THEWILL AUG 8 - AUG 14 EDITION

AUGUST 08 – AUGUST VOL 1 NO.26 •

Receding Foreign Investment Threatens Tax Reform Gains

14, 2021

HAJYA FATIMA NI EDof GO AMMther MHeaOH Millions! rt of Gold, Mo

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Price: N350

AUGUST 8 - AUGUST 14, 2021 • VOL . 1 NO. 26

Godwin Emefiele: Quintessential Banker/ Intellectual @ 60

Memorial For Chief Solomon Sunny Chukwuma

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T H EWI LLN G

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2023 ELECTION

Fire in PDP ●Wike, Makinde, Fintiri,

Others Seek Secondus’s Ouster ●Zoning Tears Party Apart ●Third Force A Possibility EDITORIAL

Tokyo Olympics: Mass Disqualification of Nigerian Athletes

TINUBU: PRESIDENTIAL AMBITION AND HEALTH CHALLENGES

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Fintiri

Makinde

Wike

COVER

Governors Wike, Makinde, Fintiri Seek Secondus’s Ouster

BY AMOS ESELE

B

y now, the picture must be very clear to Prince Uche Secondus, embattled National Chairman of the main opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, that his planned second term bid in office may not manifest due to some influential forces in the party who are vehemently opposed to his continued stay as leader of the party.

The bone of contention between his detractors and supporters is whether to allow him serve out his tenure which ends this December. This squabble has fueled the crisis in the party forcing the Board of Trustees to set up an expanded reconciliation committee to broker a truce and restore peace and stability to the national executive.

As exclusively reported in the online edition of this newspaper last Wednesday, THEWILL learnt that one of the reasons the Governor Nyesom Wike group backed by Oyo State Governor, Oluseyi Abiodun Makinde and Adamawa State Governor, Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri amongst some notable leaders facilitated the surprise resignation of seven members of the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party was to force Secondus to resign.

His re-election bid, his opponents believe, will open old wounds that his erstwhile ‘godfather’ and sponsor, Wike, had harboured against him when he reportedly ‘helped’ former Vice President Atiku Abubakar emerge as the party’s flagbearer beating the promoted Governor Aminu Tambuwal/ Wike joint ticket during the presidential primaries in Port Harcourt in 2019.

By Thursday, it appeared that a deal had been brokered PAGE 4

to at least allow Secondus complete his tenure following the quick interventions of some governors led by Chairman of the PDP’s Governors Forum, Tambuwal and Board of Trustees, BoT members.

That move prompted the Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the party, Prince Diran Odeyemi, who was among the seven deputy national officers that resigned from the NWC last Tuesday, to withdraw his resignation.

Odeyemi pledged to work with the Secondus-led NWC to ensure a successful National Convention, where new officers of the party will be elected.

He said in a letter dated August 4, 2021, that his decision to withdraw his resignation was taken in view of the activation of the internal method of resolving issues by the party elders and leaders across the length and breadth of Nigeria.

“This decision is taken in view of the activation of the internal method of resolving issues by our leaders across the length and breadth of Nigeria,” he said, adding that, “I also wish to state expressly that whatever embarrassment the resignation has caused the party, its leaders, members and supporters are highly regretted.

NWC, and will continue to play my roles to ensure a successful National Convention, which will usher in new national officers.”

The seven national officers in their separate resignation letters addressed to the National Secretary of the party, Senator Umaru Ibrahim Tsauri, had alleged being sidelined and treated unfairly by Secondus. The seven deputies are Odeyemi, deputy national legal adviser, Ahmed Bello; deputy national women leader, Umoru Hadizat; deputy national auditor, Divine Amina Arong; deputy national organising secretary, Hassan Yakubu and Irona Alphonsus, deputy national financial secretary.

According to a party source, the Wike group offered members of the NWC between N25m ($50K) – to N50m ($100k) per official to resign from the Secondus-led party executive. Only seven members, who are deputies, accepted the deal, according to our sources.

A BREATHER FOR NOW While they promised to remain loyal to the PDP, their resignation according to a party source, was part of the clamour for leadership change, targeted at removing Secondus who has fallen out with his main sponsor and backer, Wike.

“Most importantly, in view of the fact that the tenure of myself and other members of the present National Working Committee (NWC) will expire in another three months, it is my view that the boat should not be rocked under any guise.

However, like the proverbial cat with nine lives, Secondus, popularly referred to as ‘Total’, who has weathered many storms since assuming office in December 2017, has again survived the coup to unseat him.

“Consequently, I pledge my loyalty and commitment to the party and the Prince Uche Secondus-led

SOURCE OF TROUBLE Though Mr. Kola Ologbodinyan, National Publicity THEWILLNIGERIA

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COVER Secretary of the PDP told THEWILL that Secondus had never intimated him about a second term nor made any move that indicated another shot at the Chairmanship. Despite his claim, this newspaper gathered that the race for the 2023 Presidency is the reason behind the raging storm over the removal of the Secondus-led NWC. The Wike group according to our checks does not believe Secondus would support their bid for the party’s presidential ticket.

the prescribed quota of votes spread across other states of the country.”

Ologbodinyan thinks otherwise. According to him, many persons still misconstrue the role of the National Working Committee, NWC, of the party hence, what he called the “current fretting in the party.”

Recall that Senator Rochas Okorocha of the APC had flown this kite in mid-January in Port Harcourt when he was a guest of Wike in the Rivers capital.

“What many people do not understand is that there is a criterion about who is where and who does what.

We have not reached that stage in the NWC. We are products of our respective zones as persons who occupy positions in the party. That is why people are fretting.”

He said there is no crisis but disagreement in the party.

“There are concerns by members and this is normal in any organization be it church or corporation or office and we have the internal mechanism to resolve them and that mechanism has been activated.”

THEWILL investigation, however, revealed that there are three strands to the ongoing ‘disagreements’ in PDP. The first one is already playing out. It is intended to make sure Secondus entertains no idea of recontesting the Chairmanship when his tenure expires this December. According to sources, the fall out of the party’s presidential primaries that the former Vice President won still rankles.

Checks revealed that Wike had wanted Secondus to support the emergence of Tambuwal as presidential candidate with the Rivers state Governor as running mate.

Following their humiliating defeat at the primary, Wike, who had hitherto bankrolled the party, stopped funding it accusing Secondus of staying on the same, ‘forbidden’ track of disloyalty and disobedience. To compound matters, three governors, two senators and three federal legislators have so far defected from the party while allegations of corruption, which is a subject of litigation, has embroiled the party’s NWC.

Though this is a typical political calculation similar to the emergence of n-PDP that broke off from the then ruling PDP in protest against the nomination of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan at the national convention for a second term, our source said it is a high possibility again.

Okorocha said; “In this dispensation, there are many bad people in APC, many bad people in PDP. The good people of APC and good people of PDP must come together for the purpose of making Nigeria great. I could imagine where I would join forces with Wike. Governor Wike, this is my hand of friendship.

Let us bring all like minds, all great people of Nigeria.

Rather than complaining, let us come together to make this country greater and greater as it should be.

“What brought me here today is not a party but love and friendship. I am not PDP, I am APC but the time has come when we must break the jinx of party division

“

According to a party source, the Wike group offered members of the NWC between N25m ($50K) – to N50m ($100k) per official to resign from the Secondus-led party executive. Only seven members, who are deputies, accepted the deal, according to our sources

The second phase of the plot, which is becoming clearer to party elders and leaders as they wade into the lingering crisis, is what a source described as ‘current dynamics at play in both the ruling APC and the opposition PDP.”

and embrace brotherhood and friendship and be able to state what is good and what is bad. A bad man is a bad man whether he is in PDP or APC”, Okorocha had said.

While this option has proved attractive to aggrieved party members of both major parties, according to the source it is because of similar problems plaguing them. APC is yet to resolve the issue of where it would zone its presidential candidate while the PDP has a party understanding that if enforced it would give its ticket to a candidate from the north. However, with the current agitation for power shift to the south, which the Southern Governors Forum recently supported, the PDP is in a fix. The fear is that giving Secondus another chance as National Chairman would perpetuate the status quo for his ‘man’ Atiku Abubakar, again.

For the APC, party chieftains are also divided on what they call a gentleman’s understanding that power should shift to the south after President Muhammadu Buhari’s tenure. However, Buhari in a television interview in May said the party would decide his successor and a former National Chairman of the party, Chief John Odigie Oyegun replied that the reality is that zoning must be respected in the party.

Frontal in his reaction, a former Governor of Ogun State and an APC chieftain, Chief Olusegun Osoba stirred controversy in the party when he said there was an understanding on zoning the presidency to the South after Buhari, saying that the party constitution drafters did not include it in the document because they did not want it to become a subject of litigation in the future. These dynamics are the crossroads that faces both parties with hard choices ahead of the 2023 general elections.

FIGHT TO PUT OUT THE FIRE Responding almost immediately to the brewing crisis, the PDP Board of Trustees, BoT, after hours of meeting behind closed doors at its national secretariat, Abuja, chose to intensify reconciliation efforts to keep the party together and stronger ahead of the PDP elective convention slated for December.

The meeting which was summoned by the chairman of the Board, Senator Walid Jibrin, had in attendance prominent party stalwarts including Secondus, National Secretary, Senator Tsauri and Deputy National Chairman North, Senator Suleiman Nazi; past Senate presidents, Abubakar Bukola Saraki, David Mark and Adolphus Wabara.

According to the party source, the heated crisis in the parties is a prelude to the likelihood of the birth of a new political party often termed ‘Third Force’ by analysts, which will be dominated by aggrieved ranking members of both the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, and the PDP. This move according to the source could be a masterstroke as many Nigerians blame the two main political parties for the current deplorable state of the country.

Others included former governors of Kaduna, Niger, Cross River, Katsina, and Osun states respectively, Ahmed Makarfi, Babangida Aliyu; Ibrahim Shema, Liyel Imoke, Olagunsoye Oyinlola. Onetime minister of Special Duties, Tanimu Turaki, and former minister of Foreign Affairs, Aminu Wali were also in attendance. Olisah Metuh, Senator Ben Obi and Shuaib Oyedokun and Wike, who Ologbodiyan said is a statutory member, all met and failed to broker a truce, thus, culminating in the decision to constitute an expanded reconciliation committee to resolve outstanding issues.

ENTER THE THIRD FORCE According to the source, both PDP and APC have aggrieved governors, while some current federal cabinet Ministers and lawmakers have been eyeing the possibility of leaving their parties and coming together under one umbrella ahead of 2023.

Earlier this year, the BoT and National Executive Committee, NEC had passed a vote of confidence on the Secondus-led NWC. However, events of the past few months have been quite challenging for the Rivers State born party leader, as some party chieftains escalated calls for his resignation or ouster.

“If you have say five governors each leave both parties that makes ten. What would remain of the PDP would be eight governors, while the APC would have 18. What now plays as deciding factors would be: who becomes the presidential candidate because don’t forget that a president is duly elected when the candidate wins the popular vote including garnering

The expanded reconciliation committee which has seven BOT members, all13 governors of the party, all NWC members, three former governors, three former Ministers, former presiding officers of NASS and current PDP NASS leaders will determine how the party advances from the debacle.

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IMAGES Memorial For Chief Solomon Sunny Chukwuma

T

he family of Chief Solomon Sunny Chukwuma, the Ochudo of Akumazi Kingdom in Delta State, who passed on last year following a brief ailment held a memorial service in his honour presided by Bishop Michael

Odogwu Elue, Bishop of Isele-Uku Diocese, at St. John’s Catholic Church, Agbor last weekend. Guests were hosted at a colourful reception. Chief hosts of the event were Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria in charge

of Economic Policy Directorate, Dr. Kingsley Obiora and his wife, Rita Obiora, daughter of the deceased.

In attendance were Delta State Governor, Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa, his wife, Edith Okowa, Central Bank Deputy Governors - Mrs.

Bishop Michael Odogwu Elue leads other Rev. Fathers at the memorial service.

R-L: Gov. Okowa, a guest, Hon. Elumelu and Hon. Nwokolo.

Dr. Obiora & Wife, Rita.

R-L: Kingsley & Rita Obiora, Priscillia & Justice Ize-Iyamu & Kate Chuwkwuma, wife of the deceased.

Obi of Akumazi, Henry Ezegwukpo Jegbefume I.

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Dr. Dan Okwudiogo.

The church choir

Hon. Elekeokwuri, Delta SSG, Ukah, Ika North LGA Chair, Ebonka, Hon. Okoh & a guest.

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IMAGES Aishah Ahmad, Mr. Edward Adamu and Mr. Folashodun Shonubi. Hon. Ndudi Elumelu, Minority Leader, House of Representatives, Hon. Victor Nwokolo, member House of Representatives, Mr Kayode Pitan, MD Bank of Industry, Mr. Jonathan Tobi, E.D. BOI, Mr. Uche Orji, MD, NSIA, Mr. Austyn Ogannah, Publisher, THEWILL NEWS MEDIA, Mr. Hillary Ibegbulem, Principal Secretary to the Delta State Governor, Secretary to the Government of Delta State, Chief Patrick

Ukah, Alh. Abba Bello, MD, NEXIM Bank, Alh. Abubakar Kure, MD, NIRSAL, Dr. Lawrence Akande, E.D. NIRSAL, Chief Felix Achibire, Chairman, DFC Capital and Fortis Microfinance Bank, Alh. Bello Hassan, M.D., NDIC, Alh. Abbas Masanawa MD, Nigerian Security Printing and Minting PLC, Engr. Chris Orewa – E.D. Nigerian Security Printing and Minting PLC, Mr. Emmanuel Ukeje, Special Adviser on Economic Matters to the Governor of the CBN, Sir Peter Aliogo, Board Member,

First Bank Holding PLC, Chief Ede Dafinone, Non-Executive Director, NEXIM Bank, Dr. Emmanuel Olowofese, D.G, West African Monetary Institute, Chief Ikenna Okafor, Chairman, 9MOBILE Payment Service Bank and Chief Cairo Ojougboh – former E.D., NDDC amongst several other top officials of the CBN and the private sector.

Image Credit: Peace Udugba/THEWILL.

R-L: Ifunanya, Chike, Chinedum and Chidubem Obiora and guest Joke Ogedengbe.

R-L: Uche Orji, Edward Adamu and Folashodun Shonubi.

R-L: Austin Otule, Chief James Ume, Femi Soneye and Mallam Isa Kollere.

R-L: Chiamaka Ndu-Melekwe & husband, Ndubuisi, Dr. Kingsley Emu (4th right) and guests.

R-L:Osita Nwanisobi & Dr. Hassan Mahmud.

R-L: Mekwuye siblings, Emmanuel & Steph-Esther. R-L: Family of the deceased, Rita, Priscillia, Ben, Mrs Kate Chukwuma and others.

R-L: Hillary Ibegbulem and Austyn Ogannah THEWILLNIGERIA

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R-L: Dr. and Mrs Obiora and Dr. Cairo Ojougboh and wife, Ruth.

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NEWS

LG Boss Urges Court to Stop PLASIEC from Conducting Poll

FROM YAKUBU BUSARI, JOS he Chairman of Langtang North Local Government Council of Plateau State, Hon Ubandoma Joshua Laven has dragged the state Independent Electoral Commission (PLASIEC ), the Commissioner and Ministry of Local Government & Chieftaincy Affairs and the state Attorney General before the High Court, seeking an order to stop the conduct of the LG polls scheduled for October, 2021

T

The Chairman of PLASIEC, Hon Fibia Ntung Ari has fixed the council polls for October.

According to Laven, the decision of the PLSIEC to conduct the poll in October would rob him of a further year in office as he was sworn into office a year after his counterparts. According to the state law, LG Chairmen are meant to stay in office for three years but Laven has done two years, having been sworn in 2019.

Joshua-Laven, in a motion on notice filed before Justice Ishaku Kunda of State High Court 5, said his action was in pursuance to order 42 and 43 of the Plateau State High Court (civil procedure) rule 2020, section 7 of Construction of the Federal Government 1999 (as amended) and section 38 of LGA Laws 2016 and section 18 of State Independent Electoral Commission (PLASIEC) 2016.

According to Joshua-Laven the Plateau State Local Government Council Election Appeal Tribunal declared him to be the duly elected Chairman of Langtang North Local Government Council by its judgment of 19th July, 2019 for a three-year tenure but that PLASIEC then issued him with a Certificate of Return on the 17th October, 2019 while Governor Lalong administered the Oath of Allegiance and Oath of Office on him on the 9th October, 2019.

He pleaded through his counsel, Bar.Niri Darong, that, “The tenure of the Applicant as Chairman of Langtang North Local Government Council under section 38 of the Plateau State Local Government Council Law, 2016, is for three (3) years effective from the date he took the Oath of Allegiance and Oath of Office.

“But the Respondents have fixed 9th October, 2021 as the date to conduct election into the Office of Chairman of Langtang North Local Government Council, among others.

“If not restrained, the Respondents would truncate the statutory three-year tenure of the Applicant,” JoshuaLaven argued.

Consequently, Joshua-Laven said he was seeking for “an order of this Honourable Court for interlocutory injunction restraining the defendants by themselves, their agents, representatives or privies from doing anything or taking steps towards conducting elections into the office of Chairman of Langtang North Local Government Council on 9th October, 2021 pending the hearing and determination of the substantive suit.”

He was also seeking for an order of the Court for mandatory injunction restraining the defendants, their agents or privies from doing anything or taking any step prejudicial to his Office pending the determination of the substantive suit.

When the case came up for mention, Justice Ishaku Kunda on Friday adjourned the hearing to August 17, 2021 for ruling on the motion of injunction .

However, counsel to the defendants Barr. Fidelis Kaatpo did not oppose the application for adjournment sought by the Applicant/Claimant.

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L-R: Representative of the Ooni of Ife, Olajigbade Adewumi; the celebrant, Olori Francis Meshioye with his wife, Alaga (Mrs.) Meshioye, and Oba Idowu Adeleke, the Owajesi of Ife during the cutting of cake at the colloquium in honour of Olori Francis Meshioye’s 60th birthday at Muson Centre, Onikan, Lagos on 5/8/2021. PHOTO: Peace Udugba.

Makinde Swears-in Seven Commissioners, Assigns Portfolios

BY AYO ESAN

O

yo State governor, ‘Seyi Makinde, on Friday, sworein the seven commissioner nominees who were reappointed into the cabinet, charging them to keep raising the bar of governance.

The governor, while speaking at the swearing-in ceremony held at the Executive Chamber of the Governor’s Office, Secretariat, Agodi Ibadan, stated that names of the remaining commissioners would soon be made public.

