The following are the activities lined up by the Federal Government of Nigeria to celebrate Nigeria’s Centenary. The objectives, the need for celebration, the legacy initiative and the commemorative events are outlined.

PART 1:
THE BROAD FRAMEWORK
The Centenary celebrations are designed around the key concepts of unity, indivisibility, virility, progress and promise of the Nigerian federation. It is against this background that the following are put forward as nodal anchors for its delivery.

Were Anyim not educated but restricted to his rusty village of Ishiagu, Ivo Local Government Area, LGA, of Ebonyi State, he would have been a very good story under the moonlight. With a voice which is at variance with his massive Sum ho-wrestler frame, Anyim’s attribute as a good story teller made it easy for him, as Senate President, to warm up to the rambunctious former President Olusegun Obasanjo; just as the same attribute endeared him to his colleagues in the Senate at a time a certain banana peel could create a domestic accident.

Hip, hip, hurray! How do you determine whether to celebrate an epoch?
That appears to be what has gripped some Nigerians now: How to celebrate Nigeria’s centenary, whether to roll out the drums.

Some agree. Some disagree. Yet, the fact remains that Nigeria’s amalgamation of 1914 happened and, therefore, can not be wished away. Nigeria is 100years, simple.

*Other prominent Nigerians speak on the Centenary celebrations.

C E N T E N A R Y: We’re celebrating the failure of a nation – Odumakin

Mr. Yinka Odumakin is the spokesperson of the Save Nigeria Group, SNG.

In 100 hundred years, we have become an example of the ruination of a nation with a bright prospect. At amalgamation and even at independence, Nigeria had bright prospects for the black race and for Africa but 100 years down the line because of the mismanagement and misrule of our past leaders, the country today is a sham. We are lagging behind in every sphere and all global indices now. The country is being robbed by insecurity – today 70 per cent of our people live below poverty line; all our infrastructures have collapsed at 100.

It was a fitting start. A celebration of togetherness! Political differences between some former heads of state and President Goodluck Jonathan were temporarily set aside last Monday when they joined the president to kick off the centenary celebration at the banquet hall of the presidential Villa.