The Nation Newspaper

Category: Comments

Buhari and his captive 12 million votes

By Olabode Lucas

The late Muhammadu Buhari who was the President of Nigeria from 2015 to 2023 could not by any stretch of imagination be regarded as a dyed in wool politician. A close study of him, right from the time he was a military Head of State from December 1983 to July 1985, through to the time he was a democratically elected president from 2015 to 2023, showed him as somebody who had disdain for politics. However, this does not mean that he did not crave for political power when he was alive, as evident by his strenuous three failed attempts at presidential polls in 2003, 2007 and 2011 before eventually taking the political power in 2015.

Despite the attitude of the late Buhari to politics, he had a cult followership in politics in the northern part of the country and perhaps this was the main reason why a northern political group allegedly drafted him into politics. According to Buba Galadima, a political gadfly and a chieftain of New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP), Buhari was recruited into Nigerian political space so that he could help to curb Oduduwa Peoples Congress from uprooting Fulani structures in Ilorin.

The cult-like followership of the late Buhari in the North was reflected in the votes he garnered in all the elections he contested since he entered political fray. In 2003 presidential election, when he contested under the platform of ANPP, he garnered 12,710,022 votes which was 32% of the total votes cast at the election, while in 2007 when he contested against the late Umaru Yar’Adua, his votes dropped to 6,605,299, which came to 19% of the total votes cast at that election. In the 2011 presidential election when he contested under his newly formed party, the CPC, the late Buhari’s votes rose to 12,214,853 which was also 32% of the total votes cast at the election.

However, despite his huge votes in the 2003, 2007 and 2011 presidential elections, the late Buhari could not clinch the presidency until 2015 when he was the candidate of APC, a more widely spread party than his former parties. In this presidential election, his votes soared to 15,191,847 representing 56% of the total votes cast. The late Buhari thus failed to get up to his captured votes of 12 million only in 2007 when he contested against Umaru Yar’Adua, another formidable northern politician.

Read Also: WHO reaffirms Nigeria’s Maturity Level 3 status in medicines, vaccines regulation

Since the demise of Buhari, many political pundits had speculated on who would inherit his cult-like followership in the North together with his captured 12million votes. Some even suggested that the late president had gone to the grave with his votes. It has to be stated however, that 15 million votes of Buhari in the 2019 presidential election was not totally transferred to Bola Ahmed Tinubu who contested the 2023 under the platform of APC, the party of President Buhari. In the 2023 presidential election which was a three cornered fight, Tinubu was able to win the contest with a score of 8,794,724 votes which translated to 36.6% of the total votes cast. Atiku of PDP came second with 6,984,520 votes (29%) and Peter Obi came third with 6,101,533 votes (25.4%).

Although President Bola Tinubu won the majority of his votes in the northern part of the country to become the president in 2023, it was obvious that he got a tiny fraction of the captured 12 million votes of the late Buhari in the North. One can only speculate the reasons why this situation happened as electoral votes defy any mathematical permutations. However, one cannot be too wrong to suggest that the tepid support given by the late Buhari to Tinubu’s candidature was one of the reasons why Tinubu could not get most of Buhari’s famed captured votes in the North. The body language of the Buhari during the preparations for the 2023 presidential election showed that he would have preferred another northerner in APC instead of Tinubu to succeed him after his own eight-year tenure. Many felt that his preferred choice was Senator Ahmad Lawan from Yobe State who was the then Senate President. It was also possible that 12 million votes usually attributed to Buhari were not entirely genuine votes which might have been brought about by over voting, a practice that was prevalent in our elections since 1999. The use of Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) in the 2023 election minimized the evil and undemocratic over voting and ballot stuffing which marred our previous elections. Consequent upon the use of BVAS, the recorded turnout of voters of 27% in the 2023 presidential election was much lower than the recorded turnout in 1999 (52.3%), 2003 (69%), 2007 (57.5%), 2011 (58.7%), 2015 (43.7%) and 2019 (34.8%). The ‘low turnout ‘ of voters must have affected the votes garnered by the candidates in the 2023 presidential election. There is no doubt that our present voter registration in the country is inaccurate and unreliable as it contains humungous level of multiple registrations.

The socio-political configuration of Nigeria right from the colonial era gave the northern part of our country an unassailable control of the political trajectory in our country. The uneven-handed British colonialists left three unequal regions with the Northern Region overwhelming the two regions in the South in terms of land mass and population which was contrived. Subsequent rulers of the country, especially the military overlords who were mainly from the northern part of the country, compounded the situation to the advantage of the North. From the 12- state structure of 1967, brought about by the Yakubu Gowon military administration designed to undermine Ojukwu’s attempt to break up the country, the country is now configured into 36 states with one capital territory of Abuja. In the present structure, the North has 19 states with the federal capital territory at Abuja, while the South has 17 states unlike the configuration in 1967 when the North and the South had six states each. In addition, the country has 768 local government Councils and six area councils, the distributions of which were skewed to the advantage of the North.

All these political configurations give an unbridgeable advantage to the North in politics and revenue allocations and presently, nobody can be the president of the country without massive votes from the North. Chief Olu Falaye of AD/ANPP learnt this bitter lesson in 1999, so also were Atiku of ACN in 2007 and Goodluck Jonathan in 2015. In view of this present political reality, the votes of supporters of Buhari in the North would still be relevant in future presidential elections in the country and these votes have to be harnessed. All things being equal, the ruling party, APC, which brought the late Buhari to power in 2015 and 2019 after three failed attempts, should automatically be the home of these votes. However, nothing is certain in politics.

•Professor Lucas writes from Old Bodija, Ibadan

August 14, 2025
Kemi badenoch and Nigerian citizenship

By Mike Kebonkwu

The crocodile may live in the water or river for a century but it does not become fish; it still remains what it is, a croc. A man’s citizenship inheres in his/her DNA, it is ingrained and settled at birth not by the passport one carries. You may choose to live in another hemisphere for convenience and mimic their accent; you remain who you are, defined, determined and settled by God who chose your parents and their place of birth. Your parents confer citizenship on you first, and if by any chance, you change your nationality by naturalizing under any circumstances, the genetic makeup conferred on you by your parents at birth is not extinguished. That is what determines your citizenship.

