The Nation Newspaper

Tag: year’

  • Air Peace is Company of the Year

    Air Peace has won the Company of the Year Award 2017 of Leadership Group.

    The airline received the award weeks after it was recognised as a National Carrier of Repute at the yearly conference of the Nigerian Institute of Public Relations (NIPR) in Umuahia, Abia State, where six of its crew members were also honoured as Nigerian Crew Member of Repute.

    Leadership Group Limited Chairman, Mr. Sam Nda-Isaiah, who spoke at the event in Abuja,   said Air Peace and other award recipients were selected for the honour on merit.

    He hailed the carrier and other awardees for making significant contributions to the economic development of the country, urging them to sustain the high standards they were reputed for.

    Meanwhile, Air Peace has dedicated the award to its customers, saying their huge support and patronage had been the pillars of its success since it commenced commercial flight operations more than three years ago.

    The airline assured that the award, which was received on its behalf by its Chief Operating Officer, Mrs. Oluwatoyin Olajide, would spur it to deepen the quality of flight services.

  • FirstBank CEO named African Banker of the Year

    FirstBank CEO named African Banker of the Year

    Managing Director/CEO of First Bank of Nigeria Limited & Subsidiaries, Adesola Adeduntan, has been named the African Banker of the Year in the African Leadership Magazine Persons of the Year Award which took place in Johannesburg, South Africa last weekend. He was also inducted into the African Leadership CEOs Hall of Fame at the event.

    His emergence as the African Banker of the Year is in recognition of his commitment to the noble ethics of the banking profession, strict compliance to the CBN’s reforms in the Nigerian banking industry and the economic development of the nation, coupled with his exemplary leadership in and out of the boardroom.

    The award is coming on the heels of series of nominations by the African Leadership Magazine, with focus on identifying and rewarding deserving individuals, corporate entities and governments who have excelled in leadership and entrepreneurship; proven versatility and public spiritedness laced with global best practice; contributed to a good human cause, as well as made remarkable achievements and unparalled contributions to global development.

    Responding, Adeduntan thanked the management of African Leadership Magazine for the award, stating that the award would be a further inspiration for FirstBank to continue to partner with businesses committed to the socio-economic development of the African Continent.

  • Globacom wins brand of the year 

    Globacom wins brand of the year 

    Telecom giant Globacom has been adjudged as the Nigerian Brand of the Year at the Nigerian Television Authority – Integrity and Service Programme (NTA-ISP) Award.

    In the citation on Globacom, which was presented through a multi-media relay, NTA described Globacom as the “African Brand with Global Aspirations.”

    The organisers also cited Globacom as the largest data network and the first to roll out an undersea cable singlehandedly and  a 4 GLTE network in 33 locations across the country, lapping up millions of subscribers for its data services.

    Globacom said resilience and commitment to vision backed by enormous and consistent innovation were responsible for its successes.

    The award which was received o behalf of Globacom by Mr. Mansur Opakunle, a senior officer in the Public Sector Department.

    Other senior  Globacom  officials at the event included Mrs. Justina Abdulateef of Public Sector and Mr. Sola Mogaji of the Marketing Communications Department.

  • Okon is man of the year

    All hell has been let loose since a loony organisation calling itself Society for the Promotion of Good Values named Okon as their man of the year. Before the letter arrived, Okon has arranged for it to be framed by a local Efik photographer known as Edem Rainbow Edem. Rainbow usually arrived with an old-fashioned camera set on an ancient tripod, bowing supinely and beaming gratuitous smiles at everybody. In his cowboy hat and ill-fitting grey suit with white shoes to match, he was quite a sight in the vicinity. At a point, the entire household was taken over by ethnic Efiks smelling of aromatic Schnapps and periwinkles. At this point, snooper cursed the day he recruited the mad Calabar boy as cook.

    On the day of the investiture, the whole house looked like a mini Jamestown with Efik exotica all over the place. There was a particularly uppity septuagenarian attorney looking very much like Olauidah Equaino. It was like a human museum of colonial Calabar. The proper investiture almost never got underway as Okon stormed snooper’s room in the early hours of the morning fuming and complaining. The letter read; “We request the company of Okon….”

    “Oga dem yeye people be 419 people. Dem no say I no get company. Which kind company nonsense be dat one? If I be Yoruba man dem go ask make I go get company?” Okon screamed.

    “Okon, they are simply inviting you. Illiteracy is a disease,” snooper said, smiling.

    “Oga dem see you there with your bukuru and dem no fit give you award”, the mad boy retorted sharply and saucily as he stormed out. Soon afterwards, the television people arrived to interview Okon who was by then leglessly drunk. It was at this point that he was joined by Baba Lekki who had just been released from police custody without any charges being preferred against him. It was a scene out of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. (Watch Out for Full Interview.)

     

    • ( First published in December, 2007.)
  • Year of the funeral pyre

    Year of the funeral pyre

    This is the year of the funeral pyre. The calendar year in which ‘patriots’ carve bullets and axes from soapboxes; and for the sport of politicians, increase the number of the dead.

