Author: Zainab Suleiman Okino

WHETHER we accept it or not, all is not well with the engine room of Nigeria’s economy. The petroleum industry sector, like other public sector administrations in Nigeria, remains shrouded in opacity and subject to meddling, contrary to established global protocols. From all indications, there are obvious contradictions in the inner workings between the presidency and the managers of the nation’s cash cow, leaving a stunned nation in the dark. For ordinary Nigerians, it’s hard to accept that fuel subsidies have returned, even at the exorbitant official price of N617 per litre (before the new hike) that unfortunately was never…

ON July 18, the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) held its 2024 policy meeting to determine modalities for admissions into tertiary institutions. However, the process was overshadowed by an age controversy. It began when the Minister of Education, Professor Tahir Mamman, reiterated his concern about underage students writing exams preparatory to becoming undergraduates, a point he had raised during the last Unified Tertiary and Matriculation Examination (UTME). Almost all the tertiary education administrators at the event unanimously opposed the minister’s suggestion of an 18-year minimum age, forcing him to temporarily reverse and defer the proposal. Ultimately, a minimum age…

UK Labour Vs Nigerian LP A DAY after the UK election, results were announced, and the Labour Party gained the majority. The government transition moved swiftly. Ex-Prime Minister Rishi Sunak took responsibility for the Conservative Party’s devastating blow, moved out of 10 Downing Street, and that same day, Keir Starmer, the new leader, moved in. Both visited King Charles for ceremonial blessings, as tradition demands. There was no drama, no committees, no dissenting voices, no daggers drawn, no open expressions of blame, and no threat of legal battles. Such an elegant and simple system based on understanding—Britain has no written…

WHETHER the national workforce is 720,000 at the federal level and about 90,000 at sub-national level, the number of public servants (constituting the labour force) represented by Organised Labour that the Nigerian government must contend with over the new minimum wage is grossly insignificant in comparison with the number of angry Nigerians thrown into existential agony over government’s unfriendly policies. If we argue over Labour’s so-called selfish demand for just two percent of the Nigerian populace, it becomes even more appropriate to fault the government’s recalcitrance in their negotiation with such an “insignificant number” in contrast with the possibility that…

AS PART of activities to mark (not celebrate) the one-year anniversary of the Bola Tinubu administration, the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris initiated ministerial sectoral briefings to update Nigerians on the activities of the government in the last one year. He also used the opportunity to launch the Nigerian National information Portal, the “official digital gateway to comprehensive information about Nigeria”. The portal, he said, would serve, as “centralised source for both local and international audiences providing reliable and up-to-date information on various aspects of the nation, including the government, the people of Nigeria, their cultural heritage…

AS soon as their four-convoy cars arrived the premises, residents started trickling out from their make-shift abodes called homes. In no time the excitement and jubilation that rented the air soon turned into a one-line song: “Mama oyoyo, Baba oyoyo, blow the trumpet” in reverence for their benefactor-couple (Mr Bede and Maureen Okafor) that the residents have known over the years. The “trumpet”, when blown alerts on their arrival (and invariably on food availability). On this day again, residents of the camp came out, and almost immediately conversations and throwing of banter started. An atmosphere of conviviality and familiarity enveloped…

THIS is not the best of time for the embattled APC chairman, Dr Abdullahi Umar Ganduje. It is also not the right time to be in opposition in a place like Kano state. We know politics is an endless cut-throat battle, but the intrigues and volatility of Kano politics is something else. However ever since the two former governors of the state, Rabiu Kwankwaso and Ganduje parted way and started their political roforofo, Kano has never been the same. Everything around and about them are politicised and twisted to fit certain narratives. Ganduje was recently suspended from his ward, and…

ORDINARILY, doctrinal issues of religion concerning confession and testimony are private spiritual affairs of parties involved, but when a publicly funded educational institution is dragged into such a matter, it becomes germane to interrogate the issue. Penultimate week, the social media went wild over an incident that occurred at Dunamis Church with far-reaching implications for the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN). A graduate of the university, Vera Anyim had come into the open church auditorium to testify about her sojourn and graduation from NOUN, despite all odds, and especially being the first to have a university degree in her…

THE Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) must have been taken aback by the outpouring of condemnations and criticisms over their proposed “improvement and efficiency” accompanied by 231 percent electricity tariff hike even from unlikely quarters. Neither the Band A customers who will “enjoy” 20 hours of electricity and pay more, nor Band E customers to be supplied only fours of electricity, is excited about the social divides, new status and classification.. As a matter of fact, what binds them (electricity) is perpetually in a state of flux, uncertainty, unavailability lately, and now unaffordable. The Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu at…

SHARING of palliatives to cushion the effect of extreme deprivation and hunger is Nigerian government’s answer to their self-created hardships engendered by subsidy removal, devaluation of the Naira and the effect of existential security challenge. However, in place of food and other essentials, death and maiming of citizens have trailed the exercise. Palliative sharing is not sustainable; it is ad hoc and a stop-gap measure that can never replace the permanent needs of individuals – three square meals and other essential provisions. The bureaucracy and logistics involved in buying, stocking, planning, and arranging such palliatives alone are herculean. Yet, sharing…