He equally charged the reappointed commissioners to explore more innovative ways to deliver on their mandate and positively touch the lives of the good people of the state.

A statement by the Chief Press Secretary to the governor, Mr. Taiwo Adisa, quoted the governor as saying that the composition of the whole cabinet will be completed in the next few weeks.

The statement added that six of the reappointed commissioners retained their former ministries, while the immediate past Commissioner for Women Affairs, Alhaja Faosat Ajoke Sanni was deployed to the Ministry of Special Duties.

The newly sworn-in commissioners include Mr. Akinola Ojo (Finance); Prof. Oyelowo Oyewo, SAN (Justice); Chief Bayo Lawal (Local Government and Chieftaincy Matters) and Prof.

Dahud Sangodoyin (Public Works).

Others are Mr. Ayansiju Lawal (Establishment and Training); Mr. Temilolu Ashamu (Energy and Mineral Resources).

Speaking at the event, Governor Makinde said: “Two years ago, I inaugurated the first State Executive Council with 14 members initially and the number eventually grew to 17. The cabinet was dissolved about a month ago. All of you here who have been reappointed Honourable Commissioners were members of that cabinet.

“Well, as they say, ‘you don’t change a winning team.’ Yes, that is true. But they didn’t say that we should not reassess our team. In fact, regular assessment and reassessment are important to keep teams working optimally. So, to all seven of you here today, I will say welcome back”.

Governor Makinde, who maintained that his administration will continue to take development to all the nooks and crannies of the state, said his government has done massive works along the four pillars upon which the roadmap to Accelerated Development in Oyo State 2019-2023 is built.

He equally stated that the new commissioners will all need to play their part in ensuring that emphatic and service-oriented leadership becomes the norm in the state, saying: “The people of Oyo State will no longer be dragged down to the days of mediocre leadership. You all have a role to play in ensuring that ‘emphatic’ leadership becomes the new normal in Oyo State and, by extension, Nigeria because the whole country is watching. We should not relent but keep raising the bar”.

Court Jails Four Oil Thieves In Port Harcourt

F

our oil thieves have been convicted and sentenced to different jail terms by Justice A.T. Mohammed of the Federal High Court sitting in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.

The convicts are: Ibrahim Mohammed; Abubakar Saidu, Magaji Inuwa and Godswill Goodluck Ahukanna. They were all convicted on Thursday August 5, 2021 on one-count separate charge for illegal dealing in petroleum products preferred against them by the Port Harcourt Zonal Command of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC. One of the separate count-charge reads:”That you Ibrahim Mohammed on about the 16th May, 2018, at Okirika, Okirika LGA, Rivers State, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court did deal in petroleum product, about 30,000 litres of Automotive Gas Oil (AGO) conveyed in an Iveco Tanker with registration no: Kano KMC 82 ZJ without an appropriate licence and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 1(17)(a) & (b) of the Miscellaneous Offences Act, CAP M17 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria and punishable under Section 1(17)(b) of the same Act”.

Another separate count read: “That you Godswill Goodluck Ahukanna on or about the 31st day of October 2019 at Onne, Port Harcourt, Rivers State within the jurisdiction of this

Honourable Court did deal in petroleum product to wit: 800 litres of Automotive Gas Oil contained and conveyed in four (4) drums which is not the quality for Automotive Gas Oil (AGO) and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 1 (18) (a) (ii) of the Miscellaneous Offences Act CAP M17 of the Revised Edition (Laws of the Federation of Nigeria) 2007 and punishable under Section 1 (18)(a)(ii) of the Act” Based on their pleas of “guilty”, prosecution counsel: I. Agu, E. K. Ebipade and K. W. Chukwuma, prayed the court to convict and sentence them accordingly. Defence counsel, A. M. Eyam, O. M. Ofordile, M. M. Suleiman and E. H. Eboh did not oppose the prosecution but prayed the court to temper justice with mercy.

Justice Mohammed convicted and sentenced Mohammed to two years imprisonment, with an option of fine of Three Hundred Thousand Naira (N300, 000.00) to be paid into the Federal Government Account. He ordered that the product conveyed in the Iveco truck tanker with registration no: KANO KMC82 ZJ be sounded and sold by the court and EFCC and the proceeds paid into the Consolidated Revenue Account of the Federation. He released the Iveco tanker with registration number: Kano KMC82 ZJ to the owner.

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POLITICS Tinubu: Presidential Ambition and Health Challenges THEWILL CORRESPONDENTS

T

he ambition of the National Leader of the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, to preside over the affairs of the country in 2023 has been one issue that has dominated discussions in the past one year and will continue to do so in the coming months.

Every one of his moves are calculated like the movements of dices on the draught board.

For a man who is famed for many political exploits that makes him a must mention in political scheming, calculations and plots in Nigeria, with Lagos as his base, issues surrounding his health have become a source of public focus and debate recently. Earlier in the year, the Jagaban Borgu reportedly flew to Paris, France for the treatment of an undisclosed illness.

His media office denied the trip was connected with ill- health. Recently, the media has been awash with another health trip, this time for surgery in Maryland in the United States of America, after which he travelled to London for a rest, where Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu paid him a visit and took a photograph with him with no accompanying message.

Although Sanwo-Olu told journalists that the visit was to confirm things for himself about the reported ill-health of Tinubu and that the APC leader was hale and hearty, it still did not explain the absence of the Jagaban from important political and personal events he had religiously participated in as a matter of life and death in the past years.

HEALTH POSERS Tinubu has not been involved in official and party functions in the country for a long time, despite his interest in the 2023 presidency.

It is gathered that Tinubu has been battling health challenges and is currently recuperating in London after he left a hospital in Maryland, the United States of America.

Only a few days ago, pictures of Tinubu and Governor Sanwo-Olu in London were circulated widely in the media to corroborate this fact.

to rest after the news of his collapse at a public event went viral.

Tinubu, who has had several medical trips this year alone, was said to have had a surgery and could be billed for another one over a yet-to-be-disclosed illness.

2023 PRESIDENTIAL AMBITION Although he has not officially declared his interest to contest the 2023 presidential election, his body language has suggested so.

Fuelling the suspicion about Tinubu’s health is the fact that he couldn’t participate in the launching of his Arewa Library, nor participate in the local government area elections held in Lagos a few weeks ago.

Also, a group supporting his ambition was launched about a year ago in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.

The group which styles itself, ‘ South West Agenda for Asiwaju’, SWAGA is led by former Minister of Works, Dayo Adeyeye and has been in the forefront campaigning for Tinubu’s presidency come 2023.

Unlike him, Tinubu also was not in Lagos for the Eid- el- Kabir ceremony. A strong Muslim, he has not missed the ceremony in the country since he was governor of the state in 1999.

He could not also attend last week’s APC congress due to health reasons.

Tinubu, it was also gathered, was in January this year sick and hospitalised in Paris, France. He was said to have complained of exhaustion before travelling out THEWILLNIGERIA

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It was gathered from sources in the APC that there was an unwritten agreement in the party that a southerner will succeeds Buhari in 2023. This was corroborated recently by the former Governor of Ogun State and a chieftain of the party, Chief Olusegun Osoba. Some even put it more succinctly that the agreement was that Tinubu would succeed Buhari in 2023.

However, some northern leaders of the party have also declared that there was no such agreement. In

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2020, following an internal party crisis which led to the removal of Tinubu’s ally and party chairman, Adams Oshiomole, it is believed the move was intended to scuttle Tinubu’s presidential ambition, ahead of 2023.

But despite this, Tinubu has remained undeterred. He has criss-crossed the country in the last two years. Not only that, he has extended his hands of philanthropy to the northern part of the country whenever there was any disaster like fire incidents.

There are indications that the northern group within the APC may not be comfortable with Tinubu’s ambition and that they would prefer another person like Governor Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State or the current Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, for the country’s top job, come 2023.

Another hurdle in the realisation of Tinubu’s ambition is the issue of religion as many believe that being a Muslim, it may be very hard for the party to get a good Christian vice presidential candidate from the North.

*Continues on Page 12

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POLITICS/INTERVIEW

2023: APC Ready Over Taraba

The Acting Caretaker Chairman of the All Progressive Congress in Taraba State, Ibrahim El- Sudi, speaks on the activities of Governor Darius Ishaku as they affect the state, among other issues, in this interview with CHRISTIANA BABAYO. Excerpts:

W

hat was the condition of your party when it was handed over to you?

How would you describe its present

After we assumed office, we set up various committees, including the Reconciliation Committee. We received members of other parties who defected to our party and returnees. I mean those who were not happy about what transpired during the congresses and left to join the PDP and other political parties. We pleaded with them to come back. Many of them are responding very well. They are not comfortable in those places and are coming back. Some of them told us that they have not seen any prospect of development in Taraba State under the PDP Government. They are putting a lot of hope in the emergence of an APC candidate, come 2023 and they believe that a credible candidate will emerge who will take Taraba State as a matter of priority, bring developmental projects and unite the divergent people who populate Taraba, in terms of tribal or political affiliations.

For now, APC is a consolidated party. We are unified with one goal. We have differences on who to support for various offices, either for governorship, Senatorial, House of Representatives or House of Assembly positions, but that does not make us to be disunited.

Because of our loyalty to the party, we are not going to any other political party. We want a situation where people will coexist in harmony, just as they did in 1999 and 2007 before the death of the then Governor Danbaba Suntai decimated and fragmented the unity that previously existed in Taraba State. I want to tell you that APC is solidly on ground. We are united and focused to take over the mantle of leadership, come 2023.

Your criticism of Governor Darius Ishaku has generated a lot of reactions. In what areas has his government failed to live up to expectation?

In all the facets of governance in Taraba State. The present government needs to stand up and make sure that it governs the state very well. Politically, people are not united. They are divided on either basis of where they come from or religious differences and that has dichotomised the people PAGE 10

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state?

When I took over the party, its entire structure was in shambles. We had a lot of misgivings.

At the end of the day, the then national chairman and the national working committee of the party sat down to resolve the issue. An acceptable list was drawn up for harmonisation. This led to the emergence of a new executive. The old executive was dissolved at a point in time and it metamorphosed into caretaker committee.

of the state. I want to sing with a big voice. When the late Danbaba and Jolly Nyame were at the helm of affairs, even the opposition parties were being carried along. Their activities were being funded by the state government. Vehicles were given to them and government was working so there was minimal criticism because everybody had a sense of belonging. But today, even within the ranks of the PDP, if you belong to a camp which those at the helm are not pleased with, you will be segregated or discriminated against, let alone of some of us who are in the opposition party.

I am not talking about APC alone, but all other political parties are equally not feeling the impact of the government. Economically, a lot of things have been bastardised by the state government such that the economy of the state has reached its lowest ebb today. Apart from petty trading, no other kind of business is moving in the state.

There is no conducive atmosphere for businesses to thrive. People are afraid of doing business because of insecurity. The past governments had been very serious about the security of the state.

Security meetings were held in communities, local government areas and at the state level almost every week. The governors used to call for security meetings and the security agencies used

“

The present government needs to stand up and make sure that it governs the state very well. Politically, people are not united. They are divided on either basis of where they come from or religious differences and that has dichotomised the people of the state to tell the government their problems, including logistics. I am talking about allowances, vehicles and fuel. The government supply these to them.

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POLITICS/INTERVIEW

Today if you engage any of the security agencies in the state in a discussion, they will tell you that the state government has abandoned them. They take fire brigade approach to issues. People are being kidnapped in the state on daily basis and the government is doing nothing about it. As a result, people are afraid of staying in Jalingo.

Is that why many politicians like you are now called Abuja politicians, because you don’t stay in Jalingo Those of us they called Abuja politicians that cannot know what is happening in the state, I want to believe that today the world is a global village. You can stay in Lagos, Abuja or Jalingo and you will still know what is happening in other wards or local government areas in Taraba.

We have people in all these places. For APC, we have chairmen in all the 168 wards in Taraba State. We have chairmen and executives in all the local government areas in the state. They feed us with information on daily happenings in all the local government areas of the state. When we hear anything, we verify from these chairmen. So we are very conversant with what is happening in Taraba State. Without being told, you and I know that developmental projects are taking place in Rivers State because the government is working. Without been told, we know that Governor Zulum of Borno State is working. We can see these through social and conventional media. There are proactive visuals been shown to people that these governments are working.

Go to Gombe State, the governor doesn’t make noise, but there are networks of roads and other evidence of infrastructural development all over the state. Therefore, economically we are discouraged from staying in Taraba State. I am a lawyer. Some people are town planners and some are businessmen. As a lawyer, what kind of case will I get if there is no security here? When there are no corporate companies to patronise me or for me to patronise? The little companies here have become moribund or at most are pocketed by certain individuals in government. What can we do in Taraba other than to go to Abuja, Lagos or other places to look for our daily bread? If the government had created a conducive atmosphere for us to stay and do businesses, nobody will move to any place. We have done that in the past. Even before I joined government in 2002, I was practicing and it was thriving very well in this state. I didn’t move to any other place, but today, I stay for a month without any case. This is not healthy to me, my family and even my legal practice. So for anybody to accuse us of being Abuja politicians, the person is being economical with the truth. The person does not know what is happening. It is the present government that is THEWILLNIGERIA

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But the PDP government in the state has laid claim to so many projects and other achievements in the state. What about that?

As far as I am concerned, those things they are claiming as achievements are not achievements.

The Water Project the present administration is claiming is a World Bank Project. We started it during the Late Danbaba’s regime and Robbo Usman was the arrow head of contact with the World Bank. We are very much aware of everything about the project. They didn’t start it. We had gotten a good percent of the work done before they came to continue and they go about claiming it and telling the people that it is their project. Again, the Km Six Road that he is claiming, was started by Danbaba. We know that continuity of projects should be the main thing for any good administration, but what has the governor done to add value to what was already in place? Maybe a kilometre or three of roads. As at now, some tracking is taking place there, but we know that it is with the intervention of the Federal Government. The Cucumber Farm is a ghost of itself. They sank a huge amount of money into the project. Some said N2 billion, some N4 billion.

They know how much they sank there. But today how much are we realising every month? This is a white elephant project used to syphon billions of naira. What are the dividends? Nobody has accounted that this is how much that is being realised from the Cucumber Farm we put in place.

From a distance when passing through that place, the entire cucumber has shrunk. A large chunk of that farm is gone. They have just wasted Taraba state government money, instead of empowering people through farming. If they had given money to individual farmers and taught them how to farm and produce good crops, the multiplying effect would have been enormous but they just cornered a huge amount in one place and there’s nothing to show as at this time we are talking.

How would you assess other welfare projects of the government?

Paying salaries is not an achievement. It is the right of every citizen to get his salary at the end of the month. That is not an achievement at all.

Because we get allocation from the federation account and therefore they have no reason not to pay salaries. One other thing the Publicity Secretary of the PDP was talking about, he was saying that the university had only one professor at its take off, today it has more than 10. Is that an achievement? In every institution, whether there is a governor or not, that place, must seek to achieve academic height. They must be able to develop their departments and employ the right calibre of lecturers. We started sponsoring those that had first degree to master’s degree when Danbaba was at the helm of affairs. It was muted by Rev Jolly Nyame and actualised by Danbaba. And as at the take-off of that university, they had about 4 professors, so it is a lie to tell us that they had only one professor. Whether Darius is there or not, we will have an influx of professors because it is the determination of the students and the lecturers of the university that will attract professors to those citadels of learning. It is not government that woo those professors. It is the activity of the administration of the university that attracts senior lecturers, professors to come to the university.

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South Should Produce President in 2023 – Babatope

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ormer Transport Minister and a Chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP), Chief Ebenezer Babatope has joined his voice to the call for the south to produce the president of the country come 2023.

Speaking with THEWILL, Babatope said he believes that the president can come from any part of the country but that with the present situation in the country, the South should produce the president come 2023.

“Honestly speaking, I believe that the President can come from any part of the country as long as that individual has what it takes to deliver. But in the spirit of equity, fairness, and justice, I believe that it should be the turn of the South.

“We should praise the Southern governors for having that courage to take that decision irrespective of their political party leanings. However, while PDP has zoning enshrined in its constitution, APC does not.

Adhering to the principles of zoning will do Nigeria a lot of good. I believe that for fairness sake, if the Presidency is zoned to the South, the South-East deserves to be given consideration being the only geo-political zone yet to have the presidency since 1999. South-east is part of Nigeria. Forget that they fought for Biafra.

Babatope also canvassed for the restructuring of the country. He said Nigeria is bleeding badly and that restructuring will help it to return to a true practice of federalism.

He said if there is restructuring there will be no need for the debates and arguments over where the President should come from.

He said instead of embarking on amendment of the 1999 constitution, the country should adopt the report of the 2014 constitutional conference saying that, the report contained solutions to Nigeria’s problems.

“I believe we should revisit it with the aim of implementing it. 2014 confab report should be implemented as it provides solutions to major problems facing the country. The confab had best representations from the nation’s six geo-political zones. Having another constitution conference will just be a waste of national resources. Not only that, it may also suffer the same fate like the dumped 2014 confab .But I believe that the 2014 confab still remain the best option for us in the present circumstances. Why they dumped that confab reports I wouldn’t know. As we are fast approaching 2023, my prayers is that we should have an election that is not turbulent”, Babatope said.

Babatope

to Take –El-Sudi

driving us out of Taraba State to go for greener pastures elsewhere.

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POLITICS *Continued from Page 9

Tinubu’s Presidential Ambition and Health Challenges

ASIWAJU’S EXPLOITS Born on March 29, 1952 in Osun State, Tinubu went to the United States in 1975, where he studied first at Richard J. Daley College in Chicago, Illinois and then at Chicago State University where he graduated in 1979 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting.

He worked for the American companies, Arthur Andersen, Deloitte, Haskins, & Sells, and GTE Services Corporation. After returning to Nigeria in 1983, Bola Tinubu joined Mobil Oil Nigeria and later became an executive of the company.

His political career began in 1992, when he joined the Social Democratic Party where he was a member of the Peoples Front faction led by Shehu Musa Yar’Adua and made up of other politicians, such as Umaru Yar’Adua, Atiku Abubakar, Baba Gana Kingibe, Rabiu Kwankwaso, Abdullahi Aliyu Sumaila, Magaji Abdullahi, Dapo Sarumi and Yomi Edu. He was elected to the Senate, representing the Lagos West constituency in the short-lived Nigerian Third Republic.

