Pastor Tunde Bakare, for whom I still cherish a lot of fondness despite his recent foolhardy foray into party politics, found some comfort last year when Nigeria was fifty, in the fact that the nation had remained together in the face of all odds. I have often wondered how much profit was in the mere fact that we could indeed be said to have stayed together as one country.

Okada Air, Sosoliso Air line, Kabo Air, ADC Airlines, Bellview Airlines, Nigerian Airways; these were just a few of our local carriers in years past.

DURING courtroom sessions, the magistrate is addressed as “Your Honour” or “the Bench”—not by his or her name. Other court functionaries are the “counsel for the defendant,” “the plaintiff,” “the prosecutor,” etc., instead of “Chuks,” “Boma” or “Musa”.

IF you were around in 1990 when the professional football league began, you will be ashamed about what is happening. The extent of amateurism that the league has attained since then has negated almost every reason for beginning the league.

Ota Egefere is my friend and a regular reader of this column. He is also a great follower of sports especially football.He called me on Tuesday to say the following: Please, tell Samson Siasia to field local players in the midfield against Guinea on Saturday. The match will come up at 2pm. The weather will be harsh to our Europe-based players. I fear that after about thirty minutes many of them would have fagged out.

I was chatting with a group of friends last week; and everyone said that they were extremely upset about the current state of the country.

To many Nigerians, the message of the President to the nation on October 1, 2011 to mark the 51st year of the country‘s independence was assuring and pleasing.

I THINK one of the most defining images of recent times, was the picture of President Goodluck Jonathan on the internet, in the presence of the American Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton, at the recent 66th Session of the United Nations General Assembly, in New York.

WHEN a government begins to disobey its own laws with impunity, then, there is cause for concern. In total disobedience of a law, which was validly enacted, to the effect that every public holiday in this land shall be celebrated on whatever day it falls, we have just emerged from one badly shifted public holiday.

THE last few years have been transformative for Nigerian banks. Beginning from the period under Charles Soludo to the last three years when Sanusi Lamido Sanusi has practically gripped the banking sector by the neck and shaken it out of slumber, Nigerian banks have not remained the same.

EVERY Independence anniversary provides us an opportunity to look back and reflect on our journey as a nation.

IN the second essay in these three series on the Boko Haram, I listed the 26 questions which were scholarly addressed by in the August 2009 Minna Meeting by 40 representatives of the Da’wah Coordination Council of Nigeria, DCCN. I did not review the answers of the DCCN to questions it asserted were among those frequently asked by devoted Muslims about the Boko Haram.

IN Nigeria’s socio-cultural settings, the brand: “Calabar Man/Woman” often ignores the fact that the people being referred to had one of the earliest exposures to Medieval European merchants among the various Nigerian cultural groups.

IN Nigeria’s socio-cultural settings, the brand: “Calabar Man/Woman” often ignores the fact that the people being referred to had one of the earliest exposures to Medieval European merchants among the various Nigerian cultural groups.

Under normal circumstances where political and public offices are geared towards the service of the people, there is little or no personal gain in capturing power or its retention. Very few Nigerians now believe the flowery promises that politicians make on their campaign trails, but we recognize the rapid transformation to affluence of these self-proclaimed servants of the people!