Perhaps the Federal Government has been very lucky to have taken many Nigerians, especially the commentators on current affairs on a jolly ride either by share deceit or clever maneuvers.

A Muslim friend who lives in Sokoto sadly tells me that fear of Boko Haram is the beginning of wisdom nowadays…and that the organisation has gradually acquired a legendary status in the North and is widely regarded as a highly efficient terror machine that operates with deadly precision and may even possess supernatural powers and is bringing the Nigerian State to its knees.

MY original intention was to digress from political issues, in this week’s column, and focus on the current outbreak of Lassa fever–which has already claimed two lives in Rivers State and is currently on the loose in six others.

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.

SINCE the publication of Hon. Josef Omorotionmwan’s article on “Stealing by Sign Posts” on 29 December 2011, there have been raging debates and comments on the issue. The latest is the rejoinder titled, “Who is Stealing by Sign Posts?” by one Aliyu Jattu from Agbede (Vanguard, 18 January 2011, p. 19). Also, see paid advertisement titled, Oshiomhole: “This Madness must stop” (Vanguard, 5 January 2012, p. 25).

I WONDER how the average Muslim Northern Nigerian felt when the Emir of Kano, His Royal Highness Ado Bayero, burst into tears when President Goodluck Jonathan paid him a condolence and solidarity visit last Sunday.

THESE are desperate times for the Jonathan Administration and the government might do worse than seeking desperate solutions. Although the streets might be free of protesting Nigerians, the smoke from the bonfires made by them to register their opposition to the careless increase in the pump price of petrol is nowhere near being cleared.

“Next time a man asks you to vote for him because he grew up without shoes, just buy him a pair of shoes and move on.”

FOR laughing out loud, a general problem is no problem. People just need to adapt and adjust. There has been a warning since last year about global economic problem in 2012 close to the depression in the 30s. Countries are making adjustments. Nigerians don’t pay attention to serious issues like they do to English soccer league and Brazilian hairs. It’s here!

These may be troubling times, but may also be seen as interesting times in the annals of our country. Just when Nigerians thought that things couldn’t get much worse after the Xmas Day mindless bombing and ‘mass’ murder of Christian faithfuls in the FCT, seven days later on 1st January 2012, Nigerians were ambushed with over 100% increase in pump price of petrol.

FOR laughing out loud, a general problem is no problem. People just need to adapt and adjust. There has been a warning since last year about global economic problem in 2012 close to the depression in the 30s. Countries are making adjustments. Nigerians don’t pay attention to serious issues like they do to English soccer league and Brazilian hairs. It’s here!

THE political history of British postcolonial countries began with the reform of the capitalist British Empires. The strategic difference between these postcolonial countries is to be found in the nature of their independence politics and their independence politicians.

THE saying that in a democracy, people get the kind of government they want is true, after all. When on January 1, 2012, the federal government effected the removal of the subsidy on petrol, Nigerians waited with uncommon enthusiasm to embark on the nationwide “indefinite” strike called by organised Labour and civil society.

Last week, the focus was on the micro-economic impact of subsidy removal, in other words, its effect on individuals and the new choices the policy has thrown up for people whose lives have now become unsettled in many ways. This week, the attention turns to groups; specifically it addresses the low income group and the middle class.

It was from a friend who called me last week that I first heard the pleasant news of the end to the fuel subsidy imbroglio. The call would have ended within a minute if not for his rather curious comment that there was ‘no victor no vanquished’.