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LAGOS, the most cosmopolitan and politically progressive state in Nigeria on March 18, 2023 engaged in the degenerative politics of exclusion. The debilitating disease of campaigning that a non-full-blooded native cannot be governor, is an incapacitating one. Ten days later, a different philosophy of politics evolved in Scotland where the parliament elected 38-year-old Humza Haroon Yousaf, son of first generation migrants from Punjab, Pakistan, as the country’s first minister, or de facto leader.

The Scots were not interested in who Yousaf’s father is, where his wife comes from or the nationality of those he hangs out with; they simply want someone to get the job of governance done; somebody to lead their struggle  for devolution of power in the United Kingdom, UK. So, the world would be witnessing the strenuous struggles of Scotland led by Yousaf to negotiate a possible exit from UK, while the latter, led by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak of Indian origins, would be fighting to keep the kingdom united. Interestingly, Pakistan and India, along with Bangladesh were a single country under British colonialism. So, while Scotland strives to progress in world politics, Nigeria is in regression.

The Nigeria media also appears not to be patient enough to read the world. For instance, in this week’s three-nation African tour by United States, US, Vice President Kamala Harris covering Ghana, Tanzania and Zambia, they are screaming that Nigeria was snubbed. Some of the headlines read: “US Vice President, Kamala Harris shuns Nigeria”; “Nigeria missing as Vice President Kamala Harris visits Africa”; “Nigeria missing in VP Harris list of countries to visit”; “Again, US shun Nigeria!”

These are clearly presumptuous. We do not know the reasons for the tour and whether Nigeria fits in. We do not know the objectives, and in any case, why must Nigeria, one of the 55 countries in Africa, be included in a tour of three countries. To me, it is logical  for the US to visit Ghana because it is the American military base in West Africa; a poster boy of International Monetary Fund anti-people policies and a place where unpopular Western culture can be tested. It is, therefore, not surprising to me that the visit is coming at a time the Ghanaian parliament is debating a Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender, LGBT, bill called the “Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Value.” It seeks to make it a crime to be gay, bisexual or transgender.

Harris had, before her visit, said she had raised the issue of LGBT with Ghana because it is a human rights issue. Ghanaian President Nana Akufo-Addo had tried to pre-empt parliament  when he told the American media: “I have no doubt that the parliament of Ghana will show as it has done in the past … its sensitivity to human rights issues as well as to the feelings of our population and will come out with a responsible response to the proposed legislation.”

In Ghana, Harris, accompanied by her husband, Doug Emhoff, returned to the LGBT issue and the Ghanaian bill: “I feel very strongly about the importance of supporting the freedom and supporting the fighting for equality among all people, and that all people be treated equally. I will also say that this is an issue that we consider, and I consider to be a human rights issue, and that will not change.” A second issue about the visit is the US trying to get Africa into an anti-China and anti-Russia alliance. On the latter, Akufo-Addo in December, 2022, in a report to the US, had complained that Burkina Faso was engaging Russia’s private military contractor, Wagner Group, to fight Islamist extremists and violent groups. 

In an apparent reaction to this, Harris announced in Accra: “To help address the threats of violent extremism and instability, today I am pleased to announce $100m in support of Benin, Ghana, Guinea, Cote d’Ivoire and Togo.” She said in 2024, Ghana would receive an additional  $139m.

 These are not things that are likely to appeal to Nigeria because the country’s position on LGBT is clear, and a campaign against China and Russia are not likely to succeed as Nigeria has no disagreements with those countries. Also, we do not have a culture of making other countries enemies, our  enemies.

Indeed, why should Africa side one international power bloc against the other, more so when world politics is not always logical? For instance, the war in Ukraine threatens to go on for a while with each side digging in. As more lethal arms are being deployed, the UK decided to supply depleted uranium munitions-armour piercing tank rounds – to Ukraine. In reaction, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced his country would be deploying tactical nuclear weapons in neigbouring Belarus. Ordinarily, this would seem a tit-for-tat war game.  However, the European Union, EU, would have none of it. EU top diplomat, Josep Borrell, bellowed: “Belarus hosting Russian nuclear weapons would mean an irresponsible escalation and threat to European security.”

The US also responded angrily as this may be an escalation of the arms race. But as an African, I ask myself: what am I missing in all these? If the US has, over the years, crossed the oceans to store nuclear weapons in Germany, Turkey, Italy, the Netherlands and Belgium, what will be out of place for Russia to store same type of weapons in neigbouring Belarus?

The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, ICAN, described the Russia decision as an “extremely dangerous escalation which makes the use of nuclear weapons more likely…the likelihood of miscalculation or misinterpretation is extremely high; sharing nuclear weapons makes the situation much worse and risks catastrophic humanitarian consequences”.

I agree completely. However,  it would be wishful thinking if some countries can deploy nuclear weapons and we expect others not to do same. Generally, why would countries with nuclear arms decide whether others should not be similarly armed? For instance, why would Israel attack Iran in an attempt to stop that country acquiring nuclear weapons when it is warehousing  the same weapons?

Generally, it will be unwise for Africa to allow itself to be a pawn in world politics. To me, it is understandable that the US would send our Jamaican-African sister Harris on a charm offensive to Africa, it is left to us not to be as vulnerable as Brother Akufo-Addo.

World politics reminds me of the 1700 British play: ‘The Way of the World’ by William Congreve. The title is based on the dog-eat-dog manner the characters in upper class society employed all means including greed and deception to outwit themselves to protect their  interests. Africa needs to learn the way of the world and map out its own path to development.

In the months that preceded the February 2023 presidential election, supporters of Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso both badgered me to recognize Kwankwaso’s matchless political might and affronted me for ranking Peter Obi above him. My unrelenting assertions, which have turned out to be accurate, that one of Bola Tinubu, Atiku Abubakar, or Peter Obi would emerge president this year riled them to no end.

One day in 2022, a particularly persistent, monomaniacal Kwankwaso groupie asked me in a comment on my Facebook page why I consistently ignored Kwankwaso in my analyses of likely successors to Muhammadu Buhari. I responded that it was because Kwankwaso was only a “local champion” of Kano politics who had no political traction outside the state.

My lighthearted, unpremeditated comment was screenshot and shared widely within Kwankwaso devotional circles on social media. Kwankwaso’s devotees were enraged because they misconstrued my description of their object of political worship as an insult.

