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FULL LIST: Presidency Releases Tinubu’s Appointees To Date, N’West Leads, S’West With Highest Juicy Positions

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The Presidency, through Sunday Dare, Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, has provided a list of the President’s appointments to date as it tries to defend alleged lopsided appointments.

In the list, South West has 29 appointees of the President as against 24 stated by Dare.

For instance, Femi Gbajabiamila, who is one of the first appointees of the President, appointed as Chief Of Staff on Friday, June 2, 2023, was not mentioned in the list.

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The South East has fewer appointments.

Also, it appears that the West Eest, where the President comes from, has the majority of the key appointments into ‘juicy’ positions.

Here is the list of Tinubu’s appointments to day:

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South West:

1. Bosun Tijani
Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy
2. Wale Edun
Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy
3. Bunmi Tunji-Ojo
Minister of Interior
4. Adebayo Adelabu
Minister of Power
5. Dele Alake
Minister of Solid Minerals Development
6. Dr. Jumoke Oduwole
Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment
7. Adegboyega Oyetola
Minister of Marine & Blue Economy
8. Olayemi Cardoso
CBN Governor
9. Lieutenant General Taoreed Lagbaja
Chief of Army Staff
10. Kayode Egbetokun
Inspector General of Police
11. Zaccheus Adedeji
Chairman, FIRS
12. Adeola Ajayi
Director General of the Department of State Services (DSS)
13. Bashir Adewale Adeniyi
Comptroller-General of Customs
14. Olanipekun Olukoyede
Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC)
15. Kayode Isiak Opeifa
Managing Director, Nigeria Railway Corporation
16. Oluwasegun Faleye
Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of the Nigeria Social Insurance Trust Fund
17. Vincent Olatunji
(NSITF)
18. Raji Kazeem Kolawole
Managing Director /CEO, Nigerian Communications Satellite Limited (NIGCOMSAT)
19. Bayo Onanuga
Director General, National Board for Technology Incubation (NBTI)
20. Sunday Dare
Special Adviser on Information and Strategy
21. Tope Kolade Fasua
Special Adviser on Public Communications Orientation
22. Peju Adedajo
Special Adviser to the President on Economic Matters (Office of the VP)
23. Temitola Asekunle-Johnson
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Investment & Privatisation (Office of VP)
24. Mariam Temitope
Senior Special Assistant to the President, Job Creation & NSMEs (Office of VP)
25. Tunde Rahman
Senior Special Assistant to the President, Regional Development Programmes
26. Moremi Ojudu
SSAP on Community Engagement
27. Tope Ajayi
SSA, Media and Public Affairs
28. Segun Dada
Special Assistant, Social Media
29. Demola Oshodi
SSA, Protocol

READ ALSO: ‘We Are Sorry’ – Presidency Apologises Over Errors In Federal Appointments List

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North Central:

1. Shuaibu Audu
Minister of Steel Development
2.Muhammed Idris
Minister of Information
3. Zaphanian Jisalo
Minister of Special Duties
4. Lateef Fagbemi
Minister of Justice
5. Joseph Utsev
Minister of Water Resources and Sanitation
6. Nentawe Yilwatde
Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction
7. Imaan Sulaiman Ibrahim
Minister of State, Police Affairs
8. Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi
Minister of State, Agriculture and Food Security
9. Bashir Bayo Ojulari
GMD, NNPC Limited
10. Ambassador Mohammed Mohammed
Director General, National Intelligence Agency
11. Dr. Idris A. Sulaimon
Director General, Nigerian Broadcasting Commission (NBC)
12. Dr. Ahmed Abubakar Audi Commandant General, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps

13. Engr. Jaji O. Abdulganiyu Controller General of the Federal Fire Service

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14. Kemi Nandap
Comptroller-General of the Nigeria Immigration Service
15. Haruna Y. Usman
Chairman, Upper Niger River Basin Development Authority
16. Dangajere Shuaibu Bawa Jaja Managing Director, Upper Niger River Basin Development Authority

