King Sunny Ade ( KSA), the respected Nigerian music legend, has talked about why he has neither denied nor confirmed the rumours that he was having an affair with the late lady of songs, Onyeka Onwenu (MON).

In a recent condolence visit to the families of the late singer, KSA paid tributes to Onwenu while sharing his experiences with her.

Addressing rumours about their relationship, he clarified that the speculation was a strategic move to promote their music.

“That was a gimmick we did. It was for the music. We wanted to launch ‘Wait for Me.’ Before, people used to think she was my girlfriend. Me and her have never said yes or no,” he explained.

King Sunny Ade described Onwenu as an extraordinary woman who provided invaluable advice and support.

“She’s someone who will sit down with you. She used to say. “Can I chip in for some advice?” And the advice was always excellent,” he recalled.

Reflecting on their collaboration on the iconic song ‘Wait for Me,’ KSA noted that Onwenu often took the lead in their joint projects.

“Because when it comes to music that the two people have to do together, she used to do more. She would just tell me Sunny, let’s take it this way. And it’s always good,” he said.

He expressed his intention to continue performing the song in her honour, always crediting her as the true owner. “I will, on her behalf, sing it throughout my life with any artiste that you want me to. I’ve done it several times in different countries. I mentioned her name. I said she’s the owner of the song.”

He also shared the values he learned from Onwenu, emphasising her dedication to music and her vision for their work to have a global impact.

“She’s the first person to say this thing, we must do it. Sunny, let’s do it. This is what we want to do. It’s not only for us. It’s not only for our nation,  but for the whole world,” he stated.

Onwenu, a celebrated singer and actress, passed away on July 30 leaving a significant void in the Nigerian entertainment industry.

Kunle Wizeman Ajayi, the Governorship candidate of the African Action Congress, AAC, in the forthcoming gubernatorial election in Ondo State, has been reportedly arrested.

Ajayi, who is also a member of the Take It Back Movement, was arrested by operatives of the Nigeria Police Force on Saturday in Akure during the ongoing one-milion-man protest against hunger and hardship.

The AAC candidate was, according to the organization, arrested alongside another activist, Patrick Owolabi.

The human rights advocacy organisation, Take It Back Movement, announced the arrest in a post on its official X handle, while demanding their immediate release.

The post reads, “It’s unfortunate that the @PoliceNG is yet to learn.

“The continued clampdown on peaceful #EndBadGovernceInNigeria protesters is a total shame.

“We condemn the unlawful arrest of Ajayi Wizeman & Patrick Owolabi in Ondo state and we demand their immediate and unconditional release!”

However, when contacted by DAILY POST, the Ondo State Police Public Relations Officer, SP Odunlami Ibukun said, “I have not been briefed on that report”.

Malam Ibrahim Shekarau, a former governor of Kano State, has blamed the emirate tussle on politicians involvement institution.

Shekarau said if politicians had stayed away from traditional institutions in the state, there wouldn’t have been emirate crisis.

Recall that Governor Abba Yusuf had reinstated Muhammed Sanusi while dethroning his predecessor, Aminu Ado Bayero.

The governor’s decision followed the repealing of the Kano State House of Assembly Emirate law of 2019 that had paved the way for Ado Bayero as Kano Emir.

Commenting on the matter, Shekarau expressed hope that Kano State would be peaceful and the tension created by the tussle would be over.

Featuring on Channels Television’s Politics Today, Shekarau said: “There will be peace. We need the traditional institution. I will not go into that because I belong to the institution.

“It was the political angle that seemed to have led us into this crisis. If the politicians had kept away from all of this and of course the traditional institution if properly engaged, I don’t see any disagreement.

“The traditional institutions are leading in their own right in society. The governor or any government appointee is a leader. There has to be this synergy of understanding.”

On Thursday night, gunmen believed to be members of the Eiye Confraternity shot and killed the manager of a hotel in Ilorin, the capital of Kwara State.

The deceased who was identified as Anthony Balogun was the one running the hotel owned by his mother before the unfortunate incident.

The sad incident occurred at about 8 pm on the ill-fated night inside the premises of the hotel located in Olunlade area of the Ilorin metropolis.