But it isn’t. Although many Nigerian English speakers think “local” is a term of disesteem, it isn’t by any stretch of conventional semantic imagination. It’s a value-neutral term that simply means nearby; not far away in relative terms; limited to a town, city, state, region, etc. rather than a larger area.

 As I pointed out in an April 20, 2014, Daily Trust grammar column titled “12 Popular Misusages in Nigerian English (II),” “There is not the slightest whiff of inferiority in the word in all varieties of English except in Nigerian (and perhaps Ghanaian) English.” A “local” person isn’t an inferior person. Nor is an “international” person a superior person. “Local,” “regional,” “national,” and “international” are mere terms to indicate geographic relativity. 

It was always obvious to any disinterested observer that Kwankwaso was a local Kano champion, that he wasn’t in the presidential race to win it, and that he only wanted to leverage his presidential run to help his son-in-law get elected as governor of Kano State. And he achieved his goal.

Kwankwaso won Kano State convincingly in the presidential election, but didn’t even win second place in Jigawa, which used to be a part of Kano State until relatively recently. That’s a classic instantiation of a local champion.

Obi was different. From about the midpoint of 2022, it became apparent to me that Obi would shake and shape the presidential election in ways his opponents hadn’t come to terms with. When I wrote a column titled “The Peter Obi Tsunami APC and PDP are Underrating” on June 18, 2022, several Kwankwaso supporters—and, of course, APC and PDP partisans—sneered at my suggestion that Obi would be more than a social media sensation among naïve, wide-eyed southern Nigerian youngsters.

A few Kwankwaso supporters imputed ridiculous, extraneous motives to my analysis, such as the idea that I wanted Obi to be president because my wife’s father is Igbo from Anambra State. There was also, of course, the inverse of this sentiment from Obi enthusiasts. Some of them playfully said to me that I was “Obi-dient” because I was an “in-law” to Obi. 

I’ve never been obedient (however the word is contorted in spelling) even as a child. I’ve always been rebellious, disobedient, and inquisitorial. It’s insulting to think that as an adult I’d be obedient, even as a joke, to a delusional, manipulative, Machiavellian, identitarian populist.

Yes, I’ve advocated power rotation to the Southeast in several past columns in the service of national cohesion and distributive political justice and would have been happy for either Obi or Kingsley Moghalu to be president, but my assessments of Obi had no connection with this personal disposition. It was based purely on what I perceived. And my perception has turned out to be more accurate than my critics were prepared to accept.

Even though Obi’s support base was delimited by religion, it did transcend Anambra State, the Southeast, and the South. It got to Christian Northern Nigeria. I predicted exactly that. I thought he would win Benue State, but he fell short because of the star power of APC’s governorship candidate, who I understand is a well-loved Catholic priest. I didn’t think he would win Nasarawa and Lagos states, but he did. His loss of Rivers State is obvious electoral fraud.

Obi’s critics said he had no structure to win elections outside his ethnic base. They didn’t reckon that the church was his structure. And it situated him as widely as it could. Even in the remotest villages in Nigeria, pastors preached that Obi was the only defender of the Christian faith that congregants must vote for. It was the biggest, most impassioned, pan-regional mass mobilization of Christians that Nigeria has ever seen.

Few political structures can outrival that. But the structure of the church that enabled him to win pan-regional Christian votes (except in Yoruba land where ethnic solidarity proved to be more potent than religion) also limited and doomed him. It made it constitutionally impossible for him to be president even if he won a plurality of the vote. 

That is why I think Obi is suffering from a delusional disorder when he talks of his “mandate” being “stolen.” What “mandate”? As Buhari will tell him, intense religious mobilization of voters can take a candidate far, but it can never lead to a national mandate. 

Obi couldn’t possibly have a national mandate when he couldn’t get up to 25% of the votes in Kano, Kaduna, Sokoto, Zamfara, Jigawa, Borno, Yobe, Katsina, Gombe, Bauchi, Adamawa, Kwara, Niger, Kogi, Kebbi, Ondo, Osun, Ekiti, Oyo, Ogun. That’s 20 out of Nigeria’s 36 states. He won or got more than 25% of the votes in only 16 states. With or without rigging, I can bet my life that the outcome would be the same.

When people are ensconced in their hermetically sealed echo chambers, they hear only their own voices and noises. The sounds that exist outside their self-created silos are always inaudible to them. That’s precisely what’s happening to Obi and his devotees. But I look forward to what his petition will reveal.

Anyway, what the outcome of the election has revealed is that Obi isn’t the “local champion” that Kwankwaso supporters told me he is worthier to be called than Kwankwaso. Obi, in fact, won more votes in the North than Kwankwaso did.

Obi got 2,080,847 votes in the North. Kwankwaso got 1,454,649 total votes, most of them from Kano, cementing his position as a local Kano champion. In fact, as TheCable’s March 7, 2023, post-election analysis showed, “Kwankwaso did not get up to 100,000 votes elsewhere aside [from] Kano.”

Apart from winning 12 states (I insist he won Rivers State, making it 13), including two northern states, Obi bested Kwankwaso in 13 northern states: Kaduna, Taraba, Borno, Gombe, Kebbi, Kogi, Kwara, Niger, Sokoto, Nasarawa, Plateau, Adamawa, and Benue.

I don’t say this to ridicule Kwankwaso with whom I am on cordial relational terms. In fact, when he visited the United States late last year, he was gracious enough to call me from Washington, DC—after his minions had made an anguished hue and cry about my offhanded, well-intentioned but misunderstood description of him as a “local champion.” 

Although I am critical of his tendency toward infantile personalization of power (which caused him to paint red “Kwankwasiyya” inscriptions on physical projects he completed when he was governor), I have profound respect for Kwankwaso for his transformational infrastructural uplift of Kano, my second state after my home state, and for his remarkably praiseworthy investment in the education of Kano’s youth even while outside government.

I have never ceased to be impressed by the investment of his own personal wealth (to the extent that we can call the wealth of any politician “personal”) to sponsor scores of brilliant Kano youth to acquire much sought-after and relevant higher education degrees in universities across the world. He himself completed a PhD in water engineering from Sharda University in India last year, which signposts his love for education.

