The Nation Newspaper

Category: Hardball

  • Obaseki’s many records 

    Obaseki’s many records 

    Former Edo Governor, Godwin Obaseki — his god did not win in this one! — set yet another unflattering record in Edo history: he wasn’t present to hand over to new Governor, Monday Okpebholo. 

    Was that the tradition when Adams Oshimhole handed him power in 2014?  Or was it because he could not “instal” Asue Ighodalo, as Adams Oshimhole “installed” him, that Obaseki “fled” power in his last 48 hours, with some reports (to embarrass him, for sure) claiming he had “escaped”, only for his camp to retort that he wasn’t “missing” but in Lagos?

    Ha!  Edo no be Lagos!  Yet, it was to this same Lagos that Obaseki “fled”, when his last ugly power days, of his arrogant power years, confronted him! It was also from this much-vilified Lagos that Obaseki shopped for his hoped-for successor, Ighodalo!  So, Edo be Lagos now?  Ha!

    Still, away from opportunistic sloganeering, in the heat of crass opportunism, Obaseki added no shine to Nigeria’s young democracy, by fleeing from a peaceful transfer of power. 

    O yes, the United States just rewarded Donald Trump with thumping re-election, though he too fled from a similar duty in January 2020.  That’s shame to Uncle Sam, and its macabre preening as some grand peacock of global democracy. 

    Shame, not because the US electorate elected whoever they wanted but shame because that guy fled from onerous duty, simply because he lost the poll.  Now that he has won, that eternal shame is on him.  Good that President Joe Biden, who defeated Trump four years hence but his pick, Vice President Kamala Harris, lost this time, has pledged to do his “presidential duty” to transfer power.  That’s democracy.  It also sounds very much like Immanuel Kant’s rigorous concept of categorical imperative.

    But back to Edo.  Obaseki has done himself no good by scurrying away from doing his last duty as governor.  May such shame never visit Edo politics again! 

    Yes, Nigeria’s democracy is young — the latest and the longest stretch, so far, is 25 years but still counting.  Yet, Obaseki’s ugly record is there. 

    It’s a mini-Trump, really.  Whoever is embittered so much to refuse to peacefully hand over power, would have truncated the democratic process if he had the muscle to do so!  Such a mindset, need Hardball repeat, is anti-democratic.

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    With Obaseki, however, it was self-ruin foretold. Here, was an individual contesting looted arts with the Oba of Benin, somewhat re-living the perfidy of his grandfather against Oba Ovonramwen Nogbaisi (reigned: 1888-1897), which drove the looting in the first instance.  It was the first grand folly new Governor Okpebholo just reversed.

    The same fellow threw his weight against the Constitution, by refusing to swear in legislators, elected just like him, because he wanted to play the imperial governor. This same fellow well-nigh refused to allow back his reinstated Deputy Governor, until the courts threatened dire consequences. 

    Yet, this same guy refused to swear in Edo judicial officers, even after the National Judicial Council had okayed their appointments.  It’s just a self-imposed tragedy that he would flee from the same brainless power he loved to wield so much, like the biblical thief in the night!

    Obaseki’s power gambits are so reminiscent of the tortoise in the Yoruba folktale.  Asked when he would return from his travel, he snapped that he won’t until when he was disgraced.  Obaseki’s reckless power choices cemented his end-power self-induced disgrace.  Let new Governor Okpebholo learn from Obaseki’s pitfalls.

    Nothing lasts forever — especially political power.

  • Law agents and rank indiscipline

    Law agents and rank indiscipline

    What’s the update on the recent clash in Osun State between personnel of the Nigeria Police and those of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC)? It’s about four weeks on that the state government and respective security service promised to investigate the shameful incident, but seem yet to follow through.

    Hostilities flared between officials of the two security services in Osogbo last month in a supremacy battle that the agencies blamed on each other, but which boils down to rank indiscipline. The corps accused the police of brutalising its personnel who were on lawful security duty at a housing estate in the state capital, and keeping one of the corpsmen in detention for some days. A statement by the spokesman of Osun NSCDC command, Adeleke Kehinde, said the problem began on Tuesday, 22nd October, at about 8p.m. when individuals in native ‘Ankara’ fabric but with jacket top, claiming to be policemen, drove in a private vehicle into an estate that is guarded by personnel of the Osun command of the NSCDC purportedly to arrest a suspect. The plainclothed individuals were reportedly confronted  by the corpsmen for proper identification, which they refused to provide and rather resorted to intimidation of the NSCDC personnel before leaving the estate.