    This is the year in which criminals, hired assassins and mass murderers actualise their dreams of bliss that they might become governors, legislators, local government chairmen and councilors in 2019.

    Like the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), the All Progressives Congress (APC) turned governance and citizenship into a Darwinian spectacle of turbulent energies: hate-mongering, blaming, fleeing, chasing, murdering and devouring, these past three years.

    Despite this sad reality, gangs of critics who fought Goodluck Jonathan and the PDP off, tend to downplay Buhari and his APC’s ineptitude and ethical ambiguities. For instance, ex-pension boss, Abdulrasheed Maina’s scandalous reinstatement in very suspicious circumstances, has failed to incite appropriate resent. But that is just a tip of the iceberg.

    At the moment, gangs of oil thieves, striving in twos and threes, fours and fives have made it on to the boards of Nigeria’s most lucrative cash cows, the country’s public corporations. From their vantage positions, it becomes easier to cause fuel scarcity, prevent stable electricity, dominate import/export business, steal public funds, influence election results. No thanks to President Buhari and his expedient gospel of ‘change.’

    Buhari wants to free Nigeria from corruption but he is hobbled by desperate lust to play sweetheart to the Nigerian electorate and the nefarious cabal by whose designs he believes he is able to maintain his feeble hold on power.

    Jonathan’s government was atrocious but Buhari’s government as it is, manifests as a political grand opera of instability, double-speak, over-hyped achievements, anguish and resentment.

    There is no use blaming Buhari. He probably meant well until the lust for power overwhelmed the supposed patriot in him. Ensconced in his high office, he lives immune to the ravages of infrastructural lack, declining naira, power outage, insecurity, unemployment and endemic poverty snuffing lives out in the cities, suburbs and backwaters.

    Thus it was mortifying to hear his deputy, Yemi Osinbajo, harp on the APC’s capacity to live up to its campaign promise by paying N5, 000 monthly to impoverished families in the country. Where? How? Why should that be an achievement to be proud of?

    Speaking on the initiative in the run-up to the March 28 presidential polls, Osinbajo stated that the initiative was meant to support 25 million of 119 million extremely poor Nigerians who earn less than N200 a day to take care of their families. The vice president added that the fast way of dealing with that was the N5,000 monthly Conditional Cash Transfer Programme.

    “We will give N5, 000 to the poorest 25 million over a phased period, if their children are enrolled in school and participate in immunization…So we are actually doing two things; we are giving stipends to the very poorest and ensuring that in order to earn that stipend they certify two conditions,” he said.

    Hmmm…To think we had higher expectations of Osinbajo and Buhari. I would rather they regale us with facts and figures about measures they took to restore stable electricity supply, revivify comatose industry, revolutionise education, healthcare, provide good roads among others.

    These were achievable in the past three years – at least in convincing phases – had the APC truly devoted resources to tackling crucial social problems.

    Buhari and Osinbajo were supposed to be great men. Nigerians reposed trust in them believing they were invulnerable to the lure of illusionary politics and celebritized governance.

    A vote for Buhari/Osinbajo resonated as a vote for men with permanent personalities, integrity and values. The Buhari/Osinbajo Nigerians voted for didn’t just care about winning for personal gain alone – at least we thought – or conquering to perpetrate vendettas, hedonism, and oppression – atrocities several members of their cabinet and the ruling party are guilty of.

    We didn’t vote Buhari/Osinbajo to celebritise victimhood or blame-casting. We voted them to improve governance, provide stable electricity, revivify comatose industry, enable entrepreneurship, provide employment opportunities, improve quality healthcare, education, among others.

    Does the APC’s performance in the past three years excite electorate will to retain it in power come 2019? Has the Buhari/Osinbajo team performed well? I would give them a resounding score of 20 over 100 (20%) – obtainable by the administration’s convincing anti-corruption war.

    Notwithstanding the incumbent administration’s apparent shortcomings, the ancient political rite of domination by the attractive person with deep pocket or sheer political capital, will manifest in keeping it in power. We see it in political cult followership of characters like Atiku Abubakar, and President Buhari.

    Thus this year, Nigerians will foolishly bicker and fight in support or against Atiku Abubakar, Buhari and any situational clown that would express his ambition to contest the presidential seat.

    Nigerians will make uninformed choices, as usual. The eye elects and the mind accepts a galvanizing object and formalizes the union in espoused politics, bigotries, ethics – all of a political nature.

    This imposes a hierarchic character on the electorate, making all receptors of the beloved’s manna. The structure is sadomasochistic. Infinitely subservient.

    This year, the cycle continues and the feeling accentuates of Nigeria as the proverbial ragged babe caught in a cycle of cannibalism enacted by the APC and PDP, savages attacking and retreating in obsessive rhythms of victory and defeat.