17. Dr. Amos Gizo Yadukso
Chairman, Lower Benue River Basin Development Authority
18. Engr. Ninga Terese
Managing Director, Lower Benue River Basin Development Authority
19. Abiodun Essiet SSAP on Community Engagement

20. Gimba Kakanda
Senior Special Assistant to the President, Research and Analytics (Office of the VP)
21. Isaq Ahmed Ningi,
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Digital media & Emergency Management
22. Mr. Aliyu Audu,
Special Assistant to the President, Public Affairs
23. Sen. Ibrahim Oloriege
Chairman, NHIA
24. Tunde Ajibulu,
Deputy Executive Secretary (Services), UBEC
25. Sunday Sylva Togo Echono Executive Secretary, TETFUND

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North East:

1. Abubakar Kyari
Minister of Agriculture and Food Security
2. Idi Mukhtar Maiha
Minister of Livestock Development
3. Sa’idu Alkali
Minister of Tranportation
4. Yusuf Tuggar
Minister of Foreign Affairs
5. Muhammad Ali Pate
Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare
6. Ibrahim Gaidam
Minister of Police Affairs
7. Uba Maigari Ahmadu
Minister of State for Regional Development
8. Ahmadu Musa Kida
NNPCL Non-executive Chairman.
9. Nuhu Ribadu
National Security Adviser
10. Mohammed Buba Marwa Chairman, National Drug Law Enforcement Agency

11. Hajiya Hafsat Bakari
CEO, Nigeria Financial Intelligence Unit
12. Prof. Abdu Dauda
Chairman, Chad Basin Development Authority
13. Tijjani Musa Tumsa
Managing Director, Chad Basin Development Authority
14. Alh. Sanusi Mohammed Babantanko
Chairman, Upper Benue River Basin Development Authority
15. Abdulhamid Yahaya Abba SSAP on Community Engagement

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16. Dr. Bala Mohammed
Deputy Governor, CBN
17. Aliyu Modibbo Umar
Special Adviser (SAD), General Duties
18. Sadiq Wanna Special Adviser (SAD), to the President on Power Infrastructure (Office of the VP)

19. Usman Muhammad
SSA to the President on Administration & Office Accommodation (Office of the VP)
20. Nasir Yammama
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Innovation (Office of the VP)
21. Bashir Maidugu
Deputy State House Counsel (Senior Special Assistant to the President)
22. Dr. Daniel Bwala,
Special Adviser on Media and Policy Communications
23. Mr. Francis Adah Abah
Personal Assistant to the President, Special Duties
24. Mumuni Dagazau
Executive Vice President for Downstream

READ ALSO: U.S, China Tariff War Could Slash Trade By 80%, Okonjo-Iweala Warns

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North West:

1. Mohammed Badaru Abubakar Minister of Defence

2. Hannatu Musawa
Minister of Art, Culture and the Creative Economy
3. Ahmed Dangiwa
Minister of Housing and Urban Development
4. Bello Goronyo
Minister of State for Water Resources
5. Yusuf Tanko Sununu
Minister of State for Education
6. Bello Matawalle
Minister of State for Defence
7. Hajiya Hafsat Bakari
CEO, Nigeria Financial Intelligence Unit
8. General Christopher Gwabin Musa Chief of Defence Staff

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9. Air Marshal Hasan Bala Abubakar Chief of Air Staff

10. Haliru Nababa
Controller General of the Nigerian Correctional Service
11. Shehu Usman Mohammed Corps Marshal of the Federal Road Safety Commission

12. Aminu Maida
EVC, Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC)
13. Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi Director-General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA)

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14. Brig Gen YD Ahmed
Director-General, National Youth Service Corps
15. Mohammed Buba Marwa Chairman, National Drug Law Enforcement Agency

16. Abdullahi U. Ganduje
Chairman, Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria (FAAN)
17. H. E. Abdullahi U. Ganduje Chairman, Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria

18. Dr. Musa Adamu Aliyu
Chairman, Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission
19. Nasiru Gawuna
Chairman, Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria
20. Musa Sarkin Adar
Chairman, National Inland Waterways Authority
21. H. E. Nasiru Gawuna
Chairman, Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria
22. H.E Aminu Bello Masari
Chairman, TETFUND
23. Alh. Bashir Usman Gumel Chairman, Federal Medical Centre, Yola

