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OPINION: Obasa, Aláàfin Ṣàngó And The Capture Of Lagos

Published

10 months ago

March 2, 2025

By Festus Adedayo

On Wednesday, February 25, 2025, a very toxic but innocuous advertorial was published in the Punch newspaper. It was authored by a group which called itself De Renaissance Patriots Foundation. Entitled Systematic Marginalization of Lagos State Indigenes, and signed by Major General Tajudeen Olanrewaju (rtd.) and Yomi Tokosi, the advertorial explains the legislative gangsterism currently going on in Lagos State, ex-Speaker Mudashiru Obasa’s impudent audacity and President Bola Tinubu’s nauseating silence on the civilian coup ongoing in the State of Aquatic Splendour.

The only fitting narrative that can explain the Obasa phenomenon and the Lagos godfather’s paternalism for Obasa and his ilk is the Osu caste system in Igboland. Among other obnoxious systems like the killing of twin babies, killing of children who grew first upper incisors, human sacrifices, among others, Osu caste is evergreen in its evil, and rooted in Igbo tradition and religion. Rev. George Thomas Basden’s book Among the Ibos of Southern Nigeria, (1921), a detailed account of the clergy’s experiences while living in Igbo land as a Christian missionary in the early 20th century, examines the people’s customs, beliefs, social structure and religious practices.

On page 109 of the book, Basden defined Osu as “a slave, but one distinct from an ordinary slave (ohu/oru) who in fact is the property of the god and when devoted to a god, he has no prospect of regaining freedom and he restricts his movements to the procuts of the shrine to which he was attached”. Centuries after the end of slavery and in spite of modernity, Osu caste’s poignant smell is rank in Igboland as Osu are still discriminated against, cannot marry a freeborn, their aspirations curtailed. They are thus forced to form an inter-group bond and alliance to press for their rights. A former minister under Olusegun Obasanjo, who is an Osu, is the rallying point of this caste against discrimination by “freeborn” Igbo. As I will argue presently, the Lagos parliament crisis, among other indicators, is fueled by the ancient indigene/settler dichotomy in Lagos. In this case, the Lagos godfather symbolizes the Obasanjo minister, hell-bent on protecting his fellow Lagos migrant-settlers.

General Olanrenwaju’s group which published the advertorial made several allegations against the godfather. They are encapsulated in the phrase, “persistent discrimination against the indigenous people of Lagos State.” Perhaps, the most insulting to the group was the temerity of the godfather’s choice of two non-indigenes of the state, Bisi Akande and Segun Osoba, ex-governors of Osun and Ogun States, to mediate in the crisis of the Lagos House of Assembly. Apart from the group’s total denunciation of this alien intervention, it specifically took Akande to the cleaners. Akande, it said, who “is struggling for political breath” in his home state, being unable to resolve the ongoing conflagration therein, feels entitled to poke-nose into Lagos matter “because his children, Akande Funmilayo (Chairman Apapa/Iganmu LCDA) and Yinka Akande are seriously benefiting from (sic) as Local Council Chairman and Director of Lekki Free Trade Zone respectively.”

As groups or individuals, Lagos indigenes have always stood up against the ruling establishment. A 1908 proposed water rate for Lagosians is an example. On July 20 of that year, Governor Walter Egerton proposed to charge Lagosians for them to access portable water. This was after his government constructed a #130,000 pipe borne water scheme, the precursor of the Iju waterworks built in 1916. Two indigenes of Lagos, John Randle and Orisadipe Obasa, medical doctors, under the banner of the People’s Union, arranged a rally of Lagosians at Enu Owa on November 26, 1908 where they took Egerton on. Randle and Obasa were themselves not autochthonous Lagosians. Randle, born in 1855 in Regent, Sierra Leone, originally from Oyo town, was son of Thomas, who settled in Aroloya part of Lagos, while Obasa, whose father descended from the Elekole of Ikole-Ekiti, was brought to Lagos in 1878. It must be borne in mind that Orisadipe Obasa has no ancestral connect with Mudashiru who is currently recreating an MC Oluomo motor-park hijack prototype in the Lagos parliament.