    Nigeria, the ragged babe, is thrust to the savages for the umpteenth time; they nail her down to a rock in their slaughterhouse of greed; they bind iron thorns around her head, pierce her unformed nipples, hands and feet. They cut her heart out to sup on its blood.

    Picture us as the ragged child; the pre-nubile damaged girl. The savages live on our shrieks and cries. They nourish from our interminable miseries, pain and death. They grow young as we grow old.

    If we retain them in power, innocence dies by degenerate experience.

  • ‘2017 was year of growth for African start-ups’

    A member of the judging panel evaluating the Southern Africa edition of the Global Start-up Awards (GSA) in 2018, Barbara Mallinson, has said 2017 was a good year for Africa’s start-up ecosystem.

    “It feels like 2017 is when the start-up scene finally grew up in Africa. For years, innovative things have been built and taken to market, but very few of these innovations managed to scale and exit successfully. This year was different. We’ve seen funding and scaling and exits on a level that’s comparable to the States or Europe. Startups that stood out to me include Luno for how they got their timing right. The combination of the perceived risk of holding local currency and the global trend to get into crypto-currencies has resulted in huge growth and a significant Series B for the crypto-currency exchange and wallet. There is also Sweep South and I’m just a fan of their model and can see it working in many different areas,” Mallinson said.

    Mallinson believes despite the usual ongoing challenges faced by African start-ups, greater access to funding and other avenues of support will encourage home-grown entrepreneurs to compete.

    “There’ll still be the usual market access challenges that we’ve come to tolerate over the past few years but on top of this, there’ll also be greater competition from other start-ups. These days, it’s a whole lot easier to start a business, receive operational support and gain access to funding than it was before. And because of this, many more people are choosing to do so.

    “Nearly all of the continent’s most successful start-ups have come from cities such as Jo’burg, Cape Town, Cairo, Nairobi, Accra, Kigali, Kampala and Lagos. It’s not surprising, since each of these cities has an established and flourishing start-up eco-system that plays host to numerous incubators, accelerators, investors and industry events. The next step however, is to scale these opportunities beyond the big cities, where needs are often greater and innovative solutions could make a bigger difference,” Mallison added.

    The Southern Africa edition of the Global Start-up Awards has a total of 13 award categories including best start-up founder, best incubator and best fin-tech start-up of the year.

    Judges will make shortlists from all the online nominations received before a jury scores each of the finalists per category. A public vote will then be conducted and added to the jury’s score.

    Winners will be crowned for each participating country in the region before the regional awards take place in the third quarter of 2018 followed by the global award show.

    Online nominations will open on  March 5, 2018 via the competition’s official website.

    Mckevin Ayaba, Regional Director for GSA-Southern Africa said: “Start-ups from here don’t get to be on the limelight because we don’t always have the people who that they ca make it to the next level. We want to recognise them because technology is shaping the future of the world and we need to encourage start-ups to keep doing this important work.”

  • Enter the year of politics, sports

    It’s a new dawn and new challenges over the next 12 months. Deputy Editor (News) ADENIYI ADESINA examines the issues that are likely to shape the world this year.

    Welcome to the year of politics and sports.

    There will continue to be diplomatic tussle on the world stage for economic and military superiority. There will be scientific discoveries; climate change will still be dominant as usual in spite of the United States (U.S.) pulling out of the Paris Agreement but politics and sports will take the centre stage this year.

     

    North Korea

    North Korea and its eccentric leader Kim Jong Un will remain on the front burner. The ‘Rocket Man’ is believed to be getting set to fire another missile this month in spite of protestation from all including its ally, China.

    From Hockey World Cup in India to the Commonwealth Games in Australia, the winter Olympics in South Korea – amid the fear of the North Korean nuclear threat – to the football World Cup, the single largest sport fiesta, holding in summer in Russia, sport is it.

     

    Sports

    The June World Cup will be one of the two important events holding in Russia this year. The second is the general election in March. President Vladimir Putin will get another six-year term on completion of which he will become the longest ruler in Russia’s modern history.

    It’s a new dawn in Liberia. Former World’s best footballer George Weah, will take office as President after a landslide victory in a second round ballot against Vice President Joseph Boakai.

    Nigeria will be full of action because the politicking for the 2019 elections will take place this year. The elections are billed for next year’s February and March.

    Party primaries to pick candidates and the stumping will happen this year as the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) after regaining its groove with a relatively successful convention, gears up to dislodge the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) from Aso Villa.

     

    Ekiti, Osun governorship polls

    Governorship elections are billed for mid-year in two south west states – Ekiti and Osun.

    Governors Ayodele Fayose (Ekiti) and Rauf Aregbesola (Osun) are ineligible to contest. A grueling battle for the top positions is predicted. The governors won’t find it easy to instal successor.

    No doubt, the elections will be rancorous and the two major parties will be stretched thin. Already, the scramble to be standard bearers is fully on course.

     

    Cuba

    History will be made in Cuba where power will change hands from a Castro to another person for the first time in 58 years.