After the results of the June 12, 1993 presidential elections were annulled, Tinubu became a founding member of the pro -democracy National Democratic Coalition, a group which mobilised support for the restoration of democracy and recognition of Moshood Abiola as winner of the June 12,1993 presidential election. Following the seizure of power as military head of state by General Sani Abacha, he went into exile in 1994 and returned to the country in 1998 after the death of the military dictator, which ushered in the transition to the Fourth Nigerian Republic.

In the build up to the 1999 general elections, Tinubu went on to win the Alliance for Democracy, AD primaries for the Lagos State governorship elections in defeating Funsho Williams and Wahab Dosunmu, a former Minister of Works and Housing. In January 1999, he stood for the position of Governor of Lagos State on the AD ticket and was elected governor.

Perhaps, the golden era of Tinubu began with his assumption of office as governor of Lagos State in May 1999. His achievements in office between 1999 and 2007 endeared him to Nigerians across the nook and crannies of the country as Lagos state under him became a model for other states especially the geometrical increase of its Internally Generated Revenue.

From there Tinubu rose to national prominence and also had a firm grip of Lagos State as he single handedly handpicked his successor, Babatunde Raji Fashola (SAN) and those that followed him, Akinwumi Ambode ( 2015-2019) and the incumbent Governor Babajide Sanwo - Olu. This development has made Nigerians to widely perceive him as the “Godfather of Lagos”, leveraging his political capital in the mega city-state to influence regional and national affairs.

In 2007, following the landslide victory of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the April 2007 elections, Tinubu was active in negotiations to bring together the fragmented opposition parties into a “mega-party” capable of challenging the PDP. In February 2013, Tinubu’s negotiations in creating PAGE 12

Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu and Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu when the governor visited the leader in London last week.

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Fuelling the suspicion about Tinubu’s health is the fact that he couldn’t participate in the launching of his Arewa Library, nor participate in the local government area elections held in Lagos a few weeks ago.

a “mega opposition” party became paid off with the merger of Nigeria’s three biggest opposition parties – the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), a faction of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) and the new PDP (nPDP), a faction of serving governors of the then ruling People’s Democratic Party[32] – into the All Progressives Congress (APC).

In 2014, Tinubu supported former military head of state ,General Muhammadu Buhari, leader of the CPC faction of the APC – who commanded widespread following in Northern Nigeria, and had previously contested in the 2003, 2007, and 2011 presidential

elections as the APC presidential candidate.

Tinubu initially wanted to become Buhari’s vice presidential candidate but later conceded for Yemi Osibanjo, his ally and former commissioner of justice.

In 2015, Buhari rode the APC to victory, ending the sixteen years rule of the PDP, and marking the first time in the history of Nigeria that an incumbent president lost to an opposition candidate.

Tinubu has gone on to play an important role in the Buhari administration, supporting government policies and holding onto the internal party reins, in lieu of his long-held rumored presidential aspiration.

In 2019, he supported Buhari’s re-election campaign defeating the PDP candidate Atiku Abubakar.

THE 2023 QUESTION How will Nigerians received the Tinubu’s health challenges concerning his ambition to govern the country. Political analysts believe this may whittle down the general support for his ambition. They are of the opinion that Nigerians may be wary of supporting anybody with health challenges for the country’s top job, given the experience of the incumbent president, Muhammadu Buhari who has travelled abroad several times for medical treatment and he is currently in London for the same purpose.

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TRIBUTE Godwin Emefiele: Quintessential Banker/ Intellectual @ 60

decisions to have reappointed you as the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria for a second term.”

BY MICHAEL JIMOH

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residents and prime ministers have been known to keep cabinet members waiting for hours, days, weeks or not even see them at all if they are not keen. After the scandal that swirled around Simon Cameron during Abraham Lincoln’s presidency in America, he declined meeting his Secretary of War despite the latter’s desperate attempt to see his former friend and dinner partner.

Banning imported rice and some such commodities has saved the country billions of foreign exchange and boosted local production. Banning sale of forex to operators of Bureau de Change is cutting money laundering. Under his watch, CBN has intervened and implemented some laudable policies.

One of them is the Nigeria Youth Investment Fund (NYIF) to tackle youth unemployment and also empower them. As the name suggests, sums of money – anywhere from N250, 000 to N50, 000 with low interest rates - have been made available to thousands of youths to start up a business. There is also the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Fund (MSMEDF), Agribusiness Small and Medium Enterprises Investment Scheme (AgSMEIS) and Creative Industry Financing Initiative (CIFI.) And the Anchor Borrowers Programme which has rejigged farming in the country.

If he is so inclined, President Muhammadu Buhari may not take calls from any governor of the thirtysix states in the country he presides over – party loyalist or anyone from the opposition camp.

Indeed, soon after re-election in 2019, the president declared that from then on, anyone who wanted an audience with him should go through his Chief of Staff or Secretary to the Federal Government.

But there is one governor he cannot ever decline his call or refuse to see in person. Though this particular governor has no state of his own from which he calls the shot, he plays a more central role in Nigeria’s economy than any of the state chief executives. That man is Godwin Emefiele, governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, appointed in 2014 by Goodluck Jonathan and reappointed by PMB last year to continue his run in office.

Emefiele was born in Lagos on August 4, 1961 to parents from Agbor in Delta state, which makes him a confirmed Lagosian. He also attended primary and secondary school in the state then proceeded to University of Nigeria, Nsukka, where he distinguished himself as a graduate of Banking & Finance having made Second Class Upper Division. It was no surprise he also became the Best Graduating Student in 1986 for an MBA. He topped all of that with executive studies at Stanford and Harvard, choice institutions for serious minded business executives in the making.

Of course, Emefiele would turn out to be one in no time, starting off a sparkly career with Zenith Bank Plc from inception in 1990. Ten years later, he was Group Managing Director of the same bank, owing, no doubt, to his very refined mind as a banker/ intellectual, as one of his former workers told THEWILL recently.

Though now a PR man and biographer, Toni Kan Onwordi who celebrated his 50th last month, worked with Emefiele at Zenith Bank many years ago. “I remember him as a quiet, unobtrusive and observant man,” TK told the newspaper. “He interviewed me when I joined and I found him cerebral and detailed which was not surprising since he was a lecturer in finance.”

Continuing, TK also compared him to former CBN THEWILLNIGERIA

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governor, Charles Soludo who people say “has been the only intellectual at CBN.” For TK, that is isn’t true, insisting that “before GIE, as we called him at Zenith, became a core banker, he was first an egghead.”

Is it any surprise PMB reappointed Emefiele, an egghead and banker rolled into one, for a second tenure as CBN top man? The records are there for all, and counting.

It has been said that Buhari reappointed Emefiele for his radical fiscal policies and prompt response to the COVID-19 scourge. What the presidential seal of approval means is Emefiele’s professionalism, a man who knows what to do to get a wonky economy working again.

To be sure, no past CBN governor had to face plummeting oil prices as it happened under Emefiele. No previous CBN governor was confronted with a raging virus that almost brought the world to a halt. Emefiele weathered all of that and did not go under. Instead, he quickly put in place some economic policies that got the country going once again despite the odds.

A commentator, Boniface Chizea, writing for Vanguard on the CBN governor’s sixtieth had this to say: “If we are looking for one institution that has been accountable for the country’s quick exit from the pandemic to resume growth, it must be the Central Bank under your watch…the President also admitted openly that it was one of his best

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The reason for such interventions in these areas is to make funds available to small businesses with interest rates as low as five percent. Any economist will tell you that lack of access to funds is the main obstacle to starting up businesses in this part of the world. Emefiele made that possible as governor of CBN, and is still continuing to do so.

In good shape at sixty where some in his lofty position would have been seduced into needless indulgence and become portly in the process, Emefiele is military straight, no extra ounce of fat anywhere. Those who know him closely say he is a habitual walker, covering long distances as opportunities present themselves.

Of course, being the nation’s number one banker can be very demanding. But having taught in an institution of higher learning, successfully run a bank and the professional that he is, Emefiele has never been more at home where he currently is.

In his seventh year as CBN governor, it is hard to imagine PMB terminating his appointment midway like it happened to one or two of his predecessors.

It is also had to imagine Emefiele himself leaving Nigeria’s number one financial institution worse than he met it. One of the most cerebral and successful bankers of all time, Alan Greenspan, 13th chairman of Federal Reserve in America, famously quipped thusly: “The true measure of a career is to be able to be content, even proud, that you succeeded through your own endeavors without leaving a trail of casualties in your wake.”

His Nigerian counterpart seems to know that already.

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EDITORIAL Tokyo Olympics: Mass Disqualification of Nigerian Athletes O

n Wednesday, July 28, 2021, the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) of World Athletics issued a statement that ruled out 10 of the 23 athletes Nigeria entered for the athletics events at the Tokyo Olympic Games.

The body, which is charged with the responsibility of managing all integrity issues, doping or nondoping, for athletics, threw out the athletes for failing to meet minimum testing requirements under Rule 15 of the Anti-Doping Rules for Category A countries.

That embarrassing public statement not only rendered over 40 per cent of the athletics contingent of Team Nigeria ineligible to contest their events at the global sports showpiece, it also put the country on the spot when it expressly mentioned Nigeria as “the most affected country” for having 10 of her athletes fail to meet these minimum requirements.

The requirements for Category A countries are not overboard and they are provided by the AIU to Member Federations like the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) with guidelines published under the “National Federation Anti-Doping Obligations”. For every Category A country’s athlete, the standards require that they undergo three nonotice out-of-competition tests (urine and blood) in a 10-month period leading up to a major event.

That was all the AIU required and the absolute low bar the AFN failed to scale. By so doing, it brought an untoward and disgraceful negative media attention to Nigeria, condemned the dreams of 10 hardworking athletes that had toiled over the postponement of the Olympics and sacrificed to scale

through the hoops of qualifying for the delayed Games, only to get to Tokyo and become ineligible because of the irresponsibility of their country’s sports management.

In the first place, Nigeria had no business being considered a Category A country and classed alongside Ukraine, Belarus, Ethiopia, Kenya, amongst others, as she often produces clean athletes without doping histories. Under the AIU rules, National Federations are categorised annually by the AIU Board in three different categories: A, B and C. The categorisation is codified according to the level of doping risk to the sport. It is structured with Category A having the highest doping risk to the sport and Category C the lowest.

However, as the AFN devolved into infighting and factional warfare, the very business of piloting the country’s athletics and building up competitive athletes was relegated to unimportance and actual athletics responsibilities were abandoned.

In 2019, the AFN failed to report on compliance with Rule 15’s obligations as mandated by a Category B country and as stipulated under the AIU’s guidelines leading to the country’s demotion to a Category A status.

As the AIU had associated Nigeria with a weak domestic testing apparatus, it became the responsibility of sports governance in the country to ensure the eligibility of her athletes by meeting every minimum standard in due time. All verbal assurances that came from the Honourable Minister of Youth and Sports Development, Sunday Dare, to the effect that Team Nigeria was ready for Tokyo have fallen flat on the basis of Wednesday’s AIU report.

Although the beleaguered AFN quickly accepted its flawed role in the outcome by admitting its failure for the lapses that rendered 10 Team Nigeria athletes ineligible, it sought to excuse itself by saying the ineligible athletes were tested but the tests did not comply with required standards and brought up the notion that no prohibited substances were linked to any Nigerian athlete.

Their feeble attempt at downplaying the severity of the situation is disappointing at best and unbecoming of what is required at this global level of sporting governance, at worst. When a governing body cannot meet the barest minimum requirements, not only must an outright apology be forthcoming, voluntary resignations or direct firings must follow for the country to demonstrate how highly it places integrity and a no-nonsense intention to make amends.

To compound matters, PUMA, the German Sportswear manufacturing giant on Wednesday terminated its 4- year contract with the AFN. According to the company’s director, Manuel Edlheimb, the company cancelled the contract “As a direct consequence of the recent developments, particularly at the Tokyo Olympic Games 2020 and pursuant to clauses 9.2 and 7.3 of the Agreement.”

Nigeria has seen enough of these failures in governance that unless very strict measures are taken to arrest recalcitrance, especially in the AFN with all the factional internal bickerings and the internecine warfare, this cycle will perpetuate itself just as the athletes themselves acknowledged in their angry reactions to the development, to the detriment of sports, in general, and the country’s reputation, in particular.

AUSTYN OGANNAH

Publisher/Editor-in-Chief Editor – Olaolu Olusina Deputy Editor – Amos Esele Politics Editor – Ayo Esan Business Editor – Sam Diala News Editor (Online) – Felix Oboagwina Copy Editor – Chux Ohai Cartoon Editor – Victor Asowata Entertainment/Society Editor – Ivory Ukonu Photo Editor – Peace Udugba Head, Graphics – Tosin Yusuph Circulation Manager – Victor Nwokoh Nigeria Bureau: 36AA Remi Fani-Kayode Street, GRA, Ikeja. Lagos, Nigeria. info@thewillnigeria.com / @THEWILLNG +234 810 345 2286, +234 913 333 3888. EDITOR: Olaolu Olusina @OLUSINA [Letters/Opinions: opinion.letters@thewillnigeria.com] PAGE 14

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OPINION Neither for Nor Against Sacked Pastors

BY SESUGH AKUME

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any have expressed their views for or against the sacked pastors of Living Faith Church; for or against the church and its presiding bishop, Dr David Oyedepo. I’m for neither. For the following reasons First, for the pastors, I’m sure they weren’t recruited from the streets and deployed to the churches: They must’ve been members of the church for a while and ought to have been immersed in its culture. They ought to have known about meeting and exceeding expectations. For instance, if the church itself grew by 10,000 additional branches last year alone with COVID-19 lockdown and restrictions notwithstanding, one would expect them to know that nothing less is to be expected of any one of them, and not only them but everyone else in the system.

Second, I want to believe they went through different levels of pastoral training before being ordained and commissioned, and at the point of employment they knew what they were signing up for.

Every staff and/or member of the church must’ve heard of the critical ministry handbook The Mandate: Operational Manual Living Faith Church Worldwide Winners Chapel written by the founding/presiding bishop himself, the most critical resource material of the commission next to the Bible. I expected all staff to have read it to know what is expected of them.

Third is, thousands of pastors were employed last year alone, why then would anybody be among 40 of those found to be unfruitful? I’d do my best never to be among the least 40 of even 100, not even of 1,000. We’re talking of 10,000 here!

I’ve read the Sahara Reporters’ news report of one of the laid off staff blowing disclosing how his (now former) colleagues doctor figures, report fund collections that are not true with the active connivance of others in the system, and make up for the falsified records from their salaries. He went ahead and said many of them don’t have meeting halls, no congregations, etc but create the illusion with the false filings, a practice characterised as ‘wisdom’ or ‘applying wisdom’ which he couldn’t do.

First, I personally don’t appreciate people who care about a system so much after leaving or on their way out. This, he could’ve said when inside to save the system. Second, why would anybody draw a salary for doing nothing? What were they being paid for? Third, there are many who report accurate figures and are visibly growing or is everybody reporting growth falsifying figures? The gentleman should take several seats!

On the other hand, I’m not pleased either with the manner in which the pastors were sacked. I know church is business but if it’s done in the name of Christianity, my opinion is that the motivation for all in Christianity is love. Meaning whatever is done ought to be in love, sacking unproductive workers inclusive.

Many claim Jesus said any tree that bears no fruit will be yanked off. But these aren’t trees are they? They are human beings. Those who say these things forget the part where an unfruitful tree was to be uprooted but the master asked it to be manured again for another season to see whether it would be fruitful or not before deciding.

I’ve seen no record of the underperforming pastors being interacted with to find out what the issues might be, and seeking to help them fulfill their commission, failure of which they were relieved of their duties. In my opinion, it’s the humane way to go about it.

From the letter seen in the public domain, the sack was ‘with immediate effect’ as they were required to vacate their living quarters the same day! I think people should be given notice to quit and not be hounded out of their residences the same day, even if they are bachelors and live alone. They didn’t kill anybody or commit any crime, they simply didn’t meet the ‘church growth index’.

I think relieving people of their duties can be made painless, after all they are leaving. I think business should be done with some humanity and consideration.

•Sesugh Akume, a public policy analyst, wrote from Abuja. He can be reached via sesugh.akume@gmail.com, and tweets @sesugh_akume.

Nigerian Elections Are Bought And Sold Like Suya

BY UZOR MAXIM UZOATU

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The buying and selling of Nigerian elections have abiding partners in the mischievously named Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), a pathetic judiciary, crooked politicians, and their foreign and local allies.

Let’s start from Nigeria’s much-ballyhooed return to democracy in 1999 during which an army ruler handed over to a former army ruler who had pulled off his army uniform.

Lest we forget, the 2015 monster that is now hurting Nigeria to death was forged when the then INEC chairman Professor Attahiru Jega showed his hands early enough by manipulating the re-jigging of polling booths to favour his northern constituency.

here’s this book by Peter Enahoro entitled You Gotta Laugh to Cry.

The so-called democratic elections in Nigeria almost always end up making all Nigerians laugh to cry.

Well before the 1999 presidential election, the American journalist Karl Maier who was on a tour of Nigeria to write his book This House Has Fallen: Nigeria in Crisis told me that Chief Olusegun Obasanjo had been chosen by the powers-thatbe to return as the elected leader of Nigeria.

The pre-eminent politicians of the era in the G-34 Group that formed the PDP put it as a rule that anybody who aspired to contest for the presidency must first win his local government election.

Obasanjo could not win his ward but the rule had to perforce be put away for the erstwhile imprisoned man from Otta to become PDP presidential candidate over the vain efforts of Chief Alex Ekwueme in the primaries.

The controversy that this elicited made Jega to shift to the next strategy of starving Permanent Voters Cards (PVC) to some zones even as the war-torn north had full compliments of PVC distribution.

The clinching dimension was the card reader which was never tested before the commencement of the elections.

It was obvious to any objective mind that the umpire was only working towards a pre-determined end instead of actually preparing to conduct credible polls.

Like American TV wrestling, the Nigerian election was fixed.

American Secretary of State John Kerry had to come to Nigeria to issue some warnings when the polls were initially postponed.

country from the colonial times to this day.

The censuses and elections have all been manipulated to fit a formula to serve the interests of the British colonists and their minions.

Little wonder then that Kano and Jigawa states posted more votes than the entire Southeast in 2015!

Now that I have mentioned Jigawa in this piece on buying and selling of Nigerian elections, let it be known that one of the fictional factions of political parties in the about-to-be contested governorship election in Anambra State had to go up North to Jigawa State to get a binding court injunction in an election scheduled to hold down South in Anambra State.

