The recent movements in the top national leadership of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has created vacancies and opened a discourse on an apparent rush to appoint or elect a new national chairman and secretary for the party.
Author: Editor
Two weeks ago, the Federal Government of Nigeria declared a state of emergency on food security. The declaration of emergency is the best policy pronouncement of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu (BAT) since the assumption into office about two months ago. If this declaration was done with a similar pronouncement of emergency on education and security before the withdrawal of fuel subsidy, it would have set the ball rolling at an exponential speed. It would have been an excellent starting and hopes would have been rekindled, desperation would have been dampened. Nevertheless, we must commend the responsiveness and sensitivity of BAT to the yearning of Nigerians. So far, BAT is the only President who has made such a pronouncement on food security, which is the most essential security to life. Death by hunger is more devastating and traumatic than death by a bullet as hunger takes days of pain and suffering before the body succumbs to the final breath while a bullet takes life in a matter of seconds. Thus, a bullet may be a preferable way to end it all than hunger. We must remember, food insecurity is the mastermind of all other insecurities; banditry, corruption, insurgence, kidnapping, and robbery.
Last week, the federal government, through the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC), banned two loan app banks, permanently removing them from Google Play Store and initiating the process of deleting their respective apps.
With the Women’s World Cup launching this month, FIFA is still siding with corrupt national football federations over women players. Across Africa, wage theft for female players and rampant gender inequality continue to characterize the women’s game.
Nigeria is an interesting country and one with peculiar set of citizens. It is an intricate place to govern. Anyone, who is not prepared for leadership, but found themselves in political position of authority to lead, would be overwhelmed in no time with the kind of complexity in the nature of the country and its people. Sometimes ago, when the newly sworn-in President Tinubu was asked how he felt with the challenges facing the country as he took over, his response was epic and depicted someone who knew what he was getting himself into. He simply answered that “nobody should pity him because he asked for the job”.
Years back, a report I read explained how at some point South Korea’s economy grew significantly with infrastructural development.
One of the major issues begging for consideration as Nigeria and other stakeholders review the aftermath of the country’s 2023 General elections would definitely be the health of Nigeria’s political party system. It is a matter of fact that by the 90s, in an attempt to stem the tide of communism, one party states, and dictatorships around the world, the West recommended and supported multi-party democracy as the way forward, to ensure participation, inclusion, and fairness. This was packaged as a pill to address the menace of one-party states and authoritarianism and indeed many African countries, including Nigeria bought into it, and even went a step further to fashion our democracy after the American model.
Intrigues, mischief, blackmail, and internal crisis are some of the characteristics of any ruling party in Nigeria. This is what has become of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in recent times. The party is constantly facing multidimensional crises, and getting a good party man to stabilize it is becoming an impossible and herculean task.
At the ECOWAS Summit in Bissau on 9th July 2023, President Bola Tinubu was elected Chairman of ECOWAS. In his acceptance speech, he warned that the threat to peace in the region had reached an alarming proportion with terrorism and an emerging pattern of military takeovers that ECOWAS must take concerted action addressing with the urgency the matter demands. Shortly after, he was in Addis for the African Union Summit. His first action point as ECOWAS Chairman was establishing the Presidential Troika + 1 (Talon – Benin, Embalo – Guinea Bissau and Bazoum – Niger + Umar Tourray, President of ECOWAS Commission to develop an immediate action plan to address terrorism and coups d’états in West Africa. The four presidents met in Abuja on 18th July and drew up plans to engage Mali, Burkina Faso and Guinea on expeditious return to constitutional rule, credible and inclusive elections. They also proposed a pathway to an expeditious OPERATIONALISATION of ECOWAS Revised Plan of Action for the eradication of terrorism in West Africa. This action-man approach by President Tinubu is raising hopes that Nigeria is now ready to assume once again its traditional leadership role in West Africa, which the country has abandoned for almost two decades.
Before and during his campaign days, the President of Nigeria, Senator Ahmed Bola Tinubu told everyone that becoming the country’s president was a lifelong ambition. He boasted of his agenda of readiness and competence to take Nigerians out of the woods, the backstage of suffering. At a point, he told Nigerians that he would build on Muhammadu Buhari’s achievements. Don’t forget that Nigerians were already suffering and building on that is “a killer.”