faulker002

By Femi Fani-Kayode ”A voice is heard in Ramah, mourning and great weeping. Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted because they are no more”- Jeremiah 31:15. O lifeless one, you have lost all sense of decency and you are drunk with power. As the children are murdered in cold blood and cut short in the streets of Abuja by your soldiers you watch silently from a distance: smug, smiling, detached, indifferent and secretly egging the killers on. Simply put, the butchery and bloodfest excites you and stirs your passion. You love the brutality and finality of murder: it makes you feel like a powerful man and it makes your Adrenalin  flow. As the mothers of the slain weep and as their fathers cry to God for justice your impish Vice smiles the smile of the wicked and boastfully proclaims how the two of you are preparing to dance "shaku shaku" for the 2019 election. Your sheer depravity and insensitivity is certified and confirmed. You have proved me right: in ...

By   Paul Onomuakpokpo With the murder of Hauwa Liman, we have once again been starkly reminded of our lack of governmental bulwark against the savagery of those who are unmoored from all legal and moral boundaries in our midst. *Leah Sharibu Yes, it is only a reminder. Successive governments have abandoned the citizens in a gruelling struggle with their challenges. But the battle for daily survival only becomes more tormenting with the lurking reminder that these challenges are not just existential; they are unconscionably inflicted by a pestilential leadership deficit. Now, consider this: Despite the billions of dollars that are yearly voted by the government for electricity, security and other forms of infrastructural development, the citizens are saddled with the responsibility of providing these for themselves.  It is this state of government-spawned stasis that renders the citizens vulnerable to marauders and terrorists like Fulani herdsmen and Boko Haram. And the grisly...

By   Paul Onomuakpokpo Since we seem fated to chafe under the carapace of duplicitous politicians, we are justifiably cynical about their promises. In their desperation to get power, politicians harangue us with these promises in varied shades. But there is often that lurking caution that we should treat these promises as mere hallucinations of people who flay at anything in sight to assuage their hunger for power. *Atiku Abubakar  Yet, how do we measure the authenticity of our politicians if we accept as a given that politics is not a site of credibility? How do we align with the self-immolating notion that politicians are free to live in a world that is divorced from the reality of the rest of the citizens? We should not rule out the possibility that it is politicians who do not want to meet the demands of their offices but want us to take them seriously who are the purveyors of the expectation to gloss over the tragedy of the violation of their promises.  Thus, notwith...

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye A day after the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) announced Dr. Kayode Fayemi of the All Progressives Congress (APC) the winner of the July 14, 2018, governorship election in Ekiti State , a video of Fulani herdsmen brazenly parading their cows on the streets of Ado-Ekiti went viral on the social media. Reports say the video was shared on Facebook by one Isaac, the younger brother of Mr. Peter Ayodele Fayose, the outgoing governor of the state.  *Fayemi and Fayose  In a comment accompanying the video (reproduced unedited), the younger Fayose wrote: “ Fayemi was rigged in on Saturday against the wish of Ekiti people. Today, Fulani herdsmen have the boldness to rear cow on the street of Ado Ekiti. This is pathetic! This is scary. I pity Ekiti and her people!”   Now, even if this video was not shared, the discussions that dominated the Ekiti governorship campaigns and the deep apprehensions they provoked even beyond the state woul...