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24. Dr. Mohammed Gusau Hassan Chairman, Federal Medical Centre Birnin Kudu

25. Isa Sadiq Achida
Chairman, Raw Materials Research and Development Council
26. Amb. Abubakar Shehu Wurno Chairman, Sokoto-Rima River Basin Development Authority

27. Major Gen. Jubril Abdulmalik Secretary, Civil Defence, Immigration and Prisons Services Board

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28. Dr Mohammed Mohammed Aminu
Registrar/Chief Executive Officer (NABTEB)
29. Abdullahi Tanko Yakassai SSAP on Community Engagement

30. Sani Dattijo
Deputy Governor, CBN
31. Rukaiya El-Rufai
Special Adviser to President on NEC & Climate Change (Office of the VP)
32. Hakeem Baba Ahmed
Special Adviser (SAD), on Political Matters (Office of VP)
33. Muhammad Bulama
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Politics/Special Duties (office of the VP)
34. Zainab Yunusa
Senior Special Assistant to the President on NEC (Office of the VP)
35. Abdulaziz Abdulaziz
Senior Special Assistant to the President, Print Media
36. Ibrahim Masari
SSA Politics

READ ALSO: Ibas Shuns Court Order Appoints 23 LGA Administrators In Rivers, New RSIEC Management [FULL LIST]

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South South:

1. Festus Keyamo
Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development
2. Ekperipe Ekpo
Minister of State, Gas Resources
3. Heineken Lokpobiri
Minister of State, Petroleum Resources
4. John Enoh
Minister of State, Industry, Trade and Investment
5. Nyesom Wike
Minister of Federal Capital Territory
6. Abubakar Momoh
Minister of Regional Development
7. Vice Admiral Emmanuel Ikechukwu Ogalla
Chief of Naval Staff
8. Major General Emmanuel Undiandeye
Chief of Defence Intelligence
9. Emomotimi Agama
Director General, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)
10. Mrs. Glory Ekpo Oho
Managing Director, Cross River Basin Development Authority
11. Sen. Magnus Abe
Chairman, National Agency for the Great Green Wall
12. Chief (Barr.) Ebikemi Boi Bosin Chairman, Niger Delta Basin Development Authority

13. Hon. Amgbare Ebitimi
Managing Director, Niger Delta Basin Development Authority
14. Mr. Saleh Abubakar
Director-General, National Agency for the Great Green Wall (NAGGW)
15. Dr. Dakorinama Alabo George Director-General, Border Communities Development Agency (BCDA).

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16. Gift Johnbull SSAP on Community Engagement

17. Emem Nnana Usoro
CBN Deputy Governor
18. O’tega Ogra SSA, Digital/New Media to the President

19. Mrs. Linda Nwabuwa Akhigbe SSA, Strategic Communications

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20. Rowland Ewubare
Group Chief Operating Officer, NNPCL
21. Nosa Asemota
Special Assistant, Visual Communications to the President
22. Prof. Nenibarini Zabbey
Project Coordinator, HYPREP

South East:

1. Dr. Doris Anite Uzoka
Minister of State for Finance
2. Bianca Ojukwu
Minister of State for Foreign Affairs
3. Nkeiru Onyejiocha
Minister of State for Labour
4. Sen. Dave Umahi
Minister of Works
5. Dr. Uche Nnaji
Minister of Science and Technology
6. Uzoma Nwagba
MD, Credicorp
7. Rt. Hon. Emeka Nduka
Managing Director, Anambra-Imo River Basin Development Authority
8. Adesua Dozie
Company Secretary and Chief Legal Officer, NNPCL
9. Hon. Mark Okoye
MD/CEO, South-East Development Commission (SEDC)
10. Philip Ikeazor
Deputy Governor for Financial System Stability, CBN
11. Sophia Mbakwe
Executive Vice President of Business Services, NNPCL
12. Mr. John Ugochukwu Uwajumogu Special Adviser, Industry, Trade and Investment

