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ACF@25: North must reset now, say Dalhatu, Buratai, Ribadu

Notable northern elders, political leaders, and cultural figures yesterday called for bold solutions to long-standing insecurity and development challenges across the region.

They spoke at the 25th anniversary of the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) in Kaduna.

The silver jubilee programme featured technology and entrepreneurship exhibitions, women-focused pavilions, cultural nights, and an awards ceremony aimed at showcasing the North’s potential and celebrating innovation.

Opening the session, ACF’s Board of Trustees (BoT) Chairman, Alhaji Bashir Dalhatu (Wazirin Dutse), emphasised the need for modern development models that empower youth and reduce inequality. “We must begin in earnest to plunge into modern developmental efforts,” he said.

The BoT chairman noted that the ACF has created platforms where experts could mentor young entrepreneurs and guide innovative projects.

Dalhatu stated that inclusive development — not just economic growth — should define the North’s future.

He highlighted the forum’s goal of bridging the gap between the haves and have-nots while reinforcing the message of unity under the mantra, “North is one people, one North.”

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Dalhatu also acknowledged the region’s security challenges and called for more effective strategies from security actors.

“We appreciate their sacrifices, but it is time to look for further, better, more effective means of curtailing insecurity,” he said.

A former Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt.-Gen. Tukur Buratai (retd.), described the milestone as a moment to reflect on the past progress and future challenges.

The former Army chief noted that the event’s focus on youths under the theme: Creative Economy: Engaging the Youth, as critical to reversing the North’s development deficits.

“Northern Nigeria is a microcosm of the nation. When one part of the country develops, that progress translates to others,” he said.

Representatives of Yobe State Governor Mai Mala Buni, the National Security Adviser (NSA) Nuhu Ribadu, and the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) also addressed the gathering, emphasising the need for national unity and strategic approaches to tourism as a tool for security and community development.

There was a high-level roundtable on “Tourism for Security,” chaired by Minister of Arts, Culture, Tourism and Creative Economy, Hannatu Musawa, underscored the connection between economic opportunity and stability. “Tourism and security are inseparable. Visitors will not explore our heritage sites or cultural festivals if they fear for their safety,” she said, adding that insecurity often stems from exclusion, poverty, and alienation.

Musawa called for collaboration between government, investors, communities, and security agencies to safeguard heritage sites and protect the region’s developmental vision.

Other dignitaries at the event included a former Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed; former Kaduna State Governor Ramalan Yero; Nasiru Gwamdu Sardaunan Dutse, and the Emir of Zazzau’s representative, the Wazirin Zazzau, Alhaji Muhammad Inuwa, alongside other northern elders.

The ACF’s 25th anniversary celebration served as a reflection on the past and a call to action, emphasiding that the North must adopt innovative, inclusive, and security-conscious strategies to ensure sustainable growth and unity for the region’s future.

November 21, 2025
A way out for the North

I have been drawing attention to the Northern problem in Nigeria since 2020 (The Northern question in Nigeria, The Nation, September 16, 2020). The comparative analysis presented in that article concluded that the Southern problems in Italy, as outlined by Antonio Gramsci in The Southern Question (1906), provides a theoretical basis for analysing the Northern problems in Nigeria. I revisited the Northern problems in 2024 with statistical data (The Northern question in Nigeria—Facts unknown or ignored, The Nation, June 26, 2024). Both articles were updated and republished within the last one month.

Many respectable Northerners and journalists have since reechoed the Northern problems. For example, Suleiman lamented: “Northern Nigeria is in tatters, politically, economically and socially. Almost everywhere you turn, the news is of death, destruction and despair as if we were a rudderless and leaderless people” (Suleiman A Suleiman, The North in tatters, Daily Trust, July 1, 2024)

Lukman similarly lamented: “The living reality in Northern Nigeria is very explosive … Indices of poverty, unemployment and inequality are beyond description. Conditions of schools and hospitals are, to say the least, depressing. The civil service, in virtually all the 19 states, is only a shadow of itself, with hardly any public service activity taking place … Few industries exist in the region. And on account of insecurity, agricultural activities, the mainstay of the economy of the region, is highly on the decline” (Salihu Mohammed Lukman, Open letter to Northern politicians, Daily Trust, July 1, 2024).

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At various times in the last few years, these Northern problems were also highlighted by the former Governor of the Central Bank and Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi; former Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir el-Rufai; and Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote. In all the articles and statements, the blame was put squarely on Northern leaders, particularly politicians.

History tells us that the Northern problems in Nigeria date back to colonial times. Indeed, the erstwhile separate Northern and Southern Protectorates were merged into a single colony in 1914 to ease the use of economic and human resources from the South to sustain the North.

It is against the above backgrounds that the complaints by some Northern leaders about the neglect of the North is viewed as disingenuous, especially when they are presented as if the neglect was caused by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration, which only recently marked two years in office.

There are at least three major reasons why the cry of Northern neglect is viewed as politically motivated at this time. First, the complaints are being orchestrated with the activities of opposition politicians as they coalesce in the buildup to the 2027 presidential election.

Second, it looks like political propaganda for Northern leaders to cry neglect under a President, who has spent only 2 years and 3 months in office, while a Northerner (military or civilian) has led Nigeria for at least 46 of 65 years of independence. If the solution to Northern problems existed only in the centre, why would they linger over 46 years of Northern leadership, and by what magic would they be solved in just over two years by a Southern President?

Third, the distribution of resources relative to each state’s contribution to the national purse disproportionately favours the North at the expense of money-making Southern states. For example, in the first quarter of 2025, VAT records show that the three Northern zones (Northwest, North Central, and Northeast) benefited much more than the three Southern zones.

For example, Lagos state alone generated N819 billion VAT revenue, which is more than the remaining 35 states combined. Yet it got back only 28 percent of its contribution. By contrast, each of the 19 Northern states got between 30 and 55 percent more than it contributed. For example, the six Northeastern states contributed N30 billion but got back N124 billion, that is, more than four times their contribution.

It is a similar story with contributions to Gross Domestic Product. The top ten contributing states are in the South, while the bottom 10 are in the North. Again, Lagos state alone contributed more to GDP than all 19 Northern states combined. In general, the South is home to the nation’s largest money earner, oil revenue, which is now being displaced by tax revenue (thanks to the Tinubu administration’s ingenuity with the newly passed Tax Bill).

