The Nation Newspaper

Category: Tony Marinho

  • ‘Baby bonus’; Stop ‘Okada epidemic’

    ‘Baby bonus’; Stop ‘Okada epidemic’

    The US Government is putting a  ‘Baby Bonus’ $1,000 in individually personalised accounts for every new-born US citizen in 2025/26/27 for investment in the stock market which is expected to continue to grow at an average rate of 7%. Withdrawal can only be made from 18 years of age. The parents, family and friends are encouraged to add to the account over the coming years according to their means. The money can be left in the account even to old age growing indefinitely. Is this an incentive to have another baby or a reward for having a baby or merely a political bribe to tele-guide or force the family vote of father and mother in the next election?

    Imagine what effect such a policy would have had on the world’s children. Of course, being a wealthy country, $1k is peanuts for the USA and most advanced countries. But in Nigeria, a similar gesture of $1k =N1,550,000 today due to serial mismanagement and total ignorance among our political leaders of basic economic principles and a complete disregard for their responsibility to defend and improve the value of the country’s currency financially, emotionally and patriotically.

    The evil habit of government awarding oil blocks creating several instant multibillionaires, while the masses wallow in near absolute poverty, pollution, is a despicable policy. Surely it would have done no harm to have allowed the country and particularly the areas where the oil blocks are located the same wealth creation opportunity as those multibillionaires enjoy merely because of an oil well licence? Spreading wealth is the key to a self-sufficient family, business and governance economic system that will endure beyond political cycles of plenty and famine.

    Communities and states should be better recipients of oil-windfalls than individual citizens, assuming corruption can be eliminated. But the fear of corruption cannot be the excuse not to do the correct thing. Certainly, every country should look at this ‘Baby Bonus’ policy to determine its workability and possible benefits. Unfortunately, the people to analyse and decide on such long-term strategic policies are politicians with a reputation for thinking mainly of self, at the expense of development strategies. Such politicians have amply demonstrated their greed above the needs of the people as they demand outrageous and scandalous ‘pension scams’ for ‘serving one or two terms’ and who would much rather award funds to themselves for new jeeps, though many have several personal vehicles.

    It is this greed over need that allowed Nigeria to become an ‘Okada Epidemic Zone’ because our leaders cannot see the need to replace the millions of motorcycles and three-wheeler ‘Keke Napep’ with 14–60-seater buses especially in towns and cities, like in their precious New York and London. This would remove the 10-20-30 motorcycles clogging almost every roundabout, cut congestion, free up traffic and even more importantly, also cut  road crashes and accidents and crash-related deaths, injuries and hospitalisations and bed occupancy rates by as much as 50-80%. This would remove a huge burden of care from government medical facilities and their budgets and other hospitals and save affected families much preventable grief and cost.

    Already ‘okada’ have been banned in Maiduguri successfully for security matters. It is time to widen the ban to reduce the spread of the ‘Okada Epidemic’ for health and security-related matters. Many estates ban Okada.

    Read Also: Nigeria must invest more in the young population – Speaker Abbas

    The terrifying high speed of the commercial Okada carrying  passengers, even mothers and their babies (sometimes to their deaths), as well as their complete disregard for junction and ‘Keep to your lane’ Road Safety Highway Code Law make most crashes fatal or result in severe body, bone and brain injuries. Almost all of these crashes are preventable with signs  –Okada Maximum Speed Limit of around 30-40kpm, more pre licence teaching of the very young ignorant and arrogant Okada drivers who seem to think and act as if they exclusively own the side, middle and all road lanes.

     In Oyo State when Professor Soyinka started his Road Safety Corps and recruited some of us to update the Highway Code and also, as special marshals to get drivers to slow down on the Ife-Ibadan Road, there were no ‘Okadas’ in number. Today the okadas outnumber the cars and other vehicles maybe by 100 to one and block every junction causing mayhem. They surround vehicles on all four sides like a swarm of bees and can kill. They always gang together, intimidating drivers especially if they, the Okadas, have crashed.

    All road traffic authorities need ‘Okada Education Pamphlets’ to limit the number of Okada which can stay at one time at junctions and stop spots. Only a manageable number of registered Okadas and Keke Napep should be allowed in any particular area. All road violations should be punished.  Our traffic agencies, including the police and VIO should rise above all scandal like extortion and be closely monitored by supervisors to stop bribery and other corrupt practices. 

    Tinted window palaver has started again. Will this be done without checkpoint scamming?

    We should be happy to hear that the Siemens Power Contract is still moving forward and hopefully the upheaval in the power sector ownership will scare away unserious partnerships. All previous exercises were like repeated extortionary refinery Turn Around Maintenance scams. We hear of ongoing scams in the prepaid meter project with officials in the field telling a different story for the published free meter scenario.   

  • Falcons fallout; Reward template

    Falcons fallout; Reward template

    The largess showered on the Super Falcons including $100,000 and an Abuja house, probably in the 1506 ‘Crime Estate’ proven by the courts to be recaptured from Emefiele’s reign of terror’ over Nigeria’s assets in CBN, has generated mixed feelings. Of course, we do not know what other past Czars at CBN did. How clean were they really?

    Nobody questions the need to reward the Super Falcons and their supporting entourage. But how much is too much in a country with a minimum wage of N70,000/month and a maximum wage of several million/month? Even that N70,000 is often ignored in both government and private sectors and ignored also by the employees of these sectors who in their turn have employees of their own in the domestic setting -armies of underpaid house-helps, servants, drivers, nannies, carers, cooks and guards many of whom earn less than minimum wage and work longer hours.

    Contrast this with the unrealistic excessive multi-million ‘maximum government wage’ of Sinators [no apologies for the typo] and UNRepresentatives [no apology for the second typo]  commandeered, cornered from the budget, not earned, by members of the ‘greed over need driven’ political class.  Nigerians have protested themselves hoarse against this exaggerated self-assessment of worth without success. Paradoxically, National Assembly, NASS added insult to the injury by nastily awarding its members jeeps worth around N164m each interestingly about $100,000.

