PMB is on an official visit to France, where he will be meeting the President of the European Parliament, and the President of the European Commission and he will address a special session of the European Union Parliament. This meeting will be attended by members of the executive and legislative arms of the Union.

In 1984 I visited Eyadema’s Togo. I was dumbfounded. Eyadema was after all an empty inconsequential vessel. The stark rurality and wretchedness of Lome and the cheerful naivety of its residents could only be surpassed by Gnassigbe’s megalomania. The national radio would pause and greet him almost hourly and would never forget to wish him well with his meals. His pictures which hung every where seemed to summon reverence from passersby. Policemen would line the routes he would travel and would herald his passage with their whistles which compelled everyone to stop and to join them in clapping furiously, waving frantically and smiling with a determination to please him.

The story said eight secondary school students, five boys and three girls, aged between 14 and 16, were arrested for being cult members. According to one of the girls, a 15-year-old, the leader of the cult, Sergeant, had sex with the three girls in his house before making incisions in their hands to draw their blood “and told us that we had joined his group.’’ Just like that. I doubt if sex was part of the initiation; the young man just wanted free sex with multiple partners simultaneously and “caught the three girls mugu.” This brings to fore the importance of teaching our daughters sex education and self-worth. A girl with self-worth does not surrender her body cheaply the way these three girls did.

Let me start with a personal story. At a point in my life, I ignored the church like many youths in their 20s still do. It’s the rebel in us that wants to break away from the sermons and doctrines that we have been force-fed with in childhood and adolescence especially those who have attended mission schools. I opted for squash, Sunday luncheons, social visits, movies or simply to sleep off Saturday night hang overs. It didn’t help that I was in a profession that did not see Sunday as a hallowed day. But habits and characters formed in childhood are difficult to completely shake off and the lure of the church became stronger as I grew older.

I’ve just chanced upon an article that was written in The Will, an online publication, on January 11.

It stated that the PDP’s Deputy National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Abdulahi Jalo, “has tasked former President Goodluck Jonathan to speak out on the controversial $2.1bn meant for the purchase of arms to fight the Boko Haram insurgency during his tenure but which was allegedly shared by some influential politicians.”