Daily Post reports that two gunmen allegedly entered the hotel and requested to see the manager.

The deceased, who thought that they were prospective customers, came out of his room to meet them at the reception.

The assailants reportedly called him out of the reception and shot him at close range on the chest, according to sources.

They were said to have macheted him on the head, hands and legs after some gunshots.

Kwara State Police Commissioner, Victor Olaiya, who confirmed the development, said it was the outcome of the 8/8 cultists activities after the 7/7 celebration of another confraternity known as Aiye.

Responding to questions from journalists in Ilorin on Friday at the police command headquarters, the commissioner who described the case as a fresh one after the efforts of the police to mitigate the fallout of the nationwide hunger protests in the state, assured that the culprits would be hunted and brought to justice.

The case was reported at the Ganmo Divisional Police Station, close to Ilorin, while the body of the deceased was deposited at the Kwara State General Hospital, upgraded as the Kwara state University Teaching Hospital, Ilorin.

The Abia State Government has stated that it has not received the 20 trucks of rice intended as palliative aid from the Federal Government.

The State Commissioner for Information, Prince Okey Kanu, who stated this, said no such palliative had arrived in the state, adding that there was no communication from the Federal Government for any such palliative.

He described as fake news, reports that the Federal Government had also distributed 50kg bags of rice to states for sale at the cost of N40,000.

“We didn’t see any truck of rice from the Federal Government. And the issue of selling a 50kg bag of rice for N40,000 is fake news.

”We don’t deal with rumours and speculations. There has been a way the federal government communicates with us when it has to do with palliatives, and no such message has come from the federal government,” he said.

Fielding questions on whether it was not proper for the government to open channels of communication with the federal government on the issue, the commissioner said it was not necessary.

“There is no point for us to be wasting our time looking for where to verify the news. If the news was authentic, we could have gotten the message as a government straight from the federal government. No such thing happened!”

Reacting to an inquiry on the efforts of the state government to alleviate the effects of the economic hardship on Abia residents, he said the state government “believes in teaching the people how to fish,” in addition to giving them palliatives.

THE 10-day nationwide #EndBadGovernance protests that end today, known by the reduplicative compound “Zanga-Zanga” in Hausaphone northern Nigeria, have ruptured the coalition that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu managed to build with a portion of the northern Muslim political establishment since 2014, which put Muhammadu Buhari in power in 2015 and 2019 and him in 2023. 

But this Zanga-Zanga-inspired rupture also reveals the initial precarity and fragility of the strange-bedfellows coalition. Buhari and Tinubu were previously fierce political adversaries who distrusted each other’s motives and undermined each other. Their alliance was more accurately a political scaffold that papered over their contradictions for a temporary gain, which was the ouster of Goodluck Jonathan from power.

Tinubu’s associates and acolytes in the Southwest, who said they protected Buhari from revolt in their region even when he bungled governance with uncommon ineptitude, are understandably miffed at the rawness, fierce intensity, and undiluted anti-Tinubu fervor of the protests in northern Nigeria.

They are wondering why Buhari, his associates, and even the APC establishment in the North didn’t return the favor. The answers are obvious, but people in power are often blind to the obvious, especially if the obvious is disquieting. 

First, Buhari and his supporters know that the Tinubu group, which had a tight leash on the Southwest political space, didn’t protect Buhari from the consequences of his infernal incompetence out of any high-minded considerations. They did so because they needed power after Buhari’s term in office. It was unvarnished calculative opportunism. 

Since Buhari’s people have no expectation of any kind of requital from Tinubu, like Tinubu did from them, they felt no obligation to protect or explain away Tinubu’s own hard-hearted incompetence. The chase often stops after a conquest. Men who woo women can relate to this sentiment.

Second, the misery that Tinubu’s simultaneous policies of never-before-seen astronomical petrol price increase and devaluation of the naira unleashed on the country are felt more deeply in the North than in any part of the country because of the preexisting multidimensional poverty in the region and the pervading insecurity that makes farming almost impossible. 

Money is now both hard to find and worthless when it is found, and food is both hard to find and unaffordable when it is found. That is an unprecedentedly profound, not to mention unsurvivable, existential torment.