    Read Also: First Lady donates ₦1bn, relief items to Niger flood, fire, banditry victims

    Politicians seeking public office should be on a government scale Level 18, 19, 20, 21. Period! Nigeria will only progress when politicians serve the country and not service themselves and family generations unborn with misappropriated funds.  The president, the VP, senators, representatives, are government jobs not ‘Luxury King Solomon or Midas Treasure Hunts’. Minister means ‘servant’. Our governors demand houses and pensions and gratuities for just four years of hyper-well-paid governance with poor service delivery.  There is a disconnect here.

    The euphoria of the Super Falcons win and the value added to Nigeria’s sporting reputation are unquantifiable in money or in the value of the free positive promotional worldwide publicity.  The win is a huge a morale booster, a yardstick and motivator for others coming behind to measure themselves and surpass. It is a[nother] giant further step to establish more positive sporting role models nationwide. This latter is in spite of the fact that most of the sports girls and women either ‘japa-ed’ abroad to take advantage of better training facilities and better structured sports support scholarships and contracts or were actually born, schooled, scouted and groomed abroad and are actually routinely playing internationally, not in Nigeria.

    Good positive news created by Nigerians anywhere is good positive Nigerian news no matter the intermediate country circumstances. This is especially important as our newspapers and world opinion of Nigeria and Nigerians are dependent on recurrent undated negative social media and violence of terrorism, kidnapping, ritual killings, baby factories, drugs and diseases. It is a time when so many other Nigerians seem to be specialising in ‘PHD’ aka ‘Pull Him Down’ or ‘PND’ aka ‘Pull Nigeria Down’ activities.

    However, there is need for government at LGA, state and federal to have ‘Yardsticks of Reward’ a STANDARDISED ACADEMIC AND SPORTS REWARD TEMPLATE. Recently, Nigeria has been blessed by a tsunami of First Class or First in Class graduates at home across the world, at home in Nigeria and across the academic world. Yes, some were rewarded with job offers and cash gifts but how does that compare to the most recent Falcons awards? How does academic brilliance compare to a football or athletic prowess in the receipt of government financial rewards?

    Already there is a loud complaint on behalf of our star athletes who carry Nigeria’s name sometimes under another flag, winning hard earned laurels on the world and continental stage. Nigerians who change their flags are not traitors. If they were they would change their names and pretend to be rooted elsewhere, but they do not. Their change of flag is like a change of baton in a relay -essential for the necessary progress to finish the athletic career race. In this case it is due to economic, strategic reasons and usually to escape the poor track record of Nigerian sports administration in which the athlete is often neglected. But they are still recognised by their names even when draped in other flags. It is not shame on them for surviving. It is shame on us, Nigeria, for forcing them, by our infrastructural and administrative inadequacies, to make the japa decision made by them or their parents during the five japas created by past authoritarian or economically oppressive regimes.

    Some argue that our largely international team actually stopped home grown players succeeding. Some complain that $100,000 per Super Falcons is arbitrary and extravagant compared to the poor sports budgets and poor service delivery and needs of the sports sector generally in Nigeria. THIS IS TRUE. Certainly, we need a REWARD TEMPLATE.

    But Nigeria’s participants in sports and academics for the thousandth time demand an answer to the morality in why a 160m+[not 200m+]  country would rather allow its private sector reward past presidents with private contributions amounting to around N20billlion for a ONE Presidential Library, than government and private sectors spending a similar amount upgrading sports facilities, administrative quality and quantity, talent hunts, progress ladders and competitive events and reward structures FOR 50 MILLION YOUNG NIGERIANS? 

  • Falcons; Sports deficit; N3-4trn power debt

    Falcons; Sports deficit; N3-4trn power debt

    Congratulations to the Super Falcons who defeated Morocco 3-2 to win the WAFCON for the 10th time. Wow! Hurray. Their win is a triumph over many battles of life, with setbacks, overcoming rejection, scepticism, self-doubt, negativity and sports administration fiascos -the lot of every Nigerian athlete. We pray they were actively protected against sexual harassment. There is always luck with huge skill, knowing when to score and more brilliantly when to pass for others to take the goal glory. Yes, there is a winning team but the others are not losers but fellow football athletes who have also given their all with one winner.

    This year it is the Super Falcons putting Nigeria back on the world football map. Hurray! Our players will go abroad as with any successful profession from sports to medicine. The only ‘profession’ not sellable abroad is the ‘profession’ of ‘politics’. Think about that! Nobody wants our politicians, but they impose themselves on us. Far too expensive to maintain!  The familiar ‘minister-to-international-job’ transition happens, but rarely for politicians. For those who succeed in the ‘politics-foreign job’ jump, it is their primary pre-politics profession which takes them forward like agriculture, the judiciary, economics, finance and medicine.

    The video call with President Tinubu was of, as yet, unrecognised monumentally important. The winning team loved their president. They showed the traditional respectful admiration of youth. We all loved it. It is obvious President Tinubu can easily engage and relate with Nigeria’s youth.  Sadly, President Tinubu is rarely seen with ordinary youth, or with real, not AI, photo ops for the youth to share in millions. This is an important and costly PR failure of his management team to inroad the youth mind pre-vote, especially as 2027 has been accelerated into today’s politics.

    No doubt, the houses allocated to the team, coaches and management,  will be  delivered hopefully not after 30 years of administrative obstructionism with no  one punished, but right now from the 1506 individual homes Emefiele built. Creating great good out of bad. So, unknown to him, he was actually using our money in CBN to build for the Super Falcons and other good people if the remaining houses are put to good governance use. The remaining houses should also be allocated within Nigeria’s social architecture -a moral lesson.

    Read Also: Tinubu governing with people, not above them, says Shettima

    This Super Falcon’s success in football this year focuses attention on the need to vet and assess sports facilities and sports ladders at each LGA, state and federal government level. There is now once more, a 2025 opportunity for the Tinubu government and state governors and LGA chairmen to correct past neglect and return to the glorious days of year-round training for north, south and eastern regional sports festivals and Inter University Games, NUGA, best exemplified by Governor Samuel Ogbemudia of then Bendel State who became the Sports Czar of Nigeria. Moshood Abiola, presidential campaign winner in 1993 became ‘Pillar of Sports’ for his contributions. Time to make our champion sports personalities household names, role models and pillars. The federal government should allocate adequate funds to send teams athletes abroad after rigorous training schedules in any of the several National Sports Stadia, some run down with rubbish accommodation. Governors and LGAs chairpersons should take up ‘Nigerian Sports Infrastructure and Sports Superstructure’ with more responsibility to the youth  and improve primary and secondary school sports with more zonal competition and exposure.