TO the chagrin of many citizens of Nigeria, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration, like his predecessor’s, constantly demonises the previous government of President Muhammadu Buhari to justify the negative effects of their harsh and unbearable economic policies, such that you would be forgiven to think they belong to different political parties. We don’t know whether making a scapegoat out of the past administration was part of the ruling party’s mantra. Blaming ex-President Goodluck Jonathan was a familiar refrain that characterised the Buhari presidency for eight years. In those early years, it was excusable, considering Jonathan’s below average performance and their…

LIKE every other human endeavour, it is now time for the world to critically scrutinize and assess the administration of Alhaji Yahaya Bello (GYB), the immediate past governor of Kogi state. In the state’s peculiar form of political landscape, an objective evaluation of the governor’s legacy is not likely because of primordial sentiments and the image of GYB in the minds and eyes of many people, his towering political influence in the governing All Progressives Congress(APC) and the way he projected himself in that context in the last eight years. It is debatable if the governor’s stewardship was more about…

SINCE 1994 after the end of apartheid, South Africa’s foreign policy has been decidedly robust, developmental, and principled without being isolationist. Described as a “middle-ranked power in Africa”, South Africa has been able to “punch above its weight” to possibly “influence world affairs”. This is apparent in the way SA manages its complex relationships with opposing world powers such as USA, China, and Russia even as it continues to take bold decisions in respect of Ukraine-Russia and Israel-Palestine wars, such that anybody with a passing interest in world politics can easily recall SA’s posture. On the contrary, South Africa’s former…

NIGERIA has become a vast scam zone, demanding urgent action. Just when it seemed we had reached the peak of scams and scandals with the revelation of certificate racketeering from neighboring Cotonou in Benin Republic, allegations of outright stealing and money laundering surfaced from the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Eradication. However, whether by coincidence or design, the female gender bore the brunt of a scandal involving the triumvirate of former minister Sadiya Farouq, suspended minister Betta Edu, and suspended National Social Investment Programme Agency, (NSIPA), boss Halima Shehu, all linked to an N84.1 billion fraud in the same…

THE Former Central Bank of Nigeria Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele finally got a respite last Friday when he was released from Kuje prison after meeting his bail conditions, but not before his alleged atrocious and unfathomable heist was made public, to his eternal disgrace. Emefiele was arrested by the Tinubu led government and spent 195 days in detention, while investigations into his tenure at the apex bank were ongoing. Though the media decried his and EFCC former chairman, Abdulrasheed Bawa’s long detention without trial in line with the country’s laws, by the time his trial commenced, it is obvious we…

THE lingering political crisis in Ondo state over Governor Rotimi Akerodolu’s health appeared to have thawed last week when President Bola Tinubu waded in to find an acceptable and amicable settlement. Despite the “good intentions” behind the president’s engagement with the warring parties, some of the clauses in the adopted resolutions might elicit, or even fuel more feuds in no distant future. What the president achieved in the temporary truce was basically to uphold party supremacy under “one family” and keep the crisis off the prying eyes of the opposition, at least for now. However, the issue is not even…

THE governor of Niger state, Alhaji Umaru Bago recently expressed his concern over the country’s revenue sharing formula. The state he governs, Niger is called power state. It is no fluke; it hosts hydrocarbons worth 6000 installed capacities from Shiroro, Kainji and Jebba hydro power stations) as contributions to the national grid, yet the state has remained largely undeveloped. For giving much to the nation, and receiving virtually nothing, the governor said his state is being shortchanged and is determined to right the wrong. The governor, who also threatened to go to the Supreme Court over inadequate compensation for his…

ANGER seems to be welling up on the Plateau over recent judicial pronouncements in respect of the last elections. The outcomes of the Benue and Plateau elections were hailed as examples of enduring political legacy of loyalty to, and influence of godfathers because of the return of Jonah Jang of PDP and George Akume of APC. Their candidates were victorious in the governorship election and the incumbents lost out while a substantial number of lawmakers also emerged from their camps. However, while those gains are being consolidated in Benue state, in Plateau state, the initial successes and victories have been…

TWO things happened recently that should make us rethink the direction Nigeria should go with regards to the laws that govern us as a nation and the electoral law that guide the conduct of elections in the country. Former INEC chairman, Prof Attahiru Jega’s opinion that the electoral laws should be amended and the revelation that Federal Executive Council would now hold only at the instance of the president, in addition to the long-forgotten agitation for restructuring and true federalism form the fulcrum of this article. Until the last eight years, the agitation for restructuring of the federation had been…

SINCE their creation, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), have always been mired in controversy and blemished by political influence. From the appointment of the heads to their activities, the anti-graft agencies are also troubled, as much as they trouble alleged offenders, in addition to subtle institutional rivalry between them and the Attorney General’s office. The recent appointment of a new substantive chairman of the EFCC in person of Olanipekun Olukoyede has once again put the agency on the spotlight of national discourse over issues surrounding his qualification, competence,…