Indigene/settlers conflict in Lagos dates back to the 15th century. The Awori headsmen earliest settlers on Lagos Island, descendants of legendary Ogunfunminire, who hailed from Ile-Ife, had faced a Bini attempt to uproot them which was successful. A fierce battle that took place at Iddo had Olofin, who administered the area, being routed. Since then, the development of Lagos has attracted the influx of migrant-settlers Yoruba and other ethnicities laying claim to Lagos. The influence of migrant-settlers was so overwhelming that when in 1950, Dr I. Olorun-Nimbe emerged Mayor of the Lagos Council, only him and four others were Lagos indigenes while the rest 19 were migrant-settlers. The 1951 Constitution which placed Lagos under Ibadan, in a Western Region administration, further worsened Lagos’ fate, until the 1954 Constitution restored its place. In 1967, Lagos got a state of its own and federal capital status. So, when in the 1950s, the heartland of Lagos indigenes’ residence, the Isale Eko, was demolished, groups were formed to continually fight the interest of indigenous Lagosians. They included the Isale Eko Association (1955) and Egbe Eko Parapo (Lagos Citizens’ Rights Protection Council – LCRPC) 1962. The latter emerged from a merger of the Lagos Aborigines Society and the Egbe Omo Ibile Eko (Association of the Sons of Lagos State) which was led by Chief T. A. Doherty. Today, the most prominent of those associations is the Association of Lagos State Indigenes (ALSI) hitherto led by Justice Ishola Oluwa, a retired High Court Judge.

The role of identity in Nigeria’s migrant-settlers crisis shows its importance in Nigerian social life. It also shows that identity has negative potentials that can be deployed as a tool for mobilizing violence. In the year 2000, Lagos deployed identity for violence when Hausa and Yoruba indigene-settlers engaged one other in a fratricidal war in Ketu. That fight, which claimed lives, indicates the adversarial use that autocththony can be put to. Scholars have said that several of Nigeria’s worst conflicts occurred because original inhabitants, or indigenes, are pitted against migrant-settlers. The Obasa Lagos budding conflict, though appears political, may unravel the powers behind it.

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In Yorubaland, the migrant-settlers dynamics is rich in literature. It is indeed an ancient phenomenon. Signified by the native markers of àjèjì or àjòjì (migrants) and onílé, (autocththony) the common phrase that defines that transaction is, no migrant-settler should duel with an indigene over ownership of land (àjòjì kìí b’ónílé du’lé). This is the meat of General Olanrewaju and his De Renaissance Patriots Foundation’s beef with Tinubu and why many autochthonous Lagosians, regardless of Tinubu’s behemoth political power in Nigeria, his talismanic influence and boundless wealth, are against his continued domination of Lagos. It also explains why a Tinubu, who today is carrying a monstrous elephant of Nigerian power and wealth on his head could be this needlessly bothered by the tiny cricket of being sidelined in the sack of Obasa as Lagos House of Assembly Speaker. The moment Tinubu loses this makeshift, badly-constructed Lagos identity in the battle with autochthonous Lagosians, he has lost all.

The above was recalled with the aim of stating that, though the àjèjì and onílée stranger politics in Lagos has always been on the front burner, it has been more pronounced in recent time. This specifically drew more Lagosians’ ire with the godfather, an àjèjì, becoming the Lord of Lagos and defender of the rights of fellow migrant settlers. In the above referenced advertorial, the De Renaissance Patriots Foundation claimed that since 1999, only one Lagos Omo-Onílé (son of the land) has been governor, ostensibly Raji Fashola. What this means is that Tinubu, Akinwumi Ambode and Babajide Sanwo-Olu, in the words of the advertorial, are àjòjì. The group also listed names of many àjòjì who it said have, unfairly, hoisted the banner of Lagos at the detriment of Lagosians.

Some extreme ones among the Lagos indigenes’ rights advocates have literally equalized their battle to an ancient Yoruba wise saying that no stranger can back a child like its mother (kò s’éni t’ó le mòó pòn bí olómo). Some others, in pursuit of this narrative, have claimed that the àjòjì at the helm of political affairs in and of Lagos, don’t appreciate Lagos enough, just like the domestic goat undervalues the prowess of a hunter and his gun; or one who inherits a huge agbada gown does not appreciate its value (ewúrẹ́ ilé kó mọ iyì odẹ, aj’ogún ẹwù kó mọ iyì agbádá nlá). It is on these twin premises that they derive their two conclusions. One is that, Lagos could have developed more than it does if the migrant-settlers had been autochtonous Lagosians. Second, that Lagos could have been greater but for the fact that the wealth accruable to the Ajoji from their leadership of Lagos are being funneled to the migrants’ original place of migration.

Prior to 1999, there did not seem to be anyone who held the jugular of Lagos like Tinubu. Before the ascendancy of his volcanic phenomenon, the last power outpost of Lagos was a group pejoratively called the ‘Ijebu Mafia’, disciples of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, operating as Afenifere leaders, living in Lagos. They determined the political geography of the aquatic state. Indeed, this group conducted the primary for the 1999 governorship which allegedly had Late Funsho Williams coming tops but which an internal abracadabra among the group tilted in favour of Tinubu. Immediately he grabbed political power, Tinubu, applying Law 33 of Robert Greene’s 48 Laws of Power which encourages the power holder to discover each man’s thumbscrew – their weaknesses – found out the Ijebu Mafia leaders’ thumbscrew and used it to prepare their political graveyards. He then succeeded in tearing them apart, deploying the Niccolo Machiavelli divide and rule tactics in the service of his ambition.