    Nigeria has had many unsung sports heroes and heroines. In a country desperately needing non-political role models, ask yourself how many schools have honoured them or named a door, room or a wall after them? Probably none.  Use the internet. Research them and make classroom posters for real-life influencers like Chioma, Ajunwa, Falilat Ogunkoya, Mary Onyali-Omagbemi, Lucy Ejike, Asisat Oshoala, D’Tigress team, Tobi Amusan, Ether Oyema.       

    Renovating, refurbishing or rehabilitation, call it whatever, of schools is not newsworthy or celebrated in normal countries where high school standards are the ‘minimum standard’ and compulsory norm. No one waits for end stage school dilapidation or collapse, injury or death before doing the right thing. At last, in Nigeria more public schools are getting a long overdue facelift making them ‘Child and Teacher Friendly Classrooms and School Environments’.

    Please Google Bariga LCDA Lagos for an amazing primary school and Governor Okpebholo of Edo State for a similar impact. Enough of pointless spending billions on politicians while our children wallow in education poverty. It is our responsibility to ensure children enjoy their ‘years of learning’ .   

    Nigeria owes GENCOs N3-4trillion. Prof Oke has pointed out that the debt needs interrogation to ensure its accuracy. A multi-pronged forensic audit should be initiated urgently. Government organs must pay their bills like we do. We all know of the disconnection of government hospitals and health centres ruining patient outcomes. Criminally, many heads of government institutions actually failed to pay their electricity bill (and salaries and pensions) monthly without cause or consequence for years.

    Yet, even without paying their monthly electricity bills, those in authority have no spectacular achievement over those in the private sector. So, what did they do with the money illegally ‘saved’ by the non-payment of the electricity bill? Accurate electricity cost projections should be inserted in all government institutions and allocated funds must be used properly. Are we in this N3-4 trillion black hole partly because 30–40-year electricity Budget Allocations were diverted or stolen outright, like the security vote may be?

  • 2025-27: Don’t waste 20 months!

    2025-27: Don’t waste 20 months!

    The needless, selfish, calculating, shortsighted, diversionary, derisive but definitely carefully  orchestrated earthquake upheaval and tsunami turmoil in the political landscape throw up many obstacles on the formerly anticipated smooth road to the 2027 election and the ‘traditionally agreed’ cyclical double term amounting to eight years for southern power. Compounded by the death of former president, Muhammadu Buhari, commanding 7-12million votes it, has brought the 2027 election into sharp focus. It is already negatively impacting politics, political alignments and especially political performance and political planning.

    Disgracefully, many politicians want Nigeria to stop and to suddenly appear in 2027. They behave as if the entire remaining five months of 2025 and 12 months of 2026 governance year and two or three months of 2027 do not matter. But that intervening time is real time. It is almost 20 months. Nigerian cannot lose or waste 20 months to political inertia. Twenty months is an instant in the life of a politician. But that real time is 20 months of real lives of the 160million Nigerians in urgent need of positive infrastructure impact by the current already voted in governance structures at federal, state and LGA.

    Incumbent politicians, contractors and civil servants must become razor-focused on the 20-month welfare of the entire population which includes the electorate that voted for them in 2023 and also all living Nigerians be they potential voters or not.  This time before the actual election must not be abandoned to campaigns with zero delivery politics.

    The 2027 electorate, including most of those reading this article and several million additional 18-22 year olds, ‘2027 FIRST TIME VOTERS’ who are currently growing into the 18+electoral population, will be faced with ‘the usual’ deceptions, bribery and corruption of fact and fictional claims and denials, and pressures  up to and on the day of the election in 2027.

    What a wonderful thing it would be if we could offer our new young voters an honest @abiola standard 2027 election and of course a non-Babangida annulled result. But before then, we the people must not allow the political class to take their eye off the ‘Good Governance’ part of their contract with the people. The electorate will not and must not tolerate neglect of ‘good governance’ by those we have elected in 2023 who have our vote, our mandate and our money to do the ‘2023-2027job’.  If they fail, they should be put to the test and if confirmed to be found wanting, removed at the next election 2027 regardless of their political party to make way for others more willing to serve a full uninterrupted four years and not truncated in 2030 for a repeat performance of the ongoing 20 month pre-2027 campaign.

    For years Nigeria has routinely ‘lost a year to irresponsible pre-election politics’ causing government paralysis every four years. We must immediately combat this risk of 160million Fellow Nigerians losing 20 months of Good Governance in this election cycle. In order to force  the current set of  politicians at federal, state and LGA to fulfill their mandated responsibility, for which, we tend to forget, they volunteered it would pay all the governments at federal, state and LGA to begin to PUBLISH WEEKLY OR CERTAINLY MONTHLY REPORTS in all areas of public/ people, public/politician interface. The NGOs which specialize in governance monitoring, naming and shaming, evaluation reports, must redouble their efforts and widen their efforts and the publicity during these 20 months pre-2027 to ensure Nigeria and Nigerians are at last given the best possible ‘Political Service Delivery’ and ‘Good Governance’ available.

    This will take a greater sense of responsibility and commitment to Fellow Nigerians and Good Governance on the part of the current incumbent political office holders, their advisers -special and ordinary, the surrounding civil service, regardless of political party.

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    No political party has delivered anything close to the needs of the people when compared to what they collectively consume as ‘politics management fee’-the huge cost today of political service delivery by the presidency, NASS-Senate and Reps, the cost of minsters, special advisers, ministries etcetera.

    Nigeria cannot continue to carry on its head, a calabash of the greedy needs Nigeria’s political class. The political calabash is so heavy it is crushing Nigeria’s neck bones and spine and reducing our performance. Nigeria exemplifies the fact than no country can grow if political class values itself so highly above the citizenry. We do not need to catalogue the woes that have faced and are still facing Nigerians in daily life. They are summarized in the poor supply of power, water, health, education, security, shelter everywhere.

    If all the money corruptly diverted and ‘corruptly overpaid’ to politicians as salaries, allowances and unearned pensions had been used directly on the citizenry, many of these problems would have been solved just like in many other countries.