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13. Chioma Nweze
SSAP on Community Engagement
14. Kingsley Stanley Nkwocha SSA to the President, Media and Communication (Office of VP)

15. Kingsley Uzoma
SSA to the President on Agribusiness & Productivity Enhancement (Office of VP)
16. Mr. Fredrick Nwabufo
SSA to the President on Public Engagement

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OPINION: Ofala: Glo And An Invite From Agbogidi

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By Lasisi Olagunju

‘Teacher of Light’ is the title of a biography of Chinua Achebe written by Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and Tijan Sallah. What does it mean to teach light? Or, rather, what is light? If you know what darkness does, you would know what light means and the value it holds.

“When the moon is shining, the cripple becomes hungry for a walk.” With that proverb and its moon metaphor, Chinua Achebe established himself as a true teacher of light. My muse pushed the proverb to my presence as I read through an invitation to me from the Obi of Onitsha asking that I be part of this year’s Ofala Festival. It occurred to me that moment that it is not only the moon that gives light; culture is an illuminator, it also gives light, especially to people like me who routinely forget how to dance to ancestral summons.

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I had the very rare privilege of being honoured by the Nigerian Academy of Letters with its Honorary Fellowship in August this year. From the North to the South, only three Nigerians were so honoured: I was one; my brother, culture scholar and media icon, Jahman Anikulapo, was one; the deeply intellectual Obi of Onitsha, His Majesty Igwe Nnaemeka Alfred Ugochukwu Achebe (Agbogidi), was the third, the biggest of us. At that ceremony, the Obi, who said he had looked forward to meeting me, met me, held me and has kept me close as a son.

So, his invite to the Ofala Festival came. The festival holds this week. I wish I could be there as the king’s guest; but wishes are not horses. Because the mountain here is blocking the view of the mountain over there, I cannot honour the invitation. So I prayed for the success of the festival. The Obi answered with a thunderous ‘Amen’.

Ofala? I checked and found that the word “Ofala” is an enduring offspring of the Igbo words ọfọ (authority) and ala (land). Ofala is history retold in performance; it is also culture renewed. It relives the Obi’s authority over the land and its people.

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Ofala is Obi’s return from sacred silence. The festival celebrates royalty’s reborn, and the Ndichie’s renewal of loyalty to the king. In Iru Ofala and Azu Ofala, the king returns from ancestral presence to repossess his warriors with their red caps.

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Etymologists say the word ‘festival’ derives from the Latin ‘festum’. Anthropologists have followed the word through centuries and civilisations as its meaning evolved across cultures and disciplines. Émile Durkheim and James George Frazer were influential figures in early anthropology. Scholars, in summaries, say that to Durkheim and Frazer, festivals are communal expressions of belief and solidarity. They say that with festivals, people renew their social and spiritual bonds. In Ofala, we see that they are right.

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Leo Frobenius, German ethnologist and archaeologist, was in Africa on multiple occasions between 1904 and 1935. In the 1910s, Frobenius observed festivals in diverse places; he documented them and saw in them vital celebrations of familial, tribal, and religious life deeply rooted in ancestral history and beliefs.

The German observed right. Ofala and similar festivals bind communities; they celebrate social cohesion and keep sacred traditions alive. They fuse communal history with spiritual renewal and survival. In them, the rhythm of everyday life comes alive.

Ofala has grown to attract great brands. Its major sponsor is telecoms giant, Globacom, which has been there since 2011. I have very solid people in Globacom, which makes me an envoy of its greenery and deepens my interest in everything, particularly, festivals in which the company is involved.

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The Yoruba tell their children: When you behold greatness, honour it with reverence. Tí o bá ri olá, pón olá lé. That is what I am doing here. It is what Globacom’s long partnership with the Obi and Ofala does; an act of reverence to the greatness of the culture that birthed them.

From Lisabi in Abeokuta to Ojude Oba in Ijebu-Ode, and from Ofala in Onitsha to other vibrant festivals across the land, Globacom’s partnerships reflect a philosophy rooted in understanding that just as a zebra is defined by its stripes, a people are defined by their culture. In other words, a person without culture is like a zebra without stripes. Sustaining culture is sustaining the people.