    After two unsuccessful attempts, Fidel Castro, supported by his brother Raul and other radicals, took over the reins after President Fulgencio Batista fled the country in 1959.

    Many Cubans never knew any other ruler than a Castro because revolutionary leader Fidel Castro loomed so large until he was bedridden and had to vacate office in 2008 for his brother and long-standing deputy, Raul.

    Raul was head of the armed forces and defence minister before he became Fidel’s deputy and successor-designate.

    It is to Raul’s credit that socialism was reformed and there was a thaw in the frosty relationship between Cuba and the U.S. to the extent that they have restored diplomatic relationship.

    The 86-year old is stepping down after two terms of 10 years.

     

    Trump

    President Donald Trump will know how much he has impacted his people with his’ America First’ and ‘Make America Great’ slogans,  when the mid-term elections are held in the United States in November. It will be a referendum on his presidency.

    Many senatorial and House seats will be up for contest as well as some governorship seats. The teaser to what is to come is Trump’s Republican loss of an Alabama senate seat to the Democrats for the first time in 25 years.

     

    South America

    South American countries will get new leaders after elections across the major countries of that continent.

    Brazil, which has been bedeviled by political crises and allegations of graft against its political class, will elect a president in October following Mexico’s presidential poll in July.

    How do you handle Trump? That question will dominate the campaign. The U.S. President is insistent on building a wall on the United States border with Mexico, with a warning that Mexico will pick the bill, without saying how.

    Mexicans will elect a leader who can best handle the matter in Mexico’s overriding national interest.

    Columbia will in May hold its first presidential election since the armistice with the FARC rebels. The end of one of the longest running wars will determine the economic situation of the country.

    European countries Sweden and Italy are also due to pick new parliament and prime ministers. While the Catalonia Independence bid in Spain will dominate headlines in the year.

    The result of the election called by Madrid after sacking the government in the rich region in which the separatists carried the day, is a slap in the face of Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.

     

    Congo DRC

    Congo will also be able to shake off the Kabila dominance which started in 1997 when Laurent Kabila overthrew dictator Mobutu Sese Seko and assumed leadership.

    His son Joseph took over in January 2001 after Laurent was assassinated by one of his bodyguards.

    President Joseph Kabila had to be pressured by the International community to allow election which will hold later this year.

    Kabila completed his constitutional two terms and kept the country in abeyance thereafter.

    He neither set a date for election nor sought constitutional amendment for tenure elongation. He only said there was no money to conduct an election.

    The opposition which saw this as tenure elongation by subterfuge picked up the gauntlet.

    When the vast country with the second highest population on the African continent was becoming ungovernable, the United Nations (UN) and the African Union (AU) intervened and a date for election set. Will Kabila respect it?

     

    South Africa

    South Africa will also politick a lot this year although the general election to pick President Jacob Zuma’s replacement is next year.

    However, there is a possibility that Zuma may be ousted before he is due to exit.

    The president’s hold on the African National Congress (ANC) is ebbing.

    Zuma supported his former wife Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma for the party’s leadership position but Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa, with whom he is estranged, was elected. Ramaphosa, one of the ANC leaders that the late President Nelson Mandela pushed to boost the Black men in business and who enjoys the confidence of the business community, is poised to become the next President of the Republic.

    Britain will know its fate and its new economic direction as the Brexit negotiations get to a critical point.

    The world’s attention will also be glued to the UK in May when Prince Harry takes American Meghan Merkel to the altar in a marriage that will shatter many royal traditions.

     

    Russia 2018

    While Nigeria will be nominally represented at the Winter Olympics, the same cannot be said of the World Cup in June in Russia.

    The Super Eagles, carrying Nigeria’s flag in the same group with Croatia, Iceland and Argentina, are expected to put up a great performance and break the country’s World Cup Performance record.

    This will be Nigeria’s sixth appearance since 1994’s debut, but the country has never progressed beyond the second round. A quarter final place, and a defeat of Argentina, which defeated the Eagles in the last five editions will bring smile to the faces of soccer-loving Nigerians.

  • Ghost of the year

    Ghost of the year

    The year never ends until we chronicle its kingpins of comedy, those who unveil its underbellies of humour. The real humourists, though, are not persons who go out of their ways to crack our ribs. They make us laugh just by being themselves in the routine glories of their days. And they could even be genuinely appalled at our amusements. They are not I go dye O, or that tribe of humanity who write out skits or jokes with a view to the punch line. Anything they do is a kaboom of laughter. They take themselves seriously while we keel over. But we never cheer them on, and they hate us if we do. The stages are not artificial. There are no paid audiences, or advertisement jingles to invite us to their acts. Ironically, they are funny because they are sad. The best comedies, whether it is Shakespeare’s AS You Like it or Soyinka’s Jero Plays, hint at the visceral pain inside us. Through them, we mock ourselves.

