Kemi Badenoch, the new leader of the British Conservative Party was born to Nigerian parents with Yoruba ancestry. Her father, the now late Dr. Femi Adegoke was a Medical doctor and Yoruba Nationalist activist in Lagos, and her mother, Feyi Adegoke was a Professor of Physiology at the University of Lagos.  Kemi was born in […]

Every act enacted to contain the Igbo is an act against the progress of Nigeria

By every index, Nigeria as a nation, has very nearly, finally collapsed. It is held together now only by a very weak thread called fate. Basically, Nigeria has slipped to the symbolic phase of nationhood. It can only perform symbolic actions of nationness: convoke a parliament which only sits symbolically because it is actually not […]

I am Onye-Igbo. I Iunderstand the principles of sovereignty very clearly. I understand that all humans are born free and equal – irrespective of status, race, or ethnicity. For as long as they are human,theyembodythehighest attributes of creation, which is life, none of which can be measuredgreaterthantheother. As my Igbo ancestors always knew, and as those among […]

Twenty years ago, the alumni of the Government College Umuahia first met in the United States, and decided to take on the challenge of restoring their famous alma mater, the Government College Umuahia, and while at it, have some fun.  In that first convention that drew many of the “oldboys” of the Government College Umuahia […]

Two weeks ago, newspapers in Nigeria reported that the National Council of State met, and the current president, Mr. Bola Tinubu, chaired it. For starters, I’m still unable to reconcile with the fact that a man of the quality of Tinubu would sit on a seat on which the giant Azikiwe sat. It is a […]

The fact that I have to write this, makes me retch. It turns my stomach because this is the 21st century, and there are still many among us who still think in this brutally savage way about other people, who they have to dehumanize in order to feel alive themselves. That I have to defend […]

Chinua Achebe, the leading African writer of the 20th century, did write in his The Trouble with Nigeria, that Nigeria was a fractious nation. However, a shared fear and antipathy of the Igbo was the single thing that unites Nigeria. This situation persists. And this certainly, is the impulse that drives Bayo Onanuga, senior Special […]

In recent years, the Supreme Court of Nigeria has come under withering criticism, because it had left Nigerians skeptical of its ability to reflect, interpret, and deliver justice. Many of its declarations – the judicial imposition of a governor who was not elected on Imo state, and its affirmation of the strange proclamations of the […]

Nigeria is in dire straits. That is no longer news. It is not even news anymore that Nigerians are going through the worst economic crisis of their lives. The very lean Structural Adjustment Programme years – the SAP years – may not even compare. Ihavebeentoldthatthekindof desperation seen now in Nigeria is apocalyptic. It is strange […]

Two weeks ago, armed attackers stormed Aba, and at the Obikabia military checkpoint on the outskirts of the city, shot and killed two soldiers. It was a very unfortunate and dastardly act by these very cruel, heartless and rampaging gunmen who targeted armed soldiers, and have been making the South- East of Nigeria a terrible […]

There was a tradition recorded by the Roman historians, Suetonius and Tacitus, of the Naumachia, the spectacular, very large scale, gladiatorial public entertainment, which the Romans themselves also called Navalia Proelia because it was held at sea, or large lakes, or flooded arenas.  Those who were rounded up, or selected to these Naumacharii, normally prisoners […]

Nigerians are a hardy lot. That is what everyone says: Nigerians survive everything with humour. They laugh even at their own death. They turn everything into a huge joke. Life is a huge joke in Nigeria. But increasingly, a lot more Nigerians are not finding this funny any longer. Laughter is no longer the best […]

The fear of being hung out to dry, may have forced Columbia University President, Minouche Shafik, to take the extreme measures

He is doing this, not in Nigeria, but in America, where his incredible skills and talents have been appropriated and put to use