By 2007 when the godfather left office as Lagos governor, he had totally decimated their ranks, cloning a counter-group called Afenifere Renewal Group and leaving the Awo disciples licking their fatally bruised wounds. Abetted by Lagosians themselves, only a few, like the late Chief Ganiyu Dawodu, fought Tinubu to the hilt before his transition. By the time Lagos aborigines woke up to do a reconnaissance, it was too late. The godfather had captured Lagos and kept the lagoon and the sea inside his limitless-space pocket. Twenty five years after, not only does the godfather determine the political and economic barometer of Lagos, he determines when it will rain in the state or its time of drought.

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The godfather’s migrant-settler place in Lagos is discussed only in hushed tones. Those privy to his migration and the story of his settling in Lagos maintain sealed lips. While he was governor of Lagos State, some dissident groups made efforts to document his migrancy by writing a book to document the family tree of Lagos Tinubus. Some other analysts have said that if the Lagos autochthony is to be broken into brass-tacks, virtually all Lagosians will fail the litmus test. For instance, the ancestor of the Tinubus is himself a Kanuri. While some settlers chose the Lagos Island side of Lagos called Isale Eko, Sierra Leone returnees were known as Akus or Saros, and Brazilians and Cuban returnees known as Agudas. Many of them originally hailed from towns scattered round the southwest. Only the Aworis can be said to own the Lagos autochthony. Immediately Mudashiru Obasa began to recreate the MC Oluomo-style tactic in Lagos House of Assembly, some forces came out to assert the deposed Speaker’s àt’òhúnrìnwá (migrant) status in Lagos and that he was not linked in any way with Orisadipe Obasa.

The 2023 election witnessed a groundswell of push-backs by, especially non-Yoruba indigene-settlers in Lagos, against the godfather’s fiefdom hold on Lagos. The outcome of that election showed a gradual whittling of the corrosive hold of the godfather on Lagos politics. Apparently a rebellion, Lagos migrant-settlers encircled the Peter Obi Labour Party and succeeded in giving it 582,454 votes as against 572,606 for the godfather’s APC. The godfather must have been furious. Until then and since 1999 when he held court, no one dared peer naked fire to look at the fiery face of the leopard. In the process of scapegoating for this colossal rout, a source told me the godfather held his Ajélè (an appointed official who oversees an empire’s economic and political interests) responsible and has since not forgiven him. More importantly, he is cross with him for being his own man and having the guts to win re-election due to his personal effort. For any godfather, a la the precepts of the Forty-eight Laws of Power, the Ajélè had committed an unpardonable sin against the Leviathan. So, even though Obasa rode roughshod on the Ajélè as Speaker, especially during the 2025 budget speech presentation, keeping him waiting for hours, the godfather wasn’t fazed and probably wrote the script. The world has since seen that, as Obasa’s water bug (Ìròmi) dances on the stream surface with impunity and audacity, executed with sheer brigandage, as well as abetted by institutions of the Nigerian state, the danceable tune egging the poor little creature on comes from a godfather drummer living in Aso Rock whose ego was fatally bruised.

To buttress General Olanrewaju’s submission, today, Lagos political power echelon, from governor, deputy governor, commissioners to special advisers, ministers representing Lagos, to federal and state parliamentarians, is tilted in favour of àt’òhúnrìnwá (immigrants) as against autochthonous Lagosians. The most laughable was Senator Solomon Olamilekan Adeola who represented Lagos West from 2015 to 2023 and before then, from 2011 to 2015, was Lagos House of Representatives member. Today, the man, known as Yayi, has perfunctorily exchanged state of origin like a prostitute changes her liaisons. He now represents Ogun West.

The story of Lagos, its godfather and potential explosion is beginning to resemble the cataclysmic end of the Yoruba deity of thunder and lightning, Ṣàngó. Aláàfin Ṣàngó, the third monarch of the Oyo Empire, was about the most celebrated and one of the most controversial rulers of the Empire. He was fiery, ambitious, charismatic and was extremely powerful. Like the cap insignia with which the Lagos godfather is known by today and which his worshippers scramble to don, Ṣàngó’s motif was a staff called Ose Ṣàngó, an ornately carved symbol depicted by fire, lighting and thunder.

Ṣàngó, the third Aláàfin of Oyo, who reigned between the 15th and early 16th centuries, was a man of great ambition, fiery charisma, and immense power. His name is invoked today to reify awesome might and the mystery of power. He mirrors a complex interplay of leadership acumen, divinity, and eventually, a reference point of potential human vulnerability. Like the Lagos godfather, Aláàfin Ṣàngó had a talismanic and commanding presence and inspired widespread loyalty. He also had the magical and mystical ability to command fire from the sky in his fit of anger. Ultimately, though his strength , the endowment ultimately led to his downfall. One day, Ṣàngó, enraged, invoked fire which resulted in a conflagration that went out of control. It eventually led to the destruction of his palace as well as lives of its inhabitants. It was the beginning of his end. Stripped of all he had, Ṣàngó departed Oyo Kingdom and never returned. He eventually committed suicide at a place called Koso.

