I HAVE written this piece to show why the PDP and for that matter all electoral parties must understand the causal connection between the Jihadist Politics and the possible extinction of liberal constitutionalist electoral politics in Africa. It is a must understanding for the BoT Chairman and Mr. President.

MALI is one of the Achilles heels of the territorial arrangements of the global inter-state order. And Africa is the region where opportunities for re-drawing of the global political map is most fecund. Al Qaeda’s search for a regional space for its global anti-secular anti-westernisation Islamist statecraft is a fundamental interest in the politics of the Malian crisis.

TO appreciate the title of this news analysis a map has been generated. This map is a geopolitical map of the Central African Republic, CAR.

NIGERIA is waking up to the fact that elections are not about constitutional administration of government but are indeed contestation for power. The formation of the All Progressive Congress (APC) is informed by this understanding. This realignment only polarizes the contestation for power and fails to address the need to de-fuse electoral politics to owing to the fateful fusion of the two politics, the electoral and state formation politics. The increasing call for a Conference may perhaps reflect what is now seen as untenable structure of power and authority in Nigeria, and a need to do something about it in the present condition of large-scale endemic insecurities.

IF we understand how we became a country we would approach issues of insecurity quite differently.

PETER Ishaka’s Sunday Comment in ThisDay, Sunday March 3, 2013 on the above subject is introduced by this summary excerpt:

PROFESSOR Julius Ihonvbere, the Secretary to Edo State Government, provided an insight that is useful in the appreciation of the challenges confronting the President’s National Security Advisers. It is as C-in-C that a President is intimately involved in national security management through the appointment of his National Security Advisers.

By John Amoda
CAN the governing elites in Nigeria be divided on the intentions of the Boko Haram? The answer is yes, they are divided. But should they be divided, the answer is no- they should not be divided. Why? The Boko Haram have not hidden their intentions to transform Nigeria into a Sharia [...]

AS a republican in a Republic of Nigeria I have not harboured kind thoughts on the value of the institutions of traditional rulership. I saw their survival in an empire as a function of the strategies of pacification and policing of populations ultimately ruled by imperial force.

SIMON Kolawole’s “A Lesson Or Two From Super Eagles” in ThisDay of Sunday February 17, makes the connection between politics and excellence. The Super Eagles, according to Kolawole, exemplified the relevance and wisdom of decision made on the merit of what is the case.

THISDAY, February 17, 2013 in the Sunday News page carries the story titled, “Nigeria Sliding into a Failed State, say Nwabueze, Akinrinade, others- seek convocation of National Confab”. It is this phrasing of the National Question that informs the title of this particular column.

THE Constitution of this country has established the prime value of the currency of Nigerian citizenry, and our politics instead of being the cultivation of the appreciation of Nigerian citizenry, has been and continues to be a process of a structured depreciation of the value of citizenry.

HAKEEM Baba-Ahmed reviewed the meeting of Eminent National Leaders of Thought arranged by the National Summit Group.

OCHEREOME Nnanna’s Vanguard, Monday, January 28th, 2013, is devoted to President Jonathan’s explanation of the Boko Haram insurgency in his recent interview by CNN’s Christiane Amanpour. Ochereome quotes the President:

THE text of President Barack Obama’s second inaugural speech delivered January 21st, 2013 at the National Mall of the Capitol, Washington DC is similar in tone, gravity and perennial lucidity and clarity to any of the chapters of Moses’ Deuteronomy in the Holy Bible.

IN the News page of Vanguard, Monday, January 14, 2013 one finds these captions- “There is no security at Arepo”- Amosun; 3 more bodies recovered; pipeline vandalization, a big business- DPR”. All of these captions are perspectives on Arepo as a structure of anarchy.

HAKEEM BABA-AHMED approaches issues of Nigerian political ethos with the energy and perspicacity of Chidi Amuta and I read him for his reading of politics in Nigeria. In his North: The goals of power, he attempts analysis of the political North in a way politics that should encourage politicians in the South to engineer a Political South.

WHAT is the context of the present security condition of society in Nigeria? Is it one of continuity from the colonial to the post colonial or is it one of transition between the colonial and the post colonial? The process of decolonisation in Nigeria was one of change of the officeholders of the British colonial government. The statecraft of the Nigerian Independence Politicians, or more cryptically phrased, the Nigerian Political Class, from Independence to the present has been one of governance adaptation of the institutions of British Administration for the colony of Nigeria. Independence was instituted by both Britain and colonial Nigeria as succession in office. In the gallery of succession in the offices of heads of ministries or agencies, there is first the picture of the last British Office holder and then the picture of the first Nigerian successor.

OCHEREOME Nnanna in his Vanguard, Monday November 26, 2012 View Point explains why the planned Alliance between Chief Bola Ahmed Tinubu “Action Congress of Nigeria (CAN) and General Muhammadu Buhari’s Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) may not work. In the course of his explanation he brings to the fore the larger problem of the fate of opposition parties and the apparent futility of opposition politics in Nigeria. It is this latter problem that is addressed in this version of the Tuesday Platform.

THE title of the essay implies that both religions, Christianity and Islam are anti-ecumenist, and depend on the growth of their adherents on convertion of non-believers.

THE front page of Friday, November 23, 2012 Vanguard carries the prominent picture captioned “Reconciliation: From left were: Bishop Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury Designate; the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar; former Prime Minister Tony Blair; President, Christian Association of Nigeria, C.A.N, Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, and Estu Nupe, Alhaji Yahaya Abubakar at the launching of Tony Blair Foundation Led-Work, to encourage reconciliation between Christian and Moslem communities.

THE colony of Nigeria was not federalist, the British did not co-ordinate contesting and putative rival sovereigns.

IS it possible to speak of national insecurity in view of such regionalist dichotomy in the assessment of the present security challenges?

Amoda
THE recent resurgence of demand for state police stems from observed security lapses or deficit at the Federal level. The introduction of this column will consist of appreciation of a sample of opinion advocating or opposing the proposal.

TWO changes have been made at the apex of government’s security management and development.

THE Guardian, Tuesday, June 19, 2012 carried the following story headlined: “police unveil new strategy against terror”. Vanguard, Tuesday, June 26, 2012 headlined its own story on the Police thusly.

OBVIOUSLY, we are concerned that what is going on in northern Mali could have destabilizing effect on the entire region which could provide a haven for those who wish to do obvious harm, to train.