In recent weeks, we seem to have been wrestling with the very idea of democracy. After all, our political system has passed through the Westminster parliamentary system and over three decades of the Washington type presidential system. There is a prolonged assumption that we are indeed a thriving democracy...
Chidi Amuta
Even after three decades of his untidy retreat to his Minna hometown, Babangida never forget the ‘public’ debts he owed to Nigerians. He owed Nigerian history an expose on his turbulent leadership . He owed the Nigerian populace an insight into his personal enigma and enduring charisma. He also...
Barely mid way into his four-year tenure, President Tinubu has scored a contradictory political victory. He has succeeded in getting the political barometer of the nation to swing towards preparations for 2027 instead of pressuring him to deliver on the promises he and his party made in 2023. In...
An unwritten paradox has defined the United States up to this moment. It is the only country loved by most of those who have never set foot on its soil. It is also the one nation most despised by many who have not visited it. Loved and hated in...
Barely one week into his refurbished presidential tenure, America’s Donald Trump seems poised to set new precedents in the model of the Presidency as the pinnacle of America’s democracy. An elected president of a republic is strutting and pronouncing like an emperor. Ordinarily, an American king would be a...
Our presidential political calendar indicates May 2025 as the mid-term of the current presidential tenure. Every May 29th is some form of birthday for our democracy. Next May is mid-term. Mid-term is wake up time, a rude reminder that time is ticking and that what began as a ceremony of...
Frances’s major military base in Cote d’Ivoire is billed to close down at the end of this month. The long -standing base, Port Bouet, is to be rid of its French troop occupants and is to be renamed General Quattara Thomas d’Aquinn base after an indigenous military figure. No...
The same old “Jingle bells! Jingle bells!! Jingle all the way!!!” is again uniting Christians and non-Christians in the ancient ritual of Christmas. Ordinarily, Christmas has become synonymous with happiness and family reunion. Kith and kin come together. Food and drinks flow in households and the grueling grind of...
President Tinubu may have stumbled on a sustaining logic and viable mission for his political future. Prior to last fortnight, I was among those who were doubting what narrative or political argument could sustain Mr. Tinubu’s interest in a 2027 run. Now, there seems to be something in the...
There is a shrinking feeling about it all. With each off -season election that is conducted and results announced, we feel smaller and more unfree as a polity. Our elections bring about more insecurity; unpopular electoral outcomes require goons and thugs to protect illicit incumbents. And of course a...
Politics is in many ways like religion. It thrives on a foolish expectation of paradise perennially approaching but forever elusive. Take away the promise and prospect of eventual heaven and paradise and all religion falls flat. You dare not tell a devotee that heaven may not come or that...
In a matter of days, America’s democracy might self -correct and present a rough and bulky casualty. Mr. Donald Trump’s presidency is unlikely to be revalidated for a second term. As the various polls indicate once again, the American electorate seems poised to deal the disruptive Mr. Trump a...
The current mood of the nation is defined by a question mark. Most people are not quite sure where the Tinubu presidency is leading us. You hear it in the market place, at airport lounges, on the streets and in boardrooms. At first there was an optimism founded on...
On May 17th 2024, this column published a piece with the tittle “An Emperor and His Nemesis”. It was a prognostic analysis of the impending political crisis in Rivers State because of the suffocating hold of ex-governor Wike on his surrogate, Siminalayi Fubara, the incumbent governor of the state. Recent...
Between 1967 and 1970, Nigeria narrowly escaped the misfortune of going into oblivion. An unnecessary war was raging here. People were dying on an industrial scale, from bullets and hunger. Most of the deaths were unaccounted for. Some inconsequential people emerged from the mayhem as war heroes and illustrious...
It is a sort of sinking feeling. Something like an uncontrolled slide into a dungeon down a slippery slope. You seem trapped as you descend into a hellish pit out of which you are powerless to climb out. The descent is often propelled by a force beyond your control....
Perhaps unknown to most Nigerians, the Nigerian government hosted its political opposition in the hallowed chambers of the Federal Executive Council last Wednesday. It was a unique opportunity to hear an opposition perspective on the current state of the nation right in the executive chambers of Aso Villla....
The Nigerian politician is a most futuristic animal. He is above all else a most distractive creature, forever creating political outlets and ventilations. While our civil society remains reactive , our political class is eternally ahead in terms of setting an agenda for distracting the attention of the polity...
The anxiety preceding the hunger protests was palpable. The dress rehearsals on the part of officialdom were warlike. Government unleashed all manner of attack dogs to frighten off the planners of an over popularized nationwide protest wrongly captioned *Endbadgovernment. A nationwide protest without specific demands is doomed to fizzle...
No one can fairly accuse President Bola Tinubu of inaction or inactivity. On the job that he was elected to do, the man has been quite busy. On a daily basis, his office keeps rolling out innumerable appointments, setting up committees on nearly every subject and generally acting in...