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By Banji Ojewale There is no tool for development more effective than the empowerment of women — Kofi Annan (1938-2018), former UN Secretary-General. I am among millions of Nigerians who can’t wait for the day God will bless our dear country with a visionary and radical female president, along with a great host of the fairer sex of kindred spirit governing the states and heading the MDAs. The tragedy of an effete economy, social stagnation and political paralysis that we have lived with over the years is the consequence of the neglect of this formidable section of society by our leaders.  *Atiku  Abubakar  Developing society and its constituents boils down to making use of all the functional human capital at your disposal. The moment you succumb to so-called imperatives of culture, false religion or superstition, and you drop the women, youth and the working class from your strides, you begin to enter a reverse march. That’s been Nigeria ’s misogynist history, always draw...

By Wolff Geisler Participants in the joint UN program on HIV / AIDS, claim that between 1981 and 2006, 25 million people died of AIDS! The World Health Organization (WHO) announced that in 2007 alone 33.2 million HIV-infected people were registered, and 2.1 million people died. Leading the number of infected and the dead is the part of the African continent, located south of the Sahara (Black Africa). Only 10% of the world's population lives in the region, but 70% of them have AIDS! In Eastern Europe and Central Asia , the number of people living with HIV has increased by more than 150% over the past few years. And in Vietnam over the same period, the number of patients doubled. Among Asian countries, the first place in Indonesia .  In Russia and in the post-Soviet space, AIDS is spreading at a catastrophic pace. But how to explain how the entire African continent suffers from AIDS, yet has immunodeficiency? It's very simple: Africa has its own agriculture, but still depends ...

By Evaristus Bassey If all politics is local, there must be an exception in Nigeria . Here, all politics is selfish, especially southern Nigeria politics. If President Muhammadu Buhari wins another four year term, it wouldn’t be because of any stellar performances; it would be because of southern Nigeria politicians. Buhari has always won large in the North East and North West until the 2015 momentum thrust victory into his hands largely because he teamed up with Tinubu the strong man of the South West. *President Buhari  Just a few months ago the Senate President Saraki confirmed my earlier suspicion that Tinubu’s aggressive support for Buhari for 2019 after a lull in their relationship was essentially because he hoped for Buhari to handover to him in 2023. Tinubu is quoted by Saraki as saying that he would support Mr. President for 2019 even if he Buhari was on a stretcher because it was the surest way to guaranteeing his own 2023 ambition of being president. In other words eve...

By  Chiedu Uche Okoye Nigeria ’s political troubles and the vexed issue of her disunity date back to our pre-independence era. We should remember that we had the 1953 Kano riot during which the northern people produced the nine point programme and threatened secession, thereafter. And soon after the country had become a sovereign nation-state, it descended into an internecine civil war, which raged for thirty months and caused the loss of millions of human lives. *Nigerian leaders' during the 58th Independence Celebrations  It is a known fact that political squabble, which has existed among the ethnic groups that make up Nigeria , is one of the major features of our political history. Have we forgotten the annulled June 12, 1993 Presidential election, which led Nigeria to a political cul-de-sac? That Nigeria didn’t disintegrate owing to that cancelled Presidential poll is a miracle of high magnitude.  In addition to the political troubles, which have continuously beset o...

By   Paul Onomuakpokpo After former President Goodluck Jonathan launched his memoir My Transition Hours on Tuesday, he might have heaved a sigh of relief. It might not be because the ordeal of writing and preparing to present the book to the public was now off his shoulders. Nor because he was now luxuriating in the cathartic effect of dislodging the single narrative that de-privileges his role in nation-building and the 2015 elections. Rather, it could be because of the sweet contemplation of the fresh horizon of possibilities that had opened before him. Now, he realised that it was not all gloom – he might not have been denigrated as an irredeemable villain after all. *Former President Jonathan  For over three years, Jonathan might have been shocked by how his legendary good luck has mutated into a source of personal tragedy as he was weighed down by the thought of his now being eternally identified with a dark role in the crisis of development of the nation. He might have f...

By  Simon Abah Until we groom good people for elective office, people who are selfless, driven by a sense of mission, folks who understand the importance of urgency for change, belief in community, do not wear their opinion on their sleeve, avoid flagging religious views in favour of egalitarianism and to stop putting their snout in the trough of the gravy train and free-booting. *Gov El-Rufai  Even if a Martian comes from Mars on a white horse with Marian ideas to transform Nigeria , we would never go above being the self-proclaimed Giant of Africa. (Simon Abah, The Guardian , 30 May 2017, Between presidential and parliamentary system of government) .  When he became governor, I wondered if he had the right humanistic temperament to lead a fickle state like Kaduna , unpredictable because of the numerous numbers of religious crises that it had had in the past. I had to ask because from reports it was alleged that he wore his outlooks on his sleeves. Kaduna I reasoned did...

By Fredrick Nwabufo The depth of filth in the APC primary election can contain a tsunami. The “inglorious” exercise and its resulting attrition betray the anti-corruption sloganeering of the Buhari administration. *Adams Oshiomhole  A lot has been said about the alleged involvement of Adams Oshiomhole, APC national chairman, in the corruption shin-dig.  But what is the position of the Department of State Security (DSS)? The secret police interrogated Oshiomhole, and really did ask him to resign over allegations of bribery. Was it right in making this demand of him? What effectuated the agency to toe such a controversial and unpopular path? Well, the DSS has submitted the report of its investigations to the presidency, and it recommended the prosecution of the APC chairman. The new DSS chief is said to be a man of integrity and unbending principle, and will not brook any compromise. The case against Oshiomhole is that he allegedly received a total bribe of $55 million, som...