Two days after the #EndBadGovernance protests started, I told someone that many people in the North have been rendered so desolate, so destitute, and so despondent by the economic crunch that they are looking to cash in on the protests to commit suicide by police bullets because Islam forbids suicide.

Islam teaches that committing suicide guarantees an unfettered passage to the hottest depths of hellfire in the hereafter. I said many people who couldn’t survive the pain and humiliation of perpetual hunger might tempt security forces to shoot them so they could end it all and not fear that they would provoke the wrath of their Creator for committing suicide.

Of course, this is twisted thinking because a famous hadith, which every Muslim who took Islamic Studies in secondary school knows, says “Actions shall be judged according to intention.”

Well, my predictions turned out to be accurate. A friend shared a video of scores of protesters in a northern city chanting, “da yunwa ta kashe mu, da ma bullet yakashe mu” (rough translation: “Instead of dying of hunger, we would rather be killed by a bullet”) as they confronted gun-wielding military and police officers.

There is also the viral video of protesters bursting into the Zamfara State Government House in Gusau and defying, even daring, menacing, gun-toting soldiers who tried to stop them. Several such scenes have been replicated throughout the North.

The mistake the government is making is to dismiss the protests as entirely politically motivated. They are not. Even if they wanted, Buhari and his associates couldn’t stop the protests both because the shelf life of Buhari’s “magic” has expired (his own house was besieged in Daura, and he had been pelted with stones while he was in power in cities like Kano and Maiduguri where he had been idolized) and because the extent of anguish people are going through now is unappeasable.

Apart from the usual criminals of opportunity (who exploit every unrest to steal and destroy), the vast majority of protesters think their only hope of living is to risk death and push back at policies that kill them slowly but surely. You can’t persuade people who have nothing to lose by dying.

That was why American author Dan Groat pointed out in his 2014 book titled In Monarchs and Mendicants, “Not interested in scarin’ anybody, but people with good sense are afraid of a man with nothin’ to lose.” Lance Conrad echoed this in his book The Price of Nobility when he said, “Only a fool would underestimate a man with nothing to lose.”

People who weren’t exempt from the rage of protesters can’t stop protesters from protesting.

The self-inflicted attenuation of Tinubu’s political capital in the North plays into the old debate in the Southwest about the best coalitional strategy to attain and retain power for the Yoruba.

The Chief Obafemi Awolowo strategy, which Afenifere still believes in, sees the Muslim North as a competitor and not an ally. The Awo strategy for getting power is to build an alliance between the entire South and Northern Christians.

But the Chief Ladoke Akintola template sees the Muslim North as a strategic partner in light of the deep historical and cultural ties that bind Yoruba people and several linguistic, ethnic and cultural groups in the Muslim North, such as Borgu, Nupe, Igala, and Hausa people. (Read my October 9, 2021, column titled “Arewa and Oduduwa More Alike than Unlike.”) This is hardly surprising because even though Akintola was a Christian, he was from Ogbomoso whose traditional ruler traces ancestral roots to Borgu.

Chief MKO Abiola—and now President Tinubu—subscribe to the Akintola template. Abiola was briefly vindicated when he won the June 12, 1993, presidential election with enormous support from the North, including Kano, his opponent’s home state.

But the revocation of his epochal electoral triumph by a Northern military head of state—and the decidedly ethnic and regional character the fight for and the opposition to his mandate later took—appeared to justify the distrust of the Muslim North by the Awo group, which nonetheless gave full-throated support to Abiola to reclaim his mandate.

Tinubu, undeterred by Abiola’s experience, reinvented the Akintola template. It’s as if he wanted to prove that he could tread the same path and get to the destination that Abiola couldn’t get to. That must be why he called his presidential bid “Renewed Hope.” Abiola’s was “Hope.” Like Abiola, he chose a Muslim running mate. And, like Abiola, his running mate is a Kanuri man from Borno.

With the Muslim North now souring on him only one year into his first term and the unlikelihood of his ever recovering whatever goodwill he had from the region if he continues with his economic policies that push people to the brink of the existential precipice, the Awo/Afenifere group may be having the last laugh.