It is like the marital vow, “till death do us part”. You do not have to bellyache if you were not born in Buckingham Palace or as heir to the Emir of Bahrain; that is not where you were meant to be. Your citizenship is not an accident of migration or political attainment. You are a Nigerian citizen if either of your parents is born in Nigeria or indigenous to a Nigeria community.

Section 25(1)(c) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria settles with magisterial finality who a Nigeria’s citizen is: “Every person born outside Nigeria either of whose parents is a citizen of Nigeria”. Even when your Nigerian parents consciously travel to any part of the world to procure citizenship rights for you, that alone would not erase your Nigerian citizenship. You may enjoy the citizenship of that country if their citizenship law provides for such conferment but you are still a Nigerian; the passport you are holding notwithstanding. After all, the hood does not make the monk.

This is probably where Kemi Badenoch belongs. You may speak with the Queen’s accent or anglicized Welsh up to your native name, that does not change who you are. Your racial identity is not defined by the passport you carry; we have many Asians and Arabs also in the UK and other European countries and America; they are what they are; Asians or Arabs. If you are a dark skinned and choose to throw away your African identity, you are lost, and probably suffering from inferiority complex; your height and achievement on global stage notwithstanding.

Olukemi Olufunto Adegoke is not English name; it belongs to the indigenous Yoruba ethnic nationality from Nigeria. She is married to Badenoch, a Briton. She is probably suffering from broken identity disorder and cultural conflict.    You cannot meet a system that has been made, latched at it and the moment you are accepted, you try to erase your past; that is delusion of grandeur. Rather than build bridge of access and accommodation, you are building walls like Donald Trump who also did not know his root as a son of immigrant grandparents to the America. For Donald Trump, it is understandable because he appears like a Nordic white; Kemi is dark and an African.

England may have received and welcomed Kemi and elevated her but she is still who she is; she may choose not to renew her Nigerian passport till eternity and mimic British accent, she remains native Yoruba by tribe and Nigeria’s citizenship. I think she has more demanding task as the Conservative Party leader to concentrate to up the fortune of the Tories that is in steady decline rather than bicker over Nigeria identity, citizenship or lack of it in denial. There was absolutely no need for the verbal diarrhoea or tutorial on citizenship which nobody is actually interested in; silence would have been golden.

The future is Africa; we are so blessed and so endowed and we need people with the right mindset to come and fix it and not denigrate it in search of identity and acceptance. Kemi Badenoch should just come down from her high horse and stop making mockery of herself.

If Kemi Badenoch attended a Federal Government College in Nigeria, then she was certainly more privileged than her peers as those were some of the elites’ public schools in Nigeria. I had the privilege of attending a public boarding school, Osadenis High School Asaba in present day Delta State. Our hostels and dormitories were not like prison; they were what they were supposed to be, a place of socializing by young adolescents in academic environment and we made the best of it.

Every generation and country passes through a historical age. I did not grow up at the age of lawn mowers being used to cut the lawn, we used machete to cut grass. That was the level of development in Nigeria up to 1990s. It is part of our past that we should be proud of. Kemi’s growth in British politics was no doubt by dint of hard work and resilience but denigrating her nationality of parentage is a mark of social disorientation of psychological proportion.

Read Also: Nigeria targets 10m tonnes of steel by 2030, 500,000 jobs — Tinubu

Yes, there is corruption in Nigeria, yes there is insecurity, yes there is poor governance, yes there is under development, we have to fix it and not run away to another country to enjoy what other people had done. Every other country passed through that stage. Had it occurred to Kemi Badenoch to ever probe British history, she would have discovered the other side of the people and culture that she now romanticizes as epitome of modern civilization.

I watched with disbelief, a Podcast where even the anchor was slightly embarrassed and miffed when Kemi likened her alma mater to a prison because they used machete to cut grass and used pit latrine instead of modern water closet (WC); that is quite uncharitable and uncouth.

I am living in Nigeria and I have also not renewed my international passport for close to a decade. There are good things in Africa and Nigeria; incidentally, Kemi Badenoch would have been one of those success stories of the Diaspora because of her exploit in politics in the United Kingdom. This is not because she deserves it, but because people have fought to bring participation in UK’s politics to the level of acceptance of immigrants from other races and countries which Kemi is one. She is probably not distinguished and a shining example of anything before now, that is why she is not able to relate with her past; otherwise she should have been able to project the good aspect of her upbringing in her homeland without hiding the ugly side of it.

Kemi would have had a troubled and traumatized childhood and psychologically disoriented growing up in the boarding school in Nigeria; the best her country could offer to the children of elite at the time. Unknown to Kemi, there are many distinguished Nigerians with multiple nationality and citizenships without running verbal diarrhoeal of their country. Madam Kemi, it is my belief that it will pay you handsomely to concentrate in the arduous task of reclaiming the lost ground for the Tories and learn some lesson in culture. Take a look again at the mirror, you are the mirror image it reflects, breaking the mirror will never change it. You are cast in Nigerian citizenship; you may want to take your case to God!

•Kebonkwu Esq, an attorney, writes from Abuja. He writes via mikekebonkwu@yahoo.com

August 14, 2025
UBEC: Improving basic education outcomes for Nigerian children

By Olamide Apejoye

Billionaire businessman and chairman of the Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, addressed an expanded session of the National Economic Council (NEC) in Abuja on Thursday, March 22, 2018. At the session, Gates reminded Nigeria of the importance of making tangible investments in human capital, especially education, by saying that, “to anchor the economy over the long term, investments in infrastructure and competitiveness must go hand in hand with investments in people.”