Apart from the power of Yoruba anecdotal retelling latent in that Sango narrative, the downfall of Oba Ṣàngó is a detailed illustration that even in a modern world, no ruler or godfather is immune from the vulnerabilities of power. It also illustrates the destruction immanent in human nature. The Obasa episode, though seemingly miniature, has the potential to implode and flush the Lagos godfather down the drain, replicating the Ṣàngó downfall in recent history.

Maybe we all should just watch while an end comes to this tyrannical hold, after all, in the words of Nawal El Saadawi in her A daughter of Isis, “Things that never end are only boring, and were it not for death, life would be an impossible burden.”

The Nigerian Senate erupted again last week. This time, it was not about allegation of its leadership being a cesspool of sleaze, a home of self-serving parliamentarians nor corruptible budget-padding that have become a boring refrain. Sequel to an earlier seemingly infantile squabble over sitting arrangement, the female anti-hero of that row, Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, came on air on Friday to allege that her continuous spats with Senate President Godswill Akpabio were due to a sexual harassment she rebuffed in the past. And the social space went bonkers.

First, the two issues that threw Akpoti-Uduaghan and Senate President Godswill Akpabio to centers of discourse have throwbacks to and possess symbolic bearing in American and biblical history. Many have berated her on why a trifling matter of space/seat allocation on the floor of the parliament should get her that worked up. They must however have forgotten that one of the issues that women who try to square up to men in a patriarchal society like ours face and fight is visibility. While in pursuit of the male dominance thesis, men try to hold women down, such women try to assert themselves and create visibility for themselves.

Akpoti-Uduaghan’s squabble over seating arrangement and Akpabio’s senate’s resistance and insistence on maintenance of status-quo remind me of the famous Montgomery bus altercation of 1955. On December 1 of that year in Montgomery, Alabama, a 42-year-old woman named Rosa Parks did what philosophers call against method. Paul Feyeraband, an Austrian philosopher, had in 1976 pioneered that thesis. In a racial American society of the time where blacks were inferior and expected to leave their bus seats for whites, Parks refused to give up hers for a white male passenger. Her refusal sparked off a boycott that changed the paradigm of racial relationship in America. It even shot the less-known Martin Luther King Jr to world recognition. At the risk of sanctions for her impudence, Parks had reportedly told the Montgomery bus driver, “My feet are tired.” Like Parks’ fight for the visibility of the black race, Akpoti-Uduaghan’s resistance was a fight for the visibility of women.

If other women in the senate like Ireti Kingibe had seen the fight as being beyond mere seat allocation into an underscore of their womanliness and fight against the irritant male-dominated status-quo, they probably would have given the Kogi senator more collective push. Like Bettina Aptheker wrote in her Foreword to Nawal El Saadawi’s A daughter of Isis, “women (daily) struggle for voice and human dignity and to overcome the binds of patriarchy…and are crushed under patriarchal conventions”. Women’s sexuality is constantly crushed in this struggle.

The second issue that flows from the first is Akpoti-Uduaghan’s allegation of sexual harassment. People have taken stands either on account of their stomachs, what lies between their thighs or their political affiliations. Again, the allegation is a symbolism. Many who cannot stand Akpoti-Uduaghan’s femininity or her boldness to underscore it in a patriarchal senate have likened her allegation to the biblical Portiphar’s wife who alleged that Joseph wanted to sexually assault her. Many have also brought out her alleged history which they claim feeds the trope of her usual allegations of blackmail against the male gender. If allegation is a typecast, Akpabio’s alleged history with women validates Akpoti-Uduaghan’s allegation. A couple of years ago, Joy Nunieh, a former NDDC MD, had alleged that she slapped the senate president when he attempted to sexualize her in his guest house at Apo, Abuja.

On an Arise News interview, Ireti had attempted to infantilize Akpoti-Uduaghan, the same way a huge percentage of the senate fatherlize Akpabio who is only first among equals in the parliament. This is due to the huge war-chest in the possession of his leadership and capability to substantially jerk up members’ personal finance through graft. The other day on the same television station, Peter Onyeka Nwebonyi, representing Ebonyi State, did this by claiming that Akpabio was “our father.” Last Friday, Kingibe did this, too by referring to Akpoti-Uduaghan as “my daughter”. She further fell into the argumentative pitfall of claiming that since Akpabio never assaulted her and the two other female senators, Akpoti-Uduaghan’s allegation must be concocted. I pray thee, do these elderly women still possess their colleague’s sultry disposition? And, isn’t it a rarity to see lascivious flesh-devouring vultures attempt to take grandmothers for supper?

