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OPINION: Ooni, Alaafin And Yoruba’s Endless War

Published

4 months ago

September 1, 2025

By Lasisi Olagunju

A race of giants. The Yoruba had been producing monumental men and women long before Nigeria became a country. Professor Adelola Adeloye’s ‘African Pioneers of Modern Medicine’ (1985) has a list of eleven Nigerians who qualified as medical doctors between the 19th century and 1901. Ten out of the eleven were Yoruba. Check out their names and the dates they qualified: William Davies (1858), Nathaniel King (1874), Obadiah Johnson (1884), John Randle (1888), Orisadipe Obasa (1891), Leigh-Sodipe (1892), Oguntola Sapara (1895), R. Akinwande Savage (1900), C. C. Adeniyi-Jones (1901) and W. Cole (1901). Those are the Yoruba ten.

Chief Obafemi Awolowo, in his autobiography, described the Yoruba as “a fastidious, critical and discerning people.” As trailblazers, their enviable record of being pioneers goes beyond medicine; it is in every field. Again, look at these lines distilled from A. G. Hopkins’ ‘A Report on The Yoruba, 1910′ published in 1969: Henry Carr, born in Lagos in 1863, was the son of a freed slave with Egba provenance; he got a B.A. in 1885 with honours in mathematics and the physical sciences and played pivotal roles in early Lagos’ political life. Obadiah Johnson was the son of a liberated slave from Oyo who was born in Sierra Leone in 1849, took a B.A. in 1879, went back to school in England, qualified as a doctor in 1884 and returned to Lagos in 1886 to play great roles in the history of medical practice in Nigeria and in the cultural history of the Yoruba. Christopher Sapara-Williams, son of an Ijesha man with strong Egba connections, was born in Freetown in 1855. He was called to the English Bar in 1879 becoming the first Nigerian to become a lawyer. “He settled in Lagos in 1888, established a thriving legal practice, and became prominent in the political and social life of the town.” E. H. Oke was a senior official in the Legal Department of the Lagos government of the early 20th century. He authored ‘A Short History of the United Native African Church: Part 1, 1891 to 1903’ published in 1918. Adegboyega Edun (1860-1930) “was a Methodist minister and schoolmaster who became Principal of the Wesleyan Boys High School in Lagos from 1893 to 1902, when he was appointed Secretary to the Egba United Government. W. T. G. Lawson was the son of a (Yoruba) government interpreter in Sierra Leone. He qualified as a civil engineer and was Assistant Colonial Surveyor in Lagos from 1879 to 1886, when he retired from government service.” Of course, you and I know that Yoruba’s legacy of firsts was carried over into the 20th century; we are in the 21st and the facts are still here, notorious.

A people with this pedigree should normally be above petty squabbling. But that is not so with the Yoruba; they drop the elephant and go after crickets. You would want to ask what their problem is. My friend and Punch columnist, Abimbola Adelakun, told me yesterday that it was “the curse of enlightenment”; the afflicted knowing enough to paralyse themselves. They have the dubious blessing of what my teacher, Professor Adebayo Williams, recently described as a “squabbling and dissolute elite.” They routinely fight themselves over nothing.

On Monday, August 18, 2025, a needless statement was dispatched from Oyo to Ile Ife over a chieftaincy title given to an Ibadan man by the Ooni of Ife. Just as it happened in c1793 in Apomu market, the statement from Oyo has turned out the spark needed by those angling to rekindle the blaze that burnt the past.

The Yoruba are supposed to be the well-clothed moin moin, but they behave more like akara, naked and caked. They are daily exposed to the elements by their knack for division, friction and discord. They get bent and broken by what Vera Schwarcz calls the “accumulated weight of outworn habits.” It means very little that they are well-taught and knowledgeable with more than two centuries of advantage over their neighbours. They rarely collectively profit from their endowments. It is a curse.

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I am an Oyo-Yoruba. I have watched in horror as some Yoruba persons, self-interested actors, use the opportunity to say what had always been unsaid, and should be unsaid. You would think this house is another Tower of Babel, or the very abode of Eris, the Greek goddess of strife and chaos. Nothing that binds the family together has been left unquestioned. Some have even extended the war to the Yoruba language and its dialects. They sweat to define what is standard and substandard; what is superior and what is inferior and the implications for the users.