Nonetheless, he is still, for now, a local champion. But I think he and Obi have a bright future together in national politics if they learn from their mistakes and make strategic amends. 

Kekong Bisong was my indefatigable metaphysics teacher back in the days at St Joseph Major Seminary, Ikot Ekpene. He is perhaps one of the finest wines that the Catholic church has brewed. In knowledge and in character, he is a good advertisement for the Church. He is not a scholar and a saint only, but also a controversialist. As a distinguished Philosophy Professor, he does not only fancy controversies; he creates them. On this, I can safely say that he is a brewery of controversies.

Whenever he went up to the pulpit to preach, the atmosphere became mute so much so that you could hear the musings of ants. Mute because, we knew he will disagree with even what Jesus had said in the Scriptures. But only to agree later. He does not only disagree for disagreeing sake; he disagrees so he will have reasons for agreeing. It was he who taught us how not to follow the crowd, subscribe to groupthink, belief system, conventional wisdom, etcetera, until when there’s a justification or a raison d’etre. 

On one occasion when he came to the class, he told us a story to validate his point on what he called ‘necessary disobedience’. He started by asking who discovered the mouth of river Niger. Ofcourse, all of us said Mongo Park. He then went on to tell us of a boy who was preparing for a common entrance interview. Fortunately for him, his uncle is a member of the panel and had whispered to him that he will be asked “who discovered the mouth of river Niger.” Ofcourse, the conventional answer even among university professors is that Mongo Park did.

The day came and the boy was again reminded of the name Mongo Park before he departed home to the venue. The interview had started and it was his turn to answer questions. His uncle’s eyes were all on him when a panelist asked: “Who discovered the mouth of river Niger?”  “My grandfather”, the boy answered.  The uncle was so disappointed as the boy keeps repeating” my grandfather.” A member of the panel then went further to ask him why he thinks the answer is his grandfather. He replied: “My grandfather was a fisherman who lived around New Bussa long before Mongo Park arrived. He definitely knew about the mouth of the river before Park. Only that he was not literate enough to tell the story.”

All the panelists were amazed and clapped for the boy. This is what Kekong Bisong called necessary disobedience. For him, the work of the teacher is not to produce conventional ideas and then expect the students to reproduce same at examinations. It is rather to train the mind in challenging beliefs and conventions so as to ascertain what is true and real. This was also what Dr. Bala Usman advocated for when he called for a review of our syllabus to reflect our situation. May God bless his soul!

The ‘partisan behavior’ of some clerics during the 2023 elections, have now forced me into a recollection of Kekong’s philosophy in thinking that these behaviors, inspite of the provision in most Churches, that Priests ought not to take part in partisan politics, could at best, only qualify as holy or necessary disobedience. Apart from my personal experience, a large number of people had called to either complain about not knowing the direction to follow because of the discordant political prescriptions made by their pastors on the party to vote for, or that they and their priests belonged to different political parties and hardly see eye to eye.

The situation chilled me to the marrow because, almost, if not all churches, had representatives in the unfortunate tournament of choosing for, instead of guiding their followers on how to choose their leaders. Even the Catholic Church that used to be our bastion, exemplar, and parapet of hope owing to its rich traditions on Church-State relations, plus the provision of the Canon law that priests should not take part in partisan politics, had some of her Priests involved in this exercise of unprofessional, uncritical and seemingly embarrassing prescription of our present paralysis. What is evident is that, some church leaders, baffled by the development, came out to speak.

The Catholic Bishop of Aba, out of many other church leaders, for instance, said in a statement: “My attention has severally been called to publications and allegations of partisan engagement by priests and leaders of various groups within Aba Diocese but I carefully elected to study the situation from behind the scenes to understand the motivations of the individuals, priests and lay faithful, involved and what exactly they intend to achieve by dragging the Church and my good self into the murky waters of partisan politics. 

“I find it particularly shocking that the individuals who are actively tarnishing the image of the Church in several parishes and communities in the name of active partisanship claim to be acting with my imprimatur.  They feed unsuspecting faithful in various parishes and groups with lies and had become very much emboldened in the last few weeks, perhaps assuming my silence to mean acquiescence.”

The Bishop then cautioned: “The Church has left its doors open to all participants in the 2023 electioneering season to come sell their programmes to the people of God. We have maintained this informed position since the beginning of the campaigns because the Church cannot as a true Mother embrace one or few of its children and throw the others into the cold. We have welcomed everyone into our fold while allowing the voters the freedom to make the ultimate choice at the polls.”

That was Rev. Prof. A. N. Echema – the Catholic Bishop of Aba Diocese. After reading the statement, a friend said to me, had the Bishop seen what happened in Southern Kaduna, he would had called for a declaration of a State of emergency to checkmate clerical partisanship. But on my own steam, I remarked: “Apart from the fact that I was not happy with the way and manner some of the clerics literally bullied their followers into voting in certain patterns aimed at changing the current leadership and the nest that hatched it, I prophesied that there’s likely going to be a church-going apathy after the elections. I say this because, the positions these clerics took, excluded most of their sons and daughters whose dreams, candidates, party and interests didn’t tally; thereby denying them the warmth of the Church’s motherhood for all. But I thought we had gone beyond the issue of party and are now talking about candidates.

Yes, as Bishop Echema observed: “While admitting that the Church can guide the decision of the voters within its fold at very critical points, it must be emphasised that in making that decision, the Church is essentially concerned with the personal attributes of the leaders and their vision for the society.  Membership of any group or society has never formed the basis of the Church’s approval or disapproval of any political leader.”  

Now that the elections are over and it is an open secret that most Christian clerics in Kaduna state, out of deep angst, pointed to the direction of the PDP’s gubernatorial candidate, Isa Ashiru, who, according to the INEC, lost to Uba Sani of the APC, it is important to re-echo the words of Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah at the funeral of Yakowa to the governor-elect, Uba Sani.

