AFTER weeks of anxious waiting by young Nigerians who participated in the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination, UTME, the Professor Ishaq Oloyede-led Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, has finally released results of the 2019 edition of the examination. The examination held from April 11 through 17. Since JAMB raised the bar in its use of computer-age technology in its conduct of matriculation examinations, the release of the latest results must be one of the most anticipated because of the unusual delay.

WOLE Soyinka was in the news last week for a comment he made to Zainab Badawi on Hardtalk, an interview programme on the British Broadcasting Service, BBC. Badawi started by asking if Soyinka thought his generation of older Nigerians have failed the people and he responded in the affirmative. The hope that led many in his generation who studied abroad to rush back home to join in the transformation of Nigeria, he said, has not materialised.

IN his response to the Easter Sunday coordinated attacks on mosques and hotels during which more than 200 people were killed, President Muhammadu Buhari sent his heartfelt condolences to the government and people of Sri Lanka.  Anyone reading about the president’s response to the mindless carnage in Sri Lanka would be pardoned to think that killings on such a scale are alien to Nigerians. The truth, however, is that it has become normal to read, if not witness, mass killings involving hundreds of innocent Nigerians quite frequently. Nigerians now live under the looming shadow of unprovoked attacks perpetrated by criminals operating with hardly any fear of reprisals for their action. All over the country, Nigerians are randomly rounded up and killed while their property are carted away and their communities are sacked by groups and individuals that are not entirely unknown to their attackers or the law enforcement agents that have responsibility for such activities.

Onnoghen’s decision to fight the accusation against him might look wise if only for the reason that it gave him the opportunity to clear his name

With members of the PDP and, perhaps, a few others ready to play ball, Ndume may be banking on pulling another Saraki-like sleight-of-hand on leaders of his party

HOURS before Nigerians across 18 states of the Federation returned to the polls to conclude the unfinished business of the last presidential and governorship elections in a so-called supplementary elections, a spokesperson of the President, Garba Shehu, let out word that President Muhammadu Buhari had promised not to impose on Nigerians persons they don’t want as their leaders.

The greatest challenge facing the democratic process in Nigeria, as in most developing nations, has to do with the management of the post-election transition process. The political tension and acrimony between parties and politicians peaks at the polls and tends to escalate during collation and announcement of results, giving electioneering a “do-or-die” tendency. This situation impacts negatively on the democratic process as election-related violence often takes a heavy toll on lives and property, disrupts elections and ultimately threatens national stability.

The decision of the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Atiku Abubakar, to wage a legal challenge against the proclamation of President Muhammadu Buhari the winner of February 23, 2019, presidential election has not received the encouragement of a few informed minds in the country. One respected voice, for instance, thinks that Atiku should instead join hands with other well-meaning Nigerians, the civil society and like-minded politicians to help to properly set up and strengthen democratic structures capable of hamstringing the repeat in future elections of the large-scale malpractices that allegedly marred the last elections – an issue that constitutes the main plank of Atiku’s suit.

THE video recording didn’t look staged and the little girl’s outburst also sounded credible. In this age of social media when everyone has become a performer determined to drive attention in their direction, it makes sense not to take everything one sees at face value. But so far, nothing has happened to make anyone question the authenticity of the little girl’s ranting bout as one made for the cameras.

JUST the morning after the governorship and state assembly elections, it had become clear that Nigerian voters might have found their voice and are beginning to talk. All too often Nigerians are urged to vote as their vote is supposed to be the means through which they demonstrate their power of choice. But many times the voice of the voter hardly counts. The norm in the last 20 years of the country’s return to democratic practice or civil governance, if it would seem too optimistic to describe what we’ve had until now as democracy, has been for the voice of the people to be stolen.