Public Affairs Analyst

“It has been a tough year for Nigeria and I hope next year will be a much more prosperous one,” - President Muhammadu Buhari on December 25, 2017 Compliment of the season! It’s barely four days to the end of the year and what a year it has been! I recently joined the Arise TV as an in-house analyst and on Christmas day we had a one hour documentary on the issues that defined the outgoing year. There were so many things tabled for discussion but time was so insufficient that many of them had to be shelved for discussion on another day. For me seven key issues defined Nigeria in 2017. They are the 154 days of medical tourism by the president, the restructuring debate, the budget imbroglio, the herders versus farmers faceoff, the economic recovery and growth plan, the lingering fuel scarcity, the party politics and preparation for 2019 General Elections.  All these can be subsumed under politics or economy. In the outgoing year, President Muhammadu Buhari was out of the country ...

A public affairs analyst, Jide Ojo, also told Sunday Sun that the yearly quagmire in the budgetary process occurs due to lack of political will by the government to do things right.   He said: “For me, the problem is lack of political will to do the right thing. We cannot say that we don’t have competent hands in a country of 180 million people that can deliver a sound, foolproof, and credible budgetary process. But it’s like there is too much politicking in that process because of inherent corruption. A lot of people want to take maximum advantage of that exercise to enrich themselves, communities and cronies. I mean in all good conscience, how could  you say that a country like Nigeria with experts in all spheres of human endeavour cannot assemble a committee of experts that will plug and deal with all the issues we perennially have with our budgetary process?  We have been told that the 2018 budget is allegedly padded. The bottom line is that those estimations are f...

"People with disabilities are also people with extraordinary talent.  Yet they are too often forgotten.  When people with disabilities are denied opportunities, they are more likely to fall into poverty -- and people living in conditions of poverty are more likely to develop disabilities.  As long as societies exclude those with disabilities, they will not reach their full potential and the poor in particular will be denied opportunities that they deserve." - Paul Wolfowitz, Former World Bank President. According to United Nations Covenant on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, “Persons with disabilities include those who have long-term physical, mental, intellectual, or sensory impairments which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others.”  From time immemorial, PwDs form the bulk of Nigeria’s community of beggars. Perhaps because many of them are destitute – poor, feeble, ...

“Politics is not a game to be played by the poor. A poor person has no role in politics. A poor man cannot win election in Nigeria, how will you campaign. If you are poor, stay in your house.”  – Senator Adeseye Ogunlewe, former Minister of Works and Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria Senator Adeseye Ogunlewe is a political juggernaut. A former senator and minister as well as governorship aspirant in Lagos State. I watched him on Politics Today , a political programme of Channels Television anchored by Seun Okinbaloye on Friday, December 1, 2017. The topic was the chairmanship tussle of the Peoples Democratic Party. The party’s elective convention is due next Saturday in Abuja. The political tactician answered the questions posed to him deftly. He revealed that he was backing Chief Olabode George for the chairmanship position because the man has sacrificed a lot for the party. He described a move for a consensus candidate from Lagos or the south-west as undemocratic. In...