Kukah said to the then deputy governor and Yakowa’s successor, Ramalan Yero: “To our new Governor, Archbishop Ndangoso and I listened to all your beautiful testimony. The world looks up to you never to be tempted by the whispers of the wicked whose devilish and selfish hold on power has held our society down. Do not be tempted to think that the Muslims have taken what the wicked have presented as a prize for only Muslims. You have taken over the steering wheel and must obey and respect all road signs so that we can arrive at the destination that we have set for ourselves. “

“Balancing our dreams together “, Kukah continued, “can make ours one of the greatest States in Nigeria. Let us reverse the divisive, ugly and pernicious past which was constructed by men who had the hearts of apartheid. By pursuing the politics of exclusion, these men and women merely destroyed both the noble Faith of Islam and the North that its founders dreamt of. I want to assure you that there are millions of Yakowas outside the Muslim community, and that the monopoly of power by one section or even one gender or generation denies our people a future. This is what South Africa realized. It is what the Americans have now realized in Obama.”

To my mind, the necessary disobedience by the Christian clergy in especially Southern Kaduna should not be interpreted and seen as a creedal hatred against the identity of the governor-elect since the candidate whose coming they heralded doesn’t share the same Faith with them. It should rather be seen as an angry yearning for a change from an APC that could not only manage our rainbow collection of diversities, but also implemeneted, even on the eve of the elections, some uncritical policies that made some of its governors went to court.

Finally, did the clerics stray? No! It was simply a situational intervention; a necessary clerical disobedience to their code of conduct aimed at saying enough is enough. A contumacy that was entered into out of love. They complain that government didn’t manage diversity well; government implemented uncritical policies; the body language of government has not shown that the defense of human life is the essence of democracy. Therefore, they are ready for a new order even if to be headed by the red goat economist. God is the Giver of Power. May He bless our governor-elect and all our leaders with the wisdom to reunite us. Out of the ashes of despondency, and the cynicism of the vulnerable, shall arise a great nation. May God bless our state and nation.

Damina wrote from Holy Family Catholic Church Gidan Bako and can be reached via This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Good governance is the kernel of Nigeria’s development. Effective leadership will address a good number of today’s nettlesome challenges. The vexing problems with education, healthcare, security, unemployment, and electricity can be managed or palliated with responsible leadership. But why are we not giving currency to these crucial and experiential issues in our post-election conversations? Why is the repugnant, the vicious, and the divisive governing the public discourse?

I would hazard a guess as to why. To some, good governance is natively partial; it is selective of candidates based on kinship, religious orientation, or some manufactured puritanism. It must be their candidate as president, or doom and gloom befall the country. So, they constitute themselves into a bulwark of cynicism, scorching conversations and the polity with hate, prejudice, and fear.

This is an unpatriotic and jaundiced disposition to domestic concerns. It is clear that to these ones what matters is not whether the president-elect or the leadership is competent, and sufficiently prepared to fix the country; the grouse is that he does not conform with their bias.

But being patriotic does not mean anyone must like the government or the president, it dictates citizens must commit to the peace and progress of the country regardless of who is president. We must move the conversations away from the crude to the sublime. Nigeria is too important for groundless tropes to be the definers of critical discourses.

We should set the right tone and tenor for the next administration. We should begin to study and review the Renewed Hope manifesto. We are collectively plagued by the same problems; we need food on our table; we need qualitative education for our children; we need security of life and property; we need good healthcare; we need jobs, and we need decent living. These are existential perturbations that should arrest our attention.

We keep going through the same mill every cycle and expect a change. As citizens, we should be more purposive about governance, and less obsessed with thrilling distractions.

I must say Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, even as president-elect, has begun on a pragmatic and winsome trajectory. By seeking reconciliation with those he legitimately, fairly, and squarely defeated in the presidential election, and by re-affirming his commitment to be president for all Nigerians and to run a government of national competence, Asiwaju is endearing himself to Nigerians.

His deportment so far has been statesmanly and nationalistic, confounding the suggestions and assumptions of traducers. I hope he keeps this streak. Good governance will frustrate the expectations of scoffers.

Let us revisit the manifesto. In it, the president-elect delineated his plans for the country. My interest is in a cocktail of prescriptions – federalism/decentralisation of power, national security, economy, power, agriculture, education, healthcare, transportation, and foreign policy. These constitute the critical sectors of government. But I am of the view that the administration, most importantly, will be assessed on how well it manages our diversity, on security and the economy.

The president-elect as started well with words of affirmation, of unity, of communality, which will further help in building national consensus. He should maintain this expansive disposition – as always.

President Muhammadu Buhari recently signed 16 constitution alteration bills into law. Of significance is the bill on financial independence of State Houses of Assembly and State Judiciary and those on the removal of the railway, prison and electricity from the exclusive legislative list to the concurrent list.

I believe this offers the Tinubu administration fecundated ground to drive its vision of more balanced democracy. Federalism and Decentralisation of power is a prominent feature of Asiwaju’s manifesto. There is still a lot of room for decentralisation of power in areas of crime prevention, stamp duties, certain forms of taxation, resource allocation – as enumerated in the manifesto. It is expected that the president-elect will work with the national assembly to motor his vision.

On the economy, the president-elect has a fine blueprint and prescription. He says his administration will improve existing industries and sectors; adjust the revenue allocation prescription to give states greater flexibility to foster grassroots economic development; build an economy that produces more of the everyday items – both agricultural and manufactured goods; bring the national infrastructure policy to life and harmonise it with the national industrial policy to ensure optimal development of key sectors; review federal budgetary methodology, curb importation of non-essential goods, reform the tax system, as well as implement a naira-denominated monetary policy.

The president-elect says he will tackle insecurity with technology, confidence-building, citizens’ participation, intelligence-led policing, improvement of salaries and welfare of troops, creation of anti-terrorist battalions, bolstering of manpower, freeing the police from VIP security and guard duties, and again, deployment of technology.

In all, the president-elect’s team will largely account for the success of his plan for Nigeria. The president-elect has stated unambiguously that he will run a government of national competence. This is comforting and reassuring. He must succeed for the sake of Nigeria.

We should go back to the Renewed Hope manifesto, to study and review it. Let us talk governance, not this babel of conspiracies and prejudices. Citizenship comes with responsibility. We are evenly plagued by the same problems, of which good governance can palliate or fix. So, let us talk governance.

May the president-elect succeed.

Carlson and Hastie (1997) believe teachers and students agendas need to overlap and be in support of each other, and the result would be a positive learning environment.