    Ask yourself – ‘Why are our standard targets ‘Minimal Standards?’ No country can grow if it uses ‘minimum standards’ as its goal, because goals are usually never met. That is why doing nothing passes for doing something in Nigeria. So politicians have failed us even before we set out to succeed. We must ask ourselves what do governments actually do well and what will they do between now and 2027? They are very good at getting hyper-paid for undelivered services. Come 2027 politicians must campaign for and we must vote to markedly reduce political overheads.

  • Zard, Makinde; CSR awards, CSR pre-contracts?

    Zard, Makinde; CSR awards, CSR pre-contracts?

    There was a function organised by the Zard family for late Chief Dr Raymond Asaad Zard, the departed public face of the Zard Dynasty. Organised by Camille Zard, his son, along with other family members, it also remembered Zard’s brother, Maurice. The occasion was graced by Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State and the Archbishop of Ibadan Archdiocese Gabriel  ’Leke Abegunrin. The Archbishop highlighted the huge contribution of Dr Zard through massive employment and especially philanthropy.

    Makinde, who was pleasantly surprised when a six-year-old girl, sweetly echoed his name to applause, praised the late ‘Uncle Ray’ Zard as an astute businessman who contributed massively to the infrastructural road network and to the social and economic empowerment and the entrepreneurial development of millions of youths and families earning him many laurels, including OFR. He commended the Zard’s road construction and chicken industry as having impacted transport reliability and food security.

    As founder and chairman of Educare Trust, I commended Makinde for unhesitatingly  clearing the huge debt of unpaid pensions left by predecessors and for his political sagacity by naming the University of Technology, Ibadan after late Governor Abiola Ajimobi as the initiator of the project, though he was from a different political party.

    It is to be noted that NOT PAYING SALARIES & PENSIONS is an abomination as it disempowers and disembowels the historic solid Nigerian Family and Extended Family structure. When the elders have no money, and petty things like sweets, treats and even birthday presents dry up, the grandchildren and children often manifest their impatience, disappointment, disgust and disrespect resulting eventually in a breakdown of the domestic social order.

    Remember that the EXTENDED FAMILY WAS THE REAL HISTORIC ‘FIRST BANK IN AFRICA’ with internal loans and never-to-be-paid-back borrowing and Fox’s glacier mints and Cabin biscuits in Grandma’s hand or left strategically in one of the thousand Captain cigarette tins under her bed. Grandpa would always have a halfpenny for good grandchildren. Governors who undertake to deliberately not pay salaries and pensions, sap the hierarchal authority of every worker or pensioner family structure. This creates sometimes irreversible financial and mental instability now, and in the future; creates the environment for an army of disgruntled youth who look down on their parents. Being broke can destroy the family through the destruction of the family leading to divorce, domestic violence, unruly youth, suicides and youth who look outwards into the dark streets for peer and moral mentorship leading to drug, sexual and physical abuse and crime.

    Importantly also, the youth affected do not respect the ethics around work. The youth see no value in waking up early in future for work as they have a ringside seat or are participants in the drama around zero income of seeing their parents go and come from work with excuses, empty handed and nothing to show for it.

    So, the disturbed and destabilised youth ask: ‘Why the hype about “get a job” when your job yields no wages or pension? You have to borrow money to go to work, and grandma has to line up in an endless queue for three days and still does not get her pension which is devalued as well?” .

    Note that every government salary and pension feeds multiple families, inside and outside the pension-less home, including domestic staff, drivers, market women, barber, extra lesson teacher, schools, Okada or tricycle etc. So, one salary and pension impacts many lives.

    No doubt, the importance and danger of pension debt and urgency of stabilising the family financial state were known to Makinde when he stepped up with a high sense to political and moral responsibility to pay trillions in pensions owed by his predecessors.

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    Any governor who refuses to pay salaries and pensions is actually shooting himself in the foot, morally and politically and making enemies of the citizens. We thank Makinde for paying past pensions, with our money of course.

    We must remind all governors that paying current salaries and pensions as-at-and-when- due, is routine, normal and not reportable as an achievement or dividend of democracy. We do not hear when salaries and pensions are paid abroad. It is the sacred routine responsibility, not an option, on taking political office,  

    Other guests including myself, highlighted Uncle Ray’s contribution through large financial support for various university projects and NGOs like Educare Trust of which he was life patron. Prof Tim Tayo highlighted his contribution to Rotary International while Zonta International appreciated him also. Dr Zard also supported Nigerwives and in providing braille books for the blind. I pointed out that ‘A FORTUNE NOT SHARED IS A MISFORTUNE UN-FORTUN-ATE!’

    I also suggested to the governor the importance of encouraging CO-CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES to uplift the physical and mental health of students and teachers and that a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) portfolio of past CSR activities by contractors be made part of contract award submission processes. That would bring an avalanche of CSR into schools, hospitals and youth activities. This would fit into government activities through Public Private Partnerships. All governments can easily increase CSR inflows to aid their schools and communities from the private sector by offering annual state based PPP-CSR rewards, recognitions and awards to private sector initiatives to encourage more ‘giving’ so that the CSR heights reached by Dr Raymond Zard may be achieved by a collective effort of widening the net of CSR.    

  • Wanted: ‘Quarterly Audits with Consequences’

    Wanted: ‘Quarterly Audits with Consequences’

    The Senate Committee on Public Accounts is belatedly querying NNPCL and its predecessor NNPC over audit discrepancy queries for 2017-2023 amounting to N210 trillion -N210,000,000,000,000. Assuming a realistic Nigerian population of 160m, 160,000,000 not the much boasted but questionable 200m+, that is N210trillion divided by 160m i.e.  N1,312,500/per Nigerian or N187,464/year/Nigerian. It is fraudulent and disgraceful and speaks volumes that the 2017,2018,  2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023 audits were not done or dealt with as and when due WITH CONSEQUENCES. Is the 2024 Audit also ongoing?   There is also a Police probe over N50b.

    There is no Ministry, Agency and Department, MAD, and Corporate ‘Fear of Audits’. But there is Corporate ‘Fear of Audits with Consequences’. Such ‘Consequences’ must include public disgrace, appointment termination, demotions, return of funds and prosecutions/jail terms.  This fear is a tool to help prevent fraud and misuse or abuse of funds.