So, what should he do? The best option is to discard the IMF/World Bank neoliberal policies he’s enamored with (which have never worked anywhere in the world) and embrace Awolowo’s welfarist capitalist template of governance that puts the development and wellbeing of people at the center of policies. That may restore his goodwill with the North—and even earn him more support elsewhere.

The other options are non-starters, but I’ll mention them anyway. Like Chief Olusegun Obasanjo who won his first term with the support of the Muslim North, but who later used the Awo/Afenifere template to get a second term, Tinubu can court the Christian North and galvanize the South. Goodluck Jonathan used this template in 2011 and won.

The problem is that if Peter Obi runs in 2027, and I don’t see any reason why he won’t, Tinubu won’t be able to galvanize the South into a unified voting bloc. And, although the worst fears of his Muslim-Muslim ticket among Christians hasn’t materialized, northern Christians are unlikely to embrace him wholeheartedly, however hard he tries to woo them.

In other words, Tinubu is cooked, as Gen Zs say. Anything short of bringing down the cost of petrol, restoring the value of the naira, making everyday things affordable will doom Tinubu’s first term and deny him a second term because he is now effectively a political orphan.

Music superstar Wizkid has reemerged on social media to back his fellow artist, Ahmed Ololade, popularly known as Asake, following the release of Asake’s latest album, Lungu Boy.

Wizkid, who is featured on the album, took to his social media page to promote the new project, marking a rare public endorsement from the typically private artist.

In a show of solidarity, Wizkid retweeted the cover art of Lungu Boy, using the album title as his caption.

This move is particularly noteworthy given Wizkid’s reputation for being reserved on social media, often preferring to support his peers through retweets rather than direct posts.

His endorsement is seen as a significant boost for Asake’s new release.

The tweet has garnered considerable attention and engagement from fans and the music community.

The support comes amid widespread acclaim for Wizkid’s contribution to the album, with his verse on the track “MMS” being highlighted as a standout moment, stirring emotional reactions from listeners.

The Chief Magistrate’s Court, Wuse Zone 6, has summoned popular Nollywood actress Tonto Dikeh and her bodyguard, one Gbenga, for alleged assault and trespass.

The suit, with case number CR/359/2024, was filed by the Chief Executive of Skyewise Group Limited, Elvis Abuyere, the owner of an Abuja-based car dealership company.

In the court summons dated August 6, 2024, Iyanna ordered the two defendants to appear before the court on August 24, 2024, to answer the charges against them.

He stated that Dikeh had, in January, approached the car company for the purchase of a brand-new Changan Uni-K 2023 model from Mikano Motors.

The complainant, who was reported to have a dealership relationship with Mikano, subsequently paid N85 million as full payment for the car to Mikano, with an agreement that Dikeh would pay the balance in installments within three months upon receiving the car.

The first deposit by Dikeh was her used 2008/2009 Lexus, which was worth N37 million. She made an additional payment of N3.5 million but failed to settle the balance by the end of April, at the expiration of the payment window, thereby breaching the agreement.

On May 1, Abuyere retrieved the car from Dikeh after efforts to collect the balance proved futile. Dikeh later paid N20 million, N17 million, and N5 million, leaving an outstanding balance of N2.1 million.

On July 30, the actress contacted the car company to have the car serviced, and it was taken for maintenance. Upon completion of the repairs, the car company demanded the remaining N2.7 million from her. However, she was reported to have forcefully entered the business premises of the complainant in Maitama, Abuja, alongside her bodyguard and two ladies, thereby committing “criminal trespass.”

Dikeh is also accused of assaulting the complainant and some staff members of his company. The four individuals disrupted business operations at the car company, damaged property, and threatened to use social media to harm the complainant’s business.

They were later arrested by the police.

Earlier today, the Inspector-General of Police Monitoring Unit of the Nigeria Police Force invited Dikeh to its headquarters in connection with an investigation into criminal defamation, cyberbullying, and forgery, among other charges.

In the invitation letter signed by the Head of the IGP Monitoring Unit, A.A. Elleman, it was stated that the actress’s name prominently appeared in the investigation being conducted by the unit.

