Public Affairs Analyst

  The National Assembly has set in motion committees to further alter the 1999 Constitution. President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, on February 14, 2024, constituted a 45-member Committee on Constitution Review chaired by the Deputy President of the Senate, Jibrin Barau. The House of Representatives Committee on Constitution Review had already issued a Call for Memoranda, enjoining Nigerians to submit memoranda or proposals for further amendments to the constitution on a variety of thematic areas, including the Nigeria Police and security architecture, public revenue, fiscal federation and revenue allocation, judicial reforms, electoral reforms, traditional institutions, gender-related issues, process of state creation, state access to mining, among others, as well as any other matter that will promote good governance and welfare of all persons in the country on the principles of freedom, equality and justice. I had wished for an exercise that would be driven by the executive bra

  For some time now, a group of dissidents have been gathering under the platform of Yoruba Nation Agitators. On Sunday, May 28, 2023, people suspected of being members of the Yoruba Nation agitators reportedly hijacked Amuludun 99.1 FM in Ibadan around 6am that day. Amuludun FM is a community station owned by the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria. Seven of the agitators were arrested and charged to court by the Oyo State Government. Emboldened by that previous successful attack, members of the group last Saturday, April 13, 2024, invaded Oyo State Government House and the state House of Assembly in Ibadan and attempted to hoist their flag and take over the premises. However, the combined efforts of the Nigeria Police, Nigerian Army and Amotekun Corps foiled their sinister attempt with 21 of them arrested. According to this newspaper in its yesterday, April 16 edition, The Oyo State Commissioner of Police, Hazmat Adebola, on Monday, April 15 paraded 21 suspected Yoruba Nation agit

  On April 4, 2024, civil society organisations on the platform of the West Africa Civil Society Institute with funding support from the Ford Foundation met in Lagos to find a lasting solution to the threat to democracy in the West Africa sub-region. I was one of the participants at the august event. The meeting came on the heels of a similar one held in Accra in November 2023 and on March 11, 2024, with the leadership of the Economic Community of West African States. At the one-day roundtable were representatives of civil society organisations from Anglophone and francophone West Africa such as Nigeria, Ghana, Guinea, Niger Republic, Senegal and Burkina Faso. A scene-setter presentation on “Socio-political and Economic Context of Democracy in West Africa” was made by Ikemesit Effiong of SBM Intelligence, Nigeria. Keen observers of West Africa’s political crisis will know that there is a worrisome trend in the sub-region as it is classified as the “coup belt” of Africa, having witnes

  Health is wealth so says a popular adage. Out of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, at least two of them are health-related. Goal 3 says, “Good health and well-being” while Goal 6 speaks to “clean water and sanitation.” Truth be told, Nigeria’s health services are largely in disarray. Doctors, Nurses and other health workers in public health institutions are overworked and underpaid. No wonder many of them voted with their feet and emigrated to Europe, America, the Middle East, including other African countries to ply their trade. An October 20, 2022 report in Premium Times quoted the then President of the Nigerian Medical Association, Uche Rowland, as having said at a symposium, “One doctor is available to treat 30,000 patients in some southern states, while in the North, it is one doctor to 45,000 patients. In some rural areas, patients have to travel more than 30km from their abodes to get medical attention where available; thus making access to healthcare a ra

  It is very disheartening that in 2024, the provision of a stable electricity supply remains a political campaign rhetoric. Nigeria is a laughing stock of the global community as a country whose citizens rely on different sizes and shapes of private electricity generators to power their homes and businesses. Billions of dollars of investments in the power sector have only yielded a mere 4,500 megawatts of public electricity supply. All the various reforms including privatisation of electricity generation and distribution haven’t impacted positively on the electricity supply chain. Even the payment of subsidies to power distribution companies has not made electricity readily available to consumers. Nigeria at present has 27 electricity generating companies popularly called GenCos and 11 power distribution companies better known as DisCos and they include Abuja, Benin, Eko, Enugu, Ibadan, Ikeja, Jos, Kaduna, Kano, Port Harcourt and Yola DisCos. The Minister of Power, Chief Adebayo Ade