We cannot suffer on all fronts by having a National Assembly that is allegedly a cesspit of Nigerian national patrimony-devourers, as well as home for devourers of the flesh of our women. Yes, it is almost an impossibility to prove sexual harassment by a woman, but Akpoti-Uduaghan’s boldness and the sheaves of evidence she claimed to possess to buttress her claim should be encouraged. No one must attempt a “family affair” settlement or else, one more rascally libido would be let loose.

News

Trump Places Nigeria, 14 Others On Partial Travel Restrictions To US

Published

15 hours ago

December 17, 2025

Editor

The United States has partially suspended the issuance of immigrant and non-immigrant visas to Nigeria and 14 other countries, citing concerns on radical Islamic terrorist groups such as Boko Haram and the Islamic State operating freely in certain parts of the West African country.

Specifically, the classes of visas affected include the B-1, B-2, B-1/B-2, F, M, and J Visas.

President Donald J. Trump, on Monday, signed a proclamation expanding and strengthening entry restrictions on nationals from countries with demonstrated, persistent, and severe deficiencies in screening, vetting, and information-sharing to protect the country from national security and public safety threats.

The United States also cited the Overstay Report, noting that Nigeria had a B-1/B-2 visa overstay rate of 5.56 per cent and an F, M, and J visa overstay rate of 11.90 per cent.

The Proclamation includes exceptions for lawful permanent residents, existing visa holders, certain visa categories like athletes and diplomats, and individuals whose entry serves U.S. national interests. It narrows broad family-based immigrant visa carve-outs that carry demonstrated fraud risks, while preserving case-by-case waivers.

While the proclamation continues the full restrictions and entry limitations of nationals from the original 12 high-risk countries established under Proclamation 10949: Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, it adds full restrictions and entry limitations on 5 additional countries based on recent analysis: Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, South Sudan, and Syria.

On October 31, the U.S. President Trump redesignated Nigeria as a “Country of Particular Concern (CPC)” for the persecution of Christians by violent Islamic groups.

In a Truth Social post, Trump hinted that the US will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria and may very well go into the country, “guns-a-blazing,” and that the military intervention “will be fast, vicious, and sweet, just like the terrorist thugs attack our cherished Christians.

In his first term, President Trump imposed travel restrictions that restricted entry from several countries with inadequate vetting processes or that posed significant security risks.

The Supreme Court upheld the travel restrictions put in place in the prior Administration, ruling that it “is squarely within the scope of Presidential authority” and noting that it is “expressly premised on legitimate purposes”—namely, “preventing entry of nationals who cannot be adequately vetted and inducing other nations to improve their practices.”

Trump in recent weeks has used increasingly loaded languages in denouncing African-origin immigrants.

At a rally last week he said that the United States was only taking people from “shithole countries” and instead should seek immigrants from Norway and Sweden.

In June 2025, President Trump restored the travel restrictions from his first term, incorporating an updated assessment of current global screening, vetting, and security risks.

News

OPINION: Man-of-the-people, Man-of-himself

Published

16 hours ago

December 16, 2025

Editor

By Suyi Ayodele

Whatever Comrade Adams Oshiomhole lacks in height and body volume, he makes up for in mischief. If you are not prepared for the mud, don’t engage the pint-size Edo senator in any combat.

His greatest weapon is his tongue. This is why he prefers to be called ‘Comrade’ – just an appellation he acquired in his hey days in the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), when the masses thought that he was fighting their battles. His public persona tilts towards that of the man-of-the-people. But on a scrutiny, the man is a man-of-himself.

Comrade’s best strategy in any argumentation is sheer sophistry! His eloquence is top-notch, his argumentative prowess arresting and his rhetoric captivating. He can be sarcastic and can also be deadly acerbic! He speaks and gyrates at the same time. Give him a microphone stand a bit lower than his height; Oshiomhole still leaps forward to emit incomprehensible verbiage. He is a dramatist par excellence. No. He is the drama itself! He combines all the characterisation of a folklore as he quadruples as heroic, non-heroic; anti heroic and A-heroic figure – beating the trinity to a distant second place!

Oshiomhole is a man one cannot afford to hate. He is equally a man too dangerous to love. His basket of mischief remains inexhaustible, his repertoire of goodwill also bottomless! He disappoints when one expects wisdom; and equally excels just when one gives up on him. A master of confusion while he remains unperturbed, Comrade is a summary of the dysfunctionality of the Nigerian political system! He displayed that in good measure last week.

I would have made a huge cash-out last week if the childhood experience I had over gambling had not taken the better part of me. Someone, who was ready to put anything to it that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s ambassadorial nominees like Reno Omokri, Fani-Kayode and Mahmood Yakubu, the former Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) would not make it through the senate, had staked a huge amount of money. I held a different opinion. He asked us to bet, not like the small finger-thrust displayed by Governor Monday Okpebholo on national television recently. This was real-time betting.

