sack,  Akogun Olumide said, “The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) said the agency should recover funds amounting to N1.6 billion. But along the line, we met bottlenecks. Politicians were interfering, saying the money was not disbursed by us. Because of these obstacles, we decided to stop and recommended that those who issued the money should be responsible for the recovery. So, in view of that, we continued with our mandate”.

    This curiously worded press statement does not indicate that the Chairman of the agency was directed to stop the fund recovery process that he was mandated to undertake in the first place. Rather, faced with resistance by those he was supposed to recover the money from, he desisted from carrying out the directive, advised that the responsibility be shifted to others, and “we continued with our own mandate”. Is there any description for this other than indefensible insubordination?

  • The voodoo called injuries

    The voodoo called injuries

    It is precisely 14 days to Nigeria’s next World Cup qualifier against Rwanda inside the Nest of Champions in Uyo, with the voodoo of missing key players due to injuries starring us in the face and which have effectively ruled out at least six players from the must-win game on September 6.

    In fact, coaches pray fervently against it knowing how badly it dissipates their squads ahead of crucial matches such as the two waiting for the Super Eagles against the Rwandans on September 6 and the kill-and-go game against Bafana Bafana on September 9, a date dear to my heart. September 9? Why always September 9.

    These injury worries have sidelined central defender Semi Ajayi, while poor form arising from a spate of injuries kept them off the pitch last season, making them ineligible for bidding during the summer transfer period, such as Taiwo Awoniyi of Nottingham Forest FC in the Premier League.

    Ajayi’s injury also raises fresh concerns over squad depth, as the team continues to battle with injuries to key players ahead of must-win matches. His injury problems paved the way for the Baggies to stop his contract, prompting his summer move to Hull City, where he delivered a dominant display against Coventry before the latest setback.

    Chelle is now saddled with the task of replacing Ajayi which means the Malian coach will naturally play an ageing William Troost-Ekong who has a way of rising to the big occasions with Bassey who features regularly for Fulham FC of England in the centre-back.

    Awoniyi was attempting to get on the end of a cross by winger Anthony Elanga. Sources told BBC Sport that Awoniyi suffered a ruptured intestine. He received medical attention for several minutes and had to leave the field after initially attempting to carry on.

    Having had the first part of the surgery, he spent the next day in an induced coma, as medical staff monitored his progress. Awoniyi had the second stage of the operation, including closing the wound, on the third day after the horrific injury in one of the Premier League matches last season against now relegated Leicester City.

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    Iheanacho’s spell on the sidelines with thigh injury contributed immensely to his poor form at the Foxes, leading to his move to Spain. Indeed, the former Golden Eaglets’ striker was out for “a number of weeks” after tearing his adductor muscle.

    This voodoo is threatening the depth of the squad with only Stanley Nwabali as the safest hands in the goalkeeping area of the team. The talk of having Okoye to stand in as the reserve goalkeeper has been shattered following the results of an investigation into the allegations of “unsporting misconduct” or match-fixing which was dropped against him by the tribunal.

    Okoye’s two-month ban began with Udinese’s first official game of the season, scheduled for their Coppa Italia tie against Carrarese on August 18. He will miss six Serie A matches and return to action on October 18. The import of this judgment leaves Nigeria with the short end of the stick, as it effectively rules out the Udinese FC of Italy goalkeeper from Nigeria’s September 6 and September 9 fixtures.

    My thoughts ran wild trying to figure out the goalkeepers to deputise for Nwabali in the event of injuries or red card (God forbid). I quickly rushed to the team’s past invitation of players’ list. Again, my heart shrunk. Tanzania-based Amas Obasogie will still fight for the goal-tender’s starting shirt. My only fear is that he has returned to Nigeria, casting doubt on his fitness and the quality of opposition he had whilst playing in Tanzania’s league last season.

  • Decentralisation of PPP approvals will catalyse development

    Decentralisation of PPP approvals will catalyse development

    Four (4) days ago (17th August, 2025), the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC), released a new policy guideline to fast-track Public-Private Partnership (PPP) projects in Nigeria, thereby decentralizing approval powers, which will enable ministries to approve projects valued below N20 billion, while agencies and parastatals are authorized to handle projects under N10 billion. Accordingly, a project approval board will be established to oversee the process.