     

    Ghost of the Year

    The winner is Ben Murray Bruce. This was a year we neither heard from him nor saw him. He was like Ralph Ellison’s The Invisible Man. When he became senator, we did not hear enough of the oyibo media mogul. His debut act was the Silver Birds Awards in Eko Hotel. He decorated himself as the common-sense commoner. He would disinfect Nigerian politics and governance of its grand follies. He had come that we may have senses and have them more abundantly.

    In line with his cult of common sense, he would pooh-pooh first class flights, forgo the fancy craze of luxury hotels, patronise the local humility of Innoson-made cars. In a flourish of the lowly, an Innoson car sat without proclaiming itself in the hall in a parody of a dealership. He sported a face of mock gravity that hardly concealed his cheerful vanity, as a revolutionary recruit of the Nigerian political elite.

    But he had a giddy fall from his common-sense horse when AMCON revealed that his Silver Birds had been one of Nigeria’s whited sepulchres, a phony, slivery shine over a cadaver of debt, other people’s money. So, the bluster about injecting sanity in a body politic adrift was all a lie. At the Silver Birds Award night, then Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan of Delta State saw perfidy in his claims and wondered if Murray-Bruce would muster the guts to make such a bluster half-way through his tenure. Uduaghan did not even know that the man would be a ghost. Silence, they say, is golden. His is ghostly.

     

    Artist of the year

    He is an orator with a supernova smile, but the man beat any contender as the artist of choice. With his statue of another comedian from another part of the world, Rochas Okorocha, sometimes described as Owelle, is our artist of the year. He gave us a statue of Jacob Zuma, the dancing ecstasy of a politician and parody of a leader of South Africa. Okorocha’s imagination tucked away the bust of the Madiba or locals like Achebe, or Azikiwe or Ojukwu because the Imo State governor wanted to amuse us. No ribs would stir at sculptural tributes to those men. He made his point, and the headlines bustled across the country. No less inspired was this from the bowel of Sigmund Freud: “Zuma’s erection, Okorocha’s pains.” If the Freudian power is hard to miss about a man who wanted his people to be so happy, he appointed his sister to promote its ministry.

     

    Worshippers of the year

    During the Middle Ages, a cleric and intellectual Peter Abelard asked the question, “when did God become man?” You only had to watch the video of celebrants when our dear president Muhammadu Buhari emerged after months away to take care of his health. The streets in some parts of the country erupted in raptures with adorers for his return in good health. The videos were unmistakable in their pious adoration. Men and women were flailing in worshipful reverie. On a roadside, a woman fell to her knees in rhapsodies. Not just that, she bowed many times with her forehead pasted with dust from its trip up and down the ground. Another person poured water on the ground and drank it. It did not matter if a person had defecated or urinated there before, or any other sort of impurity.

    This was worship that trumped any in the church or mosque in the whole year. They were answering Abelard’s question over 500 years later. They were saying that in 2017 God became man in their president.

     

    Dancer of the year

    A tragedy foreshadowed it. His feet must have wobbled and collapsed when his brother, the charismatic Isiaka Adeleke, passed on.  But he was asked to fill his brother’s shoes in the Senate. To do that, he found his dancing shoes. On soap boxes, his dance moves prophesied the thrills to come. But polls were serious, and he had to win first. Win he did. And the dance floor was never the same again. From the victory stage in Osun State to the church in Atlanta, Demola Adeleke, the roundish, pot-bellied happy senator was at it. He stole the show anytime and every time, and he found many times to dance. He made law-making into choreography. His heavy frame yielded to the nimble flow of his rhythms, sometimes led by his paunch, or head or even feet, his face lit up as the crowd allowed him room to roam. As a metaphor for his colleagues, he had no rhythms in ideas on the Senate floor, where even his waist did not spin. His nephew, the well-known singer Davido, waded in and described the thespian senator as Nigeria’s Michael Jackson. He probably has a point because the senator’s middle name is Jackson.

     

    General of the year

    Nnamdi Kanu had his secret service. He had his soldiers. Earlier in the year, he declared that he was going to war. No compromise to Nigeria that he described as a zoo. He was an Igbo general, he told himself, although he wore a cap that was a phony version of a man he would not brook: Obafemi Awolowo. Maybe because he envied him since Awo also went behind bars for treasonable felony. Kanu was that megalomaniac. He also had a sort of spectacle that had the rims that mimicked the Ikenne sage – sort of. But no matter. Kanu was pictured mounting a guard of honour. He played host to some mighty men of the east, and he began to see himself brushing shoulders with Buhari, his gaoler, in short order. Not until Buhari ordered the routing of his men, who had no resistance or a whimper of a prayer or even a war plan. The worst of it was the disappearance of Kanu. No one knows where he went, or how. The general even has no troops to remind us he once swayed in the east. What a war commander!