I was tempted to enter the ring especially when he was willing to double his stake while mine remained static. But I remembered that I must honour the solemn pledge I made to my late father. I assured the old man that I would never gamble again in my life. I had used the two Kobo he gave to me to buy Phensic, a type of analgesic medicine of those days, to play kàlòkàlò. It was an experience I never hoped for again. As the offer came, my father’s voice rang in my head: É s’ómo kèé hì ta tété kì ha jalè (a child who gambles will eventually steal). I declined and I lost what would have been a Christmas bonus!

Alas, the screening turned out to be a hollow ritual; a drama of the absurd with Oshiomhole playing the lead villainous character! The former governor of Edo State was at his sophistry best at the screening of the 68 rotten tomatoes and sweet potatoes President Tinubu packaged as ambassadorial nominees and sent to the Senate for screening and approval. Many of us were entertained by the charade the National Assembly displayed at the ‘screening’. The only people who were disappointed were those who expected the senators to ‘skin’ the nominees.

As it turned out, all the 68 nominees were cleared. Any moment from now, Reno Omokri will be presenting his letter of credence endorsed by Tinubu, to the president of his ambassadorial post. By then, Tinubu would no longer be a “drug Lord” and certificate forger as Omokri alleged when he ‘was in the world’! It was Omokri’s screening that provoked Comrade Oshiomhole to tackle one of the oldest senators in this political dispensation, Ali Ndume of Borno State.

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For Oshiomhole, who, in one of his numerous campaign frenzies, had once opined that once a politician decamped to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), all his sins are forgiven, one cannot put anything past the Iyamoh-born politician. No cause is too dirty for him to defend, no candidate is too unpopular for him to support, project and vow for.

A short voyage to the Comrade’s political shenanigans. In 2016, as the out-going governor of Edo State, Oshiomhole, while projecting the chairman of his economic team, Godwin Obaseki, as the governorship candidate of the APC, said that Obaseki was the “compressor” of the air conditioning of the state economic successes under his watch. He told the people to vote for Obaseki because Obaseki was the one who brought all the funds the government used in achieving feats for the people.

Then he went after the jugular of Obaseki’s opponent and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu. Comrade Oshiomhole said that in his entire life, I quote him: “I have never seen a pastor who lies effortlessly like Ize-Iyamu.” He went further to label Ize-Iyamu as a violent pastor “who carries Bible in the day and gun at night.” The crowd cheered. He added so many other unprintable expletives and Ize-Iyamu lost the election.

Four years later in 2020, Obaseki and Oshiomhole fell apart. As the National Chairman of the APC, Oshiomhole denied Obaseki a second term ticket. Obaseki, who had earlier got Oshiomhole suspended from the APC, changed to the PDP and picked the party’s gubernatorial ticket.

On the other side, Ize-Iyamu left the PDP and picked the APC ticket. Edo people waited to see what Oshiomhole, who had been disgraced out of the APC national chairmanship office, would do. Brazenly, Comrade took over the campaign machinery of Ize-Iyamu. Oshiomhole on several occasions knelt to beg the people to vote for Ize-Iyamu!

Oshiomhole told bewildered audiences from town to town that he was misinformed of Ize-Iyamu’s character! He said so, jumping from one end of the podium to another without any modicum of remorse! According to him, after the practice of dipping Agege bread into a hot beverage, the next best thing that has ever happened to humanity is Ize-Iyamu! Fortunately, the people could see through the Comrade’s hypocrisy! His candidate was beaten blue-black at the count of the ballot.

That was the Oshiomhole that spoke last week in defense of Omokri’s nomination as an ambassador. In his warped reasoning, now that Omokri had weaned himself of his infantile perennial attacks on the character of President Tinubu, ‘all his sins are forgiven’ and he is worthy to be an ambassador! His argument, if projected further, is that once a man becomes transformed, his past would no longer count!

That argument did not sit down well with Senator Ndume, and possibly some others who would rather get Omokri to explain how he saw the light and heard the voice on his way to Damascus to persecute Tinubu! Oshiomhole’s response was his sophistry of “when I talk, those who have not been governors should listen”, as if we have not seen governors and former governors as witless as the next-door fatuous Gardner in this dispensation.

The elders of my place said when a song is bad, nobody justifies it as being a palace song. That is exactly what Oshiomhole did in his defence of the irritation that Omokri and his ambassadorial nomination have constituted. Who would ever think that a day would come when a once fascinating character like Comrade would rise to defend a figure like Omokri!

The response by Ndume that he had been senator before Oshiomhole ever dreamed of becoming one took the argument to the highest buffoonery! What has been the impact of the decades Ndume has spent in the senate on his people? How many of his constituents are in captivity? How many of the people he represents are working as slaves on the farms of bandits so that they can live? Beyond the numeric of his years in the senate who Ndume epp?