In development, education is one of the core components of human capital; it is responsible for the development of skills, competencies, and productivity and accounts for a net positive impact on economic growth. It is therefore not surprising that some of the most advanced economies also have the highest Human Development Index; take the Scandinavian countries, for example. For many scholars, education is the single most essential element in the upliftment of people from poverty.

In Nigeria, there have been several education interventions in the past; one such is the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), established in 1999 as a reform programme for improving access and quality in basic education. Since its inception at the outset of this republic, preceding governments have made efforts to build on the foundational ideals of the commission, but there is no doubt that the current government realises that there is still so much work to be done, from enhancing school enrolment, curriculum to infrastructure and funding.

It was the awareness of this enormous task that informed the appointment of Aisha Garba in December 2024 as substantive Executive Secretary of the commission. Garba, headhunted from the World Bank, had, prior to her appointment with the Nigerian government, served as a senior education specialist with the World Bank, bringing more than 24 years’ combined experience and 15 years at the multilateral institution. Garba has had experience designing and implementing key education programmes in Nigeria, Ghana, Somalia, Kenya, the USA, and the United Kingdom. Her work of over two decades earned her the title of a bold education reformer.

In just seven months of championing reforms at UBEC, Garba has demonstrated that leadership can deliver tangible results. Under her watch, Nigeria has opened a new page in education reforms, and the outcome is already evident in curriculum, school enrolment numbers, teacher training, key infrastructure upgrades and support for sub-nationals through grants.

Through her reforms, basic education is returning to its core mandate of delivering literacy, numeracy, and critical thinking skills to students through the overhaul of curriculum and the introduction of digital literacy and entrepreneurship. Her reforms have also focused on outcome-based learning, a more learner-centred approach that places emphasis on skills and practical knowledge.

In seven months, UBEC has constructed 4,951 new classrooms and renovated 3,070 others across the country. It has also supplied over 353,625 units of school furniture and distributed more than six million primary school textbooks to students. It has distributed an estimated 420,009 library materials and another 158,000 Nigerian history books to improve student knowledge of Nigerian history and current affairs.

In terms of curriculum, UBEC, in partnership with the Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council (NERDC), has initiated the overhaul of the curriculum to include digital literacy, entrepreneurship, and critical thinking and established the Teacher Professional Development Initiative, which has impacted more than 978,800 teachers.

Perhaps the most significant change under her watch is the reform of a hitherto rigid plan that has constituted a bulwark in the way of sub-nationals looking to access the UBEC matching grant. Through her transparent and simplified reforms, sub-national access to UBE funds has increased. About 28 states, including the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), have received N78.6 billion out of the N120 billion allocated for 2024. Simple as this appears, it was quite herculean before Aisha Garba’s bold commitment to reforming the process.

Under the previous plan, it was metaphorically easier for a camel to get through the eye of a needle than for states to access the UBEC matching grants for nearly two decades. This was a period of missed opportunity that denied sub-nationals the funding support they needed to implement basic school key infrastructure projects. Garba’s reform has removed the bottlenecks standing in the way of progress in an efficient and transparent manner. The access to the UBE fund has increased enrolment, especially in northern Nigeria, where enrolment numbers have been playing catch-up, with several children accessing school for the first time.

Read Also: Nigeria’s cocoa exports surge to N1.2tr

Garba’s leadership is also maximising strategic partnerships with development partners, including the World Bank, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office of the United Kingdom (FCDO). She has engaged her network and deployed her capacity to raise funds through development partners, a reflection of her role at the World Bank.

It hasn’t been without challenges. Garba’s work has attracted a lot of praise, as Nigerians took out time to commend the progress already witnessed whilst hoping for more. Some elements have also deployed unwholesome tools to distract from the work. They issued press statements that appeared like the hand of Esau but the voice of Jacob, looking to use deception to misrepresent her work and position. It took a quick minister of education, Tunji Alausa, to repel those media attacks whilst using the opportunity to proclaim some of Aisha Garba’s successes. Reformers will always thrive when the political system goes out of its way to protect them from the sharks hell-bent on business as usual.

Garba’s strategic leadership and vision continue to reposition UBEC as a high-impact, transparent, and reform-focused institution that delivers on its mandate of access, equity, and quality education to Nigerian children. Considering the length of her mandate, you could say it is early days, but it is a good sign of what is coming in the day when it gets to be reflected in the morning. If she manages to maintain the focus and commitment, as she is indeed known to do in her previous assignments, we can expect to see unprecedented outcomes in the vision of UBEC, as intended when it was founded years ago.

•Apejoye writes from Abuja

August 13, 2025
Doyin Abiola, truly exceptional!

By Tunji Bello

The phrase “Gentlemen of the Press” used for both male and female journalists, has no known origin. But it became popularised following the 1929 American film by Walter Huston, who portrayed the life of a professional journalist deprived of joy of ordinary life due to the exigencies of duty.

So, with time, the phrase acquired a universal application in public discourse as a form of greeting where journalists are gathered. And despite the heroic efforts of “Women Liber” in the profession, the phrase has endured as standard greeting at press gatherings.

Surely, there are great women of the profession in history whose footprints far overshadow such gender murmurs and whose solid contributions belie any claim to male superiority. One of such exemplars was Dr. Doyin Abiola (née Aboaba), wife of our national hero Bashorun M.K.O Abiola, winner of the 1993 June 12 presidential election that gave birth to Nigeria’s present democracy. She had joined the journalism profession in 1970 with a degree from the prestigious University of Ibadan with her employment as Features Editor of then powerful Daily Times at Kakawa in Lagos Island.

By the time I joined the profession fresh from National Youth Service in October 1985, Dr Doyin Abiola had become one of its leading lights. With a Ph.D from the famous New York University, she was the Managing Director/Editor-in-Chief of Concord Group of Newspapers, arguably the leading publication in Nigeria’s media industry where I began.

