I SPOKE with Lai Mohammed, spokesperson of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), on Monday. My call was sequel to the alarm he raised about the decision of the Goodluck Jonathan regime to handover the nation’s maritime security to Global West Vessel Specialist Agency (GWVSL), a company allegedly owned by Government Tompolo, one of the so-called ex-militants of the Niger Delta, that spent the past few years subverting our country.

By Ishaq Modibbo Kawu “Politics begin where the masses are, not where there are thousands, but where there are millions, that is where serious politics begin”- Lenin THE past week will certainly go down as one of the most significant in recent Nigerian history. In a week of practical struggle, Nigerians learnt  lessons rapidly, in […]

LAST week, I expressed worry about the simplistic acceptance of ‘Boko Haram’ complicity for the bombings around the country. I had argued that we needed a more open-minded and critical interrogation of the various claims

LAST week, I expressed worry about the simplistic acceptance of ‘Boko Haram’ complicity for the bombings around the country. I had argued that we needed a more open-minded and critical interrogation of the various claims. This is because, even statements coming from state security, indicate there are criminal syndicates claiming to be Boko Haram.

I was trapped in the interface between hope and despair on New Year’s eve. I am in London, after spending the Christmas period in Dubai and watching on television outlets the horrific reportage of the tragic bombings on Christmas Day.

I HAVE reflected very much on diversity and the essential unity of our humanity in the past 24 four hours. Television images from home have been very disturbing. The tragic and unacceptable killings of people worshipping during this season of goodwill have triggered my stroll on the shores of hindsight.

I have met General Aliyu Gusau Mohammed only once; and that was sometimes last year. He was an aspiring presidential candidate; one of the four vying to be the Northern consensus candidate.

MANY people probably missed the story, especially the audacity of the challenge. But it led Blueprint newspaper of Wednesday, December 7th, 2011. The nut and bolt was that DIG in charge of operations, Alhaji Audu Abubakar, apparently perplexed about persistent complaints against the police: eternal extortions of N20 from relays of commercial vehicle drivers; those alcohol-laced: “Oga your boys are here” solicitations, etc.

LAST week, the wind of nation-wide opposition to an unpopular agenda finally exposed the ugly hind place of Nigeria’s political (economic) fowl, when Nigeria’s Senate named beneficiaries of the much-vaunted fuel subsidies.

The former leader of the secessionist ‘Republic of Biafra’, Colonel Odumegwu Ojukwu, died in a London hospital over the weekend, at 78 years. As is the wont, there has been an outpouring of emotional tributes in the wake of the passing of one of the most controversial figures in Nigerian history.

You hold the keys of heaven and hell. Power to bind and loose: bind, Thomas, bind, King and bishop under your heel. King, emperor, bishop, baron, king – T. S. Eliot in MURDER IN THE CATHEDRAL

LAST Sunday, I did the closest thing to playing Russian roulette: travelled by road from Ilorin to Kaduna, using the old road, via Mokwa. It was a nightmare. In fact, every road leading to Ilorin is so bad that people seemed to have given up hope of ever finding succour.

LAST week, I spoke briefly with a top helmsman of the PDP, on the controversy around the PDP candidacy for the upcoming gubernatorial election in Bayelsa State. I was assured that the case would “soon be resolved”.

THE American Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton, on being told that imperialism’s ‘revolutionaries’ organised in the Libyan Transitional Council, NTC, had captured and killed Moammar Gaddafi in Sirte, tried an uneducated re-interpretation of Julius Ceasar’s famous quote: “Veni, vidi, vici”, which translates from Latin to: “I came, I saw, I conquered”.

SOON after the Nigerian civil war in 1970, General Yakubu Gowon, as Nigerian Head of State, commenced a nation-wide visit of the then 12 states of the Nigerian federation. As a 10-year- old, primary five kid in Ilorin, I was very active in the scouting movement.