Yet even though the bulk of the Federal Government revenue is generated in the South, the North keeps near parity with the South in Federal allocations. For example, between January and June 2025, the North received N2.6 trillion, while the South got N2.7 trillion. Only one state in the North (Gombe, N93.47 billion) received less than N100 billion, while there are two such states in the South—Ebonyi, N99.63 billion, and Ekiti, N97.7 billion.

The above data show (a) that the North has been profiting immensely from Federal transfers, (b) that its leaders have done little or nothing to serve their people and (c) that Northern leaders in an out of government want to continue to ride on the ignorance, poverty, and illiteracy of their people to continue to amass wealth for themselves and their families at the expense of the masses. To be sure, many Nigerian politicians today could be described as self-centred, but the case of Northern leaders is exceptionally so.

A two-prong approach is needed to solve the Northern problems. One is to educate Northern masses to demand accountability from their Governors. The other is to reduce the dependency of their leaders on the centre. I have addressed the latter approach elsewhere (see Your governor has your money, ask him for it, The Nation, September 3, 2025).

The first approach has two advantages: One, it will require Northern leaders to look inwards, rather than to Abuja, for the development of their states. Two, the more autonomy is granted to the states, the less blame will be heaped on the federal government. However, such an approach requires the cooperation of the President, the National Assembly, the Governors, and their Assemblies to work on the devolution of powers that will grant political and financial autonomy to the states.

A gradualist approach appears to be underway by which power is ceded by the centre to the states in specific spheres of statecraft. For example, each state can now generate, transmit, and distribute electricity to its citizens. Already, Lagos state has again blazed the trail by jumping on this development and Enugu state has followed.

Second, work is in progress on the decentralisation of the police force to enhance local security architecture. Since Southern Governors have long endorsed the project, it would appear that the delay is from the North, which ironically needs state police the most to combat prevalent insecurity.

Besides, the recent establishment of zonal Development Commissions appears to be a precursor to the emergence of the six zones as major federating units. Each of the six Commissions is meant to coordinate the activities of its zone toward development. Although the Federal Government currently funds the Commissions, they should eventually become independent and prop their zones to political status. Rather than relapse into the old regions as federating units, the zones should be excellent candidates, if the Commissions do their work well in forging alliances among member states through shared values and zonal projects.

The last time the North had a stint of development was when there was a combination of political and financial autonomy and effective leadership. That was the era of regional government between 1954 and 1966, when Sir Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto, was the Premier of Northern Region. With various social, economic, and educational, policies, Ahmadu Bello put his region on a path of development to catch up with the Western and Eastern Regions.

It is also important to remind Northern leaders that they cannot be more Islamic than the leaders of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirate, and Qatar. These are countries, which put social and economic advancement over religion and ethnicity in developing their countries.

September 17, 2025
Presidency: North not marginalised in federal projects
- ‘Abuja, Lagos development in national interest’
The North is not marginalised in the distribution of federal projects, the Presidency said on Sunday evening.

It described President Bola Ahmed Tinubu as ‘president of all,’ a statesman, nationalist, patriot and caring leader who sees the entire country as his constituency.

According to the Presidency, the report on marginalisation of the North is faulty, stressing that the distribution of the projects has mobilised the region in the spirit of equity, fairness and justice.

Presidential Adviser on Media and Public Communications Sunday Dare, who reacted to the recent headline in ‘Daily Trust’: ‘In Two Year, Lagos Gets N3.9 Trillion Projects,’ berated the medium for sensationalism, lack of accuracy and distortions.

He said in a statement titled: ‘Why Lagos? Yes Lagos (And Abuja too). The North is mobilised, not marginalised,’ that the distortions were weaponised to inflame passion and incite the region against the administration instead of offering objective information.

The newspaper’s report trailed earlier speculations by opposition elements that the North was marginalised in the distribution of political and public service appointments, which were debunked with facts.

Also, the latest subjective report was released at a time the Northern Governors’ Forum, led by Gombe State Governor Inuwa Yahaya, praised the Federal Government for fighting the infrastructure battle in the region with much vigour and commitment.

Dare explained that the federal government also focussed on the development of Lagos as the economic nerve centre and Abuja as the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) in national interest.

Dismissing the report as a product of lazy journalism, he said “numbers without context are not facts,” adding that “they are distortions weaponised to inflame rather than inform.”

He said responsible journalism requires rigour and propaganda should be seperated from reporting in the “inescapable duty of media practice.”

Dare stressed, “The attempt to portray Lagos as over-pampered while casting the North as neglected is not just misleading; it is lazy journalism.

“The truth is more complex, more national, and more honest. President Bola Tinubu is not just a statesman, he is a nationalist and a President for all.”

The presidential aide insisted that Northern Nigeria is mobilized and not marginalized, pointing out that half of the infrastructure and agricultural investments in 2024 and 2025 budgets went to the region.

Dare added, “Let’s start with the North. Far from being abandoned, it anchors over half of the capital budgets for 2024 and 2025 when you account for trunk infrastructure and agricultural investments.”

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Reeling out vital statistics, the media adviser listed the on-going capital projects in the region.

These are: Abuja–Kano Expressway dualization, ₦12.1 trillion Sokoto–Badagry Superhighway; (₦3.63 trillion already approved for rollout in Sokoto and Kebbi), Kano–Maradi Railway and the Zungeru–Kano Power Line, Funtua and Bauchi Inland Dry Ports, and Airport upgrades in Katsina, Maiduguri, and Kaduna.

“Add to this massive funding for the Sokoto-Rima, Upper Benue, Hadejia-Jama’are, and Lower Niger River Basins; and food-security anchors like Special Agro-Processing Zones in Borno, Kaduna, and Kebbi, and wheat development in Jigawa and Kano. This is not marginalization. It is mobilization.”

Dare, who wondered why some critics are fixated on Lagos in the distribution of infrastructural projects, said they tended to neglect the patriotic motivation and reality.

He described Lagos as a melting hub, which hosts Nigerians from all the states of the federation and shoulders enormous national responsibilities.

He said: “What did Lagos receive in 2013–2015? Or 2021–2023? Without period-over-period comparisons—adjusted for inflation, exchange rates, and statutory revenue outturns—any single number is meaningless.