In my first two years in the Concord newsroom, I never came into personal contact with her. At best, our encounters were from afar: either that I was walking past her along the boardroom corridor or while in conversations with our senior editors. Of course, I was obliged to greet her with reverence.

But as time rolled by and I stepped up the ladder, I saw her as a super boss who was exceptional in professional creativity and in providing editorial leadership. She was a great risk-taker in the profession and was never afraid when it came to competition and professional judgement.

Read Also: NESG to spotlight industrialisation at 31st Nigerian Economic Summit

I was just six months in the position of Assistant Features Editor in 1989 when I was summoned to her office.“Tunji,” she asked, “the management is thinking of making you the Group Political Editor, but some senior editors are saying you are too young for such a role at just 28.”. My reply was, “Why don’t you give me a trial first?” Hearing me out, she replied, “Ok, we shall go ahead.”

We went on to set up a Political Desk of brilliant minds, who later became media stars such as Sam Omatseye as deputy, Victor Ifijeh, Olusegun Adeniyi, Louis Odion and Gboyega Amobonye, popularly called “Governor with unlimited mandate.”

Following the team’s excellent coverage of several political news stories including Gideon Okar’s failed coup against Babangida’s regime in 1990; our accurate prediction of Sir Michael Otedola as the next Governor of Lagos State in 1991- even when the then National Electoral Commission (NEC) was still counting the votes; the formation and eventual dissolution of political parties such as People’s Solidarity Party (PSP), the People’s Front (PF), and Liberal Convention (LC); the imposition of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and National Republican Convention (NRC) by Babangida’s regime; the visits to United Kingdom and the United States to report on the elections of John Major as Prime Minister and Bill Clinton as President respectively; the proposed publication of “EXCLUSIVE” on the Armed Forces Ruling Council (AFRC) meeting on proscription of June 12 election result in the Sunday Concord that almost led to the assassination of the Editor, Dele Alake, on Airport road by the regime’s goons, she would later remark to me, “You’ve never disappointed me.” And with the backing of our main editor then, Nsikak Essien (National Concord Editor), the sky was our limit.

Few months prior, she had started what was thought to be impossible — Nigeria’s first Saturday Newspaper. This was achieved using another great star of the journalism profession, Mike Awoyinfa. Egbon Mike was my former features editor and I worked as a senior staff writer under him. He had been redeployed from Sunday Concord as Assistant Editor to be Features Editor when Ola Amupitan left, and soon after transforming the features pages to a must-read for Nigerians, legendary Mike ascended again to become the editor of the new Saturday Newspaper with the late Dimgba Igwe as his deputy.

The newspaper was christened Weekend Concord. The Weekend Concord suddenly became Nigeria’s best-selling on the newsstands with its compelling human-angle approach and salacious news story about events and people.

She was not done yet. When the Babangida’s regime floated the idea of privatization of public enterprises in Nigeria, Dr Abiola summoned a select group of editors and editorial board members to a meeting on the need to study and report how it had been done in other countries. Consequently, editors were deployed to different parts of the world — about 20 countries where it had been done. I ended up visiting Mexico to do my own investigation. In the end, a book was produced on that experience, researched and written by Concord editors and senior staff.

She was never a political actor in a strict sense of politics. Her terrain was only the media. However, the annulment of June 12 election, won by her husband, transformed her. When Concord Group of Newspapers was shut down for almost two years by a combination of Babangida and Abacha’s regimes (a whole different story for another day), Dele Alake (then Editor of Sunday Concord and later National Concord), Segun Babatope, Chairman, Editorial Board and myself became her closest allies. It was like a confirmation of the political aphorism, “Never under-estimate a hitherto seemingly politically disinterested person when confronted with the challenge and reality of power politics.”

With no office to go to following the military barricade, she turned her residential apartment at Moshood Abiola crescent in Ikeja, Lagos to another fortress for us. Every day, the three of us would resume there to debate and work with some notable pro-democracy activists on daily moves while pretending that we were not being monitored by members of the state security service. We were constantly in touch with local Pro-June 12 activists and political exiles like our current President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Her telephone and fax machines were at our beck and call. Sometimes, to shake off security trail, we had to use various decoys to enter and leave her house.

By the time Concord was reopened in early 1996 with Bashorun Abiola still in detention, a lot of advertisers and suppliers deserted us out of fear of General Sani Abacha and his media crackdowns. After being left to bear the brunt, she stood tall as a leader and encouraged us to persevere.

Dele Alake resumed as National Concord Editor and I took over as Sunday Concord Editor. And when Alake left to join Governor Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s executive council in Lagos in 1999, she appointed me the National Concord Editor. We had thought the 1999 return to democracy was the salvation point following the death of our publisher in July 1998, but it was going to be the turning-point for the Newspaper empire. The family politics and antagonism also set in.

We needed substantial capital to rejuvenate Concord. Fortunately, there was a significant asset which Lagos State Water Corporation was interested in and we agreed to sell it with Governor Tinubu’s endorsement. The payment was about to be finalized by the LASG when we saw a caveat emptor from some members of Abiola’s family in some newspapers. That was the end of the transaction. This was followed by several other frustrations. And staff became disillusioned.

In November 2000, I walked up to her office to let her know I was resigning. She became disheartened and asked me to think it through. I asked for a month leave and it was from there I sent in my letter of resignation. My resignation triggered some others. Kayode Komolafe as editor of Sunday Concord also resigned. Two days after learning of my resignation, Publisher of THISDAY, Prince Nduka Obaigbena, gave me a call and offered me the Chairmanship of Editorial Board of THISDAY Newspapers.

Despite my departure from Concord, I grew even closer to the beloved media empress, Dr. Doyin Abiola, her wonderful only daughter, Doyin, and her husband Bamise. I commiserate with them. And like a chapter in every book, it must have an end. Dr Doyin Abiola has left us to join her great husband, MKO. May her soul rest in perfect peace.

Goodnight, Aunty Doyin!

Goodbye, Mummy Doyin!