Shosanya Babatunde Oluwaseyi a Prolific writer, Historian, Scholar Researcher, Educationist par excellence and Activist who is very passionate about teaching the profession because of the role played by teachers around the world which can never be overstated

Once upon a time a student's name Giada came to make an enquiries about learning an instrument. I happen to be around at the reception and this gives me opportunity to engage her for some minutes and I said I am a teacher! She looks at me and replied and so what ; l was terrified and comport myself and ask Giada is there any problem for being a teacher ? After several conversations with this little girl l realize her frustration in the context of some selected teachers. Since that they l renounce teaching because is not learning. 21st century student understands a teacher are for teaching why learning is for the student.

21st-century student is very aggressive, fast, knowledge and technological lnclined. So, for us that claim to be a teacher it is pertinent to be in the same space with our student if we want to stay relevant of course this might sound awkward more importantly, it's a reality. As a teacher, you cannot teach the way you were taught some decade ago.

21st-century teacher must pay attention for you to remain relevant and claim you are truly a teacher. Find out new acceptable way to achieve your goals in the classroom and connect with the student. If you want to go far, I advise do not disregard student input and knowledge in the class. As a teacher don't be static endeavor to explore new ways of teaching your subject.

As a teacher dig deep on current trend in education and abreast a new pedagogy and techniques in your teaching. Position yourself in the need of students and teach them how to become a problem solver. 21st century teachers should be resourceful, train and retrain yourself in addition must have growth and open mindset and continuously learning with personal development.

It's not a recent news that there is a paradigm shift in learning and teaching. 21st century teacher must align with the trend if you want to still relevant. New technology continues to emerge, as an educator let's explore and learn to be teachable. As far as I'm concerned l'm looking for more responsibility with new innovations in teaching and fresh ideas. In conclusion, calling myself a teacher might be justified in front of students. In addition As an educator we should realize teaching is not learning, rather learning occured solely of teaching. I've always loved to teach and l do believe educators should be a learner and learning is a life long activity. I advise teachers across the globe to Renounce teaching for learning to foster.

On Saturday 18 March 2023, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) conducted the gubernatorial and State Assembly elections to mark the second and concluding round of the 2023 elections. On that day, INEC, the law enforcement agencies and the Nigerian populace were presented with a golden opportunity to demonstrate to the rest of the world that, the below par showing on 25 February 2023 notwithstanding, Nigeria’s democracy had come of age. At the end of the day, not only did we fail spectacularly in this regard, but more dangerously, the fragile unity of the Nigerian State suffered a massive set back. 

For a country recently described by Farooq Kperoghi as, “a frail, imperfect patchwork of disparate nations, that is perpetually on the brink of implosion on account of political and identitarian stressors,” what transpired on 18 March 2023, particularly in Lagos State, was all very predictable and therefore preventable. All hands should have been on deck to avoid the bizzare debacle that we all witnessed. Regrettably, the critical stakeholders, whether by their acts and or omissions, conspired to do the exact opposite and in the process set a precedent that might take a generation to reverse.

The first sign that all was not well on the day came from Frank, my driver, who hails from Onicha-Olona in Delta State, who called to tell me in an emotion-laden voice that clearly, he was not a Nigerian, having been prevented, in his Badore area of Lagos State, from exercising his franchise because “he was Igbo”. Another call that came was from Bernard, a Lawyer and mentee of mine, who is from Gakem in Cross-River State and who also resides in the Lekki- Ajah axis. He too was unable to vote at his Polling Unit where a Police Officer pointedly asked him to go home as his safety could not be guaranteed! Unfortunately, these two were not the exception but were representative of the experience of a significant number of Nigerians, especially from the South-East and South-South geopolitical zones, who were outrightly disenfranchised on account of their ethnic origin.

What made the situation worse was that we should have seen it coming. In the days following the announcement of the Presidential Election results in Lagos State, where the President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu suffered a shocking defeat at the hands of the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Mr. Peter Obi, it first started as a rumour that there was an institutional strategy to disenfranchise non-indigenes during the gubernatorial election in the State. Predictably, the Igbos were once again the scapegoats, eight years after they were asked to “jump into the Lagos lagoon”. 

Things soon assumed a dangerous dimension when a few days to the election, Mr. Musiliu Akinsanya (more widely known by his moniker, MC Oluomo), the Chairman of the Lagos State Parks Management Committee was caught, in a now viral video clip, issuing threats to one “Iya Chukwudi” and other Igbo residents in Lagos State not to bother coming to the polls if they were not voting for the candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and the current Governor of Lagos State, His Excellency, Babajide Sanwo-Olu. Incredulously, when asked on Channels TV to comment on this unwholesome development, the Nigerian Police Spokesman Muyiwa Adejobi urged Nigerians to view the comments of MC Oluomo as a joke.

It was under this atmosphere that neutrals found it difficult to believe that the timing of, and the wide publicity accorded to the dreaded traditional Oro festival, which was held a couple of days before the election and was concluded on the morning of the election, was a mere coincidence. Little wonder, the election in Lagos State was characterised by voter intimidation and suppression, ethnic profiling and ethnic related violence targeted in the main against Igbos. Ethnic champions were seen boldly parading the streets of Lagos warning people who intended to vote against the APC to stay away from the Polling Units and all of this, in the full glare of officers of the Nigerian Police.

The various new media platforms were awash with videos of election related conflicts, some resulting in fatalities, that were triggered in the main by the implementation of what I have already described as an institutional strategy to disenfranchise non-Yoruba residents of Lagos which said strategy was comprehensively executed with voters being profiled based on warped criteria, such as skin colour, and those who “looked Igbo” (including, ironically, some Yorubas and indigenous Lagosians) were denied the right to vote for the candidate(s) of their choice.

Indeed, the US Embassy in Nigeria, in a post-election publication, noted as follows: “[t]he use of ethnically charged rhetoric before, during, and after the gubernatorial election in Lagos was particularly concerning.”

For at least 48 hours after the elections, I remained traumatized by the experience as it dawned on me that we, the non-Yorubas living in Lagos, are all Igbo. Indeed, all through the period, social media was awash with posts and videos from not a few Yorubas who repeatedly  asked why non-indigenes of Lagos State, especially Igbos, were getting involved in the political affairs of the State, wondering what our “stake” in the electoral process in Lagos was – with little or no regard for our constitutionally guaranteed right to move about freely in Nigeria and to vote for candidates of our choice AND our contributions to the economic development of Lagos State in particular and Nigeria in general.