Things happen. One of the things that have happened to Nigeria is the current senate – a dump site for former governors. No sane mind will not be scandalised by the conduct of the senate under Godswill Akpabio! The upper chamber has turned into a stinking chamber pot of anything goes. Last week, the chamber took the perfidy of “bow and go” to another annoying level when virtually all the ambassadorial nominees were cleared without any serious questions asked.

What, for instance, are the wives of former governors nominated as ambassadors bringing to the table? What are their pedigrees? Are they not the same peacocks we saw when their husbands were governors? Beyond rubbing pancakes and spending our patrimony as non-state actors, how else can we assess those ex-first ladies?

Without sounding pessimistic, except for the career diplomats among them, the rest of Tinubu’s ambassadors are disasters packaged in golden wrappers. The qualities of the figures nominated by the president and endorsed by the senate speak to the quality of those in power today. Sure, no man gives what he does not have. President Tinubu has given us his best men and women as our ambassadors. We wish them diplomatic successes!

Adibe Emenyonu and Michael Adeleye: It is hard to say goodbye

We lose those dear to us. That is what nature dictates. Every loss is painful. But when it doubles, it becomes very painful. I experienced double losses this last weekend. Two souls, very dear to me, were lowered to their graves. The reality that I would not see or talk to them again hurts!

I joined a group of other journalists led by Patrick Ochoga of the Leadership Newspapers, who doubles as the Chairman, Edo Correspondents Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Edo State Council, to Obibiezena community in Owerri, Imo State, for the funeral rites for Adibe Augustine Emenyonu.

Emenyonu, whom I called Adibs, slumped and died on October 18, 2025, at the age of 62. He was – imagine Adibs now being referred to in the past tense – until his death, the Edo State Correspondent of ThisDay Newspapers. Our paths crossed over two decades ago in Benin City where we plied the ‘he-said’ and ‘he-emphasised’ trade of journalism together. Adibs was a fearless and colourful writer.

Even when I left journalism for the corporate world, we continued to bond. On my return to the pen fraternity after 16 years, Adibs received me warmly, opening his contacts to me like many others did. We became closer, turning friendship to brotherhood!

I was devastated, when on the morning of Saturday, October 18, 2025, Ochoga called to announce: “Leader, I have bad news for you. We have lost Adibe!” The news was hurtful and seeing Adibs, naked in the morgue when I visited alongside the Edo State NUJ Chairman, Festus Alenkhe, and others, broke me.

Talk of a man who laboured and did not eat the fruits thereof; talk of Adibs. He was a good father to his four beautiful daughters. Three of them are university graduates today and the last baby of the house is a sophomore. Two of the three graduates attended private universities, and the last girl is also in a private university. But the man who toiled to ensure the girls got good education is no more. This is a tragedy!

Travelling to Obibiezena to pay my last respect to a wonderful friend was an eye opener. I saw Adibs’ modest country home bungalow. I saw his bust, commissioned by Genevieve, his first daughter, with Adibs’ traditional ishiagwu cap. I dared him on several occasions to wear the cap to Igbo land, and I felt sad. I became sadder with the reality that Adibs’ 93-year-old mother was inside a room in the house while the rites of passage were being performed for the son who travelled home every month to attend to her!

The entire Obibiezena mourned Adibs! The wailing, when his body arrived for the traditional lying-in-state was infectious. The old, walking with the aid of walking sticks turned up. Everyone spoke well of the departed. When I was asked to talk to his Obibiezena Development Union (ODU) executive, I gave a new name to Adibs – Adáraníléadáraníta. It means he who is good both at home and outside. Adibs was. His people testified to his goodness, his kindness, his generosity and his commitment to the community. He was, for many years, the Secretary General of ODU!

Adibs was a devout Catholic. He never joked with his creator and faith. In his ‘mischief’ whenever we talked about our religious inclinations, he would ask: “Are you sure you are a Pentecostal or a penterascal?” Adibs had a deep voice, and he equally had a deep character. Like all humans, he had his flaws. But his greatest strength was his inability to betray a trust. He was dependable, he was reliable!

I could not bring myself to go near his grave as Adibs’ remains were lowered. Coincidentally, Adibs was buried under the same avocado tree he used to taunt his friends, anytime he was in the village saying: “I am sitting under the avocado tree.” Now, Adibs sits no more, he rests, permanently, under the avocado tree! Fare thee well, Adibs!

As we journeyed back to Benin, my mind was in far away Canada, where another friend and brother, Michael Adeleye, simply Mike, was being committed to mother earth.

The news of Mike’s demise was broken to me by another friend, Tunde Laniyan. I met the duo during my voyage to the corporate world. Mike adopted me as his elder brother and all through, he called me “Oga Suyi”. His respect for age and experience remain inimitable. There was no time of the day Mike could not call to ask: ‘Oga Suyi, ki ni kin se’ (Oga Suyi, what should I do?). Mike resigned and left for Canada with his family. I was in the know of the plan to relocate from incubation to fruition. And while over there, we maintained that line of communication.

