A FEW weeks before the start of the unnecessary but costly Biafran war or The Nigerian Civil War (1967-1970), I wrote an article in the Daily Times with the caption, ‘CAN WE AFFORD TO FALL APART?‘. In my pardonable innocence, I examined the economic implications of a break_up on internal trade and movements of people.

FOR give my interest in this field. I am the son of a professor of Medical Microbiology so it must be in my genes. So aside from petroleum engineering, project management and information technology where I can mix it with the best, politics and medicine with a tilt towards microbiology also hold a place in my heart.

CALLS for a Sovereign National Conference (SONACO) are widespread; and the will of the majority is supposed to be acted on within a democratic context. But – many of my friends will be very angry with me for saying this! – I think that President Jonathan should dodge the SONACO option, if he can.

OF all the fine definitions of terrorism, the one offered by the ninth edition of Black’s Law Dictionary at page 1611 is the most appealing: The use or threat of violence to intimidate or cause panic, especially as a means of affecting political conduct. This definition accepts the fact that terrorism takes place at every level, every time, and every where.

MALAM Nuhu Ribadu is back on a familiar terrain. His appointment to head the Petroleum Revenue Task Force (PRTF) brings him back to the centre of governance, where he and his 21-member team can now monitor the oil revenues accruing to this country both in the upstream and downstream sectors.

OVER the weekend, Nigerian newspapers reproduced the interview given to the Financial Times (FT) of London, by Andrew Owoye Azazi, President Goodluck Jonathan’s National Security Adviser (NSA).

SENEGALESE President, Abdoulaye Wade, is an old man by any standard. You only need to look at him to know. While according to official records he was born in 1926, street lore has it that he might be much older given poor record keeping in those days. Which means the president might be entirely blameless in the mix-up in his age.

IT is now tragically obvious that neither government nor Boko Haram will accept that it is losing a war which is bringing unprecedented levels of fear, pain and deprivation to the nation. In the last few weeks, the Boko Haram insurgency has escalated its campaign of terror, and says that it is doing so in response to arrests, killings and detentions of its members in Maiduguri, Kano and Kaduna, among other areas.

THE Igbo say that you can tell a blind man that there is no oil in the soup. But you cannot tell him that there is no salt or pepper in the soup. It is self evident that Nigeria is in a serious turmoil. In the last 12 years angry Nigerians have wielded as much illegal guns against the country as the Nigerian Armed Forces wielded during the civil war.

WITHIN this past week, Femi Fanikayode, Chief Tola Adeniyi and NADECO have all proposed the urgent convening of a National Conference as the platform for re-negotiating the terms of association and union of Nigeria. Adeniyi in the Vanguard of Tuesday, January 31, 2012 demands such a meeting.