In truth, I was not entirely disappointed by the roles played by MC Oluomo and his ilk. I was also not disheartened by the attitude of Iya Basira, frying Akara in front of the Iyana Oba Shopping Complex, who has been brainwashed into believing that the Igbo man or woman is her worst enemy. Even former Minister of the Federal Republic, Femi Fani-Kayode did not surprise me when, as usual, he began to spew forth his ethnically laced vitriol against the Igbos.

I must however confess that I was slightly taken aback by the utterances of the Spokesman of the Bola Tinubu Presidential Campaign Council, Bayo Onanuga, who only a few years ago, visited the Kigali Genocide Memorial in Rwanda and, while suing for humanity to live together in peace and love, recommended the Museum, as a bucket-list item for ethnic champions in Nigeria. His sudden volte-face and resort to incendiary ethnic rhetoric during the elections really did take the cake and when he was called out for the ethnic slurs he employed against the Igbos, he doubled down stating that he owed no one any apologies. To date, we do not know that the Bola Tinubu Presidential Campaign Council or indeed the President-elect has done anything to distance themselves from this individual.

But really, I was neither surprised nor was I disappointed by the likes of MC Oluomo, Iya Basira, FFK and Bayo Onanuga as my expectations, where they and their ilk are concerned, were understandably quite low. What aggravated matters for me however, was that I did not see the expected indignation and widespread condemnation from enough of my friends from the South-West, some of whom I have known for more than four decades, or from the dozens of WhatsApp Groups that I belong to, including lawyers’ groups. Instead, my well educated, well exposed and widely travelled friends, who are often quick to condemn instances of racism and other forms of discrimination abroad, resorted to false equivalence and other flimsy excuses to justify this travesty…this tragedy.

It is now obvious to all and sundry that the phrase, “Omo Igbo” is definitely not a term of endearment but an ethnic slur with diverse connotations, most of which are negative. The frightening realisation from the fiasco of 18 March 2023 is that many amongst us are in a race to the bottom to determine who can be the best bigot. What happened last weekend has done incalculable and perhaps irreversible damage to the fabric of our society. What is even more tragic is that this venom is now transgenerational as this ignominious baton has been passed on to an even more rabid generation of tribal irridentists.

It is instructive that some have started to call for true healing in the wake of the election. While that is important, it should not come at the expense of the quest for justice. If those who superintended over the show of shame are under the delusion that life as we know it will go back to normal, then they are obviously not as smart as they would want us to believe they are.

If what transpired during the election in Lagos is not investigated and the perpetrators brought to book, the Igbos and other non-indigenes in Lagos will very soon find it necessary to live in their own enclaves and or areas where they feel safe. It will also become the norm for them to go to their Polling Units on election days, with dogs, guns or other weapons. Worse still, we will begin to witness the resurgence of election migration, whereby people are forced to travel to their States of origin or regions in order to exercise their franchise. We do not need a crystal ball to tell us that this is an ill wind that will blow no one any good.

If the law enforcement agencies are serious about bringing the perpetrators of these dastardly acts to book, they do not require the services of Sherlock Holmes to do this. As the Yoruba adage goes: “Àjẹ́ ké l’ánàá, ọmọ kú l’ónìí. Tani ò mọ̀ pé àjẹ́ àná ló pa ọmọ jẹ?” which roughly translates as, “if a witch cries in the night and a child dies in the morning, we do not go to the soothsayer to ask what killed the child.”

Before I end this piece, it is pertinent to state for the avoidance of doubt, that the crude resort to ethnically charged rhetoric before, during, and after the gubernatorial elections was not restricted to Lagos State neither was it exclusive to supporters of the APC. For instance, one Fred Ajudua whose mysterious release from the Correctional Centre where he was, until very recently, incarcerated, has continued to be viewed by many with incredulity, was also reported to have warned voters in Ibusa, Delta State who were not planning to vote for the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) to stay indoors and not to bother coming to vote. This and the other instances of voter intimidation and suppression experienced in different parts of the country during the last elections stand condemned.

Having said that, the point must also be made that Lagos State, the subject of the present intervention, is too important to Nigeria to be stunted and stymied by the ethnic squabbles of the type we experienced during the elections. As the Lagos State Government itself stated in October 2020 at the height of the ENDSARS agitations, “Lagos State is the melting point of various cultures, tribes and religions across Nigeria. We have co-existed harmoniously for ages and will continue to live together peacefully.”  It is necessary for the Government of Lagos State to be seen to always walk this talk. The seeming silence of the Government gives room for conspiracy theories including the one to the effect that it had accorded the ethnic irridentists a tacit endorsement.

In this regard, His Excellency, Babajide Sanwo-Olu has his work cut out to convince the populace that he did not sanction the nastiness and divisiveness employed by his supporters to ensure his emergence. The best way to start is to acknowledge that lives have been lost and that people have been deeply hurt, not just physically but also emotionally, and as such some form of reparation is required. More importantly, His Excellency must go the extra mile to ensure that he runs an all-inclusive government that does not pay lip-service to the yearnings, hopes and aspirations of ALL residents of Lagos. This is the only way Frank, my driver, and all of us non-indigenes in Lagos can be reassured that we are indeed Nigerians and that we are truly welcome in Lagos. Only then can true healing take place.

OLUMIDE AKPATA, the immediate past President of the Nigerian Bar Association, writes from Lagos

Recently, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo launched the Investment in Digital and Creative Enterprises (i-DICE) programme; a $600 million intervention fund to support young Nigerians operating within the digital and creative enterprise ecosystem. The intervention is targeted at addressing constraints faced by young creatives, such as access to capital, provision of infrastructure and delivery of specialized training amongst others. While this initiative can be considered a welcome development, there may a be need to interrogate it a bit further; especially in the light of past futile attempts. Is this the much-awaited intervention for the digital content and creative enterprise sub-sector or should we expect another? Can Mr. Macaroni, Taaooma and their colleagues now heave a sigh of relief?