    The policy framework is issued in compliance with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s directive, which is in line with the statutory powers of the ICRC Act of 2005, and which is based on Mr. President’s objective of liberalizing the economy and unlocking private capital for infrastructure which are key to the delivery of the Renewed Hope Agenda.

     According to a Country Private Sector Diagnostic (CPSD) report released in June this year (2025) by the World Bank Group, “with the right reforms, Nigeria has the potential to become a leading engine of private sector–led growth and job creation in Africa”. Therefore, this new policy couldn’t have come at a better time. It is a welcome development, given the size, scale, and nature of PPPs as they are fast evolving across Nigeria.

     I am a proponent of PPPs, and also as the Group CEO of the Global Investment and Trade Company (GITC), where we undertake investment and trade facilitation, PPP strategy, modelling and transaction advisory, policy strategy, etc. with so far, an investment profile of over $500million; my team and I, are delighted with this development because we believe that from a policy strategy perspective, this is a strategic step in the right direction which will cut out “red tapism” and excessive bureaucracy, properly streamline our PPP initiatives on one hand and also enable efficient, successful, timely, impactful, and sustainable execution of PPP projects, in Nigeria going forward

     As a key enabler of infrastructural development and PPPs in Nigeria, the ICRC is a key fulcrum to the economic recovery and development strategy of President Bola Tinubu’s administration by unlocking Nigeria’s abundant human and other natural resources for social and economic recovery, growth, development, and sustainability.

     However, the fact that the ICRC will remain the clearing house for all PPPs at the federal and across all the 36 States and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), from conceptualization to implementation, approvals, and regulation, is very important to ensure compliance with standards and achievement of impacts. The ICRC is already undertaking high-level stakeholders’ engagement with representatives of Ministries, Departments, and agencies (MDAs) involved in PPPs.

     With a current PPP profile of over 100 PPPs facilitated and/or being regulated by the ICRC in multiple sectors, that we at GITC estimate to value about $70 billion, out of which about $30billion (over N30 trillion) PPPs are being activated across various sectors within the first two of President Tinubu’s administration; the decentralization of approvals is the best approach to ensuring success and sustainability, if executed properly and implementation monitored and measured effectively.

     Indeed, over the years, as a key PPP practitioner and stakeholder, I have noticed that one of the banes of the success of PPPs in Nigeria is due to the omnibus nature of the operations of the ICRC vis-à-vis the political and socio-economic structure of the country. Indeed, the PPP model is still a nascent model in Nigeria. Hence, the timing of the decentralization of some of the PPP approvals of ICRC is apt, and it will add more value, make more impact.

     A case study that justifies approval

    decentralisation

    Part of lessons learnt as captured in an impact assessment report, published in 2016 and updated this year, by the Public – Private Infrastructure Advisory Facility (PPIAF), which is a World Bank funded organization; gives credence to this new policy of decentralizing PPP approvals, wherein the reported stated; “Clear lines of authority are fundamental to engage the private sector successfully, as demonstrated by the Nigerian Ports Authority singularly resolving concession issues. Thus, the federal government needs a more coherent and cohesive PPP regulatory framework with clear lines of authority.”

     Governance framework

    The fact that a project approval board will be established to oversee the process further gives credibility to the process and will strengthen project governance, accountability, mitigate risks, and assure effective project initiation, development, and implementation in line with the PPP objectives, agreements, and extant regulations and laws of Nigeria.

     Furthermore, the new guidelines for decentralization also detail requirements for preparing outline business cases (OBCs), full business cases (FBCs), financial models, procurement routes, and compliance steps.

     It is important that the Director General of the ICRC, Dr. Jobson Oseodion Ewalefoh, has stated that the ICRC will continue to “promote, guide, facilitate and regulate the PPP ecosystem in Nigeria in collaboration with relevant MDAs, i.e., the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP), Ministry of Finance Incorporated (MOFI), Bureau of Public Enterprise (BPE).” This is a very important part of the governance framework of the policy. The Director ICRC has also stated that there will be zero tolerance for non-compliance

     Some key points to note/ reiterate:

    I posit that some critical success factors should be noted/ reiterated/ reinforced as the new policy is activated. I am of the view that more attention should be focused on them so that we learn from past experiences, so as to guard against pitfalls and risks.

