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When audacity of immorality is at issue, the celebrated case of Smith v Hughes is always referenced. It is also used to explain the mischief rule in law. By the 19th century, the English society had become so notorious for the infiltration and embarrassment caused it by commercial sex workers on the streets of London. […]
Continue ReadingA few there were who foresaw what we are going through today in Nigeria with regards to the indescribable insecurity that has engulfed our land, no matter which part you turn, but incredibly more so in the North of the country. One such person was Chief Obafemi Awolowo who severally warned that by denying western […]
Continue ReadingWhen you have a fever, you take it as a sign that all is not well with your body. The fever usually appears before the full manifestation of the ailment. Itchy gums in babies is often a sign that a tooth is about to spring forth. The appearance of flowers on a fruit-bearing tree is […]
Continue ReadingFor a while now, I have signed this column with the following note: “This column welcomes rebuttals from interested government officials.” And every week, my readers have asked privately—by phone, email, sms—“Are you receiving such rebuttals?” Of course not. If they wrote, I would publish. But they do not, because they know it is a […]
Continue ReadingIt is my conviction that this is the year of HEALING for humanity in general. The sole intention of every lover of humanity in these times should be ‘’helping to heal the world.’’ Such efforts are what each of us can make in our individual capacities and little corners of the world. It’s often the […]
Continue ReadingNigeria enters the new year draped in curious contradiction. A protracted sixtieth anniversary celebration has recently been interrupted by an untidy debate about the nation’s very survival as a viable state. The question is simple: Is the Nigerian state failing? Among most enlightened Nigerians, there is now an inconvenient consensus that the Nigerian state is […]
Continue ReadingFellow Nigerians, the year 2020 started for most people on an upbeat note. It was the same for me. True, we had heard late in December 2019 into early January 2020 of the corona virus that was plaguing and affecting a small part of China, but we all paid virtually little or no heed to […]
Continue ReadingI can visualise the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Ali Ibrahim, also known as Sheikh Pantami, watching videos and photos of desperate clusters of people at various National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) centres across the country attempting to obtain the National Identity Number (NIN) and gleefully feeling good about himself. You know that […]
Continue ReadingThe word ‘virtuous’ is often attributed to women and girls, especially for those who look at it from the Biblical context. However, the true meaning of ‘virtuous’, according to the Oxford Dictionary, among many things include: good, upstanding, honourable, trustworthy, law-abiding, noble and respectable, which, on the other hand, are words attributed to accomplished men […]
Continue ReadingOn Christmas Day, Bishop of Sokoto Catholic Diocese, Rev. Fr. Hassan Matthew Kukah, shared a homily in which he criticised the regime of Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.). In the message, Fr. Kukah summed Nigeria’s anomie from insecurity, the rising rate of poverty, and despondency enveloping the country. He concluded his message on a note […]
Continue ReadingLast week, I recounted my family’s twin ordeal of an armed robbery attack and COVID-19 infection in my column, ‘Gunman, COVID-19 and My Family’. Unfortunately, the publication came on the day we had to move my son to the National Hospital Isolation Centre where he spent Christmas and subsequent days before his eventual discharge. That […]
Continue ReadingChief Ayo Adebanjo was practically in tears he called me on Thursday to ask if I came across a political address given by Pastor Tunde Bakare on Sunday. I could not lie to a 92- year old man and I admitted I saw it. He then asked why I didn’t let him have it as […]
Continue ReadingLooking at this well-worn phrase in reverse, it is apt to start the review of 2020, the annus horribilis of modern time, with the most ugly of the century: the coronavirus pandemic and its continuing ravaging impact. It has just been discovered that a strain of the virus has mutated into a more deadly disease than known […]
Continue ReadingTwo anecdotes have been used to justify the controversial pulpit tirades of senior pastor of Citadel Global Community Church in Lagos, Tunde Bakare, whose video went viral last week. One is that famous Obinde proverb, popularised by former governor of Lagos and Osun States, Olagunsoye Oyinlola. The second is one I stumbled onto during the […]
Continue ReadingPastor Tunde Bakare’s trending video on Bola Ahmed Tinubu, for which he is receiving caustic flak from the Nigerian online commentariat, isn’t the deodorization of Tinubu’s smelly underbelly that many people say it is. It is, on the contrary, an effective denunciation of Tinubu and a deep, lasting, strategic delegitimization of his “omo Eko” bona fides. In […]
Continue ReadingMy favourite end-of-the-year quote, which I have shared with many others, is the following passage from Chapter 3 of the inimitable Chinua Achebe’s Things Falls Apart, a novel of monumental, evergreen relevance, translated into over 50 languages, a product of pure genius, a milestone in world literature. Achebe wrote: “…The year that Okonkwo took eight […]
Continue ReadingWhat a year. WhatAyear. What. A. Year. Muddled and fragmented. Masked up and washed up. It was a tasteless year, the year we could barely smell the coffee, the year humanity was severely fatigued. It was the year that soaked our hands in an ocean of sanitizers and distanced us from each other. It was […]
Continue ReadingFor your consideration ahead of the new year, I examine five prevailing myths. One: A saviour is coming For most of Nigeria’s 60 years as a so-called independent nation, we have thrived on the false notion of a liberator or saviour arriving to make everything alright. Two of such figures are prominent: Olusegun Obasanjo, who […]
Continue ReadingOn Tuesday, December 23, 2020, General Muhammadu Buhari made what has perhaps become the most irresponsible speech of his presidency when he said, inter alia, that “we share more than 1,400 kilometers of border with that country (Niger), which can only be effectively supervised by God”. And the sad aspect of this is that his […]
Continue ReadingAs everybody knows, it is the turn of the Igbo to rule. No, others will say that the Yoruba have done so much for this regime and that qualifies them to take over when the tenure of President Buhari ends. Then the murmurs: who said the Hausa-Fulani are ready to relinquish power? These are the […]
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