“Lagos is not just a state. It is Africa’s second-largest city economy, with over 23 million residents and hundreds of thousands more arriving every year.

“Every Nigerian ethnicity is represented in Lagos. It is Nigeria in microcosm—a great melting pot straining under infrastructure loads no other state faces.”

Dare also defended the continuous investments in Abuja infrastructural development, saying that Lagos and FCT should be developed simultaneously.

He added: “Abuja is becoming the same; one of Africa’s fastest-growing cities, projected to exceed 7 million people by 2030. As the federal capital, it carries the daily weight of the civil service, the diplomatic corps, and a booming private sector.

“That is why President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has given extra care to both Lagos and Abuja. Not as favoritism, but as strategy. When these two urban giants work, Nigeria breathes easier. When they fail, the whole country suffers.”

The presidential adviser relected on the strategy of “planning continuity,” emphasising that “no project begins or ends in a single election cycle.”

He said: “What Lagos and Abuja receive today flows from the ERGP (2017–2020), the ESP (2020) during COVID-19, and the NDP (2021–2025). The forthcoming Renewed Hope Plan (2026–2030) will build on them.”

Dare drew attention to the import of mega cities, which Abuja and Lagos typify, saying that they deserve support.

Drawing attention to the global practice of giving “mega support” to mega cities by citing the example of United States and South Africa, he said “national development is a continuum, not an accident.”

Dare added: “New York City receives tens of billions in annual federal transfers, covering housing, health, education, and transport. In FY 2022, New York State and City received $117.5 billion in federal support.

“Johannesburg/Gauteng generates one-third of South Africa’s GDP. Its 2025/26 provincial budget tops R172 billion, aligned with federal transport and housing priorities.

“If New York and Johannesburg receive proportional federal support because of their scale, why should Lagos and Abuja be treated differently?”

Dare dismissed the insinuations that investments in Lagos and smacked of favouritism, stressing that much benefits would acrue to the country in the process.

He said, “Why Lagos? Why Abuja? Because Lagos is Nigeria’s economic lifeblood.

Because Abuja is its political and diplomatic heartbeat. Because both cities carry the daily weight of the federation—demographically, economically, and symbolically.

“Investing in Lagos and Abuja is not favoritism. It is statecraft. In the U.S. and South Africa, city-economies like New York and Johannesburg receive federal resources reflective of their burdens. Lagos and Abuja, which together anchor Nigeria’s survival, deserve no less.

“The real question is not “Why Lagos?” or “Why Abuja?” The real question is: What happens to Nigeria if Lagos and Abuja are ignored?”
August 31, 2025
Why Nigeria needs the North

To observers of Nigerian politics, there was nothing new in Bashir Dalhatu, chairman of the ACF Board of Trustees, accusing the President Bola Tinubu’s government of neglecting the north as he did during the recent two-day citizen engagement forum organised by the Sir Ahmadu Bello Memorial Foundation. The only difference this time around was that Tinubu, who said he is always ahead of his political adversaries, was ready with over 60 prominent northern members of his cabinet to expose the hypocrisy of those who pretend to speak for the north when indeed, it was all about self-preservation. But perhaps more damaging to the case of the hegemonic ruling class is the emergence of young educated and well informed crop of northern professionals and politicians who have now seen the danger of being enslaved by old prejudices especially with yesterday’s abandoned children of the poor who are today challenging the status-quo.

Leading the battle to save the old order was ACF’s Bashir Dalhatu who called attention to the completion of Lagos-Ibadan express way and the second Niger Bridge, all in the south while the north that gave 64% of its votes to ensure Tinubu’s victory in the 2023 election got nothing. Echoing him was Babachir Lawal, former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF). According to him: “No projects are going on—at least they are not visible to the eye, maybe in their imagination, maybe in the spirit—but we don’t see them.”

For Hakeem Baba Ahmed, Tinubu needed to be blamed for “neglecting the suffering of their people” warning that it’s the “people Tinubu is treating as if they don’t matter who will judge all politicians against their exposure to violence, death, and poverty”.

Leading Tinubu’s foot soldiers was the Governor of Gombe State and chairman of the Northern States Governors Forum, Inuwa Yahaya, who confidently declared: “Today, we gather not for empty rhetoric but to examine those promises and assess the level of progress so far. What we find is an administration that has delivered meaningful results. He went on to list several federal projects, including the Abuja-Kaduna-Kano expressway, Kano-Katsina-Maradi rail line, the rehabilitation of the Kaduna refinery, the Abuja-Kaduna-Kano gas pipeline, and the continuation of drilling in the Kolmani oilfields”.

Kaduna State governor, Uba Sani’s task was to remind the current crusaders under whose leadership “insecurity grew, education declined, and poverty deepened “ that the time for playing the ostrich was over because educated young northerners today understand that “insecurity, poverty, and educational backwardness” was the result of these leaders’ “culture of negligence, silence, and inaction”.

While Tinubu’s northern political appointees were cautious, refusing to frontally confront the hegemonic ruling power in the north, the young unrestrained non-political office holders including Farouq Aliyu, former minority leader of the House of Representatives and Alvan Hassan exhibited no inhibitions.

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For Farouq Aliyu, Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) “is an opposition group and supporters of Atiku Abubakar who cannot speak for the north”. For him ACF members love neither Nigeria nor the north but themselves. They only live for themselves.

For Alvan Hasan, “instead of Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) serving as custodians of northern aspirations, they are openly partisan”. For him, what the north needed is not infrastructure but unity. He strongly believes ACF is using religion to divide the north

Looking Seun Okinbaloye, his host on ‘Politics Today’ show, directly in the face, he asked “as a Christian from the north, can you aspire to become governor of Kwara?” Adding without waiting for an answer, that a Muslim from Plateau State cannot aspire to become secretary to government of Plateau state just as Christian from Borno State can never aspire to become governor of Borno State.

Although he stopped short of directly accusing the self-appointed custodians of values of the north of sponsoring Muslim attack on Christians, the innuendo was unmistakable in his assertion that for self-preservation, those who should unite the north end up sponsoring Muslim attack on Christians while Christians’ attempt at retaliation leaves everyone a loser with even farmers unable to go to their farms.