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    But that did not end the matter, according to the NSCDC statement. Policemen numbering about 20 returned the following day to physically assault corpsmen at the estate and took one of them away in handcuffs – first to Ataoja police division before moving him to the Police State Headquarters. Efforts by the leadership of the Osun NSCDC command to bail out the arrested corpsman were allegedly rebuffed, and he was held in police detention for three days before being released. Osun NSCDC Commandant Michael Adaralewa demanded a probe, saying “there should be no sacred cow, and we are not going to allow the matter to be swept under the rug.”

    The police issued its own statement in which it accused NSCDC operatives of obstructing policemen who had gone to the Osogbo estate to arrest a criminal suspect. Spokesperson of the Osun Police Command, Yemisi Opalola, said policemen who came from the Oyo State Police Command on investigation and to arrest the suspect were rough-handled by corpsmen guarding the estate, making the policemen call for reinforcement from the  nearest division. “Upon arrival of the reinforcement, the policemen were rescued and one of the (NSCDC) personnel who assaulted the police officers and prevented them from performing their lawful duty was arrested and taken to State CID for investigation,” she further said, adding that investigation of the incident was ongoing.

    Following the clash, Osun State Governor Ademola Adeleke called a State Security Council meeting to interrogate the matter. Police Inspector-General Kayode Egbetokun as well condemned the incident and vowed a probe. The narratives suck, but Hardball won’t preempt the official probes. What’s the update? 

  • ‘Lakurawa’

    ‘Lakurawa’

    Terrifying news! A new terrorist group known as ‘Lakurawa’was reported to have seized five local government areas of Sokoto State: Tangaza, Gada, Illela, Silame, and Binji. The terrorists were said to be heavily armed and communicate in Hausa, Fulani, Tuareg, Kanuri, Tuba, and English.

     A resident of the affected areas was quoted as saying, “They arrive in large numbers, often on 10 to 15 motorcycles. After observing the environment and community, they will leave some members behind as they move to other towns.”

    According to the chairman of Tangaza local government, Alhaji Isa Salihu Kalenjeni, “They are forcing people to pay zakat, and at the same time robbing them of their belongings. Just recently, they robbed a shop owner of N2 million. They also seized his car and released it after he paid N350,000.”

    More terrifying is that the activities of these new terrorists are not limited to Sokoto State. They have also been terrorising Kebbi State, where they were said to have killed 15 people and rustled about 100 cows in Mera, in Augie Local Government Area of Kebbi State.

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    Director of Defence Media Operations Maj. Gen. Edward Buba explained that “They exploited the vast borders from Niger Republic which stretches to Mali and which became porous as a result of the coup in Niger Republic to cross into parts of Sokoto and Kebbi states because the joint border operations with Nigerian security forces was experiencing gaps. Now we know exactly where they are.”

     Obviously, the country has not won the anti-terrorism war. The activities of this new terrorist group compound the problem. The war continues because terrorist groups in the country are still active.  The terrorists are no longer only Boko Haram members.  The involvement of ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) and ISWAP (Islamic State West African Province) has made matters worse.

    The Boko Haram insurgency began in 2009. It is troubling that the insurgency in the north is now in its 15th year.  It is at the heart of the country’s security crisis.

    The military leadership needs to pay more attention to tackling the challenges that hinder the success of the war on terror. Fighting terrorism effectively requires a sense of urgency, without which there can be no effective fight against terrorism.

    This new terrorist group must not be allowed to thrive. The military must send a powerful and unambiguous signal that it is determined to win the war on terrorism.

  • Bang, bang, Ebang!

    Bang, bang, Ebang!

    In Equatorial Guinea, the hunter just turned the hunted.  That country’s anti-graft chief was being probed for alleged graft.  Baltasar!  The titillation was truer than fiction!

    It’s the sexual romps of bang, bang, Ebang!  The leakage of those videos has sent that West African country into a tizzy!

    He is Baltasar Ebang Engonga.  His position: Director General, National Financial Investigation Agency (ANIF) of Equatorial Guinea, the equivalent of Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). 