On October 9, 2025, at about 3.09 pm Nigerian time, I sent a message to him thus: “Hello. How are my people? Can you get this book for me: “For One More Day”, a novel by Mitch Albom.” Six minutes later, Mike responded with a screenshot of the book and asked for confirmation, which I did. “Okay, I will order it now. I should get it latest tomorrow. Then we shall discuss how to send it to you.” He responded and the following day, he had the book.

After the initial plan of sending the book by hand through someone travelling to Benin failed, Mike put the book in the mail on November 1, 2025. At my last tracking shortly before I dropped off this piece, the information on the tracking platform was to the effect that the book is with the Nigeria Customs having been presented to the agency on November 20, 2025, at 11.04 am! The country we live in!

We kept chatting and then the news came. Mike is dead! How? What killed him? Just like that! Mike, gone like vapour! Mid this year, Mike called to announce that he had completed his house in Lagos. “Oga Suyi, it is your project o”, he gleefully announced. I answered by saying that I was looking forward to being hosted to a meal of pounded yam whenever his family visited Nigeria. Now, Mike is gone and gone forever! What is this life!

As I penned this, my mind raced to Mummy Oyin, Mike’s wife. The two were inseparable; they were more than a husband and wife. How is she coping, herself? What about the two beautiful daughters? Why should nature be this cruel! Mike was industrious. He had hopes and aspirations.

They caution us in Christendom not to mourn as unbelievers. I will keep to that doctrine.

Rest on Mike; sleep from all your labour! May the good Lord comfort your wife and children. Good night, Mike, fare thee well!

News

Okpebholo Presents ₦939.85bn ‘Budget Of Hope, Growth’ To Edo Assembly

Published

17 hours ago

December 16, 2025

Editor

Governor Monday Okpebholo of Edo State on Tuesday presented a ₦939.85 billion 2026 Appropriation Bill christened ‘Budget of Hope and Growth,’ to the state House of Assembly.

Presenting the budget, Okpebholo said the 2026 fiscal plan was carefully designed to build on the foundation laid in 2025, while expanding the reach of government programmes to directly impact the lives of Edo people across all sectors of the economy.

The governor said the budget prioritises critical areas of sustainable development, including security, infrastructure, agriculture, education, job creation and healthcare.

He stressed that his administration remains committed to delivering “development the people can see and feel.”the governor, the budget prioritises critical areas of sustainable development, including security, infrastructure, agriculture, education, job creation and healthcare, stressing that his administration remains committed to delivering “development the people can see and feel.”

A breakdown of the proposal shows a total expenditure of ₦939.85 billion, with capital expenditure standing at ₦637 billion, representing 68 percent of the budget, while recurrent expenditure is pegged at ₦302 billion, accounting for 32 per cent.

Okpebholo explained that the strong emphasis on capital spending reflects his administration’s determination to fast-track development through strategic investments in roads, schools, hospitals, water supply, housing and other high-impact economic projects across the state.

He disclosed that the 2026 budget would be funded through Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) estimated at ₦160 billion, Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) allocations projected at ₦480 billion, capital receipts and grants of ₦153 billion, ₦146 billion from Public-Private Partnerships (PPP), as well as other viable revenue windows available to the state.

The governor, who assured Edo residents that his government would not impose unnecessary financial burdens on citizens, noted that the administration would instead intensify efforts to strengthen revenue systems, block leakages and improve public finance management.

Under sectoral allocation, the economic sector received the largest share with ₦614.2 billion earmarked for agriculture, roads, transport, urban development and energy. Priority areas include rural and urban road construction, completion of two flyovers, drainage works, urban renewal, and expansion of farm estates and irrigation facilities.

The social sector was allocated ₦148.9 billion to cater for education, healthcare, youth development, women affairs and social welfare.

Planned interventions include extensive school renovations, recruitment and training of teachers, expansion of primary, secondary and tertiary healthcare facilities, as well as investments in youth skills, sports and entrepreneurship programmes.

For governance and service delivery, the administration sector received ₦157.7 billion to drive civil service reforms, staff training, deployment of digital tools, improved revenue collection systems, support for ministries, departments and agencies, and the full rollout of e-governance platforms.

The justice sector was allocated ₦19 billion to strengthen the courts, improve justice delivery and support legal reforms and access-to-justice programmes, while regional development and local government support will focus on grassroots empowerment, community road construction, rural electrification, water and sanitation projects, and security outposts in border communities.

Governor Okpebholo said the 2026 Budget of Hope and Growth is anchored on his SHINE Agenda, built on five pillars—Security, Health, Infrastructure, Natural Resources/Agriculture and Education—with the overarching vision of creating a prosperous and united Edo State where every citizen feels the impact of governance.