     

    Banker of the year

    He did not need a licence. He had no banking hall. He had no interest rates. Neither did he have a staff nor attend weekly meeting with other banks. Neither the CBN nor the President nor finance minister knew about him. Yet he had enough to float many a start-up, inspire a school project or even change a town in Nigeria. The bank had no name. Unlike others, the bank did not welcome anybody except the owner. It was perhaps the first secret bank known in Nigerian history. Under the control of Ayo Oke, and his wife, it had $43.4 million, 27 thousand pounds, and N23.2 million. It makes Ayo Oke, the former DG of the National Intelligence Agency, the banker of the year. It makes where the money was domiciled the apartment of the year. That is apartment 7b of Osborne Towers, Ikoyi. It was so important that a governor accused a minister of stealing the state’s money. No evidence. But it was good theatre.

  • VIPs who passed on during the year

    VIPs who passed on during the year

    Chief Dr. Alex Ekwueme

    Former Vice President, Dr. Alex Ekwueme, GCON, was one of the dignitaries snatched by the cold hand of death. After celebrating his 85th birthday in October, Ekwueme was said to have had a fall at his residence in Enugu, which caused his health to deteriorate. After some domestic battles in spite of which he fell into coma, he was flown abroad on the ticket of the federal government for urgent medical attention. But he eventually gave up the ghost in a London hospital on Sunday, November 19.

    A product of Kings College, Lagos, Ekweme studied Architecture and City Planning in the US and later got degrees in other disciplines, including a Law degree from the University of London. He obtained a Ph.D. in Architecture from the University of Strathclyde. He was a founding member of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) which eventually produced the President (Alhaji Shehu Aliyu Shagari) in the Second Republic, with Ekwueme as the Vice President.

    Dr. Ekwueme became one of the founding fathers of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and later vied for the party’s presidential ticket but lost it to Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo (rtd) who later became the President. Reputed as a peacemaker and a philanthropist, he was later called upon by the party to head its Reconciliation Committee in the wake of PDP’s intra-party discord.

     

    Maitama Sule

    Dr. Yusuf Maitama Sule, the  Dan masanin Kano and Nigeria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations passed away on 2 July 2017 in a hospital in Cairo, Egypt, after suffering from pneumonia and a chest infection . He was 87 years old.

    Prior to his appointment as the country’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, he was a presidential aspirant of the National Party of Nigeria in early 1979  but lost to Shehu Shagari. After the re-election of President Shagari in 1983, Maitama Sule was made the Minister for National Guidance, a portfolio designed to assist the president in tackling corruption.

    Before his  passage, the elder statesman who was born on  October 1, 1929 was on two occasions- 2013 and 2016, speculated to have died but the rumour was subsequently dispelled.

    As a politician, Maitama frowned at the use of religion and ethnicity as political tools to attain power.  He was critical of using them by politicians because he believed that they undermined the unity of the country.

    He came to national limelight as a member of the Northern Peoples Congress (NPC) and was elected into the House of Representatives, becoming the Minister of Mines and Oil from 1959 to 1966.

    Senator Isiaka Adeleke

    He was the first civilian governor of Osun state and a two time Nigerian Senator who represented the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in Osun State from 2007 to 2011 and was elected again under the banner of the All Progressives Congress in 2015. Sen. Isiaka Adeleke decided to aspire to lead the people of Osun in the next gubernatorial election. But little did anyone know that his dream will never be fulfilled. He returned from a political outing and met his death. His death raised a loud controversy which led to riots in Ede where he hails from. Mr Alfred Aderibigbe, a nurse, who was alleged to have administered overdose drugs on the late senator representing Osun West Senatorial District, denied the allegation before Coroner Inquest Panel, set up by the government, which was also suspected to have known something about his death.

    The death of Isiaka Adeleke, was eventually declared by Dr. Solaja Olufemi, the pathologist who conducted the autopsy examination on the late senator, aBy Paul Ukpabio

    nd who testified before the coroner inquest in Osogbo, to be linked to excessive dose of analgesics, sedatives and alcohol. Contrary to the claim of some people, who thought he was poisoned.

     

    Adeleke In March 2008 instituted a scholarship award for about 100 indigent students in tertiary institutions across the country. He held a Bachelor of Arts Degree, and a master’s degree In Public Administration. He was Chairman, Governing Council, Nigerian Export Promotion Council, Pro-Chancellor and Chairman, Governing Council, University of Calabar, Nigeria.

     

    Gen. Adeyinka Adebayo

    He was a soldier, an elder statesman and a leader of the Yoruba Council of Elders. He was appointed Military Governor of the western Region, after the death of Colonel Adekunle Fajuiyi. After the civil war, he became chairman of the committee for the Reconciliation and Integration of Biafra.

    He retired in 1975. As a politician, he joined the National Party of Nigeria. He was in year 2013 appointed by President Goodluck Jonathan as the Pro Chancellor of the University of Ibadan. He is one lucky Nigerian leader whose son Niyi Adebayo became a governor of Ekiti state. He is said also to have been a notable leader who showed exemplary leadership and died on March 8, 2017, on the eve of his 89th birthday.