Hasan was saying what most Nigerians including our leaders who often play the ostrich know the truth which everyone is afraid to admit. Sheik Gumi in February 2021 admitted on Seun Okinbaloye’s ‘Politics Today’ show, that the Fulani herdsmen were victims. He defined them “as herdsmen fighting ethnic war” and for him, the solution was dialogue and teaching them Islam. If you have seen them you will discover they have nothing like civilization other than the guns they carry”.

Today everyone seems to have forgotten Lamido Sanusi Lamido’s directive to Fulani herdsmen hosted by Benue State to the effect that they must disobey Benue State anti-open- grazing law duly passed by the state House of Assembly and assented to by the governor. We all pretend not to be aware that, the directive ’found expression in periodic harvest of death of innocent subsistence farmers who are mostly Christians in the alluring Benue trough.

We have no evidence Usman Bugaje was ever questioned for confessing not too long ago that APC then in opposition, imported some Fulani herdsmen from the Sahel region for the purpose of 2015 election.

But Hasan was not done. Even if we were to accept infrastructure is the problem of the north, he threw a challenge at the custodians of the values of the north and the author of “the south cannot have whatever that cannot be replicated in the north” which started with the derailment of Dr. Majekodunmi’ attempt at introducing a form of insurance cover for Lagos workers by northern back benchers in the first republic.

Asking if the south is not part of Nigeria, he wants them to identify the equivalent in the south “of -the ongoing 1000km Sokoto-Badagry High way or Sokoto-Kano-Maiduiguri dualised over 500km expressway.

As an aside, let me help Hassan. Apart from Lagos-Ibadan 120km expressway that has been under construction since 1999, I know of no 30 kilometres of smooth federal road from the part of Ogun, Oyo and Osun that I take to my small town, Ogotun Ekiti. In 1986, it used to take me two hours 30 minutes from Lagos to Ipetu Ijesha (when I tried it four years ago, it took me five hours). But the story is that from that border town is Awolowo’s 1959 eight kilometre scientific marvel of a narrow, dangerous, undulating road that meanders through valleys and crevices of hill to Ogotun Ekiti. At the period, it was the only road that connected Ekiti with the rest of the Nigeria as both Ilesha Ado and Ado Akure roads were in a state of disrepair.

Seven years ago, I heard Chief Afe Babalola, the founder of Afe Babalola University complaining of those two federal roads. Last week, I saw Kayode Fayemi, the immediate past governor of Ekiti State lamenting about the state of the two federal highways.

But let us return to the serious issue at hand. Our northern compatriots need our help and support even if it involves conceding all infrastructural projects to the north.

First, freedom starts from being conscious of your position on the social structure ladder. Our northern compatriots have today realized that those who did not see them beyond article of political bargaining have for long used tribe and religion to exploit their innermost fears. The rest of the country have also now realised that it is no more in our enlightened self-interest to continue ignoring their plight because of blackmail of those who falsely swear in their name for power bargaining.

instead of the competitive north of Ahmadu Bello, we have seen the northern ruling hegemonic class inspired social engineering efforts such as JAMB, quota system of admission to tertiary institutions and to our bureaucracy, all designed to slow down the rest of the country, take their toll on our bureaucracy, universities and teaching hospitals that once ranked with the best in the world.

For a perfect union, the south needs the north more than the north needs the south. Obafemi Awolowo, a foremost nationalist and an unrepentant federalist warned in the run up to independence, that except we first solve the contradiction within the northern society, we will continue to move in circles. For over 75 years, it has been motion without movement.

This is why I think no sacrifice is too much in the interest of our nation if only to honour our founding fathers including Nnamdi Azikiwe, Ahamdu Bello, Obafemi Awolowo and members of their tribe who made personal sacrifices to bequeath onto us a working federal arrangement, tragically truncated by ill-educated military adventurers.

August 12, 2025
2027: Why North won’t back Atiku, Obi – Ex-ACF Scribe Sani
- Says odds favour Tinubu for reelection
A former Secretary General of the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), Chief Anthony N.Z. Sani has said the North would rather allow President Bola Tinubu have a second term in 2027 and wait till 2031 to have one of its own installed as the next president.

This, according to Sani, will enable the North to also have the presidency for two terms of eight years.

The ex-ACF scribe told The Nation in an interview in Kaduna that this thinking in that part of the country will likely count against the ambition of former vice president Atiku Abubakar and the presidential candidate of Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 election, Mr. Peter Obi, in 2027.

“The political dynamics surrounding zoning currently favour President Bola Tinubu,” he said.

Continuing, Sani said Tinubu “has only one term left, and after 2027, power is expected by many to return to the North in 2031. That prospect alone will influence how the North votes.

“Tinubu, being the only southern candidate constitutionally limited to one more term, is likely to get the support of voters who are thinking beyond 2027.

“Southern voters, because of the zoning arrangement and the quest for fairness, would not want the presidency to return to the North just yet.

“They would prefer the presidency remains in the South until 2031 so they can complete their expected eight years before power shifts again.

“Therefore, it is unlikely that the South would vote massively for a Northern candidate in 2027.”

Sani also said most northern voters “would also strategically vote for Tinubu, not only out of loyalty to the late Buhari, but also because it aligns with their long-term interest of producing the next president in 2031.

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“Supporting Tinubu in 2027 means the North can present a strong case for power to return to their region after his final term.”

Sani said the influence of the late former President Muhammadu Buhari would also play a role in Tinubu’s bid for a second term, especially in the North because, according to him, “Buhari was able to command the loyalty and support of most northern voters largely because he was widely perceived as an honest, disciplined, transparent, principled and austere leader.”

He added: “Northerners saw him (Buhari) as someone who would never dip his hands into public funds for personal gain. That image gave him an uncommon kind of cult followership, especially among the poor.

“With his demise and the evolving political alignments ahead of 2027, I do not think that his political influence will fade or wane substantially, at least not so soon.

“His legacy is still fresh in the hearts of many, especially in the rural North, and that will continue to shape voting patterns for some time to come.

“With the passing of President Buhari, I believe President Bola Tinubu may still prevail among northern voters for two key reasons.

“First, because the influence of Buhari, particularly in the North, is still very strong and may not diminish significantly before the 2027 elections.

“Second, because of the politics of zoning and rotational presidency, which is very important to many Nigerians today.

“You may recall that when Buhari was still alive, he made it clear he did not support the coalition of opposition forces against the APC.

“He publicly distanced himself from such efforts, which showed that his loyalty remained with the APC platform that brought him to power.

