Since the death of Gani Fawehinmi, a lot has been said and published about him: about his dogged fighting spirit; about his passion for improving the fortunes of the less privileged and the poor; about his fierce battles against injustice and wickedness in high places. The list is longer.

In the days of Idi Amin, Uganda took the risk of printing new money to bail that country’s economy out of the dull-drums. The exercise backfired so catastrophically, it has taken Museveni over two decades to right the disastrous consequences.

For several weeks on, all government-owned universities have been shut as a result of the “Academic Staff being on strike. Things have been this way for decades now. Yet we have still not devised an effective method to manage the crisis.

Democracy? That’s a long way off. What we have on ground is a quarter kilometre to one-party dictatorship. We say we are a Federal Republic of Nigeria, but there is nothing federal about the system which has mutated within half a century from a federation to a military-style unitary dictatorship.

The politicians are fooling around again like they did in previous “republics”. They should be called to order before we are all consumed by the disorder which this tomfoolery is most certainly going to result in, as our past history so tragically depicts. My only fear is that we might not be as lucky as in previous situations where we emerged from it all in one piece. We will be over stretching our luck if we keep that hope alive.

Whether it was the government or the Islamic insurgents who struck first is irrelevant; what should bother any right thinking Nigerian is that in spite of foreknowledge of the anti-social activities of the Taliban and the Boko Haram group, security forces in the country could not monitor and contain their activities before they became a deadly threat to the civilized existence we are all trying to live.

The nation’s major sea port of Apapa and Tin Can Island are critically endangered.
This new danger does not arise as a result of militants’ action, but due to lack of constructive reasoning, planning and execution of sensitive projects, necessary for Apapa and Tin Can Island Ports to function effectively.

In what was considered as a world record by UNESCO, Jakande constructed within 4 years, 23,093 classrooms; increased the number of primary school from 604 in 1979 to 954 in 1983.

At least, MEND is saying, ‘give us the kind of development that you have in Abuja and we would be satisfied’.
In response to this, the government is creating institutions like the Niger Delta Development Corporation (NDDC) through which to channel this development in the Niger Delta. On top of that, it has created a ministry for the region which at best is a bureaucracy.

One of the most tragic crises we have on our hands today is the bloody uprising in the Niger Delta. Justice Belgore made it also clear to everybody who is not driven by selfish and inordinate lust for power that the 1999 constitution is responsible for the Niger Delta crisis because it did not address the issue as the 1960 independent constitution did.