In January 2021, Africa Polling Institute published a study report titled: Skit Economy: An Assessment of Digital Content Creators in Nigeria. I had the privilege of serving as principal investigator on the study, which sought to examine the rising trend of digital content creators in the country, particularly the art of skit-making; as an avenue for unleashing the deluge of talents and creative energy of the bulging youth demography. It also explored its potentials to generate wealth, create jobs and stimulate economic growth; while examining the challenges faced by creatives. Adopting a mixed methods approach, we gathered quantitative and qualitative data, and interviewed leading digital content creators and skit-makers like Samuel Perry, Debo Adedayo, Maryam Akpaokagi, Kunle Idowu and Nosa Afolabi, professionally known as Broda Shaggi, Mr. Macaroni, Taaooma, Frank Donga and Lasisi Elenu respectively.

Believe it or not, Nigerians have great appetite for digital content. Our study found that two-thirds of citizens watch comedy skits frequently. More like an elixir or stress-relief-capsules, these skits help to unwind from the hustle and bustle of daily life. Interestingly, while consumers mostly watch these skits on social media - Facebook (58%), Instagram (34%), YouTube (18%) and others; some content creators have evolved from producing sketches merely for amusement and entertainment, to purposeful tools for disseminating information, creating public awareness, marketing commercial brands and advocating for social change. In this regard, Broda Shaggi (35%), Mark Angel (26%), Mr. Macaroni (15%), Taaooma (12%) and Lasisi Elenu (11%) were ranked as the top five skit-makers by viewers choice.

Make no mistake, these folks are cashing out big time. They are milking money from skits uploaded on social media, movie production deals and brand endorsements, while enjoying celebrity status. In a recent media interview, Broda Shaggi who rakes in over $40,000 monthly from YouTube views alone, admitted that skit-making is extremely lucrative, especially for those who plan to stick around for the long haul. They are also creating sustainable jobs for their mates. For example, at the time of our study, Woli Agba employed 30 people, Josh2funny had an eight-man team, while Taaooma worked with her fiancé, Abdulazeez Greene, and six others. All these were achieved with little to no support whatsoever from the government, but not without its challenges. As our study revealed, challenges faced by digital content creators include: limited access to finance, poor electricity supply, slow internet bandwidth, limited training facilities to deliver specialized trainings, excessive taxation on social media platforms, and concerns over stringent social media regulation. These highlight the critical need for government intervention towards the sector.

Nonetheless, as our study had predicted, the last two years have witnessed exponential growth in the number of digital contents and creators, moving thousands of youths out of the unemployment bracket in the process. Hardly would you find any major news report or trendy story these days that would not be depicted in multiple skits. More so, digital content creators are becoming more daring with the kinds of content they put out. We have also witnessed skit-makers like Sabinus, Brain Jotter, SydneyTalker, Nas Boi, KieKie, Zicsaloma, Ashmusy and Romeo_WJ hit the limelight, generate mind-boggling wealth and gain significant fame as social media influencers. As we say in the local parlance, dem don blow! Furthermore, there’s been increased collaboration amongst content creators in a bid to drive viewership and piggy-bag off each other’s followership. We now watch comedy skits being aired as regular television content, and popular skit-makers featuring on movie productions. Some have even developed the nerves to shoot their own feature films, targeting platforms like Netflix, Amazon, ROK and DSTV.

To be sure, Nigeria’s service sector currently contributes over 43% to the GDP, with PwC projecting that the country’s media and entertainment sector could grow its revenues to almost $15 billion by 2025. This portends growth for the digital and creative enterprises sub-sector, and highlights the auspicious timing of the i-DICE intervention.

In conclusion, it’s fair to say that Nigeria has never been in short supply of policies, programmes or interventions aimed at addressing specific sectoral challenges, constraints and bottlenecks. Besides, this isn’t the first initiative targeted at boosting the country’s burgeoning creative industry. I recall in 2012, under President Goodluck Jonathan, the government introduced a $200 million intervention fund for the creative sector, and the Central Bank of Nigeria in 2019 committed N22 Billion under the Creative Industry Finance Initiative. However, the missing link has always been with the implementation of such initiatives. That is really where the rubber meets the road. Rounding off our study, I asked one digital content creator if he had ever benefitted from past interventions targeted at the creative sector, especially those initiated under the current administration. His response echoes the sentiments shared by many of his colleagues: “The entertainment industry funds as claimed by the government is nothing but political statements. Government claims to be releasing money for the creative industry, but it does not get to the hands of the creative artistes themselves.” Perhaps, before we shout Uhuru over i-DICE, there may be a need to inquire how the government, in partnership with the African Development Bank, intends to implement it.

Bell Ihua mni, is a Professor of Practice in Opinion Research at Coal City University, Enugu, and Executive Director at Africa Polling Institute. He can be reached on Twitter @Bellemskey or via email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

I visited the Asokoro, Abuja home of Nigeria’s former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, the other day, to observe the iftar with him, as part of the month-long Ramadan fast. Atiku very ably hoisted the presidential flag of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, (PDP), during the last general elections, as we remember. The flames and flickers of the fires stoked by that insanely corrupted poll, remain alive and active. The world “ain’t seen the end of the saga as yet,” to appropriate that popular American expression. The Wazirin Adamawa, (traditional prime minister of Adamawa) as he is also very well known, was just coming out of the house for the first time that day, apparently. Atiku is a very religious and studious character who loves paperwork. You fall in love with his handwriting when you glean his minutes on a document. Warri folks, famous for their earthy, standout variety of pidgin English will put it like; “you go like the writing die, my guy“. Not to talk about his striking signature.

He walked straight to the foyer which had been laid out for him to refresh and receive guests before attending the Maghrib prayers when I arrived. We, his associates and officials, exchanged banters with ourselves as we accompanied Atiku to the dining room thereafter. Babalele Abdullahi, Atiku’s finance director and Ibrahim Zango, his principal secretary were in tow. Andy Okolie, Atiku’s eternal speechwriter, looked in the direction of Azu Ndukwe, veteran medic and personal physician to Atiku in the last three decades, and started a conversation about me. “People rarely appreciate that you are very tall, Tunde. And this is because you are huge. Standing close to you now, I can see that people can easily be making a mistake thinking you are just of an average height”. Atiku looked back at us briefly, a soft smile playing on his lips. He had once jokingly tackled me for “obstructing passage” with my tummy at mealtime. That was back in our days in Aso Villa. He operated a virtual “open house” policy which ensured seamless interconnectivity between those of us on the president’s staff and his own officials.

