By Ikeddy Isiguzo Families – People with close affinity, usually through birth or marriage, but also loosely used to define relationships we have cultivated to the point that we see people involved in them as very close to us.

WE had to destroy the town in order to save it.” That was the United States Air Force officer’s response to the American destruction of the Vietnamese town of Ben Tre, in the Mekong Delta city with 35,000 inhabitants. Save it from who?

Former sports minister, Musa Mohammed, once got in touch to clear the air on an issue I had raised concerning the bad blood between the Nigeria Football Association and his ministry.

DID former President Olusegun Obasanjo commit blasphemy when he spoke at the Leon H. Sullivan Dialogue on Nigeria in Washington DC last week? Let us quote him and reflect appropriately: “With all due respect, if Jesus Christ could come to the world and be the Chairman of the INEC, any election he conducted would be disputed”.

The media war waged by radical journalists from the early 1980s provided the impetus and support for civil society organisations to come into being and join in this fight. The haste with which Generals Obasanjo (1979), Babangida (1993), and Abdulsalam Abubakar (1999) either stepped aside or handed over power to civilians is partly credited to the dogged efforts of the radical media, aided by the civil society groups that they encouraged and empowered.