For 100 years (1793 to 1893), the Yoruba fought the Yoruba, neighbour plundered neighbour, brother sold brother into slavery. It took a superior power from outside, the British, to impose peace on that race of discord. If Nigeria disintegrates today and each ethnic group goes its way, the Yoruba will most likely resume their internecine wars almost immediately. That is my conclusion after weeks of watching and monitoring reactions to the unfortunate simmering supremacy spat between people who claim to support the palace of the Ooni of Ife and that of the Alaafin of Oyo, and their tributaries.

What I have seen and heard in the last three weeks evokes unsettling echoes of the Yoruba civil wars of the late 18th and the 19th centuries when obas, princes and generals turned their energies inward and left the nation vulnerable to external forces. You hear and read some comments and gasp. Even where you thought you would meet wisdom, you got there and saw its opposite sitting regal, holding court. You would think the resolution of a supremacy war between the Alaafin of Oyo and the Ooni of Ife is the elixir that would cure today’s security-sick Yoruba, fix their terribly bad roads and feed their hungry. They excitably keep the ember of war glowing. Wisdom has not whispered to those doing the fanning that when brothers waste their strength and dissipate energies fighting each other, strangers seize the inheritance. It happened in the 19th century. Then, as now, the struggle was less about destiny and deliverance; it was more about pride and prejudice with devastating consequences for the collective.

The Yoruba energy and intellect fascinated the white man right from the first contact. Gary Lynn Comstock of the University of Chicago Divinity School, USA, wrote in ‘The Yoruba and Religious Change’ (1979) that “of all the societies in sub-Saharan Africa, the Yoruba of south-western Nigeria are one of the most extensively studied native group.” Toyin Falola and Ann Genova in ‘Yorùbá Identity and Power Politics’ (2006) call our attention to the fact that as far back as “1897, Samuel Johnson wrote in the preface to his pioneer work, ‘The History of the Yorubas,’ (that) educated natives of Yorùbá are well acquainted with the history of England and with that of Rome and Greece…”

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They have all these, yet, they fight dirty in the mud like pigs. Their distant ancestors preached moderation even in ennobling pursuits. They told their young to “never stay too long on the farm like hopeless slaves (and) never stay too long at home like the miserably lazy.” But in matters of power and politics, they are extremists. Today as in the past, they fight civil wars and ignore the glaring reality of their present dire situation. More than it was 122 years ago, today’s Yoruba country is hemmed in by far graver existential challenges: economic, political, security, and a generational crisis of values. Yet, what excites their political and traditional elite is which antiquated throne is senior to, or more ‘imperial’ than others. Wisdom has not told the feuding race that to stoke embers of rivalry between two thrones that should embody unity and wisdom is to indulge in a needless diversion from the urgent work of survival and renewal.

Their fathers said “if we don’t forget the bickering of yesterday, we will have no playmate.” Yet, the Yoruba (groups) remain captive of their history of wars and bloody bickering. They worship the past and pour libations to exaggerated stories and histories. But we’ve been told that “all history is tendentious, and if it were not tendentious, nobody would write it. History is therefore never history, but history-for.” Hidemi Suganami, Professor of the Philosophy of International Relations, opens his ‘Stories of War Origins: A narrativist theory of the causes of war’ with that two-sentence quote. He credits the first sentence to R. G. Collingwood’s ‘The Idea of History’ (1994) and the second to C. Levi-Strauss’ ‘The Savage Mind (La Pensee sauvage)’, published in 1972. Both lines remind the reader of Robert Cox’s much-quoted statement: ‘Theory is always for someone and for some purpose.” And it leads me here to ask why the Yoruba people tell or write (or rewrite) their histories.

The Yoruba forget nothing and remember everything. Professor Toyin Falola, in his ‘A Research Agenda on the Yoruba in the Nineteenth Century’ (1988) notes this fact. He writes that “the twentieth century inherited some of the unresolved issues of the nineteenth century, notably problems of intergroup conflicts; competition for power among individuals and lineages; redefinition of functions and criteria for chieftaincy titles, etc.” He adds that “communities with turbulent experiences have continued to remember these in their relations with others.” What we’ve seen since the latest Oyo vs Ife ‘war’ of words has its root in those “unresolved issues of the nineteenth century.”

H. G. Wells wrote ‘The War That Will End War’ (1914). The title of that book was immediately applied to the First World War as “the war to end all wars.” But the Second World War started eleven short years after the first. The Yoruba started a civil war in 1878 and for the next 16 years killed and maimed one another. They boasted that the 16-year-war was the war to end all wars. They were wrong. The