My father often tells my siblings and I, that “education is not an inheritance, any one can’t take away from you once you have it, “. I agree, but the sad reality is that in Nigeria the young are deliberately and systematically denied the opportunity to have an education. So between the poor leadership, to corrupt officials, Boko Haram insurgency, the abject poverty and the ASUU strike, the young are in dire situation.

In 2008, I wrote two articles titled “WHEN GENIUS FAILS”. The first was about the former Director-General of the Nigerian Stock Exchange, Dr Ndidi Onyuike warning about the imminent collapse of the Stock Exchange that year. It happened as predicted. The second was related to the crisis in the banking sector even as Professor Soludo was pretending that all was well with the banks. Today, everybody knows better. Where are OCEANIC, INTERCONTINENTAL, BANK PHB etc today? This article also might have been titled “WHEN GENIUS FAILS -3” and it would have been appropriate because the Federal Minister of Finance is no longer the highly respected figure she was in 2003-2005. Her return is shaping out to be some sort of personal disaster for her for many reasons – mostly political.

Balewa’s control of the national government placed the Northern region at an advantage over the other two regions because NPC, the party representing its interests, had power over federal revenue and other important national institutions. Expectedly, the NPC used its dominant influence to determine, in favour of the North, developmental projects to implement, where to site such projects and contractors that would execute them. Northern political leaders wanted power at the centre desperately out of conviction that the NCNC and AG, if allowed to control the federal government, would likely allocate more resources to the Eastern and Western regions at the expense of the underdeveloped Northern region.

Strangely, in Nigeria, 206 years after the 1807 abolition of slave trade by Britian and 15 years into the yearly remembrance of victims by the United Nations, the business has taken a new twist with two forms— internal and international— booming. Focus has shifted from energetic men preferred by Europeans for labour on plantations, to women and teenage girls as young as eight.

H er firm resolve to end a long family history of hereditary ailments landed her in the world of natural health science. UK-trained Information Technologist turned natural health advocate, Liome Engele, is the Director of Business Development at Laserderm Clinic, a dermatology and cosmetology clinic set up by British medical consultants in Lagos. In this interview, Liome takes us through her journey into the vast world of natural health science and also passes her judgement on Nigerians’ attitude towards skincare among other issues.