Public Affairs Analyst

  According to an online source, The Spruce, the term “RSVP” comes from the French expression répondezs’ilvousplaît, meaning “please respond.” If RSVP is written on an invitation, it means the host has requested that the guest should respond to say if they plan to attend the party.” Comically, RSVP has been twisted to mean, Rice and Stew Very Plenty. However, I’m using the acronym in the context of election. It means Register, Select, Vote and Protect your vote. The ‘R’ has been going on for sometime now. The Independent National Electoral Commission flagged off the current Continuous Voters Registration exercise since June 28, 2021. The commission for the first time introduced an innovation called online pre-registration where prospective registrants will fill in their details online and choose a date for the capturing of their biometrics and facials at any INEC office of their choice. This was done by the commission to avoid overcrowding at the registration centres.   More...

  The last off-cycle governorship election before the 2023 general elections was held last Saturday, July 16, 2022 in Osun State. The outcome was an upset for the ruling All Progressives Congress which had hoped to consolidate its hold on the agrarian state. However, the day after the poll, the Independent National Electoral Commission declared the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, Senator Ademola Adeleke, winner of the election. The Returning Officer for the poll and Vice Chancellor of the University of Lagos, Prof Oluwatoyin Ogundipe, announced that Adeleke got a total of 403,371 votes, beating the incumbent, Adegboyega Oyetola of the APC who got 375,027 votes in a keenly contested race. Osun State joined the league of states with off-season governorship election on November 26, 2010 when former Governor Rauf Aregbesola of the then Action Congress of Nigeria was able to prove electoral violence and malpractices in 10 out of the 30 local government areas of the state du...

  It’s the season of politics and a lot of intrigues are afloat. The most trending news now is the choice of the running mate to the All Progressives Congress standard bearer, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu. Since the unveiling of former governor of Borno State, Senator Kashim Shettima, as his running mate, many Christians have been expressing shock and disdain at the choice of another Muslim to complement and balance the nomination. To some of the critics of this decision, it goes to confirm that there is an ‘Islamisation’ agenda in the country where all Christians will be forced to accept Islam. Since this news broke last Sunday, I have been on several media platforms to discuss it. These include Spectrum Television, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State and Trust TV, Abuja. To my own mind, as insensitive as this nomination seems, bursting veins over a same faith ticket is needless. While I agree that given our plurality and diversity, the choice of a Christian would have been better in order to guarant...

  There is a nexus between Nigeria’s petroleum and electricity sectors. Though the two are under different ministries viz. Ministry of Petroleum Resources and Ministry of Power, the former provides the ingredient for the latter. By this I mean the country’s petroleum sector provides the industrial gas for all the thermal power plants operating in the country. Some of the thermal plants are Afam Power Plc, Ughelli Power Plc, Sapele Power Plc and Egbin Power Plc. It is baffling that despite the abundance of natural gas in Nigeria, so much so that international oil companies have been flaring this essential product for domestic and industrial use, the country hasn’t been able to sufficiently trap and tap this resource to power our electricity-generating companies. Aside from this, the price of cooking gas has hit the rooftop despite the country having this in abundance. Quite unfortunately, the creation of separate ministries, as well as privatisation and commercialisation of petr...

  As you are all aware, the recent party primaries have raised important questions that pertain to legislative consolidation and institution building. The high turnover rate that has afflicted the legislature since 1999 is likely to worsen in 2023, with over 70 per cent of legislators at the national level expected not to return. The figures are likely to be the same or higher at the state assembly level, where governors wield unfettered control and dictate the outcomes of elections. —Prof. Abubakar Sulaiman, Director-General, National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies at the closing ceremony of the Capacity Building Workshop for Lagos State House of Assembly on Friday, June 24, 2022 at Ogere Resort, Ogun State. Last week, German international development agency, Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, and the National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies jointly organised capacity building for lawmakers and some key bureaucratic staff of Ogun, Oyo, Ondo and Lagos S...

  The Independent National Electoral Commission announced the timetable and schedule of activities for the just concluded Ekiti governorship election on June 16, 2021. By that schedule, the off-cycle, off-season poll was to hold on Saturday, June 18, 2022. It held as planned. Unlike in 2018 when there were 35 candidates, last Saturday, there were 16 candidates that contested the election with the All Progressives Congress’ Abiodun Oyebanji coming top. According to the Returning Officer for the election, Prof Kayode Adebowale, who is the Vice-Chancellor, University of Ibadan, the APC candidate scored 187,057 votes to defeat its closest rival, Segun Oni of the Social Democratic Party, who garnered 82,211 votes, and Bisi Kolawole of the Peoples Democratic Party (67,457 votes) and 13 others. Factsheet on the 2022 Ekiti governorship election shows that there are three senatorial districts, six federal constituencies and 26 state constituencies across the states. There are 16 local gov...

  We’re counting down to the end of the regime of the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.). Last Sunday, June 12, he made his last Democracy Day speech as president. By this time next year, he would have acquired the toga of an ex-president. How time flies! This time in 2023, the seventh general elections would have been held, winners would have been inaugurated and on the next June 12, we would be listening to the first Democracy Day speech by Buhari’s successor. Such is life. Life is in phases; men are in sizes. 10 kings, 10 seasons! I have had the privilege of reviewing the president’s last Democracy Day speech on several media platforms namely Voice of America, Silverbird Television, Citizens 93.7FM Abuja, TV 360 and WAZOBIA Max TV, where I have to address the viewers in pidgin English. To my own mind, the president was economical with words in his speech. In the 24-paragraph speech, he only gave a brief history of the June 12 struggle, his appraisal of the just ...