Rags to riches stories are not uncommon in this part of the world, they abound everywhere and in different categories. Many great men have tales of humble beginnings to tell, a fact that buttresses the saying that ‘nothing good comes easy’. It is even a common saying here that ‘He who craves to be tall would not mind to have tiny legs’. So, it is believed that greatness and success come carrying a huge baggage of sorry tales.

From within and outside the country, President Muhammadu Buhari has been celebrated as a man who is capable of restoring sanity in the Nigerian system. On assumption of office, he demonstrated that he was ready to tackle corruption head on.

The All Progressive Grand Alliance, APGA, governorship candidate in Abia State, Dr. Alex Otti, and his co-travellers could go to any length to achieve their ambition. But the more they try to hoodwink the people, the more their underbelly is exposed.

Nothing empowers the spirit more than the truth. Nothing warms the soul more than the truth. Nothing dispels the darkness more than the truth.

Professor Wole Soyinka was quoted saying his latest book is the “nastiest” that he has written so far. InterInventions: Between Defective Memory and the Public Lie- A Personal Odyssey in The Republic of Liars (Ibadan: Bookcraft, 2015, 136pp) is quite close to being just that.

THE front page of Vanguard of Thursday, the 22nd October 2015, carried a picture of the members who attended the maiden Council of State meeting held in Abuja, five months after President Muhammadu Buhari, PMB, was sworn in as our President.

WITH a seeming arrogant posture, the Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria, FRCN, on October 26 posted on its website the outcome of its investigation of Stanbic IBTC for alleged infractions claimed by minority shareholders of the company, fronting as the Trusted Shareholders Association of Nigeria, TSAN and bankrolled by the Mahtani brothers of the Churchgate Group.

JUST as literature mirrors the society, the Lagos/Ibadan Expressway mirrors Nigeria. Indeed, the fall of Nigeria is fully reflected in the collapse of Lagos/Ibadan Expressway. That highway is the shame of the Nigerian nation. One wonders what the successive governments did or failed to do that resulted in the ruin of the most economically strategic road in the country.

First, the proposed Ministers without portfolios, are they going to be paid salaries and allowances? If yes, then it amounts to needless waste of public funds, to pay Ministers, without assigning portfolios to them. Mere attendance of Federal Executive Council Meetings, may not sufficiently justify the wages incurred as a result. If they are going to be paid, then, they should be given portfolios.

BY December 31st 2015, Boko Haram and its deadly activities would have become history in Nigeria – courtesy of a decisive command from a “no-nonsense and action-packed” President Muhammadu Buhari.