In a statement on her Instagram page on Friday, Dikeh stressed that she was neither arrested nor jailed by the “police or any law enforcement agency of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. I am in my house enjoying the goodness of God.”

The Nollywood actress noted that she’s a “law-abiding citizen”, and that getting involved in crime and criminalities is not one of the things she can be involved in.

The statement read further, “At no point in my life has there ever been a search warrant, arrest warrant or any other form of warrant from the Good office of the Nigeria police to my humble self.

“I will always honour invitations extended to me whether to help the law enforcement agencies in their job or to provide clarifications on issues. This is without prejudice to the fact that I will exercise my rights against anyone, persons or group of persons who attempt to peddle fake stories about me or my brand or defame my character. I will come for you. This is just to let those behind this false Narrative know that they failed woefully.”

The World Bank has strongly refuted claims made by Nigeria’s Women Affairs Minister, Uju Kennedy-Ohanenye, alleging that the bank’s officials collect 40% of every loan granted to Nigeria as consultancy fees.

The minister was reported to have made these allegations while claiming she was being victimized for refusing to sign a $500 million World Bank loan for women’s projects.

In response to inquiries, Mansir Nasir, a senior external affairs officer with the World Bank, unequivocally denied the minister’s assertions. “World Bank staff do not receive 40 per cent of project funds as ‘consultation fees’ nor are ministers entitled to five per cent of project funds for signing loan agreements. Both assertions are unequivocally false,” Nasir stated.

The World Bank recently approved a $500 million loan for the ‘Nigeria for Women Project’ (NFWP-SU), aimed at improving the livelihoods of women in Nigeria. The project, a collaboration between the World Bank, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Nigerian government, is set to run for five years, starting in six pilot states representing each geopolitical zone.

Minister Kennedy-Ohanenye reportedly claimed that her life was “at stake” for refusing to sign the loan due to unclear terms and conditions. However, days later, the ministry denied the reports, describing them as “false” and stating that the president had approved restructuring the loan to remove unnecessary expenditures and ensure direct benefits for the target beneficiaries.

The World Bank emphasized that its funded projects are implemented by recipient governments and are subject to rigorous policies to prevent misuse of funds. Nasir clarified that the recruitment of project staff is the sole responsibility of the government ministry in charge of the project, not the World Bank.

The newly-appointed Head of Civil Service of the Federation, Mrs Didi Walson-Jack, has promised to serve the interest of Nigerians as captured in President Bola Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda.

Walson-Jack gave the assurance on Friday, after private talks with Tinubu at the Aso Rock Presidential Villa, Abuja.

“I see it as a divine assignment, and I had the opportunity to assure Mr. President that, by the grace of God, I will not disappoint him,’ she said.

The new HoS, who was led to the Villa by her predecessor, Dr Folashade Yemi-Esan, also said she will “work together not only with the permanent secretaries but also with the directors and the entire civil service to deliver on the Renewed Hope Agenda.”

On her part, Yemi-Esan described the handover process as “seamless,” adding that the new civil service chief was “capable” of performing the task before her.

“The President has made the handing over seamless, which is very well appreciated. The incoming Head of Service has had some weeks with me learning the ropes and I am sure by now, she is ready to go and we thank Mr President for this.

“We also had a good time chatting with Mr President, sharing his vision for the country and especially for the civil service with the incoming Head of Service, and that should prepare her and should make her hit the ground running so that she can achieve all that Mr President has discussed with us.

“The newly appointed Head of Service is capable, very intelligent, hardworking, professional and empathic. I have no doubt that she will do the job very well,” said Yemi-Esan.

On July 17, Tinubu approved the appointment of Walson-Jack as Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, with effect from August 14, 2024.

Her appointment was announced in a statement by Tinubu’s Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Ajuri Ngelale, titled ‘President Tinubu appoints new head of civil service of the federation.’

She succeeds Yemi-Esan who retires from service on August 13, 2024.

Walson-Jack was appointed Federal Permanent Secretary in 2017 and has served in several Ministries.

Tinubu thanked the outgoing Head of Service for her stewardship and tasked the incoming Head of Service to “discharge her duties with innovative flair, integrity, and stringent adherence to the extant rules and regulations of the Civil Service of the Federation.”