     •Integrity and transparency of the process

    The PPP approval decentralization will reduce the opacity of running PPPs and increase transparency and accountability in the entire process and operations of the PPPs, so as to avoid failures or complications to Nigeria’s economy. Defective PPPs could transmute into another form of debt, which will further have negative consequences on the economy.  Therefore, I expect that the decentralization of the PPP processes should ensure successes and socio-economic impacts at national and subnational levels during this administration.

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     •Stakeholder engagement and interagency collaboration

    A robust stakeholder engagement and interagency collaboration with a transparent dashboard to show all concerned and indeed Nigerians the progress of the investments/ project on a need-to-know basis. I noted that the ICRC has already fully engaged in this regard, which is commendable.

    •Investment, business and operational modelling

    We need to be sure that the decentralized PPP models we are adopting are the correct models for the overall socio-economic interests of Nigeria. For instance, what we have heard with regard to Air Nigeria during the immediate past administration of the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development should guide our thoughts. In my humble view, some of the issues started from the PPP modeling of how Ethiopian Airlines was given a chunk of stake, the distorted local content value, etc.

     The PPP model is very important in all economic sectors because the model will determine factors like ownership structure, shareholding, Return on Investment (ROI), socio-economic benefits, etc. Hence, we should be thorough in considering and deciding which model to adopt depending on the investment portfolio and the sector, i.e. the model of the transaction, operational model, financial modelling, and the entire framework of the project; and in doing so we need to involve all the critical stakeholders to ensure that we carefully think through the options. With the ongoing reforms, I am optimistic that new win-win deal-making models that will ensure responsible critical national assets management will continue to evolve.

    • Legal framework

    About one (1) year ago, it was all over the mainstream media that one Mr. Pramod Mitta, the younger brother of the Billionaire Concessionaire that is behind the Ajaokuta Steel Mill PPP project, Mr. Lakshmi Mittal was able to leverage a legal loophole in the legal framework of the PPP to access about $500million to service a debt that he incurred in another country. Given that the PPP was signed many years before the administration of President Bola Tinubu, it remains a redundant legacy project for Nigeria, which I am happy to hear Mr. President is determined to deliver. This is a good example of how a lack of proper planning and efficient legal framework and support system for our strategic and operational engagements with our foreign investors/ partners could significantly negatively impact Nigeria in the short, mid, to long terms.

     Consequently, I advocate for the continuous full involvement of subject matter experts, all relevant government agencies, and stakeholders to x-ray the PPP models, agreements, and other relevant documentation to ensure that all the provisions in the legal frameworks protect all the interests of Nigeria before we proceed. Essentially, the outcome of the legal framework should be a win-win for Nigeria and for the investors. To also ensure that in the long run, Nigerians are not subjugated to foreign investors/ nations with no value to Nigerians. 

    •Project management and Execution Quotient

    The project management framework should be very robust, and the execution quotient of operating the PPPs should be high, with zero tolerance for laxity or slippages. This is so that the terms and conditions, as well as the deliverables of operationalizing the PPPs, especially the EPCC (Engineering, Procurement, Construction, and Commissioning) module, are delivered timely and qualitatively with full value for money and impacts. This will ensure that people will not come under the guise of investing in our critical infrastructure and end up short-changing Nigeria.

     This will also safeguard our PPPs from becoming white elephant projects.

     In closing, I look forward to faster, efficient, and impactful infrastructural development in Nigeria. God Bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

  • There was a country!

    There was a country!

    The revelations about rampant corruption in our country in recent times by intelligence officers reminds one of those days before and immediately after independence when sanity prevailed and those in government took their assignments as sacred trusts and not opportunity for graft. I still remember growing up  in my own part of Nigeria when we did not have crude petroleum but had cocoa, palm oil, rubber and lots of hardwood timber which our regional government exported and the proceeds were spent on running the administration while a big part of it was saved against a rainy day. Some of the savings was used to support producer prices whenever the prices fell in the so-called world market as a result of over production.  Stability of producer price was necessary to encourage the farmers who produced the export products. The marketing board that managed these savings was insulated as much as possible from political interference.

