THE dust generated by these recent incidents had hardly died down when last week street hawkers on the ever-busy Port Harcourt-Aba road clashed with men of the Rivers State Task Force on Eradication of Street Trading. They reportedly snatched the rifle of a Police Corporal attached to the task force.

The nine states that make up the interventionist constituency of the Niger Delta Development Commission has since last month been taking turns to play host to top officials of the Commission on projects inspection tours of these states. Recently, it was the turn of Imo State that prides itself as the Eastern Heartland. But after a tour that took the NDDC delegation round some project sites, the unequivocal verdict was: Poor job all the way.

In Nigeria, people with physical disabilities are no strangers to challenges bordering on discrimination, loneliness, dependence on people for assistance and victimization. Because they have to depend on the good will of members of the society; they are more often than not viewed as individuals who cannot contribute to national development.

Each time people die, a prayer is said for the soul of the deceased to rest in perfect peace. But sadly, for the family of the late Mr John Enofe Omorodion, a retired military officer, the soul of their father is yet to rest in perfect peace as a result of the mysterious disappearance of the corpse from the mortuary it was deposited on January 9, 2010.

The Lagos metropolis was for many years defined by a skyline of chaos engendered in many cases by uncontrolled erection and mounting of billboards and other advertising signs. Indeed outdoor advertisers appeared from every indication to be in a race against time as they stiffly competed for every available space along most streets and roads in the city.