That is what corporate sponsorship does to cultural events. Obi’s people say in a proverb, “Nku di na mba na-eghere mba nri (The firewood of a community cooks for that community).” Globacom’s firewood has kept the flame of the festivals it supports alive, warming the hearts of millions who gather yearly to honour tradition.

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To sponsor a festival is one thing; but to nurture its essence and future is another. Through resources and resourcefulness, community engagement, and cultural reverence, Globacom has redefined what corporate responsibility can mean. That is what I gleened from the firm. I agree with those words. Shakespeare writes in Hamlet that “The purpose of playing… is to hold, as ’twere, the mirror up to nature.” The playwright suggests that the aim of acting and theater is to reflect reality, showing “virtue her feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure”.

By supporting these festivals, the company, Glo, holds up a mirror to our shared identity, allowing us to see ourselves, our beauty, our resilience, our history.

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Globacom became a major sponsor of the Ofala Festival in 2011 and has sustained the sponsorship yearly since then. Fourteen years on, like the Ekwe and the Udu, two Igbo drums beating the same rhythm, the company’s unwavering support has demonstrated that corporate success and cultural preservation can walk (and work) together. I read this out and my friend, the Igbo man, chipped in: “Egbe bere, ugo bere” (let the kite perch and let the eagle perch). When business and tradition walk together, culture gains.

The Yoruba routinely remind us that it is when we walk in the rain that we know who truly walks with us. Companies get involved in arts and culture for various reasons. Some, like leeches, place their names beside great traditions so as to benefit from the greatness. But what I see with Glo here is much more than profit in cash and kind. I see a telecoms giant, wholly indigenous, that has chosen to walk tall with the ancestors, deploying its enormous muscle to connect the past and their history to the world of the modern. One word defines this; it is renewal.

The rich who spend on their people’s historical and cultural essence are not frivolous; neither are they stupid. It is patriotism; if you like, call it cultural nationalism. The wealth of culture, like all wealth, grows when shared.

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Cultural promotion yields dividends that confound account books. It stitches the torn fabric of community; it keeps the hearth of local enterprise burning, and rekindles pride in who we are and where we come from. It renews pride in our shared heritage. It makes us all richer.

If you do well the society notes and records all you do for posterity. The Alake and paramount ruler of Egbaland, Oba Adedotun Gbadebo said in 2017 that “Glo is number one in culture and support for the people. The company pioneered per second billing and others followed.” The Alake wrote that admirable testimonial eight years ago. The flag of patriotism is still there on the mountain top, flying.

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In Ofala, the king dances the dance of joy of a fresh start. In the drumbeats and dance steps, the king delights that yam is harvested as proof of life, not of death. The beats retell a people’s story as told by the ancestors. A people are as strong as the stories they tell of themselves.

This weekend (Friday and Saturday), Onitsha will be draped in Globacom’s green, the colour of growth and renewal. Colour green in French is vert, the Italian call it verde, the Spanish, in Castilian voice, say it is verde. They all draw their source from the Latin word for green which is viridis, a word that denotes freshness and vitality. History is an endless rope. English words, verdant and viridian, have this same Roman ancestry. To viridis again belongs “a large family of other words that evoke vigor, growth, and life: virere (to be green, to be vigorous), vis (strength), vir (man, masculine singular), ver (spring), virga (stem, rod), perhaps even virtus (courage, virtue).” For those insights, check French professor of medieval history, Michel Pastoureau’s ‘Green: The History of a Color’ as translated by Jody Gladding.

Whenever I meet Globacom chairman, Dr Mike Adenuga Jr, I intend to ask him the specific reason he chose colour green for his giant.

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I congratulate the Obi and Glo as the moon glows on Ofala. In the dance of that festival, drums speak, colours sing, and heritage dances. In perfect rhythm, the people breathe, act and rejoice as tradition bathes in innovation. With the moon shining brighter, Obi’s land is renewed this weekend. Congratulations, Agbogidi.