    It was the British colonial government that set this marketing board up and by the time we had party and responsible government in 1951, millions of pounds sterling had accumulated as savings which the Awolowo government in the Western Region had access to from 1951 to 1959. Marketing boards were also set up for the eastern and northern regions of Nigeria but because those regions produced palm oil and palm kernel in the case of the East and groundnuts, cotton and hides and skins in the case of the North, they did not have the kind of money which cocoa brought into the coffers of the western Nigerian treasury.

    The year 1955 begins the period I am talking about when I was in my final year in primary school during the first year of the Action Group’s government’s free and compulsory primary school education scheme. My set moved from standard four to join with those in standard five to transit to primary six and the number of years spent in primary school was shortened from eight years to six years. There was fear that standards will be lowered but nothing of such happened and my set took entrance examinations to various secondary schools in the Western Region preparatory to starting in Form One in January 1956. Most of us only took entrance examinations to schools in the Western Region. Certainly not to Lagos! None of our teachers encouraged us to do so because of what was said to be the corrupting influence of the coastal city. And our parents would not hear of us going to Benin and Warri provinces for fear of the distance and differences in languages. There were a few intrepid ones who braved going there.

    It was the best of times.  We were all enjoying heavenly paradise here in Ekiti and the Western Region and in the country as a whole. One could travel to anywhere without molestation by the police or armed robbers and Fulani herders minded their business as we did ours .Everything was good. We were not rich neither were we poor. During our holidays, we joined our parents on the farms and those whose parents were traders hawked their wares on the street. Running family economies was a joint program of parents, children, cousins and all kinds of relations with everybody making a contribution.

    In spite of the limitations of our rural environment we did well. Our peasant upbringing endowed us with all that was honest and honourable. We never stole; we never embezzled or envied any one. We were satisfied with whatever it pleased the Almighty God to put in our hands in terms of shelter and ability to send our children to school like our parents did. We did not know anyone who became rich by being a civil servant. Politics when it entered our part of Nigeria was a call to serve not to eat. The only rich people we knew were contractors and cocoa merchants. We thought our country or shall I say, our region will regenerate itself and our children will have the opportunity we had to live in a peaceful environment. But we were wrong.

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    Our self-sustaining region was in 1957 made a self-governing part of Nigeria. We still retained control over our lives and contributed financially to the central treasury which relied largely on import and excise duties as well as charges on currency, posts and telegraphs, railways and shipping, and aviation. The regions continued to run their affairs as autonomous entities within the federation of Nigeria and enjoying common services of police and defence. The regions ran their own affairs competitively and cooperatively. Crude petroleum was discovered in Oloibiri (Bayelsa State) in the East but this did not make huge impact on the East which remained the Cinderella of the Nigerian family relations.

    As we progressed towards independence, the fierce competition for control of the centre began. The northern hegemony epitomized by the NPC in the centre was then aided by the eastern subservience of the NCNC.  Then began the race to fill the posts being vacated by the British and to pack the ministries and parastatals with the ethnic cohorts of largely easterners. Obafemi Awolowo who in all his political life had favoured strong regions appeared to have abandoned his position when he decided to challenge the NPC / NCNC chokehold on the centre by resigning as premier of the Western Region to go to the centre. With historical hindsight, he should have stayed in the West like his political enemy Ahmadu Bello stayed on in the North and sent his lieutenant, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa to the centre as lame duck prime minister which he would have remained if Awolowo and Ahmadu Bello had maintained their principled federal posture as they did in the Lancaster  pre-Independence  conference of 1959.This wrong tactical move sealed the fate of the carefully negotiated agreement for the disparate regions  to remain together. These were territories big enough to be separate countries. They entered into what has turned out into an unhappy marriage which the military forced unitary system of 1966 has worsened.

    Nevertheless, the free-for-all looting and the crazy feeding frenzy on national treasury which began after the civil war ended in 1970 and have gotten worse and worse in a country where anything goes! Now we hear government wants to sell the airports obviously to politicians from favoured part of the country just like the power sector was sold to people who knew nothing about how to generate and distribute electricity.

    How does one explain the fact that the main source of the country’s wealth goes unaudited for years? The various parastatals in the oil industry are run, not with the aim to earn income and augment national income, but to consume whatever comes in from sales of crude oil and Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG). Yet we complain that the country has no roads, no railways, no modern ports and airports. We have no hydro or any sort of efficient electric power. We have written and written that the dollar guzzling petroleum refineries and petrochemical industries should be sold. We said it to Obasanjo, Yar’Adua, Jonathan and we said it again to Muhammadu Buhari and are now saying it to Bola Ahmed Tinubu to sell the damned refineries to entrepreneurs who know how to manage them.