Before anybody could understand the legal geography of the matter, INEC published the bloke’s name as the authentic candidate of the political party!

INEC’s national commissioner in-charge of publicity and voter education, Festus Okoye, an expired human rights hustler, now a hireling more like, had earlier magisterially decreed that the party had been excluded from the election.

The Obasnjo machine was so heavily funded that it made the challenge of Chief Olu Falae in the presidential election proper to look futile.

In the end, the elections held with underage voters, multiple voting, ballot-box snatching etc having a field day.

The Jigawa judgment had to come in dramatically as a deux ex machina to save blushes because the chief press secretary to the INEC chairman, Rotimi Oyekanmi, countered Okoye by stressing that the party had not been barred from the polls and INEC knew of no other faction in the party.

Even so, not a few observers stressed that the underdog actually won the election, and the legal challenge had to get up to the Supreme Court.

It may be quite convenient to dismiss Nigerian politicians as master riggers of elections without paying due compliments to our colonial masters, Britain, that introduced the high art into our benighted shores.

Remarkably INEC had received and stamped the uploaded nomination of the proper candidate on July 2 whose name it ought to publish according to the Electoral Act not later than seven days - that is July 9.

Many years later, to borrow the opening words of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude, Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar’Adua told the world that the election that brought him to Nigerian presidential power was flawed.

Because the pre-Independence elections were rigged by the British certain figures are now taken as a given in Nigerian polls.

INEC had to wait for the Jigawa legerdemain to publish the spurious candidate’s name on July 16.

In my book, the only good thing about recent Nigerian elections is President Goodluck Jonathan’s personal sacrifice to cede power in 2015.

Any talk of the elections being free, fair and credible belongs to fiction of the magical realism type of Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

Nigerian elections are simply bought and sold like suya.

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In the run-up to the Second Republic elections, the forger of the Twelve-Two-Third legal abracadabra Richard Akinjide stated that his party, the National Party of Nigeria (NPN), needed to produce its presidential candidate from the North because the region has the largest population in the country.

Akinjide later learnt in his life that this population issue is all a ruse because no credible census has ever been conducted in the

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Shamelessness is the vilest disease as it does appear that INEC is in cahoots with three despicable brothers from the most notorious family in Anambra politics involved in the choreographed injunctions and counter-injunctions.

It is incumbent on INEC chairman, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, not to let his compromised lieutenants, dodgy politicians, shady judiciary, and the scandalous “orders from above” reduce democracy.

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NIMET: Tackling Impact of Weather On Flight Safety, Operations

Missing The Recovery Boat in Rough Sea

PAGE 33

Unity Bank Unveils New Code to Combat E-Banking Fraud PAGE 35

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Receding Foreign Investment Threatens Tax Reform Gains

(FDI), which accounted for 8.90% ($77.97m) of total capital imported in Q2 2021”, the latest NBS report stated.

BY SAM DIALA

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he deepening slump in foreign investment in Nigeria signals a bad omen for the economy and should worry those in the position to halt the adverse trend. While the inauspicious development has severe implications on every sector, it could reverse the gains of the various tax policy reforms initiated in the past five years to boost nonoil revenue.

The FDI figure of mere $78 million in Q2 2021 from $148.59 in Q1, a decline of 47.53 percent, has a direct link with job losses and low revenue which affects corporate and personal income tax levels. Unemployment rate jumped from 13.4 percent in 2016 to 33.1 percent in 2020, an increase of 197 basis points.

Further analysis of the NBS report revealed a sharp decline in the sectors that mostly attract FDI and which have the propensity to create jobs and boost economic development and growth. These include Agriculture, Production, Oil & Gas, Telecos, Construction and IT Services.

It is on record that the reforms brought remarkable changes to the tax space with robust gains in revenue, increase in the number of taxpayers and reduction in compliance gap.

The Stamp Duties (Reform) Act, Personal Income Tax, Value Added Tax, among various initiatives (now upgraded in the 2020 Finance Act to boost tax revenue) yielded the desired results. Data from FIRS showed that tax revenue grew from N3.3 trillion in 2016 to N4 trillion in 2017. The growth trajectory continued in 2018 when tax revenue hit an all-time high of N5.32 trillion, then dropped slightly to N5.26 trillion in 2019. The figure for 2020 was N4.9 trillion which was affected by the COVID-19 lockdown.

Effectively, tax revenue at the federal level recorded an increase of 48.49 percent in the five-year period when investment inflow also recorded a significant increase: Investment grew from $5.12 billion in 2016 to $12.22 billion in 2017, a jump of 138.65 percent. It rose further by 37.49 percent to $16.81 billion in 2018, before hitting an all-time high of $23.99 billion or 42.7 percent in 2019.

The incidence of COVID-19 and other macro-economic challenges pulled the level of investment southwards to $9.68 billion or 60 percent. As of H2 2021, total investment inflow for the year plummeted significantly to $875 million or 90.96 percent.

While there has been a quantum leap in Nigeria’s non-oil revenue arising from the introduction of the various tax reforms, the sharp decline in foreign investment inflow witnessed in the first six months of 2021, could halt the trend and scuttle the voluntary compliance culture.

This is because an investment deficit has implications for development, employment, revenue and income growth with ultimate effect on GDP. This explains the concern by industry experts and other stakeholders over the rapid slide in investment in the economy.

WORRYING SIGNS The first wailing voice was raised by the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC), a government establishment created to encourage, promote and coordinate investments in the Nigerian economy. The agency in a recent report (July 2021) revealed that investment announcements in Nigeria declined by a whopping 80 percent in the second quarter, which suggests that foreign investors have decided to look the other way.

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Adebayo

For instance, the tax amnesty initiative under the novel Voluntary Assets and Income Declaration Scheme (VAIDS) introduced in July 2017, allowed more Nigerians to pay taxes by not punishing them for tax evasion. According to the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), the government recorded N17 billion through the scheme while the existing 14 million tax payers doubled during the two-year period of the scheme.

According to NIPC, investment inflow fell to $1.69 billion in the second quarter from $8.41bn in the first quarter. The report had also revealed that the total value of investment interests in the first half of this year fell by $1.57 billion to $10.11 billion, compared with the value recorded in the second half of the previous year.

In a similar report, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed that investment into Nigeria slumped to the lowest level in four years as of the first six months of 2021. The statistics bureau in its report entitled ‘Nigerian Capital Importation (Q1 & Q2 2021)’ released on July 28, 2021, showed that the total amount of foreign investment in the nation’s economy was $2.78 billion in the review period.

This was against $7.15 billion recorded in the corresponding period (second half) of 2020, a shortfall of 62 percent.

While the first quarter of 2021 recorded total investment inflow of $1.905 billion, the figure dropped to mere $875 million in the second quarter representing a decrease of 54.06 percent compared to first quarter of 2021. It also represents 32.38 percent decrease compared to the second quarter of 2020 when $1.29 billion investment came to the economy.

Although the picture of total investment inflow is painted in gloomy colours, of greater concern is the deepening slump in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) which has a greater impact on the economy to propel growth and expand job opportunities. This is against the impact of Foreign Portfolio Investment (FPI) which largely comprises investments in stocks and shares with limited linkage for job creation. Over the years, the boost in investment inflow has been propelled

by FPI, which paints an unrealistic picture of the health of the economy.

“The largest amount of capital importation by type was received through Portfolio investment, which accounted for 62.97% ($551.37m) of total capital importation, followed by Other Investment, which accounted for 28.13% ($246.27m) of total capital imported and Foreign Direct Investment

FDI in Agriculture in Q2 2021 decreased to $28.9 million from $66.40 million in the previous period of Q1, a decline of 56.47 percent, while Production which recorded $182.19 million in Q1 2021 nosedived to $68.03 million, representing 62.66 percent drop. In the same sliding trajectory, Oil & Gas sector attracted a total FDI of $57.25 million in Q1 2021 only to drop by 80.22 percent to $11.32 million in Q2 2021.

The Teleco sector received FDI totaling $56.28 million in Q1 2021, but dropped to a terrible level of $.34 million or 99.4 percent. FDI in Construction recorded zero inflow in Q1 2021 as against $1.50 million in Q2 2021 as FDI in IT Services trickled to $0.03 million in Q1 2021 compared with $1.60 million in Q1 2021.

UNEMPLOYMENT ANGLE This, rightly, explains the concerns generated by the World Bank report which suggests that Nigeria’s unemployment crisis in recent times is the worst in the nation’s history.

According to the research paper published in July 2021, Nigeria’s expanding working-age population combined *Continues on Page 35

NIGERIAN FOREIGN INVESTMENT INFLOW 2016-2021($'bn) 30 23.99 22.5 16.812 15

7.5

0

12.228

5.548

2016

2017

2018

2019

1.069

0.875

2020

2021(H2)

FIRS TAX REVENUE (2016-2020) N'trn 6 5.3 4.5

5.3

4.9

4 3.3

3

1.5

0

2016

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2017

2018

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2019

2020

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AUGUST 8 - AUGUST 14, 2021 www.thewillnigeria.com

AVIATION

NIMET: Tackling Impact of Weather On Flight Safety, Operations In this piece, ANTHONY AWUNOR writes that weather forecasts offered by the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NIMET) are critical to safety of flight operations

A

Noting that the accuracy of their forecasts is more than 90 per cent, Prof Matazu listed services provided

by NIMET at the airport level to include: terminal aerodrome forecasts, meter forecast, signate alert etc.

Others have to do with, if there is any fast growing weather system around the airport or within the vicinity of the descent of 50 nautical miles.

In addition, weather continues to play a significant role in a number of aviation accidents and incidents. While National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) reports most commonly find human error to be the direct accident cause, weather is a primary contributing factor in 23 percent of all aviation accidents. The total weather impact is an estimated national cost of $3 billion for accident damage and injuries, delays and unexpected operating costs.

NIMET is charged with the responsibility to advise the Federal Government on all aspects of meteorology; project, prepare and interpret government policy in the field of meteorology; and to issue weather (and climate) forecasts for the safe operations of aircrafts, ocean going vessels and oil rigs.

The Act also makes it the responsibility of the agency to observe, collate, collect, process and disseminate all meteorological data and information within and outside; co-ordinate research activities among staff, and publish scientific papers in the various branches of meteorology in support of sustainable socio-economic activities in Nigeria.

Emphasising on the critical role weather plays in aviation, Director General of NIMET, Prof Bako Mansur Matazu said that it is very difficult to separate weather and aircraft operations because flying takes place within the atmosphere which is regularly monitored by NIMET. Due to the importance NIMET places on weather, Prof Matazu said that the agency, through its Directorate of Public Relations, is organising a stakeholder workshop for all airport managers, stressing that it is all about efficiency, safety in the industry Speaking at the sideline of a conference organised by the League of Airport and Aviation Correspondents (LAAC) in Lagos recently, Prof Matazu stated that, in such forum NIMET provides weather updates to stakeholders, encourage them to patronise and take weather forecasts very seriously and also integrate it into their flight plans.

Beyond mere forecasts, Matazu, a professor of Geography, informed that NIMET also has other THEWILLNIGERIA

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On the rainy season and its impact on aviation, Prof Matazu said “In NIMET, we monitor the atmosphere, the circulation, the symbols and the weather that takes place within the atmosphere. The very component of our forecast is the seasonal rainfall prediction we provide to the public, which we issued out as early as February. In the forecast, we predicted that the country will experience normal rainfall patterns.

And this pattern entails different components of the rainfall. Very critical component of this forecast is the aeronautical meteorology forecast which we provide to the aviation industry.

“In the whole aviation industry, per minute, per second operation, especially the act of flying depends on weather. When the weather is good, you have a smooth flight and when the weather is bad, you have a bumpy flight”, Matazu added.

ccording to statistics from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), an operating mode of the U.S. Department of Transportation, weather is the cause of approximately 70 percent of the delays in the National Airspace System (NAS).

According to him, NIMET is present in all the 24 airports and all the 4 international airports, hosting independent forecasting offices in which the agency provides these forecasts.

Matazu

There is no gainsaying the fact therefore, that the impact of weather on flight operations is very critical. It was on that note, that the Federal Government of Nigeria established the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NIMET). The agency came into existence by an Act of the National Assembly – NIMET (Establishment) ACT 2003, enacted on 21st May 2003, and became effective on 19th June 2003 following Presidential assent.

response is very good from the airlines, especially with the season, now, we are in the active weather system across the country. But there is still room for improvement”, Matazu stated.

“

In the whole aviation industry, per minute, per second operation, especially the act of flying depends on weather. When the weather is good, you have a smooth flight and when the weather is bad, you have a bumpy flight

mediums to reach out to stakeholders. For instance, NIMET under the watch of Prof Matazu now has airport pilot briefing rooms which are being remodelled for efficiency.

“We have other infrastructure at the airport like the airport pilot briefing room which we are remodelling now. We encourage all stakeholders to patronise and take weather forecasts very seriously”.

The NIMET DG, however, frowned at situations whereby stakeholders send their dispatch riders to come and collect weather updates, stressing that the flight crew would gain more if the stakeholders engage NIMET directly.

“Their dispatchers do come to collect the updates.

But we always encourage that the flight crew should be coming for briefing so that they would be able to interact with our experts and professionals. We will also be doing some of the demonstrations using virtual platforms which we have upgraded at the airports. The

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Analysing how the weather played out this year, Matazu said that regularly, NIMET provides updates of their forecasts as it affects the industry. He further added that whenever, there is significant weather changes, like in the beginning of the rainy season, in the South; it is associated with thunderstorms and stormy weather.

He however, pointed out that presently, South West states like Lagos are experiencing August break or what they popularly referred to as anomalous August weather.

“Because of the changing climate, we are beginning to see it since last week in July”, Matazu said.

Explaining further on their services, Prof Matazu said that “We provide forecasts especially of windshield which is the highest risk factor with regards to aircraft operations. So we have a low level windshield alert system around the airport, in order to inform the pilots through the Air Traffic Controllers (ATCs) on intending adverse weather effects and also provide any relevant updates of weather to the aeronautical meteorology community.

On whether NIMET is comfortable working under the Ministry of Aviation, Prof Matazu said “We are domiciled in the aviation Ministry and we are very comfortable with it. We get our revenue from the industry based on our enabling Act. That also provides us additional strength to offer our services to other sectors. So, we are in no way, limited to providing services to other sectors. We are even getting more.

When aviation operation is optimal, revenue comes in and we are very much comfortable in the aviation industry.

“It shows the relevance of weather. Even if we are taken to agriculture or anywhere, we will still be offering services to the aviation industry. In Aviation, per minute, per second operation depends on weather and so we are very much comfortable. In parts of Africa, when we travel, we also recognise and appreciate Nigeria because we are more comfortable in the aviation industry than most of our sister agencies in other Ministries,” Prof Matazu said.

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INDUSTRY

Missing The Recovery Boat in Rough Sea MIKE UZOR writes that many industries are still deep in the woods amid slow economic recovery

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igeria’s economy has seen two quarters of a patchy recovery from two quarters of decline in 2020, but a number of key sectors and industries have missed the boat. There is a forward creep in GDP growth rate, from 0.11 per cent in the final quarter of last year, to 0.51 per cent in the first quarter of 2021. However, these average numbers caused massive output losses in a number of industries still in declivity.

There is a wide variation between overall GDP numbers and the growth and decline figures among constituent industries that make the average figure less useful for decision making.

Compared to the marginal GDP growth recorded in the first quarter, declines in the worst performing industries are in the region of 60 per cent.

Leading the top declining industries in the first quarter is quarrying and other minerals, where output plunged by 59.8 per cent, according to Nigerian Bureau of Statistics. The industry has experienced a wide swing in output from a drop of 83 per cent in the first quarter of last year to a positive growth of 48.4 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2020, back to the massive drop in the first quarter.

This is one industry that is rated high in potential for attracting a lot of foreign investments to drive economic diversification. Its performance underscores the fact that economic diversification isn’t happening for now.

Minister of Mines and Steel Development, Olamilekan Adegbite, has charted the roadmap to optimise Nigeria’s mineral value chain. He has offered incentives for investors willing to invest in the business, in the effort to diversify the nation’s economy.

He has in place a plan to develop a gold ecosystem in the country which he believes can make Nigeria a hub of precious metals in West Africa. However, Nigeria’s worsening security problem isn’t letting him get the capacity building investments he needs to travel the roadmap. The stalemate denies Nigeria of minerals output with thousands of direct and indirect jobs the industry has the potential to deliver.

The second of the worst performing industries on output growth is oil refining, which declined by 57.1 per cent in the first quarter. The industry has been down for quite a while, as the nation stayed undecided for a long time on what to do with its non-producing refineries. The industry declined by 52.8 per cent in the first quarter of last year, hitting the worst drop record of 68.3 per cent in the third quarter and closing 2020 with a drop of 56.5 per cent in the fourth quarter.

According to NNPC’s latest report, the nation’s three refineries have processed no crudes for over a year and their consolidated capacity utilization and combined yield efficiency is 0.00 per cent. The industry is the drag on the manufacturing sector’s output growth and this is expected to sustain until on-going rehabilitation works in the refineries are completed.

The next four declining industries all came from one sector – transportation, which recorded an overall decline of 21.9 per cent in the first quarter. The sector is one of the hardest hit by the coronavirus pandemic and the consequent restrictions on people’s movement and travels. It is also affected by security challenges that increasingly expose travelers to dangers of attack by armed bandits, robbery and kidnapping.

It has been on negative growth since the second quarter of 2020, to the tune of 49.2 per cent in the second quarter, 43 per cent in the third quarter, improving to six per cent

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“

There is a wide variation between overall GDP numbers and the growth and decline figures among constituent industries that make the average figure less useful for decision making. Compared to the marginal GDP growth recorded in the first quarter, declines in the worst performing industries are in the region of 60 per cent

decline in the fourth quarter and plunging again in the first quarter of 2021.

cent in the first quarter, which is a sustained improvement from a decline of 28.3 per cent in the second quarter of the year. It is one of the few industries that could cross into the range of positive growth in the second quarter.

The education sector contracted by 6.2 per cent in the first quarter of 2021, marking the fourth straight quarter of decline. It is however a sustaining pullback from a decline of 24.1 per cent in the second quarter of last year. The sector’s share of aggregate GDP is down from 2.1 per cent in the first quarter of 2020, and 2.2 per cent in the final quarter to 1.9 per cent in the first quarter of the current fiscal year. It is facing a spending squeeze arising from the government’s widening fiscal gap.