    Seeing the anti-sleaze czar being probed for sleaze, old-English poet, Geoffery Chaucer — remember him: of the epic poem, The Canterbury Tales? — would have screamed: if gold rusts, what will iron do!

    But seeing further the videos — alleged material graft plumbing into free-wheeling moral depravity — that spiritual dip would have sent Chaucer into a fit!  It did send the Equatorial Guineans into an uproar, prompting Vice President Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, to address the salacious scandal in a public statement posted on X, in which he slammed the clear national disgrace.

    In the exposed video footage — 300 in all, since leaked online  — the married man with six children was shown having a romp, bang in his office, with other women. 

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    The outrage was not only because Engonga’s liaison partners cut across married and single.  It was mainly fired by devil-may-care dive into debauchery: his brother’s wife (that borders on incest, since by African culture — and indeed, many cultures outside Africa — in-laws are relations), his cousin (clear incest) and — for good measure — the sister of the President of Equatorial Guinea! 

    This Ebang will well bang anywhere he damn well pleases!  Or, to use former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s favourite cliche, no matter whose ox is gored!

    And another thing: perhaps the most worrying part of the tapes were the impression that the liaison partners were hip with being videoed in the heat of passion!  That clearly is strange, since the natural reflex is to keep such passionate acts close to the chest.  Now, why this departure from the norm?

    Well, Engonga could have been shown (by the video), named and shamed.  Still, what about the question of mental health?  Why was it especially pleasing to him to not only engage in audacious sexual romps but to insist of video-tapping them?

    That, mind you, may not be one-way.  If Engonga appears to have a mental health challenge, what of his partners that blissfully played along?  These are questions that should worry Equatorial Guinea health authorities.

  • EFCC in overdrive?

    EFCC in overdrive?

    Operatives of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), government’s anti-graft agency, were reported to recently storm a radio station in Enugu to arrest a presenter amidst a live broadcast. The incident made the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), another government agency and broadcast industry regulator, to publicly apologise and call out the anti-graft agency.

    The NBC, in a statement penultimate week, apologised to the broadcast industry, the people of Enugu State and the listening public for the incursion by EFCC agents into Urban Radio 94.5 FM while a live programme was airing to arrest the presenter who they suspected of financial sleaze. The anti-graft agents had at about 6:48p.m. on 14th October raided the radio station in hunt for Favour Ekoh. The station’s management in a statement shortly after the raid said the operatives arrested Ms. Ekoh while she was presenting a live show titled ‘Prime Time.’

    In its own narrative, the EFCC denied that its agents disrupted the station’s operations, and said Ms. Ekoh’s arrest was not during a live programme. The agency’s spokesperson, Dele Oyewale, explained that the arrest was because Ms. Ekoh was being investigated by the Enugu zonal directorate of the EFCC in an alleged N700million Ponzi scheme involving some 50 victims. Urban Radio in a post on its X handle, however, insisted EFCC operatives interrupted its live programme to arrest the presenter, saying it has “strong evidence” to prove the claim. It proceeded shortly after to upload a brief recording showing the live programme being interrupted by the operatives who arrested Ms. Ekoh.

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    NBC rendered an apology in a statement in Abuja by its Director of Public Affairs, Mrs Susan Obi, who described the incident as, in the least, regrettable. The statement held the anti-graft operatives’ incursion on a live programme “a violation of the professional ethics of broadcasting,” saying: “The approach by which the arrest was carried out is improper. This action is regrettable, considering the impact of the broadcast media on the society.”

    It wasn’t that the industry regulator favoured corruption, making clear it appreciated efforts by EFCC to rid the country of financial crimes. “NBC (however) differs with the manner of approach deployed by the anti-graft agency which could have led to public disorder, disturbance, aggravated mass panic and hysteria,” the commission said as it apologised for the incident and enjoined media professionals “to continue upholding ethical standards while discharging their responsibility.”

    EFCC didn’t ply a convincing denial of the claim that its operatives stormed in on a live programme to arrest the presenter; and you would wonder what was urgent that they couldn’t wait for the programme to be over, if not that they were authority drunk. Security services need to be routinely reminded that Gestapo tactics do not fit with our democracy.

  • Bago’s fantastic target

    Bago’s fantastic target

    Sensationally, Niger State Governor Mohammed Bago made the headlines after announcing that the state would in November not only begin paying a minimum wage of N80,000 to its workers, which is N10,000 more than the stipulated new national minimum wage, but also aim to “eventually achieve a minimum wage of one million naira.” 