    Nigerians are tired of often fruitless but very costly media circus lawyer-led frenzy and multi-year consuming EFCC, ICPC-led chases through endless smiley-lawyer courts to recover billions or trillions of already stolen people’s funds all made useless by the naira crash. Look at the ex-CBN banker demanding reversal of court ordered forfeiture of the estate with 753duplex i.e. 1506 actual homes. Think what that money, if ‘unstolen’ in the first place, would have done  in the education and child and mother care of Nigerians, many now dead, deprived or suffering.

    ‘AUDITS WITH CONSEQUENCES’ IN GOVERNMENT AGENCIES SHOULD BE QUARTERLY, EVERY THREE MONTHS, AND ADDED TOGETHER AT YEAR END AND MADE READY BY MARCH THE FOLLOWING YEAR.

    It is quite distressing to the general population to see the huge press coverage given to the slightest information, misinformation or deliberate rumour, true or false, about any politician. At the end of the day, these stories have little or no positive impact on the individual citizen. Entertaining politics, political shenanigans and politicians take up too much of our media space.

    Meanwhile, there is hardly ever any assessment of the contribution of the politician to the development landscape. The media would be better concentrating on performance than on the glitz and glamour of political life provided at the expense of the poor citizens. In addition to information of how many wristwatches, cars and houses a particular politician owns, we expect a report of the contribution that particular politician to the development of the society.

    Read Also: N45,000 quarterly imprest inadequate for police operations, says Sheidu

    As we move through 2025 and into 2026, politicians and the press seem to have cancelled that period from the political calendar and are now vocal about 2027. This is the beginning of a repeat of past mistakes culminating in the shutting down of governance for one year pre-election. We cannot allow this to happen between July 2025 and 2027. The poor citizens suffering in IDP camps, driven from homes and farmlands, without jobs, without a school cannot afford for politicians to take a sabbatical year off their development responsibility just to raise an ‘election war chest’ for an election  campaign. Nigerians have suffered too much from such ‘Time out’ periods.

    Politicians must work out the best way of continuing their political ambitions while continuing to work the machinery of development for the entire elected period, without disrupting the growth of infrastructure or truncating the dreams and the delivery to the citizenry of progress. There is too much for politicians to do for them to take their eye off the people’s needs. And besides, the politicians can hold up the achievements in 2026 to increase their chances of winning the election in 2027 on merit not money.

    POLITICIANS: WORK TILL YOUR LAST DAY IN OFFICE AS IT MAY JUST BE YOUR LAST DAY IN OFFICE IF YOU ARE NOT RE-ELECTED…and then Judgement Day. Of course, politicians should further their careers. However, by taking the fat salaries per month they cannot stop working for development for one year or more pre-election. If you take the money, do the work every month. Nigeria cannot afford to pay politicians huge amounts of funds and ‘Salaries And Perks’ only to have large numbers of them take a year off with nothing tangible done, just to try to win the next elections.

    President Tinubu has had his New Tax Laws agreed and has signed into law after several months of wrangling.  They come into force January 1, 2026 and suggest a very cerebral approach to prevent over-taxation, double taxation and puts more money in the pockets of poor and low-income workers, considering the poor naira value. There is no increase in VAT which remains at 7.5% though it could have gone to 10% for upper class consumptive products like food, clothing, cars and expensive drinks and perfumes. There were vicious objections in area of VAT distribution especially between VAT-generating states and VAT consumer states. There will be VAT exemptions for low-income workers and lower taxes for medium income workers and reduction in tax in certain productive areas like agriculture and an introduction of redistribution of VAT proceeds.

    This will introduce a huge responsibility on tax authorities and the citizenry. A lot will depend on the patriotism and subsequent honesty of the citizenry, accountancy firms and tax officials. The Bible singled out judges and tax officials for special prayers to enable them to avoid temptation. How have times, opinions and practical aspects in these areas changed over 2000 years? Only time will tell. 

  • Put ‘sickle cell awareness’ in primary school curriculum

    Put ‘sickle cell awareness’ in primary school curriculum

    International medicine. The UK has introduced ‘Assisted Death’ for terminally ill and pain-ridden patients leading miserable terminal days. This means more control over Date of Death (DOD). In Nigeria, ‘terrorists’ inflict premature DOD on hundreds of healthy Fellow Nigerians in Plateau and Benue and Nasarawa states with vicious and callous regularity. Nigeria, where is your security as you retire over 400 senior officers in wartime? Too many Nigerians die from the disease ‘lack of adequate government security’.

    Elsewhere a billionaire had six ‘biological children and ‘had’ a further 100 children ‘fathered indirectly’ by him through sperm bank donations. Magnanimously, he has arranged a will equally favouring all of them amounting to $132m each. Fair!

    Already there are stem cell and gene manipulation methods to eliminate abnormal genes like sickle cell and other ‘bad’ genes from our babies, pre-birth or at birth or later. There are many inherited disorders causing a very heavy burden on families.  Soon it will be possible to prolong natural life, eliminate many diseases and even unwanted societal ‘no-no’ traits like inherited perceived stature, weight, facial ‘imperfections’. In Nigeria, we still grapple with malaria and typhoid and cholera, non-gene problems.

    The SICKLE CELL TRAIT is our most common genetic abnormality in Nigeria and especially in Western Nigeria occurring in about 25% the population. Not all of them get sick. Only the ones with SS are prone to more life-threatening sickness and SC will have less sickness. The AS and AC are never sickle cell sick but may occasionally have blood in the urine from exercise.

    If you have ever known the suffering of a sickle cell patient, you will appreciate the need to prevent your children getting Sickle Cell Disease. At nine, in the early 60s, I lost a six-year old cousin, Isho in a Yaba Lagos Flat. I sat wondering why someone playing football with me two hours before, was said by my father, a doctor and his uncle, to have died aka ‘gone to fill a vacancy in heaven’. Many years later as a registrar in Obstetrics and Gynaecology in UCH, Ibadan, I was devastated when informed that Isho’s senior sister, Yetunde had died in childbirth in Lagos. They both had Sickle Cell Disease.