  One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well. — Virginia Woolf Nigerians are angry with their government at all levels. According to the ace Nigerian novelist, Buchi Emecheta, “A hungry man is an angry one.” The Yoruba people will say hunger does not cohabit with any other thing (ebi kii wo’nu ki oro mi wo). In case you don’t know, the French Revolution, 1789 – 1790s, was precipitated by bread shortages. According to History.com, “The storming of the medieval fortress of Bastille on July 14, 1789, began as a hunt for arms—and grains to make bread.   The French Revolution was obviously caused by a multitude of grievances more complicated than the price of bread, but bread shortages played a role in stoking anger towards the monarchy.” In the Holy Bible, Matthew 12 verses 1 – 4, “One Sabbath, Jesus was strolling with his disciples through a field of ripe grain. Hungry, the disciples were pulling off the heads of grain and munching on them. Some Pharisees

  Since Senator Abdul Ningi, (PDP, Bauchi Central) blew the whistle on budget padding by the National Assembly through his BBC interview on Saturday, March 9, 2024, many Nigerians have been gaslighting and scapegoating the federal lawmakers. Yes, they have their hands in Nigeria’s cookie jar but is the executive on any moral high ground on this matter? I don’t think so. Not even the whistleblower, Abdul Ningi, can be exonerated over this matter. According to Premium Times newspaper of Sunday, March 17, 2024, “The emergence of the phrase “budget padding” into Nigeria’s political lexicon could be traced to 2016, when Abdulmummin Jibrin, the then chairperson of the House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations, accused the then Speaker, Yakubu Dogara, and some principal officers of the House of padding the budget of the House with projects….. However, controversies over the insertion of projects into the budget could be traced to the beginning of this Fourth Republic.” Premium

  Since news broke about the Federal Executive Council’s approval of the implementation of Steve Oronsaye report on the merger and acquisition of Ministries Department and Agencies on Monday, February 26, 2024, I have granted several media interviews on the subject matter. The approval for implementation is a welcome but belated decision. It should have been one of the first things President Bola Tinubu would do shortly after his inauguration. Furthermore, it is not going to be far-reaching enough to reduce the rising cost of governance in Nigeria. According to this newspaper report in yesterday’s edition, 12 years after it received the Stephen Oronsaye report, the Federal Government, on Monday, approved the implementation of some of its recommendations to reduce the cost of governance. Consequently, 29 government agencies will be merged even as eight parastatals will be subsumed into eight other agencies. More so, four agencies have been relocated to four various ministries, while o

  I have been a staunch advocate of state police despite the concerns raised in some quarters about the propensity of governors to grossly abuse the security outfit if created. Even the rank of Nigerian governors was divided on whether or not to establish state police. The southern governors were fully in support of this initiative, but their northern counterparts were not so enthusiastic initially. Thus, out of frustration, South-West governors of Lagos, Oyo, Ogun, Ondo, Ekiti, and Osun decided to establish the South-West Security Network, better known as Amotekun Corps, in January 2020. On Monday, February 12, 2024, governors elected under the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party met in Abuja and issued a communique in which they called for the establishment of state police with appropriate safeguards to prevent abuse. Earlier this month, the Lagos State House of Assembly also passed a resolution calling for the establishment of state police. Even this newspaper, in a February

  St. Valentine’s Day otherwise known as Lovers Day has come a long way. According to History.com, the Catholic Church recognises at least three different saints named Valentine or Valentinus, all of whom were martyred. One legend contends that Valentine was a priest who served during the third century in Rome. When Emperor Claudius II decided that single men made better soldiers than those with wives and families, he outlawed marriage for young men. Valentine, realising the injustice of the decree, defied Claudius and continued to perform marriages for young lovers in secret. When Valentine’s actions were discovered, Claudius ordered that he be put to death. Still others insist that it was Saint Valentine of Terni, a bishop, who was the true namesake of the holiday. He, too, was beheaded by Claudius II outside Rome. Other stories suggest that Valentine may have been killed for attempting to help Christians escape harsh Roman prisons, where they were often beaten and tortured. Accord

  Introduction Section 14(2)(b) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria says security and welfare of the citizens shall be the primary purpose of government. In 2024, neither of these two are being enjoyed by Nigerians. Compatriots feel unsafe in their own country and as for welfare, it’s a case of what legendary Afrobeat musician, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti call “Suffering and smiling”. Once upon a time, armed robbery, kidnapping and other crimes were largely restricted to the urban centres with many promising to run and hide in their villages from night marauders and criminals. Sadly, nowhere is safe any longer. The grassroot, I mean people in the communities, are facing so much unrest from criminal elements that they are now leaving their ancestral land in droves to seek refuge in towns and cities that have no succour for them. Truth be told, Nigeria is fast sliding to what the great political philosopher, Thomas Hobbes described in his 1651 famous book titled Levia