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OPINION: ‘Federal Highways of Horror’

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By Lasisi Olagunju

You know where the latest anti-government journalists are in Lagos? Kirikiri. On a day that Nigerians were celebrating an additional spur of 100 kilometres to the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Road, the killjoys of Kirikiri struck. They took a happy, joyous people of 200 million on a gruelling, bumpy ride across the country. They ran painful stories of craters and potholes and headlined them: ‘Federal Highways of Horror.’

It is a miracle that our Minister of Works, Dave Umahi, has not pummeled the Lagos newspaper called Vanguard. It ran the bad stories. It is still unclear why the minister has not rebuked its owner and spanked its journalists for publishing what they were not supposed to publish. Not once, but twice, last week they allowed the devil to use them to tell stories of collapsed federal roads from the north to the south. Their stories portrayed hardworking Umahi as a failure in monumental proportions.

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Those journalists, injected with an overdose of impudence, said they did an investigation. They painted a grim picture of federal highways across multiple Nigerian states suffering severe neglect. They said the neglect has made travel dangerous, expensive, and time-consuming. They wrote as if they were sent to pull down a house built by God.

In the South, they came up with a long list of bad roads. They said northern states shared the same story of pain. They described some roads as crater-filled horror scenes; some as barely passable, others as sites long abandoned by contractors. On the few ones harbouring contractors, the signs they displayed showed slow men at work.

It does not rain; it pours. Amid narratives of millions of bad federal roads, Umahi made himself professor last week. “I am a professor of Engineering,” he announced on national television. Professor Umahi? I pray he is not asked to name the king who blessed him with that chieftaincy title. Some Arise News television journalists, whose eyes lack lashes, forced him to make himself professor. They habitually tug at the hem of Umahi’s professorial gown. They pelt him with questions that should never be asked. They remind our working Minister of Works that a river that is not dirty does not hide its depth. Last week, they demanded the cost of federal roads per kilometre. Who does that? And, I am happy, Minister Umahi gave it back to them. He said they are illiterates. Yeah. Don’t they know that for our federal government, spirits decide the total costs of projects? If they were truly not illiterates, they would know that this government is a wholesale seller and buyer; it is too rich to do retail business measured with short tape rules and elementary school rulers.

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Oyo State governor, Seyi Makinde, thought because he was governor and engineer he could join the talk and say that calculating the average cost per kilometre was possible in road construction. He was similarly told by our minister to shut up or he would be summoned to a debate on the very difficult mathematics of road construction. Umahi said he is Makinde’s senior in engineering. Senior Prefect Umahi described electrical electronics engineers as ‘technicians’ who must not speak on project costs.

Now, what we are told to hold as knowledge from Professor Umahi is that it is impossible to know how much a kilometre of road costs in Nigeria until such projects are completed. God is great. The World Bank must have missed that wisdom back in 1999 when it created the Road Costs Knowledge System (ROCKS), a database that calmly lists what it costs to build or fix a kilometre of road from Umahi’s village in Ebonyi to Makinde’s Ajia in Ibadan. A key feature of the World Bank’s ROCKS is its record of actual and estimated road work costs, clearly defined per kilometre and per square metre. Apparently, only in Nigeria do roads and their costs defy mathematics and logic.

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In utter helplessness, we watch the roads and their costs stretch and shrink like chewing gum depending on whose fingers are working the calculator. While other countries classify their roads by type and cost per kilometre, we prefer a more spiritual approach – if you are an enemy, call it faith-based budgeting.

Clarity is the father of all openness. Why is it missing here? Again, that is not a question or a proverb that we must hear again from anyone, especially professional troublemakers called journalists. What is the problem of Nigerian journalists? Because their eyes have no skin, they query power. Where a cup is half-full, what our journalists see all their lives is a half-empty cup. They didn’t start today. They are historically insolent. What they do to this government, they did to even our ancestor, Lord Lugard, in 1913, one full year before Amalgamation. On 8 March, 1913, one rude journalist working with a newspaper called Lagos Weekly Record wrote that Lugard was a wicked, ruthless character, “a man whose walking stick is a pistol and whose thoughts by day and dreams at night are punitive expeditions and military patrols.”