“That endorsement of continuity with the APC by Buhari still matters to many of his supporters today.”
July 27, 2025
Checking the menace

The decision to establish a joint security outfit in the central region is welcome

Governors of the North Central region of Nigeria have resolved to establish a joint security outfit that will assist in stamping out banditry, kidnapping, armed gangs and all forms of terrorist activities in the six states. This is in response to the spate of killings and destructions, especially in parts of Benue, Plateau, Niger, Kogi and Kwara states. Ostensibly, all previous efforts by the central military and police authorities to flush out the criminals only offered temporary reprieve at best.

The six governors have therefore resolved to follow the step of the Western Nigeria Security Network (Amotekun) that was put in place by the governors of the South West. The governors noted that whenever the criminals in the North East and North West were under pressure, they spilled to the central region to wreak havoc.

Although the governor of Nasarawa State had said in 2020 that the region would not embrace the idea of a regional security network, the song had changed by February 2025 when Governor Abdullahi Sule said they were working in concert to stamp out banditry as it had become obvious that only joint efforts could tackle the menace.

Last week, helmsmen in the six states had come to a conclusion that the ungoverned spaces that span the whole area can only be combed when there is a shared strategy and move that would make the enemies realise that there is no hiding place anymore.

This is one strategy that all the regions should examine and decide how best to implement. While the South Eastern states had earlier came up with Ebube Agu, it did not work because it was not properly established, funded and executed by all the five states in the region. This is perhaps the time to reexamine the existing framework in the interest of the people.

It is now obvious to all that centralised institutions cannot rid the country of invaders from the Sahel region, and their local collaborators. The lip service paid to community policing over the years ought to stop now.

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So far, the Nigeria Police Force has been opposed to having armed security forces. The force should realise that this has become inevitable. All the Inspector-General of Police should insist on is that the model should be carefully worked out with inputs from the existing security network in the country. In the process of working on amendment of the 1999 Constitution, this is time to look critically into the overall security architecture of the country, at both the federal and sub national levels.

The central region is the buffer between the South and the North. Unless the criminals ravaging the far North are checked in good time, the South would soon feel the heat. President Bola Tinubu and his men should ensure that the region receives the attention it deserves now in the overall interest of the country.

Besides, it is generally regarded as the food basket of the nation. Already, food inflation is at its peak. If the state of insecurity is unchecked, starvation could be looming, thus thwarting the reform the government has embarked on.

Governor Sule and other leaders of the zone have a duty to ensure that lives and property in the area are safe. This is not the time to pass the buck, claiming that security is exclusively a federal responsibility. When section 14(2) of the constitution says the primary duty of a Nigerian government is the security and welfare of the citizens, it is referring to the three tiers of government. Something different and effective has to be put in place in the overall interest of the people.

July 24, 2025
Let us embrace, formalise and put the self confessions in the North to better use

On these pages on 31 December, 2023 I asked the question: ‘Is It Time For a Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Nigeria or Do We Simply Go Our Separate Ways’?

God works in mysterious ways.

Today, given nothing more than the honest confessions of some of our Northern compatriots, the very beginnings of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission have, very stealthily, walked in on us.

While we have the individuals to thank, Nigerians must embrace their effort while the Federal Government should formalise it as one of the ways of finally resolving our socio – political, even developmental, conundrum.

“The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of South Africa was a court-like body established in 1995 to investigate and address human rights violations during the Apartheid era.

It was aimed at promoting reconciliation and healing by providing a platform for victims and perpetrators to share their stories and come clean for purposes of ultimate truth and restorative justice. Its goal was obviously not to prosecute individuals but to foster reconciliation, promote forgiveness and usher in overall development in the country.

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In like manner, if not exactly on all fours since Apartheid was a system of segregation and mental enslavement which traumatised the entire Black population of South Africa for 46 years (1948 – 1994), the Nigerian Human Rights Violations Investigation Commission, also known as the Oputa Panel, was a Truth Commission established in 1999 to investigate human rights violations during Nigeria’s military rule from 1966 to 1999.

Its mandate included uncovering the truth about the violations and recommending redress for victims.

While both were products of institutional reform in each country, what has now, almost miraculously, walked in on us in Nigeria unappreciated is, unbelievably, the result of some honest soul- searching by some of our patriotic Northern counterparts who, where many Southerners would rather not talk at all, or lie through their teeth, preferring instead, to put the blame on others, chose to own up to their collective guilt.

Although these were told at different fora, a trending WhatsApp post by, again surprisingly a Northerner, has now put together what they describe as the contributions of Northern leaders, especially their politicians, to the extremely parlous situation of the region – poverty, socialised insecurity – banditry, Boko Haram, unemployment etc. The WhatsApp post contains some facts which, were they made by non- Northerners, would have been rightly considered extremely provocative.

But these individuals were only being truthful; the kind of truth one now expects to see come from the south too, in order to birth total healing and reconciliation to our country.

As usual, space constraint will limit what can get published of the humongous lot in an article like this.

Limited as it would be, however, it should be capable of washing our country clean if each part would own up to its own shortcomings, apologise to all and promise to turn a new leaf while the Federal Government, on its part, would waste no time, in institutionalising it as a worthy effort towards cleaning up our past.

Although the contributions of Professor Usman Yusuf, the former Executive Secretary/Chief executive officer of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) should take the cake for his consistent exposition of the contribution of Northern leaders to the region’s underdevelopment, this piece will yield that position to the Kaduna State Governor, Uba Sani, who has no less been vehement in his disdain for what he says has, over the years, pauperised the North.

In his recent critique, the governor held nothing back, declaring inter alia: “All of us, including myself, all the politicians in Northern Nigeria, including all of us here, should be held accountable for what is happening in Northen Nigeria for the past 15 years in terms of poverty, unemployment and insecurity.

As at 2016, there was nothing like banditry. What went wrong?

He called on Northern politicians to apologise to the people for their failure to address the region’s persistent underdevelopment. Expressing concern over the state of the region, he attributed its current challenges to decades of mismanagement and neglect by political leaders, admitting that the region’s multifaceted challenges did not begin two years ago, but rather, the result of systemic issues which have been allowed to persist for over 20 years by Northern political leaders who have held public office. “We all need to look at ourselves in the mirror and apologise to the people of Northern Nigeria. We let them down,”

He emphasized that the problems facing the North are deeply rooted in a long history of underdevelopment, highlighting, in particular, the widespread poverty and financial exclusion that continue to plague the region despite the billions sunk in social intervention programs in the region under former President Muhammadu Buhari, but from which majority of the population were excluded.