     

    Dr. Sam Ogbemudia

    Ex-Military Governor of Mid-West State, which later became Bendel State, and Edo state, Dr Sam Ogbemudia, was one of those who joined his ancestors this year 2017. A soldier and politician, he was highly revered in Edo state and it was not a surprise to many, when Governor Obaseki, the present governor of Edo state, declared a seven day mourning after his death was announced.

    A political colossus who left his footprint in the sands of time, Dr Ogbemudia was also known for his peacemaking efforts among his kinsmen and Nigerian politicians. And many did seek out his advice, while he was alive.

     

    He was said to have battled diabetes and high blood pressure since 1970. Suffered partial stroke in year 2016 and he died on March 7, 2017 at the age of 84. He was buried in the grave he prepared before he died, besides his late wife’s grave.

     

    Dr. Onukaba Adinoyi-Ojo

    Perhaps he wouldn’t have died if armed robbery had not turned to a huge social menace in Nigeria. Perhaps Dr. Adinoyi Ojo, the ex- Managing Director of Daily Times would have been alive to spend this festive end of the year season with his friends and loved ones. But no, he fell to the attack of armed robbers on the Illesa – Akure road on his way back from Abeokuta to Abuja, after attending the 80th birthday celebration of former President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo.

    Dr. Adinoyi-Ojo, who was former Vice President Atiku Abubakar’s Senior Special Assistant, Public Communication, is said to have at a point in his life got what is general known as a good job with the United Nation. But he opted to be in Nigeria, working to help the development of the country.

    As a journalist, he was known to have had a good relationship with his professional colleagues, and was an author and playwright.

     

    Prof. Abubakar Momoh

    Fondly known as the political whiz kid of the Department of Political Science, Lagos State University, Prof. Abubakar Momoh, the Director-General of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Electoral Institute, in Abuja, died at a time nobody expected he would.

    A renown Professor of Political Science, Momoh started his lecturing career in the year 1988. He went on to become the Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences in LASU. At his death, the Vice Chancellor of Lagos State University described his death as a huge loss and that the whole University Community is deeply saddened by the demise of the renowned Professor.

    Momoh served in several capacities on various boards and scientific committees in Nigeria and abroad. A former Vice President of the African Association of Political Science (AAPS), and National Treasurer, the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), 1991-1995. He has been a researcher and lecturer at many universities across the world, as well as being a research Fellow.

    He served as Election Observer to several African countries on behalf of ECOWAS and the African Union, as well as to some European countries. Unfortunately, Momoh, lost his father earlier in the year. He was buried on May 29th 2017 at Auchi, Edo State, where he hailed from.

     

    Prof. Andrew Nok

    He was the Kaduna State Commissioner for Education, Science and Technology, Kaduna, who died at the age of 55 on November 21, 2017. Prof Andrew Nok was said to have been rushed to National Hospital, Abuja due to sickness, three weeks before his death. But he had recovered and he was expected to return to work.

    A former university don, he left the Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Science, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, when on July 29, 2015, he was appointed Commissioner for Health and Human Services, and later became the commissioner of education, science technology on May 4, 2016.

    Nok who held a master and doctorate degree in biochemistry from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, was noted to have made some revolutionary contribution to the ministry of health in Kaduna state, whule there as a commissioner.

    He was a recipient of the Nigerian National Order of Merit Award in 2010 in the science category and several awards and research grants, including Alexander Von Homboldt Prize in 2013 for his work in finding a cure for Trypanosomiasis.

    He was also a Fellow of the Nigerian Academy of Science, Alexander Von Homboldt Foundation and Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

     

    Alhaji Gidado Idris

    Alhaji Gidado Idris was the former Secretary to the Government of Federation (SGF). A well-known technocrat, he died this year at the ripe age of 82 year in Abuja after a brief illness. At his death, his friends described his as having been a “humble, thorough and simple man who was very accessible to whoever stepped into his office as SGF.”

    Alhaji Gidado Idris hailed from Zaria in Kaduna State. He was appointed SGF in 1993 and he retired in 1999 after a civil service career that started before Nigeria’s independence. He served variously in the military and civilian government in Nigeria before his retirement.

     

    Teikumo Ikoli

    Nigerian Navy lost one of his able personnel when in April of this year, the Fleet Commander of the Western Naval Command, Nigerian Navy, Rear Admiral Daniel Ikoli, was found dead at his Apapa, Lagos residence.

    Lieutenant commander Chinwe Umar, the spokesperson for the Western Naval Command, confirmed that gunshots was said to have been heard in the early hours of Wednesday April 5, 2017, in the vicinity where Rear Admiral Teikumo Daniel Ikoli resides in Apapa, Lagos.

    And when his room was opened, he was found dead. Ikoli, a rear admiral, was Commander, Nigerian Navy Ship (NNS) BEECROFT and later appointed into the Presidential Committee on the probe of arms deal before he became Fleet Commander, Western Naval Command. It was gathered that the naval officer left the office, on Tuesday afternoon, after complaining he was not feeling too well. It was also suggested that he was depressed and had fears of possibly being assassinated due to his involvement in the arms probe.