    Of course there are more and more SCD patients surviving longer, but many more did not. Since then, many good citizens and organisation have combatted SCD through many other avenues including the Sickel Cell Foundation, Educare Trust, UCH Sickel Cell clinic etc  and improved government medical facilities etc, to prevent and to  care for those with Sickle Cell Disease.

    The sickle cell rate remains high despite the efforts by many including Educare Trust to educate, empower and encourage our youth to ask when meeting the opposite sex not only ‘what is your name?’ but to ask instead, ‘WHAT IS YOUR NAME AND WHAT IS YOUR BLOOD GENOTYPE’ . They should then only make amorous moves in cases where they are compatible. HB, AA, GENOTYPE is free to fall in love and have SS and SC free babies with anyone even SS. Those with AS AND AC SHOULD NOT RISK falling in love with AS, AC OR SS OR SC partners if they want to totally prevent the SCD in their future family. The Sickle Cell gene is believed to protective against severity of malaria but we have anti-malarials for that now.

    EACH OF OUR YOUTH SHOULD BE ASKED AND ASK OF EACH OTHER ‘IS LOVE WORTH THE RISKING SICKLE CELL DISEASE?’ Please AI research ‘SCD COMPLICATIONS’ which include misery, bone and abdominal pains, ulcers and deformities, blood flow crises, eye diseases and many days and months off school and work, limiting education and work opportunities. Sickle Cell Disease is not a political football. SICKE CELL DISEASE CAUSES PREVENTABLE DISEASES AND DEATH, debilitating the victims and their families. But all is not lost. YOU CAN SAVE A SICKLE CELL LIFE!

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    Nigeria’s primary, secondary and tertiary curricula must have sickle cell maths/logic, medicine, socio-economic impact lessons.   Millions leave school, abandoning ‘formal learning’ after just primary school. Therefore, it is not nuclear physics to logically introduce ‘SICKLE CELL LOGIC’ INTO THE NIGERIAN PRIMARY SCHOOL CURRICULUM WITH RELATED COMPULSORY QUESTIONS IN THE PRIMARY SCHOOL LEAVING CERTIFICATE AND COMMON ENTRANCE and added to with at higher knowledge content at secondary and all tertiary courses and subjects from Accountancy to Zoology and General Paper in all universities.

    Despite a National Health Insurance Service, NHIS and various state HIS organisations, few offer free service to the sickle cell population. They are now joined by Adekunle Gold and his AG Foundation’s five star care programme offering free health insurance cover for 1000 sickle cell children with LASHMA AND SAMI -Sickle Cell Advocacy and Management Initiative. HURRAY. God Bless AG and all teams involved.

    A FREE SICKLE CELL TEST & CERTIFICATE SHOULD BE MANDATORY FOR ALL VULNERABLE CHILDREN.

    THE UK’s NHS is about to ‘DNA screen’ all new-born babies for hundreds of illnesses which can be prevented by genetic modification treatments thus reducing or eliminating millions of hospital visits and bed occupancy days, countless medicine prescriptions and ‘missed work’ for illness. Serious ethical and data theft issues exist around discussing such results with the child’s family members. Should information be revealed pre-marriage to potential spouses and in-law families who may reject the individual if there is a potential for future severe or life-shortening disease. Medical ethical questions for the future.                    

  • NASS: Police fingerprints, face shots, DNA databases please

    NASS: Police fingerprints, face shots, DNA databases please

    Fingerprints were studied off and on since the year 1200 when they appeared in a Chinese novel. In 1788, JC Mayer confirmed that fingerprints were unique to individuals and between 1880-1886, Henry Faulds suggested to the UK Metropolitan Police its use in crime detection. An Argentine police officer, Jaun Vucetich classified fingerprints and successfully, for first time used them in crime detection in 1892 by convicting a woman, Fransisca Rojas of murdering her two sons.

    Francis Galton published an 1892 book titled Finger Prints.  In India 1858 Sir William J. Herschel used fingerprints on documents to prevent fraud and in 1897 India opened a Fingerprint Bureau for Criminal Identification.   Since 1902, Great Britain and other countries and now INTERPOL have placed great reliance on NATIONAL CRIMINAL FINGERPRINT /MUGSHOT/DNA DATABASE BANKS. Disgracefully in 2025, Nigeria does not have a criminal fingerprint or photo (mugshot) database- jobs for thousands of technologists. No Nigerian police station offers this routinely. 

    Why this introduction? Because FINGERPRINTING/FACE PHOTOGRAPHS/DNA ARE NOT NUCLEAR PHYSICS EXCEPT IN AFRICA apparently. Every present activity has an origin in someone’s work in the historic past. Nigeria seems to resist being brought into even ‘Ancient and Modern’ crime detection methodologies, though they are educated daily by TV crime programmes. The very first law of crime is to cordon off the crime scene, wear gloves and collect items and examine or ‘dust’ the area for fingerprints

    No doubt there are modern security professionals in the Nigerian Police. Some police, criminals themselves, fear that fingerprinting will catch them.  What powerful force prevents the Nigerian Police entering the 21st Century?  Although there are budget allocations for Police Crime Laboratories, fund diversion and underfunding cripple crime detection.

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    I remember when my first cousin, my father’s full sister’s son, Funsho Williams, a Gregorian of athletic and academic distinction and Lagos State governorship candidate was brutally executed, murdered, assassinated (you choose) on 27-7-2006 in Dolphin Estate Lagos, in a still unsolved politically-motivated crime. I was shocked at the number, in their hundreds, of people, police (high and low officer, men and women), politicians and their aides and hangers on – all eager to be press recorded, neighbours, gawkers and murderers (most likely)  who were seen trooping in and out, marching all over the blood-stained upstairs landing, ruining the crime scene. The access from the adjourning part of the duplex would have had uncontaminated DNA evidence – but no fingerprinting and no DNA till today 19 years later. Worldwide, ‘COLD CASES’ evidence awaits future investigative techniques. Here, we have no storage mentality, zero storage space and throw critical evidence away. TAPING THE CRIME SCENE IN POLICE INVESTIGATION 1-0-1. BUT DO WE EVEN HAVE LABELLED ‘POLICE: KEEP OFF’ TAPE? 

    We have learnt no lessons because recently there was a kidnap homeowner victim who was held in a house for eight days. Another victim, a doctor, was murdered at home. Both these locations would have had fingerprint and DNA evidence. Nationwide, violence, kidnapping, sexual abuse, traffickers, body part dealers as well as blatant terrorism thrive.