    According to him, “The N80,000 approved is sustainable, and with our progress in agriculture, we are confident we can increase it further in the future.” He added: “We are establishing civil service farms so that our workforce can be more productive. With this approach, we could eventually achieve a minimum wage of one million naira, but for now, we are starting with N80,000.”

    Was the governor serious? Did he expect the public to take him and his words seriously? President Bola Tinubu signed the N70,000 minimum wage bill into law in July, after months of intense negotiations with labour leaders who had demanded a much higher minimum wage. Indeed, the labour unions had initially demanded over N600, 000 monthly, arguing that the country’s cost-of-living crisis warranted such a high figure, compared with the old N30,000 minimum wage.  

    Notably, the chairman of Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) in Niger State, Abdulkarim Idris Lafene, observed that the N80,000 minimum wage which would be paid by the state government “is not fully aligned with the current economy, considering the high cost of goods and living expenses.” However, he added, “We are hopeful that the minimum wage will eventually reach one million naira, as the governor has indicated.” Unbelievable!

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    Reports say 21 states are set to begin implementing the new national wage law, with some of them ready to pay their workers slightly above the stipulated N70,000 minimum wage. The states are: Lagos, Rivers, Bayelsa, Niger, Enugu, Akwa Ibom, Abia, Adamawa, Anambra, Jigawa, Gombe, Ogun, Kebbi, Ondo, Kogi, Ebonyi, Delta, Edo, Borno, Kwara, and Kano.  

    Fourteen states adjusted the fixed minimum wage upward, possibly to give the impression that their governments are worker-friendly.  They include Lagos and Rivers (N85,000); Bayelsa, Niger, Enugu, and Akwa Ibom (N80,000).  Others are: Delta and Ogun (N77,000), Ebonyi and Kebbi (N75,000), Ondo (N73,000), Kogi (N72,000), Gombe and Kano (N71,000).

    Governor Bago of the All Progressives Congress (APC) is 50 and became governor in 2023. He was a member of the House of Representatives from 2011 to 2023.  He may be dreaming of a second term which would take him to 2031. So, he may have time to reach the point of possibly paying one million naira as minimum wage in his state. But he sounded like a politician saying what he thinks the people want to hear.

  • Happy puppets, happier puppeteers?

    Happy puppets, happier puppeteers?

    With jet pumps of emotion sprucing clean the “children’s” alleged crime, Hardball can be pardoned to think it is all right for teens to grab foreign flags, do heartless torching of government facilities and loot private shops — all as “democratic” right to protest!

    And shame: it’s the same mealy-mouthed lobby that ab initio canonized “legal protest” — no crime — but refused to take responsibility for the destruction that inevitably follows — big crime!

    Indeed, at no better time has a cynical push for “human rights” become a brazen push for “human wrongs” — and that lobby is not even sorry, given the court arraignment drama that has birthed this latest racket of conspiratorial sympathy!

    But thank God: after the equal opportunity destruction that the EndSARS riots brought Lagos, including the torching of a fleet of near-brand new Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) coaches at the Oyingbo terminal, aside torching the most iconic and historic skyline of Race Course and Broad Street, dating back to when Lagos was Federal capital, the courts did well to limit protesters — vandals? — to two spots. 

    That was how and why Lagos escaped the wilful fire that time.  But Kano, Kaduna and other parts of the North were not so lucky.  The most tragic, of all these states, was Kano.  A gallery-playing Governor Abba Yusuf gamely invited fire to own thatch roof, playing the cynical “democrat”, deluded he would hurt no one but Abuja.

    The governor’s folly harvested a band of court-burning, rod-wielding and shop-looting “children” — a self-destruct fire that laid Kano prostrate!  What was more?  That band, in merry treason, was wielding the Russian flag and baying for military rule!  Are we then supposed to forget all that, because they all were “children”?

    The voice of Esau, hand of Jacob?  Surely! But does a mad call for military rule, in a democratic setting, cease to be treasonable, just because “ignorant” teens were pushed into it by the actual plotters? 

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    Yes, the investigating authorities should nab the adult puppeteers for complete crime-and-punishment.  That’s when justice would be done everyone. But to wash the puppets clean just because you can’t get all of the puppeteers would be standing logic on its head.