In my article of May 5. 2024, titled: ‘Poverty and insecurity in Northern Nigeria: Prof Usman Yusuf’s views beginning to resonate with region’s leaders’,

I quoted him as follows: “I am old enough to clearly remember thirteen Administrations from that of General Yakubu Gowon (1966-1975) to the current one of President Muhammadu Buhari (2015- to date). It is safe to say that none of these administrations came to power with so much hope, expectations and goodwill of citizens and the international community like President Buhari’s.

Unfortunately, all this goodwill has been squandered by this government due to a messiah complex, intellectual laziness, bad governance, endemic corruption, incompetence, mediocrity, nepotism, arrogance of power, sense of entitlement, stubbornness, aversion to constructive criticisms, delegation of responsibility without supervision or holding anyone accountable, indifference, distance and disconnection from, and insensitivity, to the sufferings of our people”.

Professor Yusuf has not let down since and if you look critically at all the arrows he shot in the guided missile above, they are all headed for former President Buhari, a President of Northern extraction.

And he wasn’t yet done with Northern leaders.

I therefore wrote further in my referenced article: “The North has become a literal inferno and given the overwhelming parlous state of affairs in the region they(Northern leaders) can, no longer, afford to neglect him(Yusuf). What makes the situation worse is the fact that, like forever, especially during the immediate past administration of President Buhari, the North literally had a complete lock down of all the country’s consequential appointments.

In some of his stirring ‘sermons’, Professor Yusuf listed some of such positions; likewise in the current Tinubu administration where the North holds the offices of Vice President, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Secretary to the Government of the Federation, the National Security Adviser, Chief of Army staff, both Ministers of Defence, as well as the Minister of Police Affairs.

Yet, he went on, Northern leadership has completely failed the people, choosing instead, to look elsewhere, or blame others and concluding that the time has come for the entire Northern leadership, whether in government or not, to look at themselves in the face and agree that they have failed the people, promising to do better”.

Then the bit I consider rather provocative were it to have been contributed by a non Northerner.

It came from a young man – the youngest amongst the contributors – who identified himself as proudly coming from Bornu state.

He opened up by asking what Nigeria’s major problem is. “Come let me tell you: the major problem of Nigeria is Northern Nigeria. If you want to see conflict, Northern Nigeria, rape, Northern Nigeria. In fact, if you want to see thieves, stealing on an industrial scale, come to Northern Nigeria. Thieves engaged in primitive accumulation, just come to Northern Nigeria.

I am proud to be an indigene of Borno state. I am from Borno state. The North is where you come to if you want to see conflict, hatred, nepotism, cronyism. In fact, if you cut off the Southern part of Nigeria from the North, in ten years the South will be a proud member of the comity of nations. 70 per cent of people who govern this country are from the North, but if you want to see hunger, starvation, poverty, come to the North”.

On and on he went, touching on critical issues on which the region has taken aback, not only the North, but the country as a whole.

Many others – Northerners all – spoke very truthfully on all the issues underpinning Nigeria’s current under development and the negative roles played by Northern leaders in all of them.

So dispassionate are the speakers that I honestly, and very sincerely, believe that were all of us, Nigerians, to be this honest in owning up to our faults and, government in turn, taking the appropriate measures to benefit from it all, Nigeria can, very soon, overcome its current developmental somnambulism, as well as restore a measure of concrete and tangible security, pan Nigeria.

May the good Lord guide Nigeria aright.

May 18, 2025
North and its leadership mirage
SIR: Northern Nigeria stands at a defining moment in its history. Once the bastion of strong leadership and cultural resilience, the region is now plagued by a crisis of governance. The distinction between “leaders of the North” and “leaders in the North” has never been more pronounced. Leaders of the North are those who carry the burden of the region’s progress on their shoulders, while leaders in the North are mere seat-fillers—occupants of political positions without a true sense of duty.

Unfortunately, today’s reality leans heavily towards the latter. The region is flooded with individuals who wear the titles of governors, senators, ministers, and traditional rulers, yet their leadership amounts to little more than self-interest, political survival, and personal ambition.

The result? Northern Nigeria remains stuck in a cycle of poverty, illiteracy, and insecurity, trailing behind the rest of the country on almost every developmental index.

Banditry, kidnapping, and insurgency have become rampant, turning villages into ghost towns and leaving countless families in mourning. Youth unemployment and economic hopelessness have skyrocketed, while education continues to suffer with millions of children out of school.

Rather than prioritizing sustainable policies, these so-called leaders dish out empty rhetoric, making grand promises while doing little to uplift the people they claim to serve. Hunger has become a political tool—wielded not as a crisis to be solved, but as a mechanism of control. Those who once enjoyed three square meals now struggle to afford even one.

Yet, instead of confronting the root causes of poverty, many politicians prefer the optics of distributing bags of rice. They would rather keep the people hungry and dependent than invest in mechanized agriculture, industrialization, or skills development.

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The recent horrific killing of at least 16 northern travellers in Edo State is a chilling reminder of the dangers of mob justice and ethnic profiling. These victims—mostly Hausa hunters heading for Sallah festivities—were mistaken for kidnappers and brutally lynched. Such tragedies expose the colossal failure of leadership at all levels.

The reckless creation of new emirates and first-class chiefdoms is no longer about strengthening governance—it is about settling scores, wielding influence, and fracturing the region further.

The North needs statesmen who will champion food security, support industrial growth, and create jobs—not politicians who prey on hunger for electoral gain.

Leadership is not about occupying an office—it is about securing justice, progress, and dignity for all. So, the question lingers: Will Northern Nigeria continue to be ruled by leaders in the North who exploit suffering, or will true leaders of the North emerge to break this cycle of failure?
- Usman Muhammad Salihu, Abuja.
March 31, 2025
This North, ‘sef’

But for the fact that I don’t give awards to people, I would have decorated Governor Abdullahi Sule of Nasarawa State and his Niger State counterpart, Umar Bago, with garlands, over their words and deeds at the tail end of last month.

