Over the years, we have shouted ourselves hoarse over the precarious situation of the Apapa ports infrastructure and the attendant traffic chaos. Unless efforts being made to address them begin to yield results the effects will be felt in the economy.

FOLLOWING the last-minute stampede towards the former August 17, 2018 deadline for prospective voters to get their Permanent Voter’s Cards, PVCs, the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, gamely extended the deadline to August 31, 2018.

EID-EL-ADHA, as it is being celebrated today by Muslims the world over, honours the monumental sacrifice that was to be made by Prophet Ibrahim. Allah ordered him to sacrifice his dearly-beloved son, Ismail, as a test of obedience. Ibraham willingly submitted to Allah’s command, wherein Allah, by His Mercy, replaced Ismail at the moment of sacrifice with a ram.

Also in the Lagos Prison Command, two inmates, Tunwase Kabiru and Oladipupo Moshood, have enrolled for their Doctorate degrees in Business Administration and Peace and Conflict Resolution respectively at the NOUN. Just last week, the Controller of the Lagos State Command of the Prisons Service, Mr. Tunde Ladipo, disclosed that 157 inmates within his division were registered for the West African Senior School Certificate Examinations, WASSCE.

WHILE the nation is still smarting from the illegal siege to the National Assembly Complex by armed and hooded men of the Directorate of State Services, DSS, which led to the summary dismissal of its Director General, Alhaji Lawal Daura, another Federal agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, has embarked on some highly questionable adventures against some states.

ONE of the areas in which Nigeria’s rich potentials has been well-documented is the mining sector. In the 1960s, mining contributed up to 50 per cent to the nation’s economy. But due to the advent of oil, Nigeria lost interest in mining. Solid minerals contributed about 0.3 per cent to our GDP in 2015 as opposed to the Democratic Republic of Congo and Botswana (40 per cent).

Representatives – will reconvene soon to attend to emergency issues of high national interest. Last week, President of the Senate, Senator Bukola Saraki, had already made moves for the leadership of the two chambers to meet but the siege to the Assembly Complex by the Directorate of State Services, DSS, disrupted it.

Till today, nothing tangible has been established as to how they managed to breach the heavy security presence at the National Assembly Complex. Who were the perpetrators and their sponsors? What are the law enforcement agencies doing to bring them to book?

But this sport which is like opium to Nigerians is bedevilled by the odious phenomenon of age cheating by players. This has made it very difficult for Nigeria to consolidate after some exemplary outings such as the gold medal won by our Dream Team squad at the Atlanta 1996 Olympic Games in the USA.

NIGERIANS in South Africa feel increasingly abandoned to their fate as the spate of xenophobic killings continues. As at May this year, the Senior Special Adviser to the President on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora, Mrs. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, had on a visit to South Africa’s High Commissioner to Nigeria, Mr. Lulu Mnguni, declared that 116 Nigerians were killed in the past two years.

NIGERIA is a society whose fabric has been warped by decades of misgovernance by an extremely self-centred power elite. As a result, what is considered as noble and worthy of emulation in more sedate societies are generally overlooked while valuable attention is focused on barbaric political contests which have little or nothing to do with the interests of the common people.

THERE has been a remarkable uptick in the willingness of the Judicial arm of government to assert its independence and defend our democracy since the Senate’s confirmation of Hon. Justice Walter Nkanu Onnoghen as the Chief Justice of Nigeria on March 1, 2017.

Apart from the astronomical rise in the cost of conducting the impending elections compared to 2015, the request for funds from the National Assembly is not only coming late, its source of funding is rather complicated in view of the near-war relationship between the Presidency and the leadership of the National Assembly.

The eight assemblymen were purportedly aggrieved over an alleged misappropriation of N54 billion by the Ortom government. According to them, of this amount, N22 billion was embezzled as security vote, while N32 billion was taken from funds belonging to the local governments while months of workers’ salaries remain unpaid. They served a seven-day impeachment notice on the Governor.

IN July 2017, the news that Nigeria’s first choice team goalkeeper, Carl Ikeme, had been diagnosed with acute leukaemia, came to many Nigerians as a rude shock. He had returned abnormal blood results during the pre-season medical of his English Championship club, Wolverhampton.