    Why, Femi Falana, SAN, has even introduced a curious angle into the matter.  He has listed some of the “children” whose education the state must — as of right — fund, citing relevant sections of the law.  Great and noble!  But is the learned silk suggesting riotous kids should be rewarded on the strength of their alleged crimes, to the detriment of law-abiding ones that refused to be used as tools of insurrection?

    Hardball is for fairness and compassion, all all that.  But the Bola Tinubu government would be damned to allow itself brow-beaten from letting the law take its course.  That is due process and that is what democracy is all about.

    No sentiments.  All that do the crime — “children” or adults — must do the time.  Due process!  Insurrection is no tea party where participants are pampered.

  • Honourables go a fishing again

    Honourables go a fishing again

     Lawmakers in the House of Representatives are back on a journey that never ends: the quest for creation of a new state, further bloating the present 36-state structure of the Nigerian federation. They are prospecting for creation of Ogoja State from Cross River State in the Southsouth geo-political zone.

    A bill sponsored by Godwin Offiono representing Ogoja/Yala federal constituency of Cross River in the green chamber, and co-sponsored by two others, seeks to alter Section 8 of the 1999 Constitution (as Amended) to facilitate the creation of another state in the Southsouth region. The bill scaled second reading through a unanimous voice vote conducted by House Speaker Tajudeen Abbas at a recent session of the chamber, and it was decapped to the committee on Constitutional Review for processing before it returns to plenary for further legislative review.

    Leading the debate on the bill’s general principles, Offiono argued it was anchored on the need for equity. He recalled that Ogoja was among 24 provinces that emerged following the 1914 amalgamation of the Northern and Southern protectorates by the British colonial lord, and the province survived up till the 1967 creation of states that replaced the regional structure. Subsequent creation of additional states in 1976, 1987 and 1991 did not yet recognise Ogoja as a statehood entity, Offiono further argued, adding: “Ogoja, with a population of over two million and a landmass of 12,158 square kilometres, boasts significant economic viability driven by fertile farmlands. It is abundant in cash crops like cocoa, banana, rice, rubber and groundnuts, and has rich mineral resources such as limestone, sodium chloride, quartz, and barite. Furthermore, the area includes notable tourism destinations like Obudu Cattle Ranch and Agbokim Waterfall.”

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    The cross-party unanimity by which the bill passed second reading suggests a momentum for the proposal, at least in the green chamber. But it is a journey that never ends. The present Cross River from which the proposed new state is to be carved is a decimation of the old state with the creation of Akwa Ibom State by the former Ibrahim Babangida regime in 1987. And clamour for other states has persisted. In the red chamber, Senator Ned Nwoko recently pushed for creation of Anioma State in the Southeast zone to, according to him, address longstanding imbalance in geopolitical distribution of states in Nigeria. He noted that the Southeast currently has five states, unlike other zones that have six states while the Northwest has seven. Nwoko’s proposal itself trailed a bill sponsored by Ikenga Ugochinyere in the House of Representatives to create an additional state in the Southeast to be known as Orlu State.

    So, how many states will Nigeria get to redress inequity, especially as many of currently existing ones are not viable and heavily depend on federal allocation to survive? The honourables should, please, apply their energy elsewhere.

  • The Guardian and the Army

    The Guardian and the Army

    The Guardian newspapers was set up as one of the best media outfits in a generation when it was born in February 1983. 

    In fact, it was the forte of liberals and intellectuals and every seminal mind strove to appear on its brilliant pages. So fervent was it that its founding publisher followed the liberal tradition and squared off against the army. He lost his life because he exercised an integrity that did not yield to a pettifogging military elite and its tyrannical ways.

    So, when the same newspaper wrote a feature piece that read more like an editorial than a news feature, it was understandable that Bayo Onanuga, the president’s spokesman, roared his exception to the piece. Onanuga said the Guardian, by endorsing that piece, and its palpable pretension to a nuanced story was calling for the army to come back.

    The Guardian has said no such thing was reflected in the article, and that it was a balanced piece. The newspaper that claims to pursue truth and conscience seemed, in this regard, to have lost its ability to assess a story worthy of journalistic excellence.