•Bello, Political Scientist, Lawyer and Public Administrator, is former editor of the National Concord and later Chairman, Editorial Board of THISDAY Newspapers, past Secretary to the Lagos State Government and Commissioner for the Environment, is currently the Executive Vice Chairman/CEO of FCCPC

August 13, 2025
Tale of two reforms – Why Nigeria must not blink
- By O’tega Ogra
Economic reform is never painless. Every nation that has had to correct profound distortions has faced the same choice: take the hard medicine early, or delay and pay much more, later. In times of public frustration, it is tempting to reach for the “gentle” option, being pushed by some opposition elements. Peter Obi says, “Keep subsidies for a while.” For Atiku Abubakar, it is “Guide the currency quietly from behind the curtain.” Rotimi Amaechi and Nasir El-Rufai want to “Push the tough structural work into another year.” On the surface, it feels safer. But history is clear on where that road leads.

When Bulgaria began its transition from communism in 1990, its leaders were afraid of the shock that rapid liberalisation might cause. They freed some prices but kept politically sensitive subsidies in place, just as Peter Obi proposes. The subsidies drained the treasury, fuelled inflation, and collapsed the currency. They maintained a soft peg for the lev without reserves to defend it, exactly as Atiku Abubakar suggests for the naira. The peg broke, reserves vanished, and hyperinflation soared above 2,000 percent. They warned against “too much at once,” echoing Rotimi Amaechi and Nasir El-Rufai, and delayed the restructuring of state enterprises. Six years later, pensions were worthless, shops were empty, and the reforms they feared were forced on them in far harsher form.

Nigeria today is on a very different trajectory. From his first day in office, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu took on the biggest distortions head-on. The petrol subsidy, which drained over N4 trillion a year, is gone. The naira now trades at a market-driven rate, closing the damaging gap between official and parallel exchange rates. The Central Bank has returned to orthodox monetary policy, raised interest rates to fight inflation, and cleared more than $7 billion in verified FX backlogs that had become a national credibility problem. That clearance restored credibility to our financial system and prompted the International Air Transport Association to remove Nigeria from its list of countries blocking airline funds. That reversal matters because it signals to every global balance sheet that Nigeria pays its obligations again.

Read Also: NIMC upgrades diaspora NIN enrolment platform for effective services

These decisions have delivered measurable wins in record time. The World Bank estimates subsidy savings of around N2 trillion in 2023 alone, with cumulative savings expected to exceed N11 trillion by 2025. This money is already being channelled into infrastructure, healthcare, and targeted social programmes across the country. Portfolio inflows in the last quarter of 2024 hit $5.6 billion, more than the total of the previous two years combined and a clear sign that rule clarity is drawing money back to local assets. Non-oil tax revenue has grown by more than 20% year-on-year.

Price pressure remains the public’s sharpest pain, but the first signs of relief are appearing. Official data show headline inflation eased in June from May, the first back to back moderation in many months. Disinflation never arrives in a straight line. What matters is direction and credibility of policy. Both are moving the right way.

Atiku’s “acceptable rate” is the same illusion that emptied Bulgaria’s reserves and shattered its peg. Obi’s “phased removal” is the same phased lie Bulgaria told itself until the economy collapsed. El-Rufai’s warning about “too much at once” is exactly what Bulgaria’s leaders said before the crash. Rauf Aregbesola’s “prioritise the people before the economy” mirrors Bulgaria’s fatal separation of the two, where the collapse of the economy destroyed the very livelihoods they claimed to protect – as if the economy is not the lifeline of the people. Rotimi Amaechi’s call to slow down is the same thinking that turned hardship into collapse.

These are not alternative strategies. They are invitations to failure. They are the comfort-now, crisis-later prescriptions that have failed every country that tried them. And in every country where this happened, the politicians who sold them were gone by the time the bill arrived.

The same politicians who had their turn in power and left Nigeria with a broken FX regime, ballooning subsidies, and a dangerous debt overhang now want to lecture about “protecting the people” by bringing back the very distortions that were killing growth. That is not protection. That is sabotage dressed as sympathy.

We have seen this film before. In 1990 Bulgaria called it gradual reform. By 1996, pensions were worthless, shops and shelves were empty, and the same politicians who promised a soft landing had fled the wreckage. The dire situation in Bulgaria forced a desperate rescue the following year under conditions far harsher than anything they had wanted to avoid. I confidently repeat that, in Nigeria, those pushing this fantasy today will not be around to clean up the mess tomorrow. The only question is whether we have the discipline to finish the job or whether we hand the steering wheel back to the people who drove us into the ditch in the first place.

Nigeria is not Bulgaria in 1990. We will not drift toward collapse because a few familiar names prefer popularity over responsibility. The alternative is to hold the line and let the compounding work in our favour. Clean our books and keep the auction rulebook predictable. Keep subsidy savings transparent and tied to visible projects so citizens can see where the money now goes. Keep monetary policy tight until inflation is back within a credible band and do not second guess the float with administrative fixes that markets will immediately punish.

The IMF’s recent assessment underscored that Nigeria’s policy direction restores repayment capacity and anchors stability if pursued consistently. That is the quiet endorsement that disciplined reformers earn.

Because this debate will not end here, it is worth meeting the counter arguments head on. Some say the pain on households is too high and too fast. The truth is the subsidy was never free. It was paid through bad roads, weak schools, failing hospitals and heavy borrowing that our children would service. Redirected savings are how you rebuild those services. Others say the float has made the naira too weak and that we should fix it at a stronger number. A number without reserves is only a promise. Markets test promises. Bulgaria failed that test in 1990 and paid for it in 1996. Nigeria should not repeat it. Another claim is that investors are not yet flooding in, so reforms are not working. They rarely flood in at the start. They watch for consistency, then move quickly. The late 2024 surge in portfolio inflows is exactly that early signal. Hold the line and the longer term money follows.