Among other industries that missed the recovery boat in the first quarter are accommodation and food services, insurance and textile/apparel and footwear. Accommodation and food services declined by 4.6 per cent year-on-year in the first quarter, showing a strong improvement from the depth of 40.2 per cent plunge in the second quarter of 2020.

The industry is also one of those directly affected by travel restrictions due to the coronavirus pandemic. It is picking up as restrictions ease, but still has some way to go to return to the positive growth region.

Output drop in the transportation sector was led by the road transportation industry, which declined by 23.8 per cent in the first quarter. It had dropped by as much as 51.4 per cent in the second quarter of last year, improving to -1.4 per cent growth in the final quarter.

The insurance industry contracted by 4.6 per cent in the first quarter and accounted exclusively for the overall decline of 0.5 per cent in the financial services sector during the period.

This is however a consistent progress from a drop of 29.5 per cent in the second quarter of 2020. It shows a signal for further upward movement towards positive growth in the course of the year.

The air transport industry followed with a decline of 11.8 per cent in the first quarter, having also been in the negative growth territory since the second quarter of 2020. Even the end of year movement of people and cargo in 2020 failed to prop up the industry, which declined by as much as 51.7 per cent in the fourth quarter.

Textile, apparel and footwear declined by 4.5 per cent in the first quarter and has been in the negative growth territory since the second quarter of last year when it dropped by 14.4 per cent. It has however improved every quarter since then with a reasonable chance of improving further in subsequent quarters.

The rail transport industry declined by 7.3 per cent in the first quarter of 2021, but this represents a sustained upward movement from a drop of 63.3 per cent in the second quarter of last year. Further recovery in the industry is anticipated in view of new investments in capacity development leading to opening of new routes.

Inability to achieve a reasonable growth in non-oil sector keeps congealing the economic diversification progress and also halting effort to lift people out of poverty. The imbalance in output growth across sectors and industries leaves the economy with jobless growth.

The water transport industry equally lost output by 6.4 per

•Uzor is an economist and investment analyst.

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AUGUST 8 - AUGUST 14, 2021 www.thewillnigeria.com

BUSINESS NEWS PUTTRU’s Report Launches Tools For Assessing Energy Funding

BY ANTHONY AWUNOR

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new report has shown the enormous investment opportunities available to projects and initiatives in the African energy sector, especially Nigeria.

Aptly titled: ‘3 Must-Haves For Energy Projects To Attract Investment in Africa’, the treatise, divided into three parts: Why Invest in Africa’s Energy Sector; How to Ensure Investability of Energy Projects in Africa, and What Projects to Get into in Africa, is a crystallisation of one-on-one conversations with stakeholders in the energy industry and the funding institutions, and serves as a guidebook for investors and energy projects developers on how to design projects that meet funding viability.

Currently available for free download at their website, the report also serves to inform African governments on conditions needed for them to pull investors in, especially with other regions in the world competing for the same capital from funding institutions.

Kalim Shah, Senior Country Manager, Nigeria, International Finance Corporation (IFC), middle: presents the Gender Equality in Nigeria’s Private Sector Report toTemi Popoola, CFA, Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX), (left)’ and flanked by (R) Karl Toriola, CEO, MTN Nigeria Communications Plc during Nigeria2Equal Report Launch in Lagos on 5/8/2021.

Unity Bank Unveils New Code to Combat e-Banking Fraud

BY SAM DIALA

I

n a bid to safeguard its e-banking platforms with enhanced safety and security features, Unity Bank Plc has unveiled a new code on its USSD platform that completely puts the customer in control of his Bank Account against any e-Banking fraud.

The bank in a statement said the new code allows customers to block access to their Bank Accounts, hence without recourse to the Bank, a customer is able to prevent and protect his Bank Account from unauthorised access using any mobile device if fraud is suspected.

It said the initiative is part of the robust feature of the Bank’s USSD platform and that Bank customers can directly initiate the new Code and successfully block the account from a third-party mobile device.

To unblock the Bank account, customers can walk into any branch of Unity Bank closest to them and request reactivation.

“As a result, customers are thus able to exercise unlimited control with the new code as the Account Blockade can be initiated from any phone to prevent any unauthorised transaction or access to the Bank Account. The blockade can also be initiated to stem risks arising from the loss of debit card or incidences of unauthorized transactions.

“This feature now offers full control to Unity Bank customers to protect themselves from scams, secure all banking transactions,

and puts the customers well ahead in control of their banking transactions”, the bank said.

The bank said that the new anti-fraud code enhances its robust security system to safeguard customers’ bank accounts against any form of cyber threat or incurring financial losses from fraud attempts.

According to the latest banking industry fraud report by Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System, cyber fraud rose by 534% as Nigerian banks lost a total of N3.5 billion in the past year alone.

The unveiling of the new USSD code is, therefore, part of Unity Bank’s strategic move to protect their customers by reducing to zero, losses from electronic banking frauds.

The *7799# code which was introduced three years ago and enhanced with a multi-language capability has remained a critical component of the Bank’s robust e-banking channels facilitating seamless and secure banking transactions.

Speaking on the new anti-fraud code, the Directorate Head, E-Business, Retail & SME Banking, Mr. Funwa Akinmade said that leveraging necessary technology to protect the bank’s assets including customer’s Bank account remains a top priority for the Bank in the face of rising cyber-security threats.

He said: “With fraud concerns on major payment channels across Nigeria, every player in the financial services industry in Nigeria must think of a way to stay ahead of its game”.

...Threatens Tax Reform Gains

*Continued from Page 16

with scarce domestic employment opportunities is creating high rates of unemployment, particularly for the youth. This situation has also been worsened by the pressures of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Between 2010 and 2020, the unemployment rate rose fivefold, from 6.4 percent in 2010 to 33.3 percent in 2020. The rise in unemployment rates has been particularly acute since the 2015-2016 economic recession and has further worsened as COVID-19 led to the worst recession in four decades in 2020,” the report said.

Industry experts unanimously blamed unfriendly investment climate, intractable security challenges and acute infrastructure deficit, among other institutional and THEWILLNIGERIA

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structural problems as the core factors responsible for the historic nosedive in the flow of FDIs into the economy.

Expressing obvious concerns with these declining FDI flows, the immediate past director-general of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), Dr Muda Yusuf, pointed out that diverse institutional, regulatory and structural challenges had eroded investors’ confidence in the Nigerian economy.

“It is investors’ confidence that drives investment, whether domestic or foreign. Investors are generally very cautious and painstaking in taking decisions with respect to Foreign Direct Investment (FDI).

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•Continues online at www.thewillnigeria.com

PUTTRU the digital platform behind the report in partnership with some Development Financial Institutions, DFIs, is a business facilitation company structured to mobilise financing for energy projects by addressing barriers to raising capital for mid and large ticket investment transactions, founded by Monica Maduekwe and Franck Adjagba, who have been at the forefront of bridging the energy gaps in African countries.

Explaining the report, Maduekwe, the chief executive officer of PUTTRU described its content as profound, insightful and rich with actual examples from key stakeholders on what works in the industry.

She said “PUTTRU is delighted to present this report on ‘3 Must-Haves for Energy Projects to Attract Investment in Africa’.

Rather than leaving people with theories, we have presented in this report a pipeline of projects, which is by no means an exhaustive list of projects currently under development in Africa.

However, the relevance of sharing the list is to let players in the energy sector know that they can, unquestionably, put into practice these 3 Must-Haves almost immediately, if they decide to.

Sterling Bank Unveils Product to Simplify Loan Access for Micro-traders

BY SAM DIALA

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terling Bank has announced the launch of its new loan product, I Go Trade’. This to further bridge the gap in financial inclusion and deliver customer-centric solutions for its diversified customer base.

The bank in a statement revealed that the product will provide artisans and other small business owners across communities with quicker access to low-interest and collateral-free loans up to N300,000. It added that the loan will afford beneficiaries the luxury of financial flexibility, allowing them to obtain the funds needed to acquire inventory, working capital, and other assets needed to stay afloat and ultimately yield sustainable profit.

Commenting on the new product, Shina Atilola, Divisional Head, Retail and Consumer Banking, Sterling, explained that the product was specifically designed to cater to the needs of artisans and micro-traders living in marginalised communities.

According to him, the bank recognised the growing need for these groups of people to gain easier and quicker access to loan products.

“Across many institutions nationwide, getting a loan requires stringent processes and heavy paperwork which several small business owners find discouraging,” said Atilola.

“With ’I Go Trade’, this process has been drastically simplified.

Customers, especially small business owners, traders, and artisans can get loans at low-interest rates with no collateral and without having to physically visit the bank. This will give them the opportunity to expand their businesses and provide for their daily needs,” he added.

According to the bank, it has also made the repayment process straightforward and convenient, allowing customers to pay back on a daily or a weekly basis. Customers can access ’I Go Trade’ by engaging any Sterling agent nearest to them.

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NEWS EXTRA 13 State Commands Get New Commissioners of Police

BY JOY ONUOHA

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he Inspector General of Police, IGP Usman Alkali Baba, has ordered the posting of Commissioners of Police to take over the saddle of leadership in thirteen (13) State Commands including the Federal Capital Territory.

The posting of the Senior Officers is part of efforts at repositioning the Force for greater efficiency, stabilizing the internal security order and scaling up the fight against crimes and criminality in the country, according to DC Frank Mba, Force Public Relations Officer, Abuja, in a statement.

He said: “The affected State Commands and Commissioner of Police posted are: Niger State Command, CP Monday Bala Kuryas; Kwara State Command, CP Emienbo Tuesday Assayamo; Nasarawa State Command, CP Soyemi Musbau Adesina; Taraba State Command, CP Abimbola Shokoya; Benue State Command, CP Akingbola Olatunji; FCT Police Command, CP Babaji Sunday; Kogi State Command, CP Arungwa Nwazue Udo; Kaduna State Command, CP Abdullahi Mudashiru; Jigawa State Command, CP Aliyu Sale Tafida; Enugu State Command, CP Abubakar Lawal; Cross River State Command, CP Alhassan Aminu; Bayelsa State Command, CP Echeng Eworo Echeng and Kebbi State Command, CP Musa Baba.

Other Senior officers deployed are CP Ndatsu Aliyu Mohammed, a former Commissioner of Police, Enugu State, who is now the CP Anti-Fraud Unit FCID, Abuja; CP Sikiru Akande, a former CP in Cross River State who is now redeployed to the Department of ICT as the CP ICT, Force Headquarters, Abuja. Similarly, CP Bankole Lanre Sikiru is deployed as the CP INTERPOL, FCID Lagos; and CP Augustine Arop is now posted as the Deputy Commandant, Police Staff College Jos. Mba said the IGP, while charging the officers to justify the confidence reposed in them, has assured citizens of sustained efforts by the Force in stabilizing security in the country. He enjoined citizens in the affected States to cooperate with their new Commissioners of Police for efficient service delivery.

Abia Ex-Commissioner Lauds Ikpeazu On Security

FROM NNAYA EZIYI, UMUAHIA

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ormer Abia State Commissioner for Environment, Deacon Stanley Ojigbo has lauded Governor Okezie Ikpeazu for placing security of lives and property in the state among the top priorities of his administration.

This was just as he appreciated the governor for arming the security personnel with the required logistics including relevant gadgets for prompt and effective communication to enable them carry out their duties effectively.

Ojigbo stated this when he spoke to this newspaper shortly after Ikpeazu announced the introduction of security measures that will operate at community, local government, and the state level to rid the state of crime and criminals.

He said the importance of security in the state cannot be over emphasised as it is at the centre of both the South East and South South zones of the country and could be affected by criminal activities happening in the neighbouring ones.

According to the one-time executive chairman of Ikwuano local government council, the 17 council chairmen and other stakeholders in the security of the state must of necessity cooperate and key into the arrangement for it to succeed.

Ojigbo, therefore used the forum to commend Ikpeazu for his ingenuity and commitment to the campaign against CoronaVirus which made the state to rank first in the implementation of COVID-19 vaccination in the South East.

“Furthermore, I want to appeal to residents of the state, to adhere strictly to the laid down protocols against the novel global pandemic especially now that the third wave has begun to take its toll on people,” he concluded.

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L-R: Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Healthcare Services, Tanko Sununu; Director-General, National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye; and Chairman, Senate Committee on Health, Ibrahim Oloriegbe, at the inauguration of NAFDAC’s sensitisation campaign in selected states, in Abuja on 4/8/2021.

Ex-Presidential Aide Commends Obiano for Assessment of Soludo’s Character FROM CHARLES OKEKE, AWKA

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founding member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Handel Okoli, has commended Governor Willie Obiano for what he called “a proper assessment of the character” of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) candidate in the November 6 gubernatorial election in Anambra State, Professor Chukwuma Charles Soludo”, in the governor’s birthday greetings to the former Central Bank Governor.

Governor Obiano had last week described Soludo who was marking his 61st birthday as humble and home conscious despite his global achievements, saying his prodigious attainments upon his humble parentage and modest upbringing represent the authentic Igbo spirit which makes the Igbo people excel in various human endeavours, no matter the odds against them.

Speaking to journalists at the weekend in Awka, Chief Okoli, Senior Special Assistant to President Olusegun Obasanjo from 1999 to 2003, said: “As a friend who has watched Soludo at close quarters for decades, I know the assessment of the erstwhile CBN governor could not have been more accurate”.

According to the senior lawyer, who was for decades the Personal Assistant to the late Vice- President Alex Ekwueme: “Soludo has always been immersed in local affairs, right from the time he was an economics professor in the United States in

his 30s through the time he was a scholar at Oxford and Warwick in England to the time he was at the Brookings Institution in Washington to his consulting scholar years in Ethiopia to the period he was Chief Economic Adviser to President Olusegun Obasanjo and Chairman of the National Planning Commission to the period he was the Central Bank governor.

“His endless solidarity with the ordinary people has endeared him to our people and inspired a generation of successful people as well as young and struggling folks who now believe that they too can make it to the top with competence, hard work, honesty and integrity.

The former presidential aide disclosed that Soludo has for decades been awarding scholarships to mostly indigent students up to the doctoral level and playing a leading role in community development without talking about them in public.

“Only an extremely humble person like Professor Soludo could afford to join year two undergraduates to take courses in Statistics so as to deepen his understanding of statistical analysis when he was already an Economics lecturer with a doctorate in the same university.

“The undergraduate students didn’t know he was a lecturer because he conducted himself with extreme modesty.

“If Soludo has shortcomings, arrogance is not one of them”, he asserted.

Man Arraigned in Maiduguri for N40.5m Fraud

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he Maiduguri Zonal Command of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, at the weekend arraigned one Muhammad Abdullahi Kulloma before Justice Aisha Kumaliya of the Borno State High Court, Maiduguri for alleged N40, 500, 000.00 (Forty Million, Five Hundred Thousand Naira) fraud, contrary to Section 1(1) (b) of the Advance Fee Fraud and Other Fraud Related Offences Act, 2006 and punishable under Section 1(3) of the same Act. The defendant who was docked alongside his firm, Mbuta Criterion Nigeria Limited, allegedly deceived his victim, Modu Mustapha Tijjani, the Managing Director of Gumalti Nigeria Limited, and obtained the above mentioned sum in tranches of N27.5million and N13 Million through his personal and company’s accounts respectively, under the guise of financing a contract awarded to him by a Non-Governmental Organisation, Mercy Corps, for supply of locally made cooking stoves.

The one count charge reads: “That you Muhammad Abdullahi Kulloma being the Chief Executive Officer of Mbuta Criterion Nigeria Ltd and alter ego of Mbuta Criterion Ltd, a company registered in Nigeria, sometimes in 2020 at Maiduguri, Borno State within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court with intent to defraud obtained the sum of N40,500,000.00 (Forty Million

Five Hundred Thousand Naira) only from Modu Mustapha Tijjani, the Managing Director of Gumalti Nigeria Limited via your personal account No. 0236531326 and your corporate account No. 0458028956 with account name Mbuta Criterion Nigeria Limited both domiciled with GTB Plc under the false pretence that the said sum represent payment for the execution of a purported contract for the supply of locally fabricated cooking stoves made with clay knapsack sprayers awarded by a NonGovernmental Organisation (NGO) , Mercy Corps, which you knew to be false and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 1(1) (b) of the Advance Fee Fraud and Other Fraud Related Offences Act, 2006 and Punishable under Section 1(3) of the same Act.” The defendant pleaded ‘not guilty’ when the charge was read to him.

Consequently, counsel for the prosecution, Mukhtar Ali Ahmed prayed the court for a trial date to present his witnesses.

Justice Kumaliya adjourned the case until September 13, 2021 for commencement of trial and ordered that the defendant be remanded at the Maiduguri Medium Correctional Centre.

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OLUWAPELUMI ODENIYI: TRIUMPH OVER DISABILITY THEWILLNIGERIA

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Don’t Let Disability Stop You From Achieving Your Dream – Odeniyi

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Physically challenged Dr Oluwapelumi Odeniyi with Orile-Agege General Hospital, Ile-epo, Lagos, speaks on his condition, the difficult task of being a medical doctor and sundry issues in this interview with SHADE METIBOGUN. Excerpts:

It couldn’t be prevented and the condition is not treatable. I was a patient at Lagos University Teaching Hospital, LUTH, for a while and I went for physiotherapy but things were not changing, so I decided to enjoy myself.

Physiotherapy is not a simple thing, if you don’t need it, you will try to avoid it as much as possible

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ave you always wanted to be a medical doctor?

Yes, except for a particular phase in my life when I thought I would be a pilot. I don’t know why that thought came to me at that time. It was a very brief period. I think I was in primary three then. One of my classmates had a father who was a pilot, he came to our school to pick his child in his school uniform. You know the white shirt and the cap. I was just fascinated by what I saw, so I also dreamt of becoming a pilot too. Aside for that short period, as far as I can remember, I have always wanted to be a doctor.

How many years have you practiced as a doctor and what is your specialty as a medical practitioner?

I have been practicing for four years now and I am a general practitioner. I am nothing special, but then, we are all special anyway.

What are some of the challenges you have faced in the course of your career as a physically challenged man?

Part of my career that was most challenging was when I was in medical school. I had to rely on a lot of my friends and family members. In fact, if it wasn’t for them, it wouldn’t have been possible for to be where I am today. Then, I didn’t have a motorized wheelchair, so one of my colleagues would come to my room to wheel me down for lectures.

It was challenging but I can’t put my finger on a particular one because it has been a series of events. The buildings in this country are not made to accommodate people who have challenges like me. In many climes, things are put in place to facilitate a fuller experience of life. For instance, if I wanted to go take a walk today, it would be almost impossible. In other places there are covered walk ways, concrete steps and other things which are not readily available here. Such things limit the scope of experience that one can get.

