This week, President Goodluck Jonathan led a delegation of PDP bigwigs to attend what was termed a “Unity/Freedom Rally”, in Ilorin, Kwara State. Senate President, David Mark, must have spoken the minds of other members of the delegation when he confessed apprehension that they might have just a few people to receive the delegation

WHEN Goodluck Jonathan announced Sanusi Lamido Sanusi’s suspension as CBN Governor last Thursday, it was hinged upon sundry allegations prepared by an obscure Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria.

EARLY this week, the Borno State governor, Kashim Shettima was in Abuja to brief President Goodluck Jonathan on the heightened insurgency in his state. It was coming against the background of the massacres perpetrated by Boko Haram insurgents in a huge swathe of the state. So alarming has the situation become that the Northern Governors’ Forum convened to explore issues of the widening insecurity in the region as well as efforts to find solutions. These are the worst of times indeed for innocent, often very poor people eking out a desperate livelihood in ecologically challenged environments.

IN this column last week, I pointed out the fact that scarcity of water has remained a major social problem in Ilorin. A succession of military and civilian administrations has fleeced the state of billions of naira, under the guise of providing solution to water problem in Ilorin. Muhammed Sha’aba Lafiagi, a senator today, was the first governor who misappropriated money meant for water supply in Kwara state.

A LINGERING memory from my early child in Ilorin is the shortage of potable water in many homes in the city. During the 60s, there was a standing pipe which served hundreds of families, in a depression where what was then Oyo. Bypass (today’s Ibrahim Taiwo Road), meets the Emir’s Road. People will form long lines of buckets with regular outbreaks of fights as each one desperately attempts to get water for their family use.