Essays
Buhari: A Deal with Destiny
The date was February 27, 2019. Few days after Nigeria’s February 23rd Presidential Election. A large crowd had gathered and was getting bigger by the minute. ‘Sai Baba!’ ‘Sai Baba!!’ ‘Sai Baba!!!’, the crowd yelled
Electoral Contexts in Nigeria and Buhari’s Second Term Victory
The context of elections in Nigeria has not only been sanguinary, it has, almost always, been mired in controversy and negativity. From the nation’s first and second republics, which one could regard as periods of
Buhari’s First Term: A Socio-Economic Overview
Election time table was out and billed for the mid-first quarter of 2015. Economic and security reports available both locally and internationally were not just worrisome but frightening. The world’s largest black nation that survived
USA and Nigeria: The Covid-19 link
Early this year, President Donald J. Trump announced that he was banning migration of Nigerians and nationals of a few other countries to the United States of America–a country seen by most citizens
Between Denial and Reality: The Covid-19 xperience
When the coronavirus disease suddenly surfaced in Wuhan, China late in 2019 December, not a few people gave it any thought as something capable of shaking humanity the way it has done. Its grip was
Global Pandemics at a Glance
Mankind has a long history of peace and war, pain and pleasure, good and bad. Even amid these antipodal points, the prevalence of a disease over a whole country or the world, otherwise known as
The Quest for a Yoruba Nation: More Questions than Answers
With October 1st, 2020 knocking on our doors already, one waits with bated breath if truly Yoruba people will troop out to support Messrs. Sunday Igboho and Adams Ganiyu in their so-called demand for an
ENDSARS PROTESTS: MATTERS ARISING
Police Brutality and EndSARS in Nigeria What started in 2017 as a Twitter campaign for the disbanding of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) snowballed into mass demonstrations across major Nigerian cities between October 8 and
MY ENCOUNTER WITH MAJEK FASHEK
How time flies and how people forget the dead so easily too. Yesterday marked the first anniversary of the death of this great reggae icon and it is amazing to note how people appear to
From Mercantile Economy to Import Substitution Industrialization: The Need for a New Economic Direction for Nigeria
“We must always take heed that we buy no more from strangers than we sell them, for so should we impoverish ourselves and enrich them.”— Queen Elizabeth I (reigned 1558–1603), cited in Braudel, Fernand (1979:
The Death of Intellectual Courage: OAU’s Cowardly Cancellation of Moyo Okediji
According to Professor Moyo Okediji’s public account, Obafemi Awolowo University cancelled his lecture and book launch, and withdrew his book from the press. If that account is accurate—and OAU has a duty to tell the
When the Circle of Care Collapses: South Africa, Xenophobia and the Betrayal of African Solidarity
There are betrayals that wound the body, and there are betrayals that wound memory. The xenophobic attacks on Nigerians, Ghanaians, Zimbabweans, Mozambicans, Malawians, Ethiopians, Somalis and other African immigrants in South Africa do both. They
How societies learn to make neighbors killable
Mass killing does not begin with mass killing. It begins earlier, in language, in law, in bureaucracy, in the daily rehearsal of who belongs and who does not. A people are made killable when a
Why Awolowo Did Not Become President, Why Tinubu Did, and What Obasanjo Teaches Us About Power
Why Awolowo Did Not Become President, Why Tinubu Did, and What Obasanjo Teaches Us About Power In Nigeria, we often explain politics backwards. A man reaches the summit of power, and we call him destined.
The Reckoning: Trump, Epstein, and the Geopolitics of a Presidency Under Siege
There is a particular kind of silence that descends upon Washington in the weeks before a midterm election. It is the quiet of a city holding its breath, waiting to see whether the political earth
First Lady Commissions ICT Centre at Nigerian University
Nigeria’s first lady, Oluremi Tinubu, has commissioned a state-of-the-art Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Centre named after her at Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU) Ile Ife, Osun State. The hub named Senator Oluremi Tinubu Dream Centre
When Gamesmanship Becomes Cheating: The Moral Failure of Conduct in Moroccan-Hosted Competition
Sport derives its legitimacy not merely from skill or victory, but from the shared assumption that competition is conducted on a level playing field. Football (aka soccer), in particular, depends on a fragile moral contract:
Against Bombs, Not Against Justice: Why Critiquing Kinetic Counterterrorism Is Not Support for Terrorism
In recent years—especially amid renewed military operations against Boko Haram and ISWAP—a troubling conflation has emerged in public debate: that opposition to kinetic, military-first counterterrorism must mean sympathy for terrorists. This assumption is not only
Fasting Cannot Fix What Laziness Built
January 2026 is almost upon us, and as predictably as harmattan dust, another ritual season approaches. Nigerian religious leaders—particularly influential voices from Southwest Nigeria—are preparing to impose yet another round of 50-day fasts, 100-day fasts,
Open Letter to Nigerian Muslims
In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. Assalamu Alaikum (Peace be upon you), my dear brothers and sisters in Islam and fellow Nigerians. I write to you with a heavy heart
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