What about some of the challenges you have faced as a medical doctor in the course of your career?

Maybe I have been very fortunate; I have not had any major issue. For instance, I did my youth service here (at the general hospital, Ile-epo) and I started practicing here too. I know the system; people know me well. So far, there have been no issues.

You said you started practising four years ago. Does that mean you were into something else before then?

Not really. There were series of events that led to me starting four years ago. Don’t let my gray hair fool you. I turned 36 last month. There were some delays too. Before I went for my housemanship, I spent almost eighteen months before I found a place to do it. I wouldn’t want to attribute the delay to my physical challenge but it is the only reason I can adduce to it. Eventually, I had to do it at Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, LASUTH, because at that time, Lagos state had passed the disability bill into law. LASUTH has ramps and other facilities that was why I could do my housemanship there. Then, for my National Youth Service

PAGE 38

Corps, NYSC, I had to wait for almost fifteen months before I was posted out for Youth Service. That has to do with the mix up between Joint Admission and Matriculation Board, JAMB, and the University of Lagos, they couldn’t find my admission letter. That also contributed to the late start.

Was that the reason why you were retained at the hospital?

It is part of it. But then, I don’t think it is the entire reason.

It may form the better part of retaining me, but I was also able to do a good job. At least, I am allowed to blow my own trumpet. One thing led to the other and here we are.

Were you born physically challenged or was it an accident?

No. I have a genetic condition called muscular dystrophy.

It’s a genetic problem. It has to do with one of the genes responsible for the repair of muscles. When you use your muscles, it tends to break down and the body repairs them and they become as good as new. But if the repair is not adequate, the muscles would break down and would not function and then, weakness happens. So it was a gradual decline in function until it got to this stage.

How old were you when this challenge was discovered?

About 11 or 12 years-old. I was walking well and was very active before it was discovered. I used to play football before it all started. It is even easier if the decline is gradual because in the course of my practice, I have seen people who have lost functions suddenly and it can be very devastating.

But when you know it is gradual and you are expecting it to happen, it will not be a surprise to just wake up and you

discover that you cannot run anymore. People are able to cope easier if it was an accident than for everything to just turn suddenly and you try to pick up the pieces all over again. It has its draw back too but then, like I said earlier, while you are in this condition, you have to be thankful for the little things.

Is there any member of your family history that has such a challenge?

Family history? No. Sometimes you have random mutations that can lead to something like this. It is not always a familiar thing. Though there are some types of muscular dystrophy that have a familiar component but not in every case.

What efforts did your parent put in place to ensure it doesn’t get worse when the condition was discovered?

It couldn’t be prevented and the condition is not treatable. I was a patient at Lagos University Teaching Hospital, LUTH, for a while and I went for physiotherapy but things were not changing, so I decided to enjoy myself. Physiotherapy is not a simple thing, if you don’t need it, you will try to avoid it as much as possible. We saw a neurologist; we had our investigations done but basically it is a learn-to-live-with-it kind of situation.

How easy was it adapting to your new life?

You will notice something about children, if you see anyone of them in a full-bodied cast today, they would go out smiling and laughing. When things happened to you as a young person, you don’t have the mental capacity to comprehend it fully, so depression does not set in easily. I just had to cope with the situation, I had to take it as it came.

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easily handle in your condition?

I would have wanted to become a psychiatrist, but it will be difficult for me to do that, I also know that and I understand it too. I am contented to work within my limited capacity.

Even within my limit, I am able to make a difference in the lives of my patients, so, I am satisfied.

What about the surgical aspect, how convenient is it to work on that aspect?

That is why I am staying in general practice. If a patient needs surgical intervention, I just refer the patient to a surgeon and they would go ahead and do that. I am not even interested in being a surgeon. Even if I was in a place where there are facilities to move around, I wouldn’t want it. I wouldn’t say it is because of the experience I had in school because I am over the experience now, it is no longer painful. Anytime I remember it, I just laugh about it. The issue is, to become a surgeon, you have to be extra driven; the hours are crazy, the job is almost thankless and it is gruesome. You have to take pleasure in inflicting pain on yourself. Surgeons are a special breed. Let me put it that way. I salute them but I don’t envy them.

PHOTOS: Peace Udugba

How do you move around, coming to work and going back home?

I have a care giver that I pay, who is also my driver. I also have a motorised wheel chair. So the basic things are covered.

A lot of people use their physical state as an avenue to solely depend on others, what advice would you give to them?

Chinua Achebe once said, ‘Those whose palm kernels are cracked by benevolent spirits do not know what others less fortunate had to contend with.’ In my situation, I think I have been very fortunate. My parents have given me all they could provide to get me to where I am today. They have contributed immensely physically, financially, materially to getting me to where I am today. So, there is dignity in labor.

Having said that, I will also say that there are many people who are begging who could put their resources to better use.

There are some who are in a position where we can say they have no other choice. The circumstances are different for everyone, so I would say this, for those who are physically, challenged, look beyond yourself and see what you can do for yourself. Do the best you can for yourself.

Some people in your situation are inclined to start an awareness campaign to tell people about their condition and how they can cope with it. Have you tried to tow this path?

Yes. However, I am not entirely sure yet, but I don’t think I am cut out for public life. I prefer to sit at home and ponder things out. If I see an NGO that has something similar to my ideal, I will just support them. I don’t think I am cut out to start an NGO. Have you suffered discrimination of any kind?

Yes, certain things have happened but I ensure I don’t remember most traumatic experiences because it has the tendency to weigh one down. Yes, there have been bad THEWILLNIGERIA

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incidences but there are only a few I can recall. Most people are basically good, most people want to help and the people who want to make you feel bad are just a small minority.

The one that stands out the most for me was when I had to repeat my final year in medical school because of surgery.

I was told that I couldn’t bring my wheel chair into the theater. I wrote the school to grant me permission to move my wheel chair permanently into the theater so I can be moving it when I am there. Somehow, the response got lost, so the department did not get my letter whereas, the medical school had written that they should allow that to happen.

Because I couldn’t go to the theater, I had to retake that class. That is about the only thing. Then, there was a time we went for a test and my colleagues had to carry me up two flights of stairs. It was a very odd experience. Aside those, most people have been good to me.

Would you say that any of your patients has looked down on you because of your situation?

So far, no. In fact, sometimes they even surprise me. There was a day a woman came and she was weeping. I asked her what the problem was, she said, “You are in a wheel chair, you are a doctor and you are helping people.” She was so overwhelmed that I was even shocked myself. So far, I have not heard anybody say I cannot attend to my patients because of my situation. I don’t know if it will happen in the future. And my colleagues have been very supportive too. In this hospital, they have made it a pleasure for me to come to work every day. Those things I am unable to do on my own, they step in and assist. So far I have been blessed with the colleagues I have, I am satisfied.

Is there any aspect of medical practice that you cannot

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I believe you are looking forward to getting married and settling down No, I am leaving the possibility open. If you are going to meet someone, you have to go out and see people. I am always at home. If I had lived in the renaissance period, I am sure I would have been living in one bush alone. I leave the possibility open anyway. My analogy is this, on a scale of one to ten, my happiness covers four and six. If I am able to find the right person, the happiness could zoom off to seven or eight. But it has the potential to go down to one if I make the wrong decision. If I am convinced at a stage in my life that this is the right person, I would go ahead but right now, I kind of enjoy being single. Staying indoors doesn’t mean I am an introvert. I am more of an ambivert. I can be an introvert but I can function as an extrovert too. When I go out to party, I have people around me who actually enjoy themselves. But I prefer to be alone at home. Anyway, things change, maybe I would be interested in politics one day and I would have to go out more often.

What position are you among your siblings?

I am the third. I have two older ones. Our first child is a female, and then I have an older brother and a younger sister.

What were your parents’ reactions when you told them you wanted to study medicine?

My siblings and I never told any of them what to do.

We just told them and they support us all the way. I had to write the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination, UTME, five times I think, before I finally got the admission to study medicine. I was passing every time. There was a time I was offered Agriculture Economics, then Cell Biology and genetics. I was determined that it is medicine or nothing. Interestingly, we were the first set to write post Joint Admission and Matriculation Board Examination (JAMB) at the University of Lagos. I would have missed admission that year but because people who came for the post-JAMB interview were not performing well which was why the school had their own test and that was how I gained admission into the school.

Did your friends and classmates try to discourage you from studying medicine?

I was still walking then, in fact, if most of my colleagues in secondary school see me now, they wouldn’t know I am the one. None of them saw me on a wheel chair. It was only the people I went to college of Medicine that knows. I was still walking in secondary school. By age 18 or 19 years, I needed aid for movement. I knew I was not as strong as I used to be when I clocked 16. People around me who were not my family also did not know. They just thought I couldn’t run fast and walk quickly. I started using a walking stick to support my weight. And by the time I got to the college of medicine, I started using a wheel chair.

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STORIES BY SHADE METIBOGUN

Femi Kuti’s First Child, Made Finds Love

Funmi Iyanda Clocks 50, Celebrates on Low Key

Made & Onyenso

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easoned broadcaster and talk show host, Olufunmilola Aduke Iyanda better known as Funmi Iyanda clocked 50 years on Tuesday, July 27, 2021. The mother of one staged a low key celebration that had in attendance some of her close friends and relatives. The beautiful lady started her birthday celebration by posting lovely pictures of herself in a flowing gown followed by a beautiful poem written to celebrate her achievements. Many of her friends who expected an elaborate party were however disappointed that she opted for a low key celebration in the company of just a few people. One of Nigeria’s most watched and revered television personality, Funmi’s foray into television began with producing and presenting Good Morning Nigeria. She was also the popular host of New Dawn with Funmi and ‘Talk with Funmi.’ The talk shows were eventually rested before she started ‘Public Eye’ another talk show in 2020. Funmi Iyanda is also the chief executive officer of Oya Media, a multimedia production company based in London and Lagos state. She relocated to London some years ago but has been shuttling Nigeria for the production of her talk show, Public Eye.

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morinmade Anikulapo-Kuti, the first child of afrobeat sensation, Femi Anikulapo-Kuti, has found love.

The handsome entertainer who is more popularly

Folorunsho Alakija Bags Honorary Doctorate Degree

Idahosa & Alakija

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illionaire businesswoman, Folorunsho Alakija, has been awarded an honorary doctorate degree by Benson Idahosa University, Benin City. She was conferred with the title in Business Administration during the 16th Convocation and Graduation ceremonies of the school. The event took place at the institution’s main campus in Benin City. The elated woman, who was obviously grateful for the honor bestowed on her by the institution, expressed her gratitude to God for the opportunity given her to be a recipient of such great honour. She also thanked the institution for the recognition, while praying for all graduates of the school and also for other recipients of the award that God would continue to direct their paths in life. It was gathered that she was awarded in recognition of her contribution to the business world.

The mother of four now has more titles to her name, in addition the title, of apostle as a result of now being into full time gospel ministry.

Folorunsho Alakija’s contribution to the business world cannot be underrated. She is the Vice Chairman of Famfa Oil limited, she is also the group managing director of Rose of Sharon Group which consists of, The Rose of Sharon Prints and Promotions Limited, Digital Reality Prints Limited and Rose of Sharon Foundation.

known as Made Kuti is in love with a beautiful lady named Stephanie Inedoye Adanne Onyenso. The two lovebirds have been dating for more than a year now. They started out being friends before it blossomed to a love affair. It was gathered that some of the things that endeared Made to the beautiful lady is the fact that they share the same traits and interests. This is also the reason their love has been growing stronger by the day.

Inedoye Onyenso is a fashion model, actress and scriptwriter who is based in Lagos. She has been a support system to the young artiste since the two became an item. Always on the lookout for his shows and also encouraging her fans and followers to turn up for each event, hardly will a memorable occasion go by without Inedoye sending sweet loving words to her partner. Fondly called Queen by the afro beat player, he celebrated her recently when she marked her 23rd birthday in June. It was also gathered that Funke Kuti, Made’s mother and the rest of the Anikulapo- Kuti’s family all love Inedoye because of her warm and cheerful nature and they have also embraced her as one of their own.

Funke Kuti was even among the thousands who celebrated her during her birthday and also during the International women’s day celebration.

Former Edo Speaker Hosts Lavish Wedding Ceremony for Daughter

The Onuhoas

Iyanda

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few weeks ago, light-skinned actress, Queeneth Hilbert, was sanctioned by the Actors Guild of Nigeria (AGN). The beautiful actress was suspended by the association, following a preliminary investigation into several complaints received from movie producers and marketers for breach of contract. According to the association, Queeneth’s services was withdrawn from all movie sets indefinitely because of her unprofessional conduct. Among issues of misconduct raised were, collection of artiste fees without showing up for the production, refusal to refund fee collected after disappointment, negligence of production timing and protocols, abandoning of production set without permission and breach of contract. The AGN suspended her indefinitely and stressed that her demeanor toward her profession was capable of tarnishing the reputation of the association. She was also warned that the violation of the notice of suspension may lead to further disciplinary actions. The association went as far as monitoring all film locations and production sets across the country to ensure total compliance to their directive. However, in a twist of event, the AGN lifted her suspension after the Film and Video Producers and Marketers Association of Nigeria (FVPMAN) wrote to express the untold hardship and losses that some of their members who had contacted the actress before her suspension were going through. As she was unable to go to any location to work because of the punishment she was undergoing, AGN had to lift the suspension in solidarity with their sister organisation. It was gathered that the actress was told to resume on location and complete all pending jobs. The association also promised to fully lift her suspension after all pending work had been completely by the actress.

Hilbert

Actress Queeneth Hilbert Gets AGN’s Pardon

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onourable Bright Ehi Omokhodion, a former speaker of the Edo State House of Assembly, recently hosted a lavish wedding ceremony for his daughter, Atise Omokhodion.

The event took place at the Catholic Church of Divine Mercy in Lekki, Lagos. It was followed with a reception in a high profile hotel, which is a walking distance from the venue of the wedding ceremony. The former politician spared no cost to ensure his daughter had a glamorous ceremony which was well attended by high profile politicians and societal bigwigs. The traditional wedding took place on Friday, July 17, while the church wedding took place on Saturday, July 18, 2021 in Lagos Island as well. The lucky groom, Franklin Chukwudi Onuoha is from the Eastern part of the country, Imo state to be precise.

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BY IVORY UKONU & SHADE METIBOGUN

Meet Fancy Acholonu, Alex Ekubo’s Wife-to-be

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Ekubo & Acholonu

few months ago, Nollywood actor, Alex Ekubo made it known that he had found love. He also made a post about his proposal to his long time girlfriend, Fancy Acholonu. However, many people were disappointed because they expected the lucky lady to be one of the ladies linked to him in the past, as they believed he was dating them.

THEWILL reliably gathered that the duo of Alex and Fancy have been dating for five years before the actor finally proposed to her a few months ago. Their path crossed during one of his trips aboard. And they were friends for some years before becoming lovers eventually. Fancy Acholonu is based abroad. She is a model, actress and entrepreneur. She was educated at Los Angeles City College Foundation, Los Angeles, California. She is the Chief Executive Officer of Zodiacca, a store where customers can get accessories, apparels and other gifts perfect for their zodiac sign.

She also runs ‘Fancy kidz,’ an acting and modeling school where children are groomed. The light-skinned lady opened an ultra modern store in Los Angeles California recently. Fancy also runs a Yoga studio in the same city as well. It was gathered that the couple will be getting married in November, 2021.

Yinka Alaseyori Soars, Gets Two Automobiles in Two Months

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Alaseyori

rovidence seems not to have stopped smiling on talented gospel singer, Adeyinka Alaseyori, ever since she went viral following fellow gospel singer, Tope Alabi criticision of her over her hit song Oniduro mi. Yinka’s image and fame has continued to soar and she has been invited to minister at several shows and church functions. The singer took delivery of two vehicles recently. The first which is a brand new 14 seater bus came in about two months ago. It was gathered that one of her ardent fans gave her the bus. The elated singer took to her social media space to encourage her fans not to give up on their dreams yet but to keep on pushing till they get to their destination. According to her, the bus which is worth millions of naira came some days to her birthday. She said that she had been praying fervently to God for a new automobile which would make movement easy for her and her band members. Her prayer was answered when one of her mothersin-the-Lord gave her the bus. Not long after that, she also got an SUV gift from the founder of Champions International Church, Joshua Iginla. Yinka was invited by the clergy to minister at the headquarters of his church in Kubwa, Abuja after which he gave her the vehicle.

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rominent Nollywood celebrities, Eniola Badmus, Kunle Remi, Tobi Bakre, Uzor Arukwe and event anchor Toppy Banks, thrilled a crowd comprising consumers of Bigi brands and shoppers with cinema tickets giveaways and multiple rewards at the Bigi and Silverbird Cinemas exclusive partnership announcement event held at the Ikeja City Mall, in Lagos, recently. The celebrities who were in high spirits sensitised the crowd on the support for the movie industry with the more refreshing viewing experience made possible by the Bigi brands, comprising its 12 variants of carbonated soft drink and table water, produced by Rite Foods Limited, a worldclass and proudly Nigerian company.

At the colourful two-day event made pleasurable by the encouraging words from the celebrities who performed at various times, the crowd was entertained on how the exclusive partnership would benefit movie-lovers, who will be revitalized with the Bigi brands as they watch their favourite movies with families and friends. The Bigi and Silverbird partnership will inspire an exciting experience in the movie entertainment sector and will combine cinema viewing with a pleasurable and refreshing mood that gives value for money. It was a fun-filled evening as consumers who partook in the teasing game that ensued were given freebies consisting of labelled T-shirts, shopping vouchers, free movie tickets, Bigi products, as well as other fantastic items, courtesy of the brand.

Badmus

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Nollywood Celebrities Woo Nigerians with Gifts

Morayo Brown Celebrates Degree from Pan Atlantic Varsity

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opular talk show host, Morayo Afolabi Brown, is reveling in the euphoria of her latest feat. The popular media personality has just bagged a master’s degree in Media and Marketing Communications from Pan Atlantic University, Lekki. The elated woman who couldn’t hide her feelings rolled out the drums to celebrate her achievement about one week ago. She hosted her colleagues who graduated from the same department to a small party. The celebrant and her colleagues had fun after their two years journey as students of Pan Atlantic University. Speaking on her achievement, Morayo expressed gratitude for completing her final examination and a successful academic year at the University. She also stated that her examination was intense and that she was looking forward to her official graduation from the University in the next four months. It was gathered that her co hosts on the popular breakfast show, Your View on Television Continental have been singing her praises to high heavens and congratulating her for her achievement. The media girl has been running two academic programmes concurrently. Her master’s in Media and Marketing Communications and master’s in Business Administration. She said, she would be completing her second master’s degree next year.

