Towards healing a nation’s 60 yr old wound, by Muyiwa Adetiba
This is the sixtieth year – to the week – of the July 1966 coup that has been infamously regarded as a counter-coup. A coup thatunfortunately marked the degeneration of a Nigeria that our fore fathers strove for and tried to build.A coup that subsequently led to a thirty- month Civil War which still leaves a lingering […]
Who is benefiting from religion in Nigeria?
By Muyiwa Adetiba Tomorrow is Easter. It is the last day of the Passion Week or Holy Week in Christendom which climaxes a six week Lenten season that has been dedicated to fasting, prayers and alms giving. The Muslim equivalent, called Ramadan, is about half-way through. So for the two major religions in the […]
POST ELECTION BRUISES: The road to healing will be slow
By Muyiwa Adetiba A face of a middle aged man tearing up his international passport in a video which has since gone viral stared at me. I don’t know whether what he did was criminal or not – it would at least be considered disrespectful and a desecration worthy of recriminations in some countries to […]
You can’t always get away with lawlessness
By Muyiwa Adetiba How many times have we seen vehicles, especially commercial vehicles run red lights as if they were not there for a purpose? How many times have we seen military vehicles speed recklessly on one-way streets thereby endangering the lives of those who have the right to that side of traffic, including pedestrians? […]
Dancing in my ears
By Muyiwa Adetiba It was about an hour past midnight and I had just entered the next phase of sleep when I heard the sound. It was the unmistakable hum of a mosquito. Somehow, and not for the first time, a lone mosquito had invaded the privacy of my room. I ignored it, more in […]
Too little, too late
By Muyiwa Adetiba The words of elders will always be evergreen irrespective of when they are uttered. Some four and a half decades ago, in 1978 to be precise, I had asked Julius Nyerere, the then Prime Minister of Tanzania, about the break-up of the East African Economic Council which was set up to promote […]
The trump in many of us
By Muyiwa Adetiba The Sunday Punch should be 50 this year. It means anybody who had any role to play in the newsroom at its birth or was around within its first year would today be at least fifty years in journalism. I was in the latter group. It makes me feel ancient to say […]
A city that welcomes you and your dreams
By Muyiwa Adetiba ‘Eko gba ole, o gba ole’ is a saying that is as popular and possibly nearly as old as Lagos itself. When translated literally, it means Lagos accommodates both the thieves and the slothful. But a deeper translation is that Lagos accommodates everybody without pre-conditions. Lagos is the most accepting of all […]
High stakes and conspiracy theories
By Muyiwa Adetiba I do not know where Chief Femi Fani-Kayode got his information that one of the leading Presidential contenders had a meeting with some Generals to plan something unsavory from. I hope for his sake that it is from a credible source and not from some beer parlour. He is a politician who […]
Square pegs in round holes
By Muyiwa Adetiba Fela, our late iconoclast had a hit song titled ‘Water no get enemy’. For those who don’t know the song, it wason how indispensable water is toour everyday living. According to him, you quarrel with water at your peril because there is nothing you can do without water. You can almost say […]
Sadists in high places
By Muyiwa Adetiba I had never felt that vulnerable in a long, long while. It was the beginning of a weekend. I had functions to attend, long standing obligations to fulfill, but I was, to all intents and purposes, grounded because I had no fuel in my car and no money in my pocket. I […]
Hopefully, my last word on the presidential election
By Muyiwa Adetiba The man I consider the Godfather of Journalism in Nigeria had four of us for a late breakfast a couple of weeks ago – that is not counting a pioneering film producer who came, had his bite, said his piece and left shortly after. Ostensibly, the gathering was to celebrate the New […]
The Pope who quit
By Muyiwa Adetiba In the history of the Catholic Church which is almost as old as the history of Christianity itself, only a couple of Popes have resigned and only one Pope has actually quit. The rest have been ‘married’ to the position ‘for better or for worse, in illness and in health, until death do them […]
A new year resolution for Lagos State
By Muyiwa Adetiba I am now hard of hearing. It was something I and close family members suspected over the years but the onus to confirm was up to me. It was eventually confirmed shortly before the Covid19 worldwide shutdown. The doctor then consoled me by saying it was still socially acceptable. I don’t know […]
‘The burden of being a star’ by Pele
By Muyiwa Adetiba (A tribute to the King of soccer) The king is dead. Long live the King. Edson Arantes Do Nascimento, known to the whole world as Pele, or the King of soccer, will never really die because he will always be remembered. Very few people transcend their sport. Pele was one of them. […]
Mr Integrity turns 90
By Muyiwa Adetiba Dr Christopher Abiodun Kolade, called CK to his face by his few remaining contemporaries, behind his back by those who have worked with him or have close interactions with him and simply Dr Kolade or Ambassador Kolade by others, turned 90 a few days ago. I was not physically with him on […]