    The money we are queuing up in various capitals of the world to borrow would have been unnecessary if we ran our oil industry profitably. Unfortunately, this will continue until the crude oil in our hands becomes unprofitable and unsellable. Those running our oil industry should just compare us with the following countries in OPEC namely UAE, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, and Venezuela. Even with the American sabotage of Iran and Venezuela and the war in Iraq, they still have superior infrastructure than Nigeria. The roads we used to travel on have all been washed away because of poor construction arising from corruption and kickbacks from those who constructed them. Nemesis has now caught up with us. The poor have left the villages to waylay us on the highways and rob and attack us in the cities. The poor are now demanding their own share of our common patrimony which a few have appropriated. The rich can no longer sleep because the poor are hungry and angry. Before it is too late we must go back to the negotiated constitutional agreement that led us to Independence to avoid current and future head-butts. We need to spend more time on how to bake a bigger national cake than on how to share the dwindling little cake we are now scrambling over. A million reviews and revisions of our constitution will not get us to a desired destination unless our pilots and ourselves change course and character and attitude to work. There is honour in hard work Wealth without accountability is the ruin of many nations. That is the lesson of history.

  • Royal roulette

    Royal roulette

    • Alaafin reignites supremacy war with Ooni

    What WILL Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Abimbola Owoade, do now that his 48-hour ultimatum to Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, has expired? The ultimatum expired yesterday. Up till now, the Alaafin has yet to make good his threat that “there will be consequences” if the Ooni did not comply with his demand after the ultimatum’s expiration.

    What is the demand? The Alaafin wants the Ooni to withdraw the title of Okanlomo of Yorubaland that the Ife monarch conferred on a business magnate, Chief Dotun Sanusi, last Saturday. The ultimatum expired yesterday, but there have been no visible signs of any “consequences”, 24 hours after. According to the Oyo monarch, the Ooni has no power to confer such titles on anybody. From time immemorial, there has been no love lost between occupiers of the two leading Yoruba stools.

    In the past, they hardly saw eye to eye. Where one was, the other was never there. They avoided each other’s company, as if they were rival wives married to the same man. The rivalry affected whatever group or council they belonged to. Everything done by the authorities to accommodate both monarchs so as to avoid being perceived as taking sides with either of them never worked out. One saw himself as above the other.

    Until Osun State was created out of Oyo in 1991, this cat and mouse game defined the relationship between the revered monarchs. The rotational chairmanship of the Oyo State Council of Traditional Rulers and Chiefs between them never solved the supremacy battle. The ice was only broken when Osun became a state and Ife was listed there. Yet, the rivalry continued on other fronts. When Ogunwusi became Ooni in 2015, he embarked on a peace mission to the then Alaafin in Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi, against the advice of some hardline culture activists who wanted him to maintain his distance.

    From the outset, he showed that he believed in jaw-jaw rather than war-war. He and Owoade are in the same age bracket. They are in their 50s. Owoade celebrated his 50th birthday last month, Ogunwusi was 50 last year. As young kings, it is expected that they should be more tolerant of each other as they work for the progress of their people and the larger Yoruba race. Certain things should not come between them. Even, nothing should come between them to the extent that it would blow open. They can disagree in private and resolve whatever their differences are without a third party knowing about it.

    When the spat of royalties like them becomes public, it affects not only their status, but the royal institution they represent. What is it about conferring a title on an individual that it should split the Alaafin and the Ooni? Did the Ooni confer the title on Sanusi in secret? Monarchs like to protect their domains in their own interests, but the conferment of titles on persons is not the exclusive preserve of any king. They can give titles to whoever they liked, as long as it is within their purview. The Alaafin is saying the Ooni does not have the power to confer the Okanlomo of Yorubaland title on Sanusi.