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STORIES BY IVORY UKONU

Precious Chikwendu Accuses Fani-Kayode, Senator Bent of Intimidation

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Agbodje

Adekoya

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are Adekoya and Hanu Fejiro Agbodje are two young men who are harnessing the power of technology and are making a kill doing so. Just in their 20s, Adekoya is the face behind Abeg Technologies, while Agbodje is the face behind Patricia.com. While other well known big brands struggled to get sponsorship slots in the ongoing Big Brother Naija Reality TV show, ‘Shine ya eyes edition’, of between N200m and N500m, these young men dropped exclusive sponsorship fees of N2 billion and N1 billion, respectively.

Adekoya’s Abeg Technology is a fintech mobile payment app founded in 2019 and is designed to cater to the needs of a diverse group of people offering the flexibility of sending and receiving money by simply using phone numbers. Patricia.com on the other hand, is an e-commerce company that provides a simple, safe and secure platform that provides alternative solutions to payments through the use of Bitcoin, Perfect Money and Gift card.

The company processed over N10 billion in transaction volume in 2019 alone after having been in the business for just three years.

A graduate of Mathematics and Statistics from the University of Port Harcourt, Agbodje began Patricia.com in 2017. It was supposed to be a side hustle to earn an extra N30,000 a month, but as fate would have it, the business grew beyond his imagination.

Recalling how it all started, he said he had an uncle who visited Nigeria, and who used to give him iTunes gift card. He didn’t own an iPhone and so had no use for it. He then tried to find where he could exchange the cards for

real money and couldn’t find any local company doing that and he ended up getting scammed of the card. At that point, he realized he had stumbled on to something. He figured that if he had this problem, there would be others most likely to have the same problem and that was how Patricia was birthed.

Agbodje’s Patricia has now grown to become a leading e-Commerce platform and is arguably the first of its kind in sub-Saharan Africa. The company has been described by industry watchers as one of the fastest growing eCommerce firms in Nigeria and Africa.

Adekoya of Abeg Technologies is the product designer of Sterling Bank’s Gomoney banking app. The 26 year old is reportedly worth over $3m.

Chikwendu

Meet Dare Adekoya, Fejiro Agbodje, The Under-30 Biggest Sponsors of BBNaija Season Six Edition

to school since August 2020 and that the triplets who are due for school are not in school or given an education access. She therefore prayed the court to grant her interim access to her children, pending the hearing and determination of her appeal and to also prevent Fani-Kayode from taking them out of the country, far from her reach. Miffed by this, Fani-Kayode and Bent through the police, invited her for questioning at the Force Criminal Investigation Department, Abuja. According to the letter served her, she is being investigated in a case of criminal intimidation, blackmail, defamation of character and malicious publication. Unable to stomach his shenanigans, Precious who is also an actress took to her social media to call out both her estranged husband and Grace Bent, tagging them jokers who only know the show of power, are without shame and should show some maturity by sitting with her lawyers to straighten out the issue as it concerns her children.

Fani-Kayode and Chikwendu’s marriage hit the rock in 2020 over claims of domestic violence on her part and claims of infidelity and mental instability on his part.

Fola Ogunlesi’s Son Commits Suicide

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he high suicide rate among the younger generation is without mincing words, becoming alarming and it will only get worse if something is not done to stem this menace. Barely two months after billionaire industrialist, Chief Samuel Adedoyin’s grandson, Subomi committed suicide, Olumide, the 39 year old son of Fola Ogunlesi, the eldest of the Ogunlesi brothers (made up of Lanre Ogunlesi and Kayode Ogunlesi), has also committed suicide. Olumide who would have been 40 in a few months time was reportedly battling with depression and chose to end it all by hanging himself. At some point in his life, Olumide was famous on the social scene. He reportedly made things happen. He owned his own luxury perfume brand called Lumog which was doing quite well and controlled the market share. He also managed some of his father’s businesses such as one time foremost open air events centre, Fantasy Land and Beauty Fair Laboratories Limited, a cosmetics and perfume company. But things took a turn for the worse. The once bubbly personality fell ill and went off the radar. When he got better, he couldn’t quite dominate the social scene as he did before. His perfume brand stop raking in the humongous profits it was making and his father’s Fantasyland became relegated as other purpose built events centres sprang up and people now had a wide range of places to choose from.

With Beauty Fair Laboratories, the success that greeted its entrance disappeared and it got enmeshed in a series of scandals bothering on arbitrary sack of workers, non-payment of gratuities etc. Sources say that even as the managing director of the firm and his father the chairman, Olumide wasn’t quite in charge and all efforts on his part to rejig the company to enable it compete favorably in the market, was rebuffed.

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his will obviously surprise many who assumed that popular gospel artist Chidinma Okebalama was still a member of the singles club when unknown to them, the beautiful gap-toothed nightingale was secretly married to Emeka Eloagu, the Abuja Chef who was gruesomely murdered in his home last weekend. This is because, unlike most of her colleagues who hug the limelight like a second skin, Chidinma whose stage name is Chee or D’Voice, prefers to keep that part of her life private. Save for the fact that her work as a songwriter, music artiste and a worship leader at House On The Rock Church, Lagos, requires her to be in the limelight, Chidinma would have preferred to just remain a regular person. With a background in engineering, the Umuahia, Abia State born indigene is also an actress and has featured in the movie, God Calling. A graduate of the University of Massachusetts and Northeastern University, Chidinma is currently a consultant at Henley & Partners, a global citizenship and residence advisory firm. Besides friends, family and church members who share her grief, one other person who feels the pain of her loss is Bella Disu nee Adenuga, Chairman, Board of Directors Abumet Nigeria Limited, Executive Vice Chairman of Globacom, and a non-executive director of Julius Berger Nigeria. Bella and Chidinma are best of friends and both have come a long way together. Chef Emeka who ran Hélène’s Food Company, an Abuja based gourmet food restaurant that served Nigerian and French cuisine, was killed in his apartment by two men who gained access into it, according to a statement by his family on Friday. Chef Emeka was reportedly stripped naked, tied up and strangled to death.

Bent

Meet Chidinma Okebalama, Wife Of Murdered Abuja Chef, Emeka Eloagu

Fani-Kayode

The Eloagus

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he battle for the custody of Aragorn, Ragnar, Aiden, and Liam, children of former aviation minister, Femi Fani-Kayode with his estranged fourth wife, former beauty queen, Precious Chikwendu, has taken a different turn as Precious has accused a former senator, Grace Bent, of conniving with Fani-Kayode to intimidate her. About a week ago, Precious, who hasn’t set eyes on her four children for almost a year, accused her estranged husband, of exposing their children to different women and depriving them of proper care. This was after the former minister threw a lavish party for the triplets’ third birthday where Precious was conspicuously absent and Fani-Kayode chose the occasion to unveil his new love interest, Chika Nerita. Precious told the court that within the period of her absence, she had received reports of severe, brutish and inhuman treatment meted to her children by various women. She argued to the court that not only do the children at their tender age need adequate attention from her as their mother as well as sound moral upbringing, she added that her first son stopped going

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GLOBAL NEWS

Afghanistan War: Taliban Capture Regional Capital Zaranj A

city in southwestern Afghanistan has become the country’s first provincial capital to fall to the Taliban in recent years.

Multiple local officials said the Taliban had captured Zaranj, in Nimroz province, at the weekend, in a major blow to government forces.

The militants continue to make rapid advances in the country, as foreign troops withdraw. They have taken swathes of countryside and are now targeting key cities.

Other provincial capitals under pressure include Herat in the west, and the southern city of Lashkar Gah, in Helmand Province.

Zaranj is a major trading hub near the border with Iran. After capturing surrounding districts, the militants made a sustained bid to seize the city.

Two official sources told the BBC the city had been taken. The government has not yet officially commented.

A police spokesperson in Nimroz told Reuters news agency that the Taliban had been able to capture Zaranj because of a lack of reinforcements from the government.

The insurgents claimed victory in a post shared on Twitter.

“This is the beginning, and see how other provinces fall in our hands very soon,” a Taliban commander told Reuters.

Some reports said a deal had been reached with the Taliban, allowing Afghan officials to flee to Iran with their families.

Pictures posted on social media showed civilians looting items from government buildings.

The last time the Taliban won a provincial capital was in 2016, when they briefly held the northern city of Kunduz.

The militants have swept through Afghanistan in recent months, launching a major offensive to coincide with the withdrawal of US forces after 20 years of military operations.

The capture of Zaranj will add to their momentum. Kunduz

province has fallen to the Taliban.

The UN’s special envoy for Afghanistan, Deborah Lyons, on Friday said the war in the country had entered a “new, deadlier, and more destructive phase”, with more than 1,000 civilians killed in the past month.

She warned that the country was heading for “catastrophe”, and called on the UN Security Council to issue an “unambiguous statement that attacks against cities must stop now”.

The director of Afghanistan’s media and information centre, Dawa Khan Menapal was assassinated by the Taliban who said he had been “punished for his deeds”.

Supreme Court Asked to Block Indiana University’s COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate

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ight college students have filed an appeal with the Supreme Court to challenge Indiana University’s COVID-19 requirement.

Indiana University said in May that students and faculty would be required to take the vaccine to attend classes in person with exceptions for religious objections, medical conditions – such as allergies – and those conducting their coursework online.

The appeal arrives at the nation’s highest court on the heels of some employers, restaurants and schools requiring vaccines. About 40% of the nation’s adult population is not fully vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The students filed an emergency appeal at the Supreme Court, asking the justices to block enforcement of the university’s requirement, which they said violates their constitutional right to bodily integrity under the 14th Amendment.

“All students are adults, are entitled to make their own medical treatment decisions, and have a constitutional right to bodily integrity, autonomy, and of medical treatment choice in the context of a vaccination mandate,” the students told the court. “IU, however, is treating its students as children who cannot be trusted to make mature decisions.”

The case is one of the most compelling involving COVID-19 to reach the Supreme Court since its 6-3 conservative majority ruled against a number of orders by governors that applied to churches, synagogues and mosques earlier in the pandemic.

In a series of decisions since Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett joined in October, the court sided with religious entities that THEWILLNIGERIA

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challenged state COVID-19 rules limiting the size of their indoor worship services. But those regulations affected First Amendment rights, and the court has generally applied a higher level of scrutiny in such matters.

The students want the court to use a similar standard in reviewing vaccine mandates.

Indiana University’s requirement has been backed by a federal appeals court. The Chicago-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit upheld the requirement in a decision on Monday, citing a 1905 Supreme Court precedent that allowed Massachsetts to impose a penalty on those who declined smallpox vaccinations.

“A court of appeals must apply the law established by the Supreme Court,” three judges, all of whom were nominated by Republican presidents, ruled.

But the Massachusetts case has stirred a debate about just how far its precedential reach extends.

Because the case is filed on the high court’s emergency application docket, the justices might move relatively quickly – perhaps within a matter of days or weeks.

“Continuing our fight against this unconstitutional mandate is necessary to guarantee that IU students receive the fair due process they’re owed by a public university,” said James Bopp, who is representing the students.

A spokesman for Indiana University declined to comment, according to USA Today.

THEWILLNIGERIA

PM Johnson Continued a Trip to Scotland Despite an Official Testing Positive for COVID-19

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ritish Prime Minister, Boris Johnson sparked a fresh row the UK when he continued a tour of Scotland after a member of his team tested positive for Covid-19, deciding not to self-isolate even as others on the trip did.

There was division among officials who confirmed that a member of staff received a positive test result and is following the “appropriate guidance”, but insisted that the Prime Minister “has not come into close contact with anyone who has tested positive,” and public commentators who insist Johnson was in contact with the person in question most of Wednesday in Glasgow, before boarding a plane to continue the tour in Aberdeen. The source added that the person was tested on arrival in Aberdeen. The staff member who tested positive, and some other members of the entourage, then went into isolation.

A Downing Street spokesperson told CNN that the Prime Minister “regularly visits communities across the UK and all aspects of visits are carried out in line with Covid guidance.”

Scottish government COVID-19 protocol says close contacts of anyone who has tested positive for Corona Virus will be asked to self-isolate “for 10 days from symptom onset in the symptomatic person.”

A close contact is defined as “someone who has been physically close enough to the confirmed case for a long enough period of time, that they may have had the virus transmitted to them.”

That of England, set by Johnson’s government, says that a “person may also be a close contact if they have traveled in the same vehicle or plane as a person who has tested positive for COVID-19.”

It is not clear what criteria was applied to the officials who were asked to self-isolate. When asked why Johnson was not selfisolating, a Downing Street source told CNN that the Prime Minister was “tested in advance of traveling to Scotland and had a further PCR test,” before visiting an offshore wind farm on the final day of his trip.

It is possible that Johnson didn’t come into close contact with the staffer who tested positive, as strictly defined by the guidance. But in the past, the government has been criticized for not adhering to the broad thrust of the rules it sets.

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ARTS

Autobiography and Memoir by acquiring fame and riches, by shining like a literary star. The earlier parts of the book are about this imperative to be successful and to be rich; there is a whole chapter on the importance of flaunting and not holding back. Emezi details how much money they make – half-a-million dollars from a two-book deal for Vivek Oji and this memoir, and a few hundred thousand here and there from their other books and a movie option for Freshwater. Their big, beautiful house in New Orleans, described from room to room, with specially ordered furniture, which they bought with the book deal money, is called “Shiny” and also the “godhouse”.

Dear Senthuran: A Black Spirit Memoir by Akwaeke Emezi

BY HELON HABILA

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his pugnacious epistolary memoir by an embodied ‘ogbanje’ spirit is as fascinating for its disturbing self-absorption as for the brilliance of its writing…

Akwaeke Emezi has been enjoying a moment in the literary limelight since the publication of their first novel, Freshwater, in 2018. The book received excellent reviews and was nominated for many literary prizes, some of which it won. It was followed in 2019

by Pet, a YA novel about a transgender teenager; the next year The Death of Vivek Oji went straight on to the New York Times bestseller list. This year, Emezi’s memoir, Dear Senthuran: A Black Spirit Memoir, has been released. They make other writers who manage to squeak out a book once every three or four years look like slackers.

When does this calculated, self-affirming quest for fame and wealth become inordinate and even destructive?

“I always wanted to be famous,” they write. “When I first started writing for a living, it seemed like a de­cent avenue to accomplish this. I wanted to win all the prizes: a MacArthur, a Booker, a Pulitzer.

The usual.” There is a logic behind this relentless need to flaunt, we discover later. The logic is: since ogbanjes are named and shamed by humans in order to deter them from ever coming back, what will happen if an ogbanje decides to own their name and, instead of slinking away to the spirit world, live an opulent, shiny life?

How do they do it, where do they get the time?

Especially since they often seem to be on social media arguing with other writers (see the recent row with Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie), former friends or literary prize organisers. Emezi clearly knows the value of high-profile social media fights: they get people talking about you.

Dear Senthuran reads in part like a series of continuing fights, all carefully curated and presented to readers in book form. It is written in short, punchy chapters, which bear all the characteristics of tweets: brief, sharp, audacious and controversial. There are fights with their father, mother, professors and classmates, their ex-husband, friends, lovers ... A chapter in which the author documents a breakup with a former lover is narrated almost entirely in boxing imagery: “Do you think throwing me in the ring was less an attempt on my life than if you had held me down with one hand and beat me senseless with the other, till my cheekbones cracked, till my eyes swelled shut, till my lips split and teeth fell out, blood over your skinned knuckles, over and over, until I was limp in your grasp like the corpse you’ve imagined me to be?”

Dear Senthuran is written in epistolary style, each chapter addressed to an acquaintance – Senthuran is a friend, a writer and translator. There’s a chapter, “Dear June”, addressed to their mother, and another to Jesus, who they call Yshwa and recognise as an “older brother”, because Emezi sees themself as “a god”. Not in a metaphorical sense, literally a god. The whole book could be described as the author’s battle to be recognised for who they are. And who are they? An embodied spirit, an ogbanje.

Ogbanje, in Igbo ontology, are spirit children who are born only to die over and over in an endless cycle, plaguing their human parents with misfortune and heartbreak. It is a belief prevalent among the Igbo of south-eastern Nigeria, and also the Yoruba of southwestern Nigeria, whose name for it is abiku. This was a traditional, pre-scientific society’s attempt to explain natural phenomena through myth – children born with sickle-cell anaemia, a hereditary disease common in that part of the world, one that defied cure and forced these communities to take elaborate steps to ensure these “trickster” children didn’t get reborn.

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One of the steps was to mutilate the dead body with scarifications so that the child would not be tempted to return, or could at least be identified when they did. Emezi writes: “The possibility that I was an ogbanje came to me years before I wrote Freshwater, around the time I began calling myself trans, but it took me a while to collide and connect the two worlds. I sup­pressed it for a few years because most of my education had been in the sciences and all of it was westernised – it was difficult for me to consider an Igbo spiritual world to be equally if not more valid … When I finally accepted its validity, I revisited what that could mean for my gender.”

You could say then that this book (and indeed the other books, especially the autofictional Freshwater) is an attempt by the author to fight invisibility. It is all about the process of becoming. In carefully described passages the author details how, in transitioning, they had their breasts and uterus surgically removed; this was paid for with money skimmed from their student loans. “The choice to finally modify my body felt like a big deal in large part because other people treated it that way.” Casting off the physical in order to attain the purely spiritual becomes analogous with the scarification of the ogbanje by their parents.

Another way to fight marginalisation is to make the marginal become central, a lesson Emezi says they learned from Toni Morrison, but which the author chooses to achieve through more mundane means,

But when does this calculated, selfaffirming quest for fame and wealth become inordinate and even destructive?

When the author begins to contemplate, and goes on to attempt, to kill themselves for the first time: “I felt very strongly, that I needed to die. It would be in service to the work: the book might sell even more attached to the story of the tragic young writer who could have had such a stellar career if their corpse hadn’t been found before their first book even debuted.” Or the second time?

The second attempt to take their own life, years later, is in a hotel room in Los Angeles after a break up from the lover referred to in the book as “The Magician” or Kaninchen. This makes for extraordinarily uncomfortable, almost voyeuristic reading. A lot of sentences begin: “My therapist told me …” There are sections musing over cannibalism with their lover, what parts of the body would be the best to cut out and eat.