    A suicide angle was also raised as he was found in the pool of his own blood. He was 52 years old.

     

    Alhaji Kabir Umar

    The Emir of Katagum Emirate in Bauchi State, Alhaji Kabir Umar was also one of the prominent Nigerians who departed this year. He died at age 89. His death was announced by the state governor, Mohammed Abdullahi Abubakar, who declared that the royal father was upright, just and kept the teachings of the Holy Prophet Muhammad whose death is a great loss to the state and Nigeria as a whole.

    The late Emir it was recorded had 49 children as at the time of his death. He struggled with a protracted illness for a period of five years. He was buried at his palace in Azare.

     

    AVM Olufunsho Martins

    The death of Retired Air Vice-Marshal Olufunsho Martin was indeed a painful one. Martins who lived at Park view estate, Ikoyi, Lagos, died in a lone accident in a Ford Explorer Sports Utility Vehicle with his driver on the third Mainland bridge, after his car somersaulted and plunged into the lagoon.

    The Lagos State Emergency Management Agency, LASEMA which swung into a rescue action along with efforts of local divers, was fruitful in recovering the remains of the air Vice Marshal and his driver from the Lagoon many hours after the incident occurred.

    He was said to have just returned from the United Kingdom for a burial in Nigeria. AVM Olufunsho Martins held several appointments within the Nigerian Air Force. He was the commandant, Rehab Oshodi and AOL HQ NAF. As a businessman who owned and event centre and was also into estate business.

  • 2017: Year of the trafficker

    The West’s quest for conquest has changed the world in very remarkable ways. Continents boasting knowledgeable rulers and sophisticated empires have been ‘discovered’ and given names. So have great rivers, one of them Niger, which have always supported life on such continents. In time, as in the case of Nigeria, bustling population became an irresistible temptation. Energetic youths of both sexes were just what was needed to keep the master’s fields and factories running. So across the Atlantic the human cargo sailed on crammed ships until the voyage ended on the shores of Europe and the Americas. While it lasted, those who became too weak, or too sickly, or too stubborn were simply picked up and tossed into the sea to feed the grateful population of flesh-eating creatures and counted as marginal loss of merchandise. Those who made it to the shore soon started a new slave-master relationship. That much was clear to both sides.

    Times have changed. Trade in humans has been outlawed, and there is a semblance of freedom and equality across the world. In the fullness of time a black man would become the president of the United States of America, occupying the most powerful office on earth.

    This is surreal.

    But how much has really changed? Not much. The West’s taste for cheap African labour is as insatiable as ever. So is the desire for female African flesh.

    It is not a one-way ride. Indeed, Africans now own the latest layer of the trade. The only difference is that they have grown wiser this time. In the past, a white man carted off his human merchandise upon the exchange of such insignificant articles as a labelled bottle of kai-kai or strong drink, a sheet of looking glass, or a pack of cigarettes.

    Not anymore. Africans now sit on top of well-oiled networks of human traffickers and smugglers who make the supplies for a handsome fee. The white man or the Arab need not move a muscle. A multi-million naira trafficking ring delivers the goods.

    This year a CNN Libya slave auction footage shook the world, from Washington to other global capitals. An unhealthy number of ‘articles’ on the slave market are Nigerians, some of whom sold and resold.

    Throughout the outgoing year, we heard and read blood-chilling accounts of young compatriots bruised and battered and dehumanised by their traffickers. The other day there was an unverified video of a man urinating into a subdued black lady’s mouth, something touted to be one more proof of Nigerian migrants’ ordeal these days of atrocities in Libya.

    It is the story of the year, of how young Nigerians leave their homes and country, sometimes without the consent of their parents. It is the story of hazardous journeys through an inhospitable desert through Niger to Libya, and from the coast of that North African country to the coast of Spain and beyond. It is the story of starvation, of thirst, of horror, and of death at the hands of murderous robbers and rapists. There are tales of women forced to offer their flesh to multiples of men in one night. Some pass away in the act, some live to report it.

    It is the story that starts from the neighbourhood. A Nigerian trafficker gains the ears of a jobless or poorly-paid compatriot and sells the bogus tale of better life in Europe. Eager to break the cycle of poverty and ineffectual government, the prey bites the bait and soon ends up a sex slave, prostitute or forced labourer, stripped of every human dignity, and robbed of the cash that lured them away from home in the first place.

    There are frequent TV footages of bloated bodies washed up on Spanish or Italian coasts, and of migrants picked up as their dangerous boats managed to make it to the shore.

    This sordid development has got the world talking, a good part of it trying unsuccessfully to absolve themselves of blame. But if you blame the Libyan or the Italian or the Spanish, how much blame should be reserved for Nigerian traffickers, without whom this criminality would not have started? Is there anyone to beat the trafficker to this year’s person of the year award?