And what was Lugard’s reaction to such attacks? He fought them with laws and knocks. At a point, he documented their impudence with a letter to his wife, Flora. In the letter, he bunched the journalist with all the other “educated native” who deserved no sympathy. He wrote about the native enemy of the state: “His loud and arrogant conceit are distasteful to me, his lack of natural dignity and of courtesy antagonise me.” Lugard’s biographer, Margery Perham, graciously remembered to put this in the book: ‘Lugard: The Years of Authority’ on page 585. If you can’t get Perham but are fortunate to get Jonathan Derrick’s ‘Africa, Empire and Fleet Street’, check the details there. They are on page 115.

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So, as Lugard, the creator of Nigeria rightly wrote, the Nigerian journalist is arrogant and lacks courtesy. Such are called alárífín in Yoruba. In the days of old, the crime of àrífín carried capital punishment. Aróbafín l’oba npa. But today’s journalists are lucky that they are in a republican democracy. Even then, someone should pay for their bad behaviour. The slap they get from ministers like Umahi is the first tranche of the cost of their bad manners.

What should the state do to the conceited who won’t let expressway contracts be awarded expressly in peace? I have a solution to their problem: Like the Vanguard, they should all be relocated to Kirikiri; all of them, from Lagos to Ibadan; from Ibadan to Lagos. And, if I had my way, I would tip off Umahi and all his harangued hardworking colleagues to award contracts this week for more cells for enemies of the president’s coastal elephant and other projects of renewal. Their new accommodation should enjoy maximum security. They deserve Kirikiri, Kirikiri deserves them.

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What comes fast cannot be delayed again. It happened to cricket. Cricket set his wedding day and simultaneously asked his doctor to start preparing for child delivery. The contracts for a safe house for Nigerian journalists can be awarded today, or, latest tomorrow. There is no need for formalities. Exactly like the Coastal Road contract, this is another no for competitive bidding. We already know contractors with proven track records of expertise in casting beams and building cells. We select and hit the site digging. We can fix the contract cost after the job is done.

From this point, we see long shadows over the country; there is no clarity about important things government do. But, one day soon, like sun rays, clarity will force its way in; it is the father of openness.

Now, beyond the scaffold of satire, I wish I could just tear the mask and tell Minister Umahi that what we have today under his watch is road transportation without roads. And he is Minister of Works in charge of roads. It is a shame.

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In May this year (2025), I wrote ‘The shame of Ibadan-Ife-Ilesa road.’ The first two paragraphs of the piece read:

“Mr Dele Alake represents Ekiti State in the Federal Executive Council. Alhaji Gboyega Oyetola represents Osun State in the Federal Executive Council. Mr Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo represents Ondo State in the Federal Executive Council. All three of them are the president’s core men. Each time the council sits and approves federal roads for reconstruction in states other than theirs, what goes on in their minds? They are very powerful ministers but all federal roads that lead to their states are decrepit and abandoned. And they know. So, what is the problem?

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“The Ibadan-Ife-Ilesa road that links these ministers’ states to Lagos and to the North is the worst in Nigeria. Senate leader, Opeyemi Bamidele, is from Ekiti State. He belongs to the president’s inner caucus. Tough-talking PDP Senator Francis Fadahunsi represents Ife-Ijesa senatorial district. There are seven other senators and several Reps of APC and PDP from those three states. Has anyone heard them say or do anything to make that road well again? Do these people go home and how do they get home whenever they go home? Nigerians of all states lose lives and limbs on that road daily. Death by installments on the road is harrowing and it is a daily experience. It is a fitting tribute to the attention we pay to our people’s welfare.”

That was on May 12, 2025 (five months ago). If the road was “going, going” when I wrote that piece, it is gone now. Gone. An ex-senator told a columnist in May this year that N20 billion had been “released for repairs” of that road. In August 2025, Umahi announced the release of 30 percent of the contract sum. How much is the contract sum? Don’t even go there. If you go there, the minister will be angry. He will remind you that you are not a road professor. If you must ask any question at all, ask what has happened to what Umahi said was released, his 30 percent. Ask, because, nothing that is worth one kobo has happened on that road this year.