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    He urges the Ooni to restrict himself to awarding such titles in Ile Ife, which is historically known as the cradle of the Yoruba. Owoade refers to a Supreme Court judgment which he says recognises the Alaafin as the sole authority to confer titles on individuals in Yorubaland generally. Other monarchs of the race, he claims, can only perform such functions in their respective domains. Is the Alaafin saying that his predecessor, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi, was not aware of the Supreme Court judgment?

    If Adeyemi was aware, why did the late monarch not raise an objection when the Ooni was said to have publicly announced in 2020 that he would confer the Okanlomo of Yorubaland title on Sanusi? Or had the Supreme Court not given the judgment then? For a matter to have reached the Supreme Court, it must have gone through the high and appeal courts. With the kind of justice system we operate, that would have taken some years. Owoade became Alaafin five months ago, and they are not long enough for this matter to travel all the way from the high court to the court of appeal, and finally the Supreme Court.

    Ironically, the Ooni and Alaafin are the sons of Oduduwa, the Yoruba progenitor, who founded Ile Ife. That is why till today, the Ooni is referred to as Arole Oodua (the heir of Oduduwa). The two of them are major monarchs who should set examples for other Yoruba obas. There will be squabbles at times, but they should not be over what could be considered mundane issues. If Oduduwa’s two leading sons fight, what will their brothers do?  Who will settle the big brothers?

    Except there are other underlying factors, I see no reason why the Alaafin reacted the way he did. If he really wants to follow the rule of law as he claimed by citing that Supreme Court verdict, he should have returned to court for remedy. But he resorted to self help by issuing the Ooni a 48-hour ultimatum to uninstal Sanusi or “face the consequences”. As the nation waits with bated breath for those “consequences”, the Alaafin can, in the meantime, give answers to these pertinent questions:

       Which year was the case filed? Who are the parties? What is the subject-matter of the suit, as well as the suit and appeal numbers? And when did the Supreme Court give its judgment on the basis of which he is claiming to be the overlord of rulers in Yorubaland. Softly, softly, your royal majesty.

  • Roses don’t grow in sewers

    Roses don’t grow in sewers

    Every Nigerian loves to howl at power, until it resides in the family.

    It hits differently when a corrupt administration is led by your father or mother, granny, uncle or aunt. Suddenly, theft becomes a forgivable misdemeanour. Dishonesty is rationalised as survivor’s instinct, and a prosecuted felon morphs into a misunderstood patriot.

    It’s easier to mount the soapbox just to spout off and be seen when power resides in a stranger’s lineage. What is excused in the familiar is despised in the other.

    This is the mentality of a sick person. It is what drives a university professor and supposed sanctuary of knowledge to wrestle in the cesspit of ignorance, in defence of a demagogue. It is what quickens the journalist’s mutation from society’s watchdog into Castiliogne’s proverbial courtier with a forked tongue.

    Yet, while it is easier to pillory them for serving as propaganda mercenaries for corrupt leadership, at home and abroad, it must be understood that they cannot be any different in psyche and sentiment from the society that raised them.

    This is equally true of the corrupt doctor, nurse, engineer, accountant, policeman, soldier, politician and public officer. This is true of the armed bandit, terrorist, serial killer, rapist, misandrist and misogynist, among others. It’s garbage in, garbage out. Nobody sows poison parsley and reaps pomegranates.

    Roses don’t grow in sewers; thus, no roach crawls out of a sewage scented roseate. Society births its own likeness. The corrupted citizen is in no way different from the cockroach birthed in sewage. His stench clings to his gait, and his actions assert the filth that bred him. We cannot command fragrance from a generation nursed on putrescence.

    The average Nigerian mirrors his roots or sewer bed. Thus, the brothel prostitute and her pimp, the rapist, political assassin, ballot robber, kidnapper, and bestial public officer, are as much the results of society’s savagery as its absence.

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    Degenerate Nigeria can only be cured by farming our loins for the hidden cowries of a nobler race. The family is the building block of society and civilisation. But circumstances of its breakdown and reduction to a dysfunctional nature often foist the responsibilities of raising a child on a single, ill-prepared parent.

    Yet, despite its significance, the family is simply one among social agencies essential to a child’s upbringing. Also crucial is the role of the school, government, and religious institutions; together, they determine the quality of education an individual is exposed to and the quality of human he becomes.