Most northern leaders have been behaving as if they expect other Nigerians to carry their (North’s) load on their heads while holding theirs (other Nigerians) in the hand. That has been the dominant mentality in the north, but it is unsustainable. It is like the ‘ranka dede’ system upon which the north has been based. It is because it could not have lasted forever that we have banditry and terrorism almost all over the north today.

I remember several years ago when I was at ‘The Punch’, we were always saying that this feudal system would blow over our faces someday. How can some people think that a system whereby some people would be eating sumptuous meals in mansions with all modern gadgets while others stay locked outside the gate doing ‘ranka dede’ and waiting for the crumbs from the tables of the super rich, would last forever? How? When they are not blind. They see all the affluence in the midst of poverty. Certainly, a time would come when those people would start asking questions as to whether some people have two heads for things to be so skewed against the poor and vulnerable.

That future is here.

There is no part of the country without its peculiar kinds of bad boys and girls. We have ‘area boys’ in Lagos and other parts of the south west; their variants exist in the South East and South south in varying degrees, with some masquerading as freedom fighters. We have castle rustlers, bandits, terrorists in the north. Of course we have other kinds of criminals including cultists, kidnappers, ritual killers, Yahoo Yahoo boys and girls, Yahoo Plus, armed robbers, pick pockets, etc. all over. But nothing near the kind of evil going on in the north.

Nigeria has 18.3 million out-of-school (OOS) children. At 15 per cent, it is the highest in the world. Of the current 18.3 million, the north takes a chunk of over 15 million.

The religious/cultural factor is the worst of the factors that have sustained the problematic ‘ancien regime’ that has been used to exploit the average northerner. People who are not profitably engaged would always find alternative jobs from the devil.

And, as if what is already on ground is not bad enough, we now have terrorism becoming a booming enterprise. Just at a time we were feeling that Boko Haram was dying, another terror group that calls itself Lakurawa or Lukarawa sprang up. So, we have terrorism mutating. At Nigerians’ expense. Yet, they did not cause the problem that led to this huge numbers of OOS children that have now become thorns in the flesh of everybody. The northern elite has been encouraging the ‘talakawa’ to go into the fattening rooms to produce babies without a thought for how their needs, including their education, would be met.

Meanwhile, the north collects huge sums from the national purse ostensibly to take care of its huge population but the political elite and, to some extent, their religious counterparts, pocketed substantial parts of this money which they spend on the education of their own children in choice schools abroad. Meanwhile, they encourage the children of the ‘talakawa’ to go to ill-equipped Quranic schools where equally ill-motivated instructors teach them God knows what, after which they go to the streets to beg for alms. For want of any meaningful job or vocation, they end up as terrorists.

Imagine the trillions that we have had to cough up to fight terrorism in the north alone! This is good money that would have gone a long way to better our educational system, improve healthcare, construct and maintain roads, increase power supply as well as provide other social amenities.

But what, specifically have governors Bago and Sule said or done differently to catch my attention? Good question.

I have always said that there is no part of the country that is not blessed. When we say the north is educationally disadvantaged, I do ‘t know when that and the unjust privileges that go with it would end. The north has been perpetually disadvantaged since I was a child. It is still so now that I am getting old. What’s ‘gwan’? We always give this impression of a dry and barren North. It is not true. The northern leaders either want to continue to exploit the rest of the country or they simply refused to put on their thinking caps when they make such statements because free money is available for all to spend.

Not long ago, Governor Bago said when he took over last year: “The State IGR was hovering between N500 million and N700 million but, right now, we are hitting almost N10 billion.”

Of course, the next question is “where did you get that from”? His answer: “Just by blocking the loopholes. We have migrated a lot of collection system, reporting system. And, there is transparency in our application. We have seen loopholes; even people who generate and consume, now; don’t generate and consume. They report through the system. It is just responsible governance that we have brought into practice. Secondly, with the agriculture initiatives, we are making money.”

I read Bago’s interview in a national daily and I must confess he mesmerised me. I don’t know him from Adam but I can tell you the sky is the limit for his political career if he can walk his talk in that interview, at least, substantially. He is a man of ideas. He has clarity of expression and he seems sufficiently informed about where he wants his state to be in a few years of his tenure.

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Then Sule who is also the chair of North Central Governors Forum. Hear him: “Just like it is a sin to continue to marry wives you cannot take care of; it is also a sin to continue producing children that you cannot take care of.”

Sule continues: “Why is it that it is only here? I just got back from Saudi Arabia. I didn’t see many almajiri in Makkah, Madina, Jedda, or anywhere else. They are an Islamic nation. Yes. You mentioned that in Pakistan, they have out-of-school children, but their situation is entirely different. Why should Northern Nigeria continue to hold the entire nation at ransom when we know that it is our problem and we have to go out there and find a way to solve it?

Many of the northern elites and remnants of the oligarchy there would not be happy about these frank statements from the two governors. But their positions are the future that we are going. If the oligarchy is sad; I can understand. Nobody is happy to lose freebies. But the kind of honeymoon they have been having with public funds must come to an end someday. The owners of the money must be allowed to partake reasonably from the common wealth.

Yoruba people have a proverb that a child that is not trained (educated) will end up selling the house that those who were trained built (omo ta o ko lo ma gbe ile ti a ko ta).

Many northern leaders have abandoned their towns because of the problems now being caused by those children they played yo-yo with the money they should have spent to educate them. Those children have permanently ensured that those who refused to train them too cannot rest or sleep with their two eyes closed. So, it is now a situation of the bird that perches on a tree; neither the bird nor the tree can rest.

On a rather sarcastic note, these politicians who can no longer go to their towns come down south, particularly Lagos to add to the infrastructural pull and catch fun. Yet, when it is time to talk about raising what comes to Lagos from the Federation Account, they shoot it down.

But that is by the way.

I agree with northern leaders who always brag that the north can stand on its own. They are very correct. As a matter of fact, that is what Gov. Bago has proved with the miracle of his IGR. The only difference between Bago and those braggarts is that while they believe the north can stand alone, they are very quick to see every move to make them demonstrate that as an attempt to take crutches away from them.

That is why I am disagreeing with Gov. Zulum when he said that he won’t be able to pay salaries if President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s tax reform bills scale through in the National Assembly. For me, this is not good enough. The whole essence of the reform is, first, to obey the first cardinal rule of taxation which is to return a chunk of the tax revenue to where it is generated. To bring in more people into the tax net as well as check multiple taxation, among others.