But the total collapse of the road did not come to me as a surprise. By the noon of May 12, 2025 when I published the article, one of the senators I called out in the piece called me.

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“They have just read to me what you wrote.” He told me. Big men don’t read newspapers; newspapers are read to big men. Senator said he laughed at my naivety. He wondered why I was disturbing myself writing rubbish about a contract that may never be executed.

MORE FROM THE AUTHOR:OPINION: A Minister’s Message To Me

“Do you think Nigeria can ever be better than it is? (Sé ìwo rò wípé Nigeria lè dára jù báyìí lo ni?)” He asked and proceeded to shame me with names, facts and figures all of which answered his question with a no. He said I should record and publish all he said. I laughed at the audacity of his directive. An orphan like me will never dare court a wound on the back.

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Besides, I was taught early in life to make my eyes flexible enough for them to see the nose. That was the wisdom that eluded Partridge who claimed to know it all, and because he made that claim, he blocked his own opportunity to learn Ifá from the pigeon. ‘Mo m’Obàrà, mo m’Ofún,’ tí kò j e kí ẹyẹlé k’ àparò n’Ífá (I know Obàrà, I know Ofún’ made the pigeon not to teach Ifá to the partridge).

So, my pigeon listened attentively to the incantation from the hawk. This senator ended his long, windy speech with a submission that the Ibadan-Ife-Ilesa road, and other federal roads in the South-West were decrepit and abandoned because the Works Minister “does not like hearing South-West at all.” I heard him and sighed.

When the outspoken gentleman spoke with me five months ago, he was a PDP senator. He has since moved to Dave Umahi’s party. Now, I wonder if he will still say what he said now that he is in APC.

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Author and literary critic, Robert M. Wren (1928-1989), in 1982 wrote “The Last Bridge on ‘The Road’: Soyinka’s Rage and Compassion.” He tells us that in 1962, Wole Soyinka, in a Lagos Daily Express essay entitled ‘Bad Roads, Bad Users, Bad Deaths’ captured Nigeria’s enduring road crisis. Writing with outrage and in satire, Soyinka lamented the deadly state of the highways. He agonised over the state of the Lagos–Ibadan road (Mile 34); there was what he called “the death-trap at Ife”, and “the last bridge on Ikorodu Road.” Soyinka recalled and deplored a senator’s refusal to carry a crash victim with a spinal cord injury to Ibadan. More than six decades later, the roads are still bad, very bad; they still kill; senators are still cold-blooded; they still wonder why anyone bothers to care that the roads are bad.

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Edo GIS Denies Report Of 17-year-old Purchasing 14 Hectares Of Land

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The Edo Geographic Information Systems (Edo GIS) has debunked reports circulating on social media that a 17-year-old boy purchased 14 hectares of land in Edo State and was subsequently denied a Certificate of Occupancy (C of O) by Governor Monday Okpebholo.

In a statement released by the Director of Press, Tunde Egbiremonlen, the agency clarified that no such transaction exists in its records.

According to the statement, a 17-year-old is legally considered a minor and, as such, is not eligible to register land ownership under Edo State law.

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The Edo GIS system will automatically reject such applications due to age restrictions,” the statement read

READ ALSO:Edo Promises Effective PHCs In 192 Wards

“In the first place, a 17-year-old cannot apply for registration of land in Edo state because that age bracket is assumed to be a minor; the Edo GIS system will automatically reject the application.

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“To compound the objective of the rumour-mongers, the peddlers of the story did not explain where in Edo state, such 14,000 hectares were purchased by the minor.

READ ALSO:Edo Gov Sacks Education Board Chair, Names Replacement

Egbiremonlen also pointed out inconsistencies in the viral report, noting that it failed to mention the specific location of the alleged 14 hectares and described the story as “deliberately mischievous and fabricated.”

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He accused the originators of the false information of attempting to cause disaffection and blackmail the government, saying significant funds were spent to circulate the fake news.

Edo GIS urged the public to disregard the claims and remain vigilant against disinformation aimed at undermining the government’s credibility.

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