    Modern Nigeria is a consequence of the moral torpedoing of our families, schools, worship houses, the streets, and the media. No thanks to metacolonialism. The morally ambivalent youth has become today’s amoral nomad, superbly conditioned by Western education and the media to scorn native intelligence and wisdom of the ancient.

    Many morph into unthinking herds in real time; thus, the preponderance of skitmakers,  journalists, writers, teachers, economists, social workers, engineers, and health workers, to mention a few, who function as glorified stooges of the debauched world.

    The faithlessness and moral corruption that they personify are similar to those that drove African enablers of the transatlantic slave trade. This degeneracy remains largely unchallenged.

    To prevent its recurrence, we must hinder the social mechanisms that render our youths capable of such. And this can only be achieved through education. Right now, the educational system produces clever parrots and rarely critical minds. It equips students with training essential to their deployment as systems managers, not creators of present and future breakthroughs. Students are schooled to pass exams, not to imagine alternatives. They are conditioned to perpetuate the very structures that impoverish them.

    Of President Bola Tinubu’s N54.99 trillion budget for 2025, N3.52 trillion was allocated to the education sector. While this is considered insufficient by local stakeholders and international standards (UNESCO recommends  15–20% benchmark) it marks a significant leap compared to recent years, and signals government recognition of education as a tool of socioeconomic transformation.

    If Nigeria truly seeks sustainable growth, we must commit greater resources to grooming generations of men and women capable of preserving the Greater Nigeria enterprise.

    It’s about time we cultivated education as Nigeria’s fertile field of rebirth. So far, we have done a bang-up job exploiting school as a factory for producing certificates and training graduates as process clerks and systems managers. We must bend the arc of learning away from rote recitation, towards character formation, patriotism, and humane citizenship.

    Nigeria’s curriculum must be stripped of barren obsession with cramming and reconstituted with value. And, sublime, isn’t it? That Nigeria flaunts so many PhDs but never an indigenised scholarly theory of things.

    We must quit teaching honesty, empathy, and civic responsibility as abstract ideals, but as living habits. The Yoruba notions of Omoluabi, the man of virtue, good character, and integrity, whose word is bond, must complement the Hausa-Fulani reverence for mutumin kirki, the upright man, and the Igbo ideal of nwanne di na mba, brotherhood across boundaries.

    These indigenous codes of honour, too long neglected and weaponised into manipulative soundbites, must be restored as the essence of national pedagogy. Nigeria must also reintroduce history into the classroom, stripped of bigotry, misrepresentation of context, dates and battles. The past must be recalled only to inspire pride without prejudice, and as a mirror of infractions and consequences.

    A child who grows up with fables of the tortoise’s greed and communal folklore learns integrity through melody and myth astride the theoretical grain. Arts and literature must be reimagined as moral laboratories where Nigeria perpetuates its better self. Alongside this, we must equip students with media literacy, teaching them to interrogate propaganda, resist manipulation, and discern truth from the lies that flood media channels.

    Ethics must be taught through living case studies of avoidable tragedies: bridges collapsed by corruption, lives imperilled by personnel greed cum inflated medical care, and court judgments bought by bribes. To raise humane generations, we must also school emotion alongside intellect. Children must be taught to manage anger, respect differences and listen with compassion. We must temper fixation with Mathematics, Sciences and English, with purposive and better structured Civic Education, comprising skills in dialogue, negotiation, and conflict resolution.

    What good are engineers who can build roads if they cannot build peace? Or medical personnel who can save lives but cannot heal themselves from tribal venom?

    Nigeria must re-imagine education beyond mere literacy and re-institute it as the foundation of model citizenship. Educational policies must shift from a culture of producing certificate-holders to furnishing nation-builders. Leadership must embody propagated ethics, as no classroom will believe that bribery is wrong while public officers flaunt mansions built with stolen funds. Nothing betrays pedagogy faster than a sullied example.

    The task may seem immense, but it is not impossible. This country can yet raise generations who sing the national anthem as a lived creed; who would never excuse larceny even in their own bloodline; and who’d always break kinship out of the jailhouse of tribe.

    This will not happen by accident, but by reinventing education as a forge of character, and for its overarching purpose to make minds, not careers or social cannibals.

    We must quit taking dormant theories and management techniques for unimpeachable wisdom and understand that the true measure of a civilisation is rooted in its empathy, and not its skill at acquisition or consumption.