    First, if any reporter wants to write about military intervention against a democratic government, it should at least hear the point of view of that civilian administration. Maybe they made an attempt, but there is no evidence in that long piece of any comment or refusal to make any comment from the government. Is that their view of balance? They definitely did not reach Onanuga or his staff for comment.

    Two, the piece did not document the various views about the anti-democratic protests, especially in the North. Did they interrogate the report from the office of the National Security Adviser that the calls were sponsored by outside forces? No, the paper did not find that worthy of mention. The NSA, Nuhu Ribadu, also said some of the protesters were sponsored by aggrieved politicians. Was that reflected in the reporting? Of course not.

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    Two politicians who did not feel happy with the government of President Bola Tinubu made comments that implied a call for the end of democracy. The first was former President Goodluck Jonathan, who said so when he commented on his frustration about the judiciary. The second was former Governor of Rivers State and former Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, who in an undisguised tone, said people should protest not only against the government but that they should protest against voting.

    That implied that there was a partisan aspect to the call for the military. Did The Guardian interview politicians from both sides and why some of them seem to be asking for the army to come back? It was a very narrow way of looking at a story as complex as democracy and the army.

    The report also referred to the harsh policies of the Tinubu administration. Did they look at the policies and what was harsh about them? Did they look at his policies aimed at mitigating the situation? This might have been the value of probing the government part of the story.

    They would have spoken about the palliatives, however flawed. They could have referred to the CNG programmes, the student loan, the credit schemes, the agricultural programmes, the oversubscribed bonds, and other facts.

    They could have looked at whether all the candidates of the last elections promised the same policies? These were not part of the story because The Guardian did not do the balancing act, often needed in such a story.

    The story condemned the coming of the military, to be sure, but it was like speaking from both sides of the mouth, and it is a disguised way of trying to dodge culpability. Of course, illustrating the story with pictures of military tanks would not flatter a democrat about that so-called balanced story.

    Hardball does not believe Alex Ibru, its founding publisher, would celebrate in his grave over what some editors and writers in the newspaper have written, especially when they did not suffer in the media or who did not know what journalists went through when the army oppressed Nigeria.

  • Unready for science

    Unready for science

    Incredible! The winners of the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG)-sponsored 2024 Science Quiz Competition, Nnanna Peace and Raphael Ataisi of Government Secondary School (GSS), Oyigbo, Rivers State, were reported saying, “To the glory of God, we came first. In our GSS Oyigbo, we lack computer and science laboratories in our school. We have no equipment in our school to experiment. So, we learn without experiment, we learn only theory.”

    They beat contestants from six other public secondary schools in the final of the competition, which was held in Port Harcourt, Rivers State. It is unclear whether the same situation exists in the other schools. 

    NLNG’s General Manager of External Relations and Sustainable Development, Andy Odeh, said the competition “is an opportunity to test our children’s knowledge, ignite their creativity, and hone their problem-solving skills – essential ingredients for innovation.

    “Through this competition, we aim to promote scientific and technological literacy, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills, encouraging young people to pursue careers in science, engineering, and technology.”

    He also said NLNG is “deeply committed to science education because we believe it is the cornerstone of development.” This year’s theme was ‘Artificial Intelligence: Innovating the Future.’  He added that the company’s commitment to science education extends beyond the competition, mentioning initiatives such as its University Support Programme, scholarship programmes, and infrastructure development in host communities.

    However, going by the remarks of the winners of the competition, there is still a lot more to be done to boost science education. The company should take urgent action to ensure that their school, and others in the same situation, have the necessary tools for science education.

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    Obviously, Rivers State, where GSS Oyigbo is located, also has a role to play in equipping public schools in the state for science education. The Rivers State Commissioner for Education, Chinedum Chukuma, represented by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Education, Ebere Emenike, was reported saying, “Rivers State is very happy with what NLNG is doing by exposing our kids to these kinds of competitions and we urge other corporate bodies to emulate NLNG. These kinds of competitions expose our kids to critical thinking and instill a passion for innovation, which is the hallmark of STEM education.”

    It is easy to talk about STEM, an approach to learning and development that integrates science, technology, engineering and mathematics, and promotes scientific thinking and creativity by emphasising application and inquiry. But STEM needs an enabling environment.

    Is the Rivers State government aware of the situation at GSS Oyigbo as described by the winners of the science competition? It’s counter-productive and inexcusable.