ALL those who say we should thank INEC and the security agencies for the Ondo war that has just been successfully prosecuted certainly know what they are talking about.

HURRICANE Sandy still held the centre-stage attention by Tuesday morning, pushing the campaigns towards the presidential election to a second place, at least for President Barack Obama.

I AM writing these lines at the Charles DeGaulle Airport in Paris. I’m on transit to Abuja, after a troubling transatlantic flight which started from Los Angeles, California, through Atlanta and over the eastern part of the US, which was literally in lockdown as a result of the hurricane. News of that dominated the airwaves in my last two days in America.

You could be driving down the waterfront close of your estate, you pull over to the side to make a call and then the next thing, you are kidnapped; whisked away to an unknown location and a ransom of 10million naira is demanded to set you free!

THE nation is being reminded that the interests of politicians is superior to all institutions, rules and processes, including the public service and procurement processes. Events are unfolding which explain why our politics in Nigeria is so anti-people, and how politicians are running our economy aground.

MILLIONS of pounds sterling. That’s how much Bola Tinubu, former senator, former governor of Lagos State, former democrat of NADECO fame (I will explain at the end of this column), says he “spent on” Olusegun Mimiko, governor of Ondo State.

THINGS seem to be happening in our country at such pace as makes it difficult to keep track of them all. The best one can do is to select from a wide range of issues and hope that what one doesn’t see others would see.

THIS is not a defence of Chinua Achebe. He does not need one. No amount of abuse can dent his global standing. Ban or burn all his books, as someone suggested, he would only feel sorry for you, not angry.

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.

I arrived New York City at exactly 9.30pm local time on Friday, October 26th 2012, and one of the exciting events waiting to unfold – quite apart from the presidential election of November 6th 2012 – is the impending arrival of powerful storm Sandy, a Category One hurricane.

Wedneasday morning I came across Stephen Keshi at the restaurant of the Suncoast Hotel in Durban. After brief exchange of pleasantries he had to go and freshen up after a long journey. We were to meet at the draw venue, later in the day, and talk.

The debate on the appropriate crude oil price benchmark for the 2013 budget has lately attracted numerous interests in the National Assembly as well as in the media. The government’s Economic Management Team (EMT) has stoutly defended the adoption of $75/barrel as proposed benchmark for crude oil sales.

Last week, one of the officials of the National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA, the same agency which under-estimated the flood disaster which had paralysed the nation, was reported to have said that there would be very little food crisis next year contrary to what people were predicting.

SENATE President, David Bonaventure Mark, seems to be rapidly shedding his military political establishment’s ideological feathers. A former influential “IBB Boy” between 1985 and 1993, Mark, in latter years, seems to be repenting of some of the odious legacies of the internal colonialist policies the establishment forced down the throat of the nation in the 1999 Constitution before they vacated power.

If we were to ask Christians what Jesus saves us from, many would say we are saved from the torments of hell. However, the hell Jesus spoke about is a real place called Gehenna; a valley outside Jerusalem where apostate Israelites sacrificed their children to idol gods, which later became a rubbish dump where criminals were burnt alive. Thus, while the hell Jesus spoke about was well-known to the Jews, it is entirely imaginary to us.