    Our gallant security services must be supported by 2025 investigation methods including gloves, boots, masks, hamzat suits, ‘A CRIME SCENE INVESTIGATION BOX’ and BACKUP FORENSIC LABORATORIES capable of taking photographs of victims and surroundings,  labelling and taking samples for later analysing for fingerprints, drugs (medical and stimulants), alcohol, chemical poisons, blood group, infections, etc.

    The best Nigerian based laboratories now are NAFDAC Laboratories, Police Lab in Oshodi both sometimes attacked, in universities, teaching hospitals especially the DNA Lab in Redeemer’s University, in the private sector especially the food and beverages and petroleum industry. THE POLICE CAN GO INTO IMMEDIATE PARTNERSHIP with these until Police Labs are upgraded.    

    The National Assembly recently called for a 2025 review of the ‘Security Architecture’ in the face of rising terrorism.  Nigeria’s terrorists repeat the cycle of capture, re-education, release, re-terrorising, recapture etc. Database identification of everyone in Nigeria is key to security. The National Assembly must include greater police crime detection capacity & capabilities as part of the strategic 2025 security architecture upgrade.

    Historically, Nigeria escaped the shame of its 50-year chronic administrative lapse, neglecting to provide landlines for the masses as it rode the crest of the cell phone wave. This move, by 2025, has empowered almost every adult Nigerian, from pauper to with communication capacity.

    Today, Nigeria missed the crest of the computer wave to educate its youth but can and must now ride the new crest of the ARTIFICAL INTELLEGENCE, AI, wave available to our government, police force and security forces to hugely accelerate the capture and quickly expose violent and impersonation 419 criminals by comparing their data to a harnessed and ALREADY AVAILABLE BIODATA BASES across several areas. These include FINGERPRINTS, DIGITAL FACIAL INFORMATION FROM very expensive previous registration exercises, costing probably trillions of naira to date, for DRIVING LICENCE, SIM CARD, PASSPORT, VOTER CARD, EXAMINATION REGISTRATION, TAX NUMBER, BANK, NATIONAL IDENTITY NUMBER CARD, SCHOOL AND WORKPLACE identity.

    Of course, Nigeria faces similar hacking threats and ‘computer crash’ risks as other countries. But with 330 proudly Nigerian languages at our disposal, it should be possible to make our passwords and codes so unique and quickly changeable that we could be adequately firewalled and protected.  ONE WAY IS TO KEEP THE ENTIRE DATABASE fully backed up, separated into multiple independent segments; 26 segments by alphabet for example and by having several regularly updated copies completely off the INTERNET AND ONLY ALLOW OFF GRID ACCESS.

  • Naira ; Uwais; CBN; $38.32b Fx; Mokwa

    Naira ; Uwais; CBN; $38.32b Fx; Mokwa

    We do have good leaders, we just do not follow. Nigeria’s former, Chief Justice of Nigeria, CJN, Mohammed Uwais dies at 88, appreciated supervising and delivering a good Electoral Reform Report in 2008, disgracefully still not fully implemented. May he RIPP.

    Foreign reserves rise to $38.32b. This is good especially after settling the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and settling past Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) mismanagement and debt to airlines and other forex debts and then properly doing the CBN’s duty of receiving forex inflows and promptly paying legitimate and approved forex demands. The foreign reserves target for the CBN, and the government should be $50b minimum. This should be government’s minimum target in order to defend and improve our naira, supposed to be our national pride.

    Our political class should be informed that, for our population size, we actually need $200b foreign reserves as our gold standard to protect the economy. Nigeria needs a compulsory percentage of forex earnings saving scheme to achieve this. Or we can make ‘foreign reserves’ the 38th state of Nigeria and allocate monthly to it like other states. 

    We must commend the CBN for fighting-the-good-fight with Nigeria’s greed and corruption-driven protected powerful forex cartels fighting back to preserve and grow their hugely expensive ‘forex middleman status’ which precipitated economically destructive black-market rates.

    In the old days, it was the forex cartels crashing the naira to horrendous black market rates, destroying the value of the naira – financial terrorism. After the forex cartels repeatedly and greedily increased the black market, or parallel market rate margin, the CBN too kept crashing the naira towards the black market rate which continued to fall until the CBN almost eliminated the difference.  We have all suffered for the callousness of the forex cartels as they destabilised our lives with the devaluation of our incomes, pensions, rents and purchasing power all spreading poverty. Fortunately, this tactic of CBN ensured financial ruin also for forex cartels which have suffered more as their self-created criminal enterprise, collapsed from billions being extracted from Nigerians daily to almost zero.

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    Nigerians may not know but Nigeria’s corruption has created several layers of ‘banking fraud’ which increase the cost of the naira and foreign exchange that exist in no other country. There is no black market in most other countries. The currency is the currency in most countries. In Nigeria, our bankers weaponised new notes under their control, withdrew the mint fresh notes from paying out by the bank teller over the banking counter, hoarded the new notes, made them scarce and then criminally created an army of usually young ladies specifically to carry out a financial crime of selling new naira notes. To this we must add the past criminal allocation of forex at CBN and through banks in exchange for financial reward-another layer of financial fraud.

    The government is at a crossroads. It has billions of weakened naira pouring in from the ‘subsidy withdrawal’ and other dollar incomes like international remittances. If the CBN manages to improve the value of the naira, that naira amount will reduce funds going to the federal and states and LGAs. Nigeria’s local debts in pensions and to contractors are in naira. It does not matter the value to the dollar on that day of payment. So, the dilemma at CBN is: having defeated the forex cartels, will they stay dead or are they just dormant, biding their time only to resurrect when the CBN tries to improve value of the naira?

    In addition, will the political machinery in Nigeria, so full of multibillions EFCC revealed corruption and ‘cash and carry’ mentality allow the naira to improve? Can they cope with their dollars hoarded abroad being worth less naira in future?  A strengthening of the naira is imperative for Nigeria’s dignity. Your country is currency! The fear is that whatever improvements are made, will they be abandoned when the pendulum of political power swings elsewhere, as usually happens in Nigeria. Why should CBN and government and Nigeria rebuild the treasury, forex reserves and naira value only for it all to be officially looted in an immediate subsequent regime?                 