But as Mr President has always said and I am fully aware, Nigeria’s path is not without discomfort, but it is the only one that gives us a fighting chance to rebuild. The facts of upward, positive change are not in dispute. It is already producing the first signs of stability and renewed investor interest. The trajectory, if we hold it, leads to a competitive and credible naira, a fiscally stronger state investing in power, roads, and schools instead of fuelling petrol imports, and an economy where capital flows in because the rules are predictable and the numbers add up. Growth will no longer be hostage to oil prices alone, and the non-oil revenue gains of the current and past year are the proof.

The opposition has shown that they have chosen collapse. Some former allies have joined them. The rest of us must hold the line. History has already written the ending for the road they want. We have chosen a different ending.

There is no painless exit from decades of distortion. The choice is as stark as it is simple. Pain now with a recovery you can see, or comfort now with a collapse you cannot control. Bulgaria 1990 is the warning. Nigeria 2023 is the opportunity. We are already making in months the progress that took years for countries in similar positions. If we keep our nerve, stay transparent, and refuse the detours that have failed elsewhere, we will not just avoid Bulgaria’s trap. We will write the modern African recovery story others will study.

And this is the truth we must hold to. The easy road has never led any nation to greatness. What we are doing under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is hard, but it is necessary. We will be judged not by how loud the complaints were in the first year, but by the strength of our economy in the fifth and thereafter. If we see this through, the same Nigerians who today feel the sting will one day stand as proof that under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Nigeria chose courage over comfort, and that choice changed the destiny of our nation for good and forever. And if we have the discipline to finish this path, it will be the one in which Nigeria wins.

•Ogra is he Senior Special Assistant to President Tinubu on Digital Communications, Engagement, and Strategy
August 12, 2025
Dousing the tension ahead of 2027
- By Mukhtar Ya’u Madobi
In less than two years, Nigerians will once again throng polling units nationwide to elect leaders who will steer the country’s affairs for another four years, beginning in 2027. Yet, as the nation inches toward this crucial general election, it stands precariously balanced between the promise of democratic consolidation and the threat of descending into political chaos.

The lessons of our electoral history are vivid and sobering. From the post-election violence of 2011, which claimed countless innocent lives, to the judicial controversies of 2023 that reaffirmed the victory of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Nigeria’s democratic journey has been repeatedly tested. These experiences have left deep political and social scars — and the warning signs for 2027 are already flashing in alarming red. The political temperature is steadily rising.

Across the country, public discourse is becoming increasingly toxic, with inflammatory rhetoric dominating campaign platforms. Politicians, in their desperate bids for relevance and support, lean heavily on ethnic, religious, and regional sentiments to rally followers.

While such tactics energise partisan bases, they dangerously deepen national divisions at a time when Nigeria desperately needs unity, tolerance, and mutual understanding. Such polarisation becomes even more perilous when layered over the harsh realities of everyday life.

Read Also: NIMC upgrades diaspora NIN enrolment platform for effective services

Unemployment remains painfully high, inflation continues to erode purchasing power, and poverty levels are worsening. For millions of frustrated youths, this economic despair makes them vulnerable to political manipulation — and for desperate politicians, they are an easily accessible pool for recruitment into violent thuggery.

The danger is compounded by Nigeria’s fragile security landscape. The Northeast still battles insurgency, the Northwest plagued by banditry, IPOB-linked unrest persists in the Southeast, and the Middle Belt continues to witness deadly farmer-herder clashes.

Each flashpoint presents an opportunity for political actors to exploit tensions for electoral gain. For years, terrorists, insurgents, and other non-state actors have capitalised on insecurity and youth vulnerability to radicalise and recruit them into criminal networks — an asymmetric challenge that continues to overstretch security agencies and undermine stability.

Adding fuel to the fire is the proliferation of small arms and light weapons. Nigeria’s porous borders have allowed a steady influx of weapons from conflict zones in the Sahel and North Africa. According to the Chief of Defence Staff, General Christopher Musa, over 500 million illicit small arms circulate in West Africa, with Nigeria shockingly harbouring about 40 per cent of them.

These weapons empower bandits, ethnic militias, and terrorists, turning political disputes into deadly confrontations. Another critical concern is declining public trust in the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). Many Nigerians perceive the electoral body as beholden to those in power, undermining its credibility. Even technological reforms such as the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and the INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV) have not fully erased public scepticism. Far too many citizens believe elections are decided in courtrooms rather than at the ballot box, a perception that fuels apathy and could incite unrest.

Compounding these threats is the toxic digital environment. While the internet and social media have created unprecedented avenues for civic engagement, they have also become breeding grounds for fake news, deepfake videos, and hate speech. In a recent case, an AI-generated video falsely portrayed Nigerian soldiers escorting cattle in Benue State, a fragile security zone. Thankfully, a PRNigeria fact-check report swiftly debunked the content. Still, the speed at which disinformation spreads means a single lie could ignite violence within minutes.

Unfortunately, Nigeria’s early warning and rapid response systems remain weak, reactive, and often too slow to prevent predictable crises. Without proactive detection and coordinated intervention, electoral tensions could quickly escalate into national instability.

The road to a peaceful 2027 election demands a whole-of-society approach. Security agencies, political leaders, religious authorities, community heads, civil society organisations, the media, and ordinary citizens must work hand in hand.

Government must tackle the root causes of political violence by rolling out targeted economic relief and empowerment programmes, particularly for at-risk youth, to reduce their vulnerability to manipulation.

INEC must be adequately funded, granted full operational independence, and backed by tougher laws against vote-buying, hate speech, and political thuggery. A nationwide peace and unity campaign, championed by influential figures across all divides, should be launched well before the polls to discourage divisive politics.

Security agencies must take the lead with intelligence-driven policing, community surveillance, and swift neutralisation of threats. Coordination between the police, DSS, military, NSCDC, and local vigilantes should be seamless, with early mop-up of illegal arms and watertight protection of INEC staff, facilities, and election materials.

The Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), under Malam Nuhu Ribadu, has a pivotal role to play, especially in coordination and regulation. Electoral offenders — whether politicians, thugs, or complicit officials — must face swift, visible, and uncompromising justice to send an unmistakable message that violence will not be tolerated.

Ultimately, the responsibility for safeguarding Nigeria’s democracy rests with the people. Citizens, especially young Nigerians, must refuse to be used as pawns in political games. They must demand issue-based campaigns, fact-check information before sharing it online, and engage fully in the democratic process — from registration to peaceful voting — to ensure the will of the people prevails.

The 2027 elections are not just another electoral cycle; they are a test of whether Nigeria can emerge stronger, more united, and more democratic in the face of growing internal and external pressures. The dangers are real, but so are the opportunities to avert them.

Government, security agencies, and citizens must rise to the challenge — not as adversaries, but as co-stewards of Nigeria’s fragile democracy. The time to act is not in 2027. The time to act is now.

•Madobi is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Crisis Communication. He writes via: ymukhtar944@gmail.com
August 12, 2025
KWAM 1 vs ValueJet
- Aviation authorities must do the rightful on the matter
The display between Wasiu Omagbolahan Olasunkanmi Adewale Ayinde Marshal, a veteran Fuji musician, better known as KWAM 1 or K1 De Ultimate, and the crew and staff of ValueJet Airline, at the domestic wing of the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, last week, is reprehensible and we hope valuable lessons have been learnt by the parties. Both parties have been sanctioned by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA).

While the licenses of the pilot, Captain Oluranti Ogoyi, and the co-pilot, First-Officer Ivan Oloba, were suspended pending investigation, Ayinde has been placed on no-fly ban for six months.

We agree with the Minister of Aviation, Festus Keyamo, SAN, that both parties deserved to be sanctioned. A viral video of the incident showed Ayinde with a flask, moving around a ValueJet aircraft going to Lagos. At a point he was standing in front of the aircraft, and later leaning on it, and was said to have resisted entreaties not to carry the substance into the aircraft.

When confronted by the security, he claimed the substance was water, but the pilot claimed the content spilled on her was alcohol. For security reasons, there are limitations on what a passenger can carry into an aircraft.

Read Also: Kwam 1 banned from air travels

The viral video does grave injury to the reputation of our aviation safety standards. The minister has described it as akin to a hostage situation, and the NCAA has written to the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice and the Inspector-General of Police, to investigate the matter and prosecute Ayinde, and anyone who has infringed any law.

While we await the outcome of such investigation, we find it disconcerting that Ayinde was ready to use his body as a shield to ensure the aircraft did not depart. But for his vigilance, the wing of the aircraft would have severed his head, as the aircraft departed despite his protests.

We wonder what Ayinde was thinking when he was shown on the video making calls. Considering his exposure, he ought to know that if his rights are breached, he has many avenues for redress, including the court of law.

While blaming Ayinde for self-help, we agree that the pilots breached the departure protocol, and thus exposed Ayinde and the passengers and staff of the airline on the ground to mortal danger. To commence departure without adhering to mandatory pre-departure clearance protocol was thoroughly unprofessional.

As rightly stated by NCAA, the actions of the pilots endangered the safety of ground personnel. Before departure, the security should have taken Mr Ayinde and his staff, into custody, for trying to obstruct the departure of the aircraft.

We support appropriate disciplinary measures against the pilots and the security staff who ought to have followed due protocol in handling the situation, instead of indulging Ayinde and his staff. The pilot claimed that Ayinde was not within her view when she moved, but before an aircraft starts to taxi, the pilot ought to get signal from the ground crew. Perhaps, the pilot may have lost her cool, as she alleged Ayinde spilled the contents of the flask on her, when she came down from the cockpit to appeal to him.

But for unnecessary indulgence, the pilots should not have interfered with the boarding procedure, as there are designated officers who should take care of that.

We commend the NCAA and the minister for the steps taken so far. The AGF and the IGP should give the request from the NCAA the deserved attention. And following due process, sanctions should be meted to anyone who may have breached the standard safety protocols of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

Of course we are aware that Ayinde has apologised to the minister on the matter, we leave the decision on his apology entirely in the hands of the aviation authorities.

We nonetheless reiterate that that viral video was bad optics for our country.
August 11, 2025
Gaza and the cost of silence
sir: As we enjoy our meals and sleep, a child in Gaza dies of hunger, starved to death by the West’s darling—Israel, the only nation allowed to carry out genocide live on TV.

For nearly two years, Israel has waged a genocidal campaign in the Gaza Strip, a tiny piece of land on the Mediterranean that has been under blockade for decades and whose population largely consists of refugees from historic Palestine, displaced when the Jewish state was created.

Beyond the human toll of more than 50,000 people killed—nearly 70 per cent women and children, according to the United Nations—the devastation has been catastrophic. Cities in Gaza have been reduced to rubble, with key infrastructure and necessities of life—schools, universities, hospitals, desalination plants, farmlands, companies, bakeries, and even mosques—systematically destroyed by Israeli forces. The beautiful and ancient city of Rafah no longer exists; likewise, Beit Hanoun and large parts of Khan Younis and Gaza City have been deliberately wiped out by Israel in an attempt to ethnically cleanse Gaza.

As if the monstrous crimes of the last two years weren’t enough, Israel is now baiting and killing hungry people at so-called aid distribution sites, which observers have termed killing fields, mirroring dystopian scenes from Squid Game and The Hunger Games.

In all of this, the world has failed to act to stop the carnage. While the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu is a regular guest in Washington, the United States has sanctioned the International Criminal Court and is arresting students protesting the genocide. European countries continue to support Israel, despite the ongoing crimes against humanity it is perpetrating. Arab and Islamic countries seem powerless to help.

Tragically, many have become accustomed to seeing images of death and destruction from Gaza, which has numbed them to the suffering of the Palestinian people. Mustafa Elmasri, a renowned psychologist from Gaza, rightly said before he passed away that “genocide has been normalized, reduced to a banal daily nuisance, like city noise people try to live with because they feel powerless to change it.”