Zulum, I must confess, is one of the governors I admire. I love the passionate ways he has been handling the various challenges besetting his state. His passion for education as exemplified in his construction works, especially school buildings that he is modernising, etc. A long time ago, I dedicated this column to him, in acknowledgement of his good works.

I could not but marvel when he waded through knee-deep floods that swept through the state capital in September. Many of his colleagues would simply stay at what they consider a safe distance and point at any object of interest.

I know the Zamfara State governor has a peculiar challenge given the havoc wreaked in the state by Boko Haram and other bandits and terrorists. But if the governor looks well to the ground, he would always find a redeeming feature that could translate to money for the state.

It is high time northern state governments began to do more of looking inward rather than relying on money from the Niger Delta. This is not about Zulum alone. It was the same mentality that made some south west governors to refer to their states as ‘civil servants,’ states, whatever that means.

Just as babies are bundles of joy, human resource is about the most-priced of all resources. It is the one that gives them meaning, galvanise them and put them to productive use. The North has a surfeit of it. It should flaunt it. If it cannot do that in its raw form as it were now, it should work towards making it productive rather than keep asking other parts of the country to wait for it.

December 1, 2024
The North wakes up

There is this common saying among the Yoruba to the effect that as long as there are lies on the head, so long shall blood be present there. Therefore, as long as the North remains Nigeria’s ‘enfant à problèmes’, its problem child, so long will writers and analysts continue to highlight issues there in the hope that relevant stakeholders will wake up to their responsibilities as Nasarawa State governor Abdullahi Sule, and a few other critical stakeholders demonstrated in the piece below.

Speaking this past week at the inaugural regional conference on population dynamics, security, climate change, out-of-school children, and vulnerable children, held in Lafia, Nasarawa State, the governor and Chairman of the North Central Governors’ Forum, called for decisive action to address the longstanding challenges, especially, of the almajiri system in Northern Nigeria.

Said the governor: “We must wake up and solve these problems ourselves without waiting for others to do it for us. We must take the bull by the horns and stop complaining”. That was after he attributed the persistence of this, and other problems in the region to systemic failures and the neglect of parental responsibilities, emphasising the need to educate citizens on Islamic teachings, especially the fact that it is a sin to have more children, or wives, than one can care for. Concluding, he asked: “Why should the North continue to hold the entire nation down when these problems are theirs to solve?”

These, incidentally, are questions Northerners are only now asking themselves. Indeed, they believed that whoever asked them were taunting them. For instance, for warning them of the consequences of considering education a haram for the children of the poor, many Northerners never forgave Chief Obafemi Awolowo.

But ere we are today with uneducated youths becoming a supermarket for the recruitment of bandits and Boko Haram elements.

To show that this event was not all talk, the governor announced plans to establish three special schools in Lafia, Akwanga, and Keffi, specifically for the rehabilitation of almajiris.

What a paradigm shift? Only a few years back, all these governors could do for them was, first repatriate them to their assumed states of origin before they were freighted, yes freighted in trucks, to Southern forests.

God be praised for small mercies.

Further confirming the seriousness of the occasion, the Executive Secretary of the National Commission of Almajiri and Out-of-School Children, Dr. Mohammed Sani Idris, after saying that Nigeria has over 18.3 million out-of-school children, the second highest in the world, after Pakistan, with over 30 million almajiris roaming Northern streets, informed the August gathering that

the commission has launched a program, in Kaduna state, to integrate 350 almajiris into formal education and skill acquisition programs, with plans to send some beneficiaries to some Islamic Universities abroad”.

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Heartwarming too, is the fact that, unlike the usual jamborees we see in the North, masquerading as seminars on all manner of things, the conference was attended by some hardheaded critical stakeholders besides politicians; people one believes, will take these decisions to fruition.

REACTIONS TO THREE ISSUES TO PONDER (The Nation, 10 November, 2024)

Of the many reactions to the above, space constraint will not permit more than one which I consider quite quintessential.

It came from a U.K based Attorney, Caleb Arogundade who. wrote the following.

“I read through this article and two things engaged my attention. First is the issue of parental neglect of children’s education in some parts of Nigeria. I have never been a vociferous advocate of ‘balkanisation’ of Nigeria, but each time that I take a cursory look at our configuration in relation to our religious and other beliefs, I become confused.

A section believes in children’s education, while another believes in uncontrolled procreation but without regard to the educational, and general well-being of the children so produced.

The ‘Rankadede’ culture in some areas is at variance with the ‘Aguda ò j¹ lab¹ G¹¹si’ culture of some other areas. I look at the attitudes of most of the leaders in the Northern parts of the country and I consider same to be wicked. You won’t find the children of the elite among ‘Almajiris’.

This is a culture they not only promote, but defend aggressively. The Yorubas would say: ‘ÌwÍ tó dil¹ ni Ècù ñ yá lò’. In other words, devil finds work for an idle hand. These hapless and mostly ‘parents-less’ children can be likened to a group of expendables!

These children should, at least, be told that disruptive activities attract appropriate consequences, but the manner the recent matter involving some Northern children was treated, showed that justice was not served; that its handling left much to be desired. The worst part was that some people chose to portray the government in bad light.

Closely connected

to this is the extent of banditry and how it is ravaging the North with these products of Almajiri being ready recruits.

There are unconfirmed reports that the security forces sometimes find it difficult to decimate the miscreants because some of the leaders in the North easily read religious undertone to the activities of bandits and terrorists, thus offering them protection. They wrongly view their decimation as an attempt to reduce the number of their religious adherents; the reason one hears of ‘400 bandits killed, or 500 arrested’ with the supposedly arrested ones soon finding their ways back into the bush. .

The second issue to address is our educational curriculum. I attended a certificate course in teaching at level 5 here some years ago. The training opened my eyes to a lot of defects in our educational curriculum development. I haven’t finished the course before I realised that our own curriculum cannot be said to be fit for purpose. There’s proliferation of Universities all over the country without any thought about what result oriented activities would follow. We politicise everything in Nigeria. Our leaders send their children out to receive qualitative education while they provide quantitative education for Nigerian youths. Governments build hospitals that are nothing more than ‘mere consulting clinics’ but jet out to treat the smallest of ailments.

One can go on and on, but I rest my case”.

December 1, 2024