There is a lack of modesty and a lack of self-awareness that is almost fascinating here; fascinating in the way a car crash in slow motion is fascinating. You just can’t look away. Sometimes you can’t look away because of the garish self-advertisement, other times it is simply for the brilliance of the writing. For all their self-obsession and narcissism, this is an author who can write. There are beautiful reflective passages on love, betrayal, loneliness, spirituality and friendship; unfortunately, there just aren’t enough of them.

• Habila is professor of Creative Writing at George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia.

Culled from The Guardian of London THEWILLNIGERIA

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TOURISM

NAFEST to Boost Ekiti Rich Cultural Heritage

While expressing excitement over the forthcoming NAFEST, Egbeyemi revealed that the event will promote national unity, social integration, redirect cultural activities, revenue generation and create windows of investment opportunities for the economic growth of not only Ekiti State but Nigeria at large.

The Ekiti State Commissioner for Arts, Culture and Tourism, Professor Rasaki Ojo Bakare in his opening speech said that the essence of the meeting was to remind stakeholders of iconic American President, Abraham Lincoln’s quote: “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four hours sharpening the axe”. This quote, according to Ojo Bakare, underscores the importance of proper planning towards having a satisfactory NAFEST. According to him, this collective interface among all the principal implementers of the NAFEST 2021 project has become and will continue to be a major success factor in every successful edition of the NAFEST.

STORIES BY JANEFRANCES CHIBUZOR

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he forthcoming Ekiti 2021 NAFEST with its theme “Celebrating Unity in Diversity” billed for November 13 through November 20, 2021 will definitely attract huge numbers of tourism and culture stakeholders to the state.

So far, the National Council for Arts and Culture, NCAC, has concluded all arrangements to make the 52nd edition of the national festival a successful experience.

To extensively tap into Ekiti State economic potentials, NCAC, has assured to implore NAFEST platform in showcasing rich cultural heritage of Ekiti State across globe.

Director General, NCAC, Otunba Olusegun Runsewe, revealed this during the opening session of a three days National Technical Stakeholders’ meeting which held from August 3 to August 5, 2021 in Ekiti State.

Runsewe, who is also President, World Crafts Council, African Region pointed out that culture has its unique way of uniting the people, and therefore brings about sustainable peace and national development.

Bakare reiterated that Ekiti State which is the home of honour, a home of professors, a home of good food and most hospitable and peaceful state harbours people of different ethnic and religious groups all over the country, adding that the state will set a new standard in the hosting of NAFEST. At the meeting were over 30 states Commissioners of Culture and other stakeholders in the culture and tourism sector across country.

Runsewe earlier added that time has come for Nigeria stakeholders to change the narratives of culture in Nigeria. According to him, it is time for all hands to be on deck to take our good hands, good ideas and good culture to other parts of the world.

Ekiti State governor who was represented by his deputy, His Excellency, Otunba Bisi Egbeyemi noted “any state that fails to take into account the need to situate culture as well as the creative capacity of its people within its developmental plan is bound to face serious social, political and economic crisis in the long run.”

Runsewe also commended the EKiti State Cultural Troupe for their wonderful performances and promised to give them more exposure to the outside world. He urge the Culture Commissioners and stakeholders to tap into the SWOT analysis and emphasize the good aspect of our country for time has come for the Nation to blow its trumpet.

existed until the day Paragoyi transited. Speaking at the event, he said “I am happy to see all friends and a lot of memories came back to me. My father had taken Nigeria’s culture worldwide. Chief Akindele was a very proud Nigerian. While a lot of people struggle these days to say they are proudly Nigerian, Akindele had since imbibed the culture of being a true and a proud Nigerian.”

media for different reasons. “For me, I will say people need to be very careful and for them not to be drawn by activities on the social media because it will make you do things that are not becoming of you”.

Celebrating Chief Olabode Oladimeji Akindele, National Cultural Icon

Explaining the purpose of the ceremony, Mr. Ladi Akindele, who is the eldest among the two sons of late Ibadan chief told THEWILL that his father passed on exactly one year.

He, therefore, pointed out that it has become very necessary to have a first year memorial celebration for his late father.

Akindele said: “I decided to have this one year memorial.

He was an icon and still an icon. I was out of the country when he died, so I was unable to make it when he was buried and so the memorial is to say goodbye”.

Akindele who revealed that he had a special kind of love for his father, while growing up, said that Paragoyi of Ibadan is very likely the highest chieftaincy tittle in the land.

Narrating his youthful years and the role he played during his father’s coronation, Mr. Akindele said “my father and I were beside each other throughout the period of his coronation. We were indeed very close.”

Akindele was just seven years as at the time of coronation but could recount every single event that took place at that time. They have therefore build a very strong bond that THEWILLNIGERIA

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According to the son, late Akindele property in Spain was at some point named Nigerian’s house, “in an environment where we as kids in those days will be the only black people in that area.”

Among the officiating pastors at the memorial service were Pastor Dele Balogun, Pastor Kayode Faseyi, Pastor Kingsley Bature, and Pastor Ekpen Osagie.

Extolling the virtues of his father, he said: “My father is a very strong personality and I will say he’s larger than mine. He didn’t need to do anything for anybody to know the consequences of his action. He does not need to say anything for anybody to know he was there, he was a kind of man who just needed to be there.”

On social media, Akindele said: “I believe is very important for people not to lose the values that exist in the social media which like having family moments and family celebrations and not just for the head but for the family should come together when any member has a birthday, not only when the head has a birthday”.

According to him, social media is very important and it can be very distorting, adding that a lot of people are in social

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ecently, Nigerians and non-Nigerians gathered at Bay Lounge Event Centre, Lekki to celebrate the one year memorial service of late Chief Olabode Oladimeji Akindele,the Parakoyi of Ibadan.

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FEATURES

Overcoming Security Challenges in Nigeria

BY DADA AHMED

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igeria, whose sovereignty spans 60 years, since her independence from her colonial master- Britain on October 1,1960, can best be described as a nation of irony in many ramifications.

Blessed with adequate rich arable land for agricultural activities, its citizens, particularly thousands of those who choose farming as a lifelong occupation, have been prevented from their farms by the activities of herdsmen in their battle for supremacy with the farmers among other contradictions that heightened the current wave of insecurity in the country.

Empirical evidence also shows that whereas the nation never lacks well qualified and adequate manpower, it continues to turn out thousands of graduates from universities, polytechnics and other higher institutions in dire need of white-collar jobs, which has become highly elusive. This stark reality thus heightens the rate of unemployment with corresponding frightening statistics.

Being Africa’s most populous black country in the world with 182 million inhabitants and an annual growth rate of 3 per cent, the Big Brother, located in West Africa, has 59 per cent, approximately 105 million of its citizens under 35 years.

Adjudged Africa’s biggest economy in Africa, Nigeria is said to have covered 92.4 million hectares and 53 per cent of the population live in rural areas with GDP growth averaged 3.8 per cent a year from 2009 to 2014, a development that makes economic analysts to term Nigeria as a middle-income country.

With these cheering statistics, one would have thought that Nigeria, by now, should be operating on the same level of development with the advanced nations of the world with much enviable developmental strides.

However, this is not to be as the 60-year-old independent country is bedevilled with teething problems, mostly human, exemplified in monumental corruption, falling oil prices, security challenges with attendant risks, policy uncertainty, with multiplier effects on the slow economy growth and development.

Members of the academic community in the country hold strongly to the popular belief that the phenomenal poverty, which they compute has reached the alarming 44.9 per cent, especially with severity in the rural areas, in their studies, remains a serious impediment to Nigeria’s growth and development in the scheme of things.

This, they further argue, has compounded the scenario where by youths, often regarded as the future leaders of society, lack economic opportunities, coupled with sporadic civil unrest.This is the submission of Onifade Comfort, Imhonopi David and Urim Ugochukwu in their studies bordering on”Addressing the Insecurity Challenge in Nigeria: “The Imperative of Moral Values and Virtue Ethics.”

Despite the efforts of the current administration in the country to put insecurity, the most intractable problem confronting the country to the barest minimum, pieces of empirical evidence show that insecurity challenge in Nigeria has continued to assume a formidable dimension, threatening Nigeria’s statehood.

According to Onifade and her colleagues, Nigeria has reached a situation whereby “the thirst for blood and the preference for violence in expressing pent-up frustration and disenchantment with the state has become a visible feature in our national development.

They argue that Nigerians and national totems may be a pointer to the need to revive moral values and virtues within the socio-economic, political, religious and educational institutions in the country.

“Nigerian leaders, politicians and their mien corners must be forced to evolve and uphold moral values and virtues

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in all their conducts in order to lead by example and to avoid heating up the polity unnecessarily by their conducts and comments, which sometimes incite violence in their followers,” they pointed out.

issued on August 4, 2021, in Kaduna, said that the attack followed that of Ungwan Magaji, Kinshicho, Kigam and Kikoba villages of Kauru Local Government with attendant casualties and property damaged during the attack.

Besides the above study, many strata of society, ranging from NGOs to various government institutions, have also carried the cross of wrestling Nigeria from the apron string of insecurity and other challenges besetting the course of peace and development in the country.

“The figures bring the total number of those who died in the attack to 25, with three persons injured, 68 farms destroyed and 63 huts burnt,” he said.

For instance, in series of killings, maiming of innocent lives and destruction of property worth billions of naira in many states of the federation, besides the complex of the 10-year-old Boko Haram phenomenal, which has dwarfed Kidnapping, armed robbery, no fewer than 25 persons lost their lives in four communities of Kajuru Local Government Area of Kaduna state alone by gunmen.This is besides Kidnapping of Secondary school students, the low and the high in the country in recent time.

The Commissioner for Internal Security and Home Affairs, Mr Samuel Aruwan, who gave the update in a statement he

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Besides the above study, many strata of society, ranging from NGOs to various government institutions, have also carried the cross of wrestling Nigeria from the apron string of insecurity and other challenges besetting the course of peace and development in the country

Security analysts describe the scenario in Kaduna state as typical of the fate of many victims of communal attacks by gunmen in recent memory in many parts of Nigeria but peace-lovers say they are not relenting in ensuring that Nigeria puts behind dustbin and resume the course of achieving reality socio-economic and political growth and development for their beloved nation.

This and others factors may have informed the ongoing National Conference, organised by The School Of Management Studies, Kogi State Polytechnic, Lokoja, with the theme:”Proliferation of Small Arms And Light Weapons (SALWs) And State Resilience In The 21st Century.”

Localising the panacea to insecurity in the state, with emphasis on the involvement of youths, Kogi State Government warned students and youths in the state against indulging in criminality and arms proliferation, stressing that perpetrators would face the full wrath of the law.

The Commissioner for Education, Science and Technology, Mr Wemi Jones, who gave the warning at the ”National Conference Of The School Of Management Studies, Kogi State Polytechnic, Lokoja, noted that the theme of the conference is apt and timely due to the current insecurity bedevilling the nation.

He gave kudos to the Rector of the polytechnic, Dr Salisu Ogbo Usman, the management and organisers of the conference for the choice of the theme, saying that it would go a long way in boosting concerted effort aimed at addressing the prevailing circumstances and situation of the nation. ”I sincerely hope that this conference will add value to existence and will also go a long way in proffering solutions to the challenges currently bedeviling our nation,” he says. *Continues online at www. thewillnigeria.com

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SportsLive Nigeria’s Olympic Litany of Embarrassments:

The Birth-Child of a Divided AFN and emphatically bring an end to that nuisance of divisional leadership bedevilling athletics adminstration in the country.

But, there was more disgrace to come, birthed from that very same factional crises that had plagued the Federation and defied even the intervention of World Athletics and the Confederation of African Athletics (CAA).

BY JUDE OBAFEMI ummarising Nigeria’s participation in the XXXII Olympiad and multi-sports events hosted in Japan’s capital city of Tokyo under twin categories of “International Embarrassment” and “National Caricature” might seem harsh on the very patriotic and committed athletes that made up Team Nigeria’s contingent to the Games and gave their all to make the country proud.

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On June 13, when the AFN received a consignment of kits from the German multinational Corporation, Puma International, for its Olympics-bound athletes and officials ahead of the games, it seemed that was the end of the search for kits for the athletes concerned as the consignment comprised of tracksuits, vests, shoes, backpacks, wheel bags, face masks, and other items, worth millions of Naira.

Therefore, the distinction must be made from the outset that the categorisation of Nigeria’s participation in the Summer Games, which this piece intends to X-ray from the standpoint of the cases that typified the very clear absence of coordinating expertise and organising quality from the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN), does not reflect on their dedication to excellence in their events.

Yet, because it was a deal brokered under factional AFN President, Ibrahim Gusau, in a 2019 partnership signed in Doha between the AFN and the company, the leadership of the section of the AFN under Chief Tonobok Okowa, which has the backing of the Federal Ministry of Sports and Youth Development and the Honourable Sports Minister himself, Sunday Dare, distanced themselves from the kits, claiming they were being investigated for fraudulent enrichment of the officials involved. They rushed to get other kits for Team Nigeria for the Games.

In fact, it will not be a stretch to argue that a better organised athletics adminstration in the country could have constituted a more competitive Team Nigeria and have made the most of the talents and gifts that abound in Nigeria to present a stronger showing at the Tokyo Games and better the country’s chances at podium finishes than only just a silver and a bronze.

Yet, what THEWILL chronicled in the many months leading up to the postponed Games in Tokyo led to the very factual prescient conclusion that a poor showing in Tokyo awaited the country. Obviously, there was no way THEWILL could have seen the exact myriad of embarrassments Nigeria witnessed the way they played out but because the leadership of the Federation tasked with the country’s Athletics governance was embroiled in an internecine factional crises, the proper task of athletics management was abandoned.

Even before the disqualification of 10 Nigerian athletes by the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) for failing to meet the minimum test requirements necessary to make them eligible to compete at the Tokyo Olympics blew open the very absence of proper regulatory framework at the AFN, several instances provided evidence that there was some disaster looming if things came to a head in Tokyo.

In report after report, THEWILL followed a concatenation of adminstrative failures that included 24 of the country’s athletes missing the chance to qualify through the 2021 World Athletics Relays, the international biennial track and field sporting event in Chorzow, Poland because of late visa applications. Poor organisation also denied a few athletes the chance to qualify at a backup tournament at the United States Relay Tour hosted in Texas.

Visa hiccups again stultified the chances of promising top sprinter, Seye Ogunlewe, and the revelation at Edo 2020 National Sports Festival, Akintola Alaba, from reaching Tokyo as they could not participate in the qualifiers, as ready as they were to do so. This was worsened when the late qualifying event, the African Senior Athletics Championships scheduled from June 22 to 26 at the Mohamed-Boudiaf Olympic Complex in Algiers, Algeria was called off due to COVID-19 concerns. Lagos stepped in to pick up hosting rights but it never held.

As though the conspiratorial denial of some prepared THEWILLNIGERIA

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Many of the athletes that represented Nigeria, some helping the country make a debut appearance in some events such as female Canoeing and the men’s individual all-around and apparatus Gymnastics events, may not have all won medals apart from Wrestler Blessing Oborududu’s silver and Long jumper, Ese Brume’s bronze, but they all had to suffer the abysmal level of disorganisation coming from the body meant to coordinate their affairs.

athletes to represent their country through incompetence was not grave enough, the factional crisis in the AFN blindsided the Federation from making certain that they reported on compliance with member federations obligations as mandated of a Category B country following the guidelines of World Athletics’ Integrity Unit, the dreaded AIU. The consequence of such a serious oversight of noncompliance motivated the AIU Board to move Nigeria into Category A level that required more stringent testing of their athletes for any World Athletics events such as the Olympics. The AFN did not comply with these tests when it sent the names of 23 athletes to World Athletics as part of the Team Nigeria contingent for the Olympics in Tokyo.

That absence of proper organisation that seriously followed guidelines was a direct consequence of the warfare in the leadership cadre at the AFN which did not allow them the time to be responsible to their roles. With Nigeria not meeting the major requirement of Rule 15 that “an athlete from a ‘Category A’ country must undergo at least three no-notice Out-of-Competition tests (urine and blood) conducted not longer than three weeks interval apart in the 10 months before a major event”, Glory Patrick, Yinka Ajayi, Tima Godbless, Chidi Okezie, Knowledge Omovoh, Ruth Usoro, Favor Ofili, Rosemary Chukwuma, Chioma Onyekwere and Annette Echikunwoke were withdrawn from competing.

The embarrassment of the very public way their ineligibility was revealed, which forced the AFN to uncharacteristically issue a swift public acceptance of responsibility, was only worsened by the public protest of the disqualified athletes on the streets of Japan. There are no words adequate enough to justifiably capture how disgraceful it was to see countrymen and women with placards, protesting the ineptitude of their sports adminstrators when they ought to be competing with their peers on the track and field for honours.

Each of these on its own was enough grounds to effect an overhaul of the entire AFN structure from the ground up

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Then, when the video of Nigeria’s shot put finalist Chukwuebuka Enekwechi laundering his only jersey provided for him went viral the shameful product of the lack of leadership in the country’s athletics as a whole had come full circle to the perpetual and mortifying disgrace of the country. More than enough kits were available but the puerile and selfish squabbles of the Dramatis Personnae conspired to rub the name of the country in the mud.

The athletes have sordid tales to tell of how contemptibly abysmal the organisation from AFN was. D’Tigers, for instance, had difficulty obtaining proper credentials for themselves because of poor organisation which affected their flight too. Their trip to Japan wound up being a 30-hour ordeal instead of the planned 10-hour flight and it cut into their schedule of training, rest and preparations, a negative that did not affect the preparations of their opponents.

D’Tigers coach, Mike Brown also had some misgivings about the poor organisation and shortcomings of the NOC as four members of his staff, with whom he handled his coaching commitments and who made the trip to Japan, were never allowed into the Olympic village because of credential and paperwork issues. The American coach was reticent about his opinions on the shoddy handling of the organising and did not say much more than: “I don’t know why it is this way.”

There are no answers than the swift reaction to the jersey embarrassment of the Enekwechi video. The sportswear company, Puma, cautious not to be drawn into the mess that has become athletics governance in Nigeria, promptly terminated its contract with the AFN with immediate effect.

Some claimed it had the option to sue but took the least cumbersome option.

It is but the culmination of a litany of disgraceful, shameful and outrightly embarrassing outcomes from a Federation that could not, even for the sake of country, get out of its own way to administer its responsibility properly and simply let 60 athletes suffer the consequences. No matter how good they were, the poor organisation was always going to impinge on their performance.

No wonder Nigeria continues to lose gifted talents to other countries, who give them all that need and see them take the world.

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