Read Also: Ex-Israeli security chiefs urge end to Gaza war

As the bloodthirsty Israeli government plans a final solution to entirely wipe out Gaza and displace its people, greater intervention is needed to put an end to the genocide. Palestinians don’t need theatrical aid drops or empty pledges of recognition. They have endured starvation, bombings, and forced displacement. They need real action to stop the violence. They need the borders to be opened, food and medicine to flow in, and their homes to be rebuilt. They also need justice—Israeli leaders must be held accountable, just as Nazi leaders were before them.

It’s time to break the silence. We can’t just watch as innocent people are killed, as children are starved to death, and health workers are kidnapped and tortured in dungeons. We must demand that governments take action to stop the genocide. The world has a responsibility to protect the people of Gaza. Elmasri may not be here to witness it, but let’s stand up for humanity and demand justice for the Palestinian people. Genocide must never be normalized. We are human beings, bound by compassion, not beasts driven by savagery.
- Labaran Yusuf, Jos, Plateau State
August 11, 2025
Our institutions failing the people
Sir: In every thriving society, the police protect, security agencies safeguard, and lawmakers legislate for the people. In Nigeria, however, many citizens are beginning to ask a painful question: Have these institutions abandoned their duty?

Across our highways and city streets, it is now common to see police officers without identification, carrying out “stop-and-search” operations that too often turn into harassment. Some mount illegal checkpoints, extorting motorists. In some cases, officers dress in casual clothing while on duty, blurring the line between law enforcement and lawlessness.

When the police—our first line of defence—are themselves a source of fear, what hope do ordinary Nigerians have for safety?

From insurgency in the Northeast to banditry in the Northwest and kidnapping in the south, the failures of our security apparatus are written in blood. Communities are raided, villages burnt, families torn apart—yet the perpetrators often escape justice. Intelligence gathering remains weak, coordination between agencies poor, and public trust dangerously low.

Security in Nigeria has become a privilege for the wealthy who can afford private guards, rather than a right for every citizen.

Read Also: I love to make people happy with my DJ skills, says Super Falcons’ star Deborah Abiodun

The National Assembly was created to represent the voice of the people, make laws that protect them, and hold the executive accountable. Instead, Nigerians often see lawmakers living in opulence—drawing heavy allowances, driving luxury cars—while millions of citizens languish in poverty.

Bills that could change lives stall for years, while personal political battles move at lightning speed. Many in public office seem more concerned with securing their next election ticket than securing the welfare of their constituents.

The cost of these failures is not abstract—it is paid in lives lost to insecurity, in dreams crushed by injustice, and in opportunities wasted because of bad governance. Every time an armed robber escapes justice, every time a citizen is unlawfully detained, every time a law that could protect the vulnerable is ignored, Nigeria’s soul takes another wound.

The way forward is to reform the police – ensuring mandatory identification, strict anti-corruption monitoring, continuous training in human rights and professionalism; overhaul the security agencies – through better intelligence sharing, modern equipment, and accountability for failed operations; make lawmakers accountable – ensuring public disclosure of allowances, regular town-hall meetings, and recall mechanisms for non-performing representatives, and empower citizens – by strengthening civic education so Nigerians know their rights and demand better.

Nigeria is not doomed—its institutions can still be redeemed. But change will not come from silence. The time has come for Nigerians to speak with one voice, to demand accountability from those in uniform and those in suits, and to refuse to be spectators in their own democracy.

If the police, security agencies, and lawmakers will not remember their duty, then the people must remind them—loudly, persistently, and without fear.
- Adeyemi Oladebo, O <oladeboyemi@gmail.com>
August 11, 2025
Kwam 1 and the dangerous cost of pride
Sir: In a country where celebrity culture and VIPs often walk hand-in-hand with entitlement, the recent Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport incident involving Wasiu Ayinde Marshal, also known as Kwam 1 and the ValueJet Airlines flight (Flight VK 201) headed to Lagos has continued to ignite a firestorm of public reactions.

In all, one reasoning stands tall and that is the thought that we could have lost one of Nigeria’s greatest musical icons, not to terrorism, illness or accident, but on the altar of ego.

Videos and reports surfaced of Kwam 1 allegedly obstructing a plane from take-off at the airport, standing in front of the aircraft in what many described as a show of arrogance, all because he was stopped from boarding with a flask allegedly containing alcohol, an item prohibited for safety reasons. The situation escalated into public drama, triggering security alarms and almost putting an entire flight at risk.

This was not just a case of a stubborn passenger or a high-ranking chief flexing status. It was a near-death experience masked by pride, defiance and years of unchecked influence. If that plane had moved just a little faster, we would have been writing a tribute, not analysis.

Many Nigerians have taken to social media and airwaves to condemn the act. Some cite Kwam 1’s history of unruly public behaviour, a track record that only worsens the optics. Others, however, have chosen to interrogate the actions of the female pilot, hinting that she may have been in a race against time and obeying strict aviation regulations.

Read Also: Kwam 1 rejects FAAN’s claim on alleged boarding infraction

Kwam 1 may have seen himself as too big to be questioned, too legendary to be denied, too traditional to be searched, but what if he didn’t bend to dodge the wing of the airplane? What if he slipped while pursuing the plane or was hit while trying to block it?

This must be a turning point not just for Kwam 1 but for everyone in positions of influence. It is a lesson in humility, in respect for systems and in the simple wisdom of thinking before acting. It is okay to be a star, but don not let the spotlight blind you. It is okay to be a chief, but do not let the crown weigh down your sense of judgment.

To those who see this as just another celebrity drama, it is not. It is a close call that reminds us all to play it cool, to drop the pride and to value life more than image.

Let him live not just to sing again, but to lead by better examples
- Dayo DaSilva, dsv123ng@yahoo.com
August 11, 2025