As Atiku took his place at the head of the table, I opted to sit in the direction of Ndukwe and Okolie so we could continue our exchanges. Sunny Mekwunye, who has been with Atiku forever, virtually, waved me to sit next to our principal’s immediate right so that younger guests could take over the southward extreme where I originally opted for. We were still doing all that shuffling when Lucky Igbinedion, former governor of Edo State, and Ben Obi, former adviser during the Olusegun Obasanjo/Atiku Abubakar regime, both breezed in. To lend from the peculiar lexicon of the uniformed services, we had to revert ajuwaya, (as you were, return to status quo). This meant I returned to my former position.

Our dinner, was interspersed with some talking and allusions to contemporary sociopolitics. You could see in Atiku, an unruffled mien, irrespective of the electoral heist he had just been victim of. He remains the calm, very well-informed, liberal-minded, measured gentleman, elder and statesman. His interjections, the dimensions, the illuminations he brought to issues, were borne of aggregated experiences over spans and space. The underwhelming outing of the Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), which has been globally acknowledged as the worst in Nigeria’s contemporary political history, was under the scalpel. Voter apathy, explicitly manifested by the participation of just about 25% of registered voters in the process, was referenced as a disturbing development.

Wholesale retrogression in the electoral process which has reversed practically to prehistoric prototypes despite assurances of advancements and innovations, and mammoth investments to that effect, featured on the discussion menu. Voter suppression, vote buying within the precincts of voting areas and the criminal manipulation of the much advertised BVAS device, were alluded to. Barefaced distortions of electoral figures beginning from the polling units, brazen seizures of ballot boxes by miscreants and the destruction of same in many instances, were under review. The question was also asked: Why do we still have to manually move election result sheets, to collation centres? Where is technological deployment in the whole process? That should ordinarily simplify the gamut of the balloting for both voters and officials, and help preserve the sanctity of the vote.

Unsavoury proceedings in various states during the elections, were also reviewed. Accentuated ethnic dimensions to political rhetoric especially in Lagos, easily Nigeria’s most megalopolitan state, was noted with unhappiness. Suspicions of INEC’s complicity in the declaration of the gubernatorial poll in Adamawa State, as inconclusive, was discussed. Soldiers and the police had taken over Yola, the state capital, the night after the Saturday, March 11, 2023, election. The media alerted Nigeria of a grand script to gift the governorship to Aisha Binani, the female APC opponent of Umaru Fintiri, incumbent PDP governor, the mandate. Fintiri was coasting home with a headwind of over 30,000 votes over his major opponent, when the election was abruptly halted. There were suggestions and allegations of a scurrilous scheme to present the governorship as “trophy” for Aisha Buhari, wife of the president, who hails from Adamawa state. The story in town was that she desired to enthrone a female governor before her exit from the Nigerian political stage as first lady in two months time.

Kogi, which assumed national and global notoriety since a helicopter was procured on polls day back in 2019, to hover over Lokoja, the state capital and rain live bullets to unsettle voters down below, featured too. It was in this very same Kogi state, that Salome Abuh, an opposition party woman leader, was incinerated in her home by political psychopaths, that same year. Her crime was that she led womenfolk under her superintendence to vote against the ruling APC in the state, in 2019. Also recall that agents of state dug all arterial roads leading to the community of the PDP senatorial candidate, Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan to prevent access by electoral officers for the polls for the presidential and national assembly polls.

In the same Kogi central senatorial zone where Akpoti-Uduaghan was all but disenfranchised, Adavi local government chairman, Joseph Omuya Salami was recorded real-time, chasing voters away from a polling unit, seizing and shredding election materials. Salami was protected in the act and watched by uniformed and armed policemen, by the way. There was also allusion to this bespectacled, grey-bearded old man, most probably a professor, who served as returning officer in some state. He was pure comic relief, barely able to read the election results, even as he began every sentence with “abuna”, a Hausa expression for “this thing.” He was simply a waffling clown. “What kind of professor is that,” Atiku asked rhetorically? Is he among our best professors? Are professors the only Nigerians who can function as returning officers in such a vast and blessed country?” he questioned further.

Atiku’s main sitting room was getting fuller as we continued our discussions. Longstanding Atiku friend and loyalist, Jide Adeniji, onetime chief executive of the federal roads maintenance agency, (FERMA), was in the house, among other dignitaries. He missed the buffet. There was also a delegation from the Osun State PDP, led by its acting chairman, Akintunde Akindele. Earlier in the day, they witnessed the judicial confirmation by the Court of Appeal of the gubernatorial ticket of Nurudeen Jackson Adeleke the Osun State governor. The seats in the living room were all but taken up by individuals and groups, even as Atiku’s exclusive meeting room was being simultaneously readied for other pre-scheduled meetings and engagements. There was order in the air, evidence that the chief host is a stickler to form and protocol.

Amidst all of these, I asked Atiku: “Your Excellency, how do you maintain such calm, such composure even in the face of the contentious polls which you apparently won, but which victory you have been deprived? ” “I believe,” he began, “that whatever happens to a man in his journey through life, has been prearranged by God. It is advisable therefore that one maintains a calm and focused disposition as much as possible.” Continuing Atiku said: “As one of those who fought for democracy, who was in fact targeted in my Kaduna home by agents of the Sani Abacha government, I’m a wholesale believer in the rule of law. Don’t forget the various issues we tested in the judiciary, all the way to the Supreme Court, during my travails as vice president. I won all of them. We have filed our petition arising from observed irregularities in the last election as you very know.”

Atiku continued: “Despite scepticism about the independence and dependability of the judiciary, especially when hard decisions have to be taken, we pray they will stand on the side of verifiable honesty, truth, justice, democracy and the good people of this country. That will be the hallmark of a truly neutral, forthright, courageous judiciary, capable of holding its own, and not necessarily appendaged or subordinate to any other arm of government. That is when we can begin to believe that we are conscientiously building enduring democratic institutions. That is our minimum expectation and the expectation of the ordinary people of this country.”

We rose in unison as Atiku joined his guests, every group and individual desiring a photo opportunity with him. I courtesied and sought permission to “fall out” as is said in the military. Atiku obliged, reminding me he looked forward to my next visit.