    From a German immigrant descendant president, the US ban on Harvard international students may be interpreted as pathological jealousy of Obama’s Harvard success, just as he craves a Nobel Prize – already won by Obama. Or is he just a failed university owner enacting the BHB-Bring Him Down vengeance-is-mine syndrome. The US has also introduced a 3.5% charge on international remittances to non-US citizens. This double taxation will marginally reduce the value of US-Nigeria remittances. Could the long-predicted very public breakup in the ‘Muskmania Matter’ be extreme playacting, an Oscar winning ‘media deception performance’ ‘let’s pretend to fight and separate’ photo trick? 

    The Mokwa flood disaster death toll rose to 230 dead, 500 missing. Is aid being delivered to all the needy in a speedy and sympathetic manner? These people are not beggars, but victims. We are disgusted with disaster relief in the past and insist that accountability and monitoring bring transparency. It is a huge task to cater for the immediate, mid- and long-term needs from daily meals, shelter, rebuilding homes and infrastructure. Qualified distressed citizens must be included in their own recovery and care so as to inject funds back into their pockets and give them a sense of dignity, not just handouts.

    There will be many criminals stealing aid packages. This is why using affected citizens important.  

  • Mokwa; 21 youth; Adesina/AfDB; EXPO-WAEC

    Mokwa; 21 youth; Adesina/AfDB; EXPO-WAEC

    The terrible Mokwa, Niger State, flood claiming approximately 200 lives and 3,000 displaced, with much destruction, was complicated by a dam collapse. Just last year, a team examined all dams in Nigeria following a similar dam collapse. We presume the team was made up of engineers and technical staff and not politicians. What was the verdict then on the dam which collapsed just last week? Were any emergency measures taken to strengthen dams made vulnerable by age, abandoned maintenance or the added water volumes of climate change?

     Maintenance saves lives. Underbudgeting, stealing or undercutting maintenance budgets has been a bane of governance since the colonialists handed over ‘maintenance’ as a main leg of government policy. Our civil servants and politicians hate ‘maintenance strategies’ and constantly ask: ‘WHY MAINTAIN, REPAIR or REFURBISH?’ They prefer to allow the collapse of all infrastructure like dams, buildings, office content and roads under their supervision so as to illegally and criminally justify approval of criminally inflated contracts for ‘REPLACEMENT.’ This is why we mostly build the same colonial roads and bridges repeatedly, and not enough new roads and bridges in new directions.         

     Horrifyingly, a second set of youth die in a road crash, this time 21 Fellow Nigerian Youth, starry-eyed, victorious after years of teamwork and dawn-to-dusk painful and costly athletic training, discipline and self-denial. They were returning from the 2025 National Sports Festival held in Ogun State to Kano, having placed 17th with 1 Gold, 3 Silver and 6 Bronze medals. We don’t know if the medal winners died or survived, but that is not the point. The question is, was this a needless, senseless, totally preventable deadly disaster?

    This accident, occurring just 40km to the destination, is barely 1-2wks after 10 students attending a competition in Lagos died in a road crash. One time is a mistake, twice is over-confidence or incompetence!  Spare a prayer for the bereaved families. We must be told who or what was at fault, and exonerate the driver if he is innocent. However, if he or any other driver or road user is guilty or found wanting, then the law must take its course.

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    Government drivers, instead of being exemplary, are well known for cutting corners, jumping traffic, blaring horns and using their taxpayer -paid security officials to terrify, torment and terrorise we taxpayers, considered lesser road-user status mortals, in order to ‘clear-the-road’ because of their ‘important cargo/passengers’ or ‘superior number plate’ or ‘government sign’ on their vehicle.  It is unlikely that the Kano Sports Commission bus had any escort so the driver must be questioned, if he survived, as well as other sports commission officials, eyewitnesses among the survivors and other road users. Was ‘driver fatigue’ a factor?   

     Nigeria must thank and honour Dr Akinwumi Adesina, Nigeria’s shining agriculture, and now financial guru, and former Nigerian Minister of Agriculture, as he exits, in glory and triumph, the African Development Bank (AfDB), after, by all accounts, a meteoric 10 years at the helm of a bank he led to great reputational growth in available loan funds, and further cemented the strong foundations of the bank. Congratulations for keeping an unstained Nigerian reputation on the world stage and changing the focus of such a large bank in funding directions.

     Exam malpractice, specifically the early release of the actual questions, again reared its ugly head in WAEC for N1,000-5,000/paper last month. ‘Expo’ was the name applied to it when we did WAEC in 1965, and some tried to cheat; so, sadly, it is nothing new. It is up to the student and parent to resist the temptation. To even ask for Expo is a criminal offence. Even if you are given a ‘fake expo’ for your money, you are still an exam cheat, something we considered to be very low on the scale of human morality.

    Exam question papers are secret by definition. Any breach is not really the fault of the students, even if they offer money to buy the Expo. If the paper was not available for sale, no one would offer money for it. Exam Question Papers must remain secret from the point of choosing the question to exam time. In this case, it is always someone, or an embedded criminal syndicate within the WAEC echelons, or within the machinery of the printing cycle of exam papers, who is ‘Suspect’ 1. Such a person must be found by a high-powered police/administrative/ forensic investigation, including a document audit.

    WAEC officials should be forced to overcome this recurring barrier to the integrity of an exam which takes 5 years to prepare for after primary school; and a dangerous probability of Expo resulting in devastatingly destabilising delay, cancellation and added cost to the students and WAEC agents throughout the country. The enormity of the burden on WAEC management is emphasised now, more than ever, as we have Nigerian 30+m primary school and almost 14m secondary school students in approximately 81,520 primary and 23,550 secondary schools (Source: Google search) all in the WAEC pipeline aspiring to sit; and previous WAEC students in addition planning to re-sit WAEC. Kudos must go to WAEC for a ‘ZERO EXPO’ in most subjects but even ‘ONE SUBJECT EXPO’ in a key subject like English is ‘WAEC ADMINISTRATIVE FAILURE’ even if it is external sabotage. 73-year-old WAEC must, like Caesar’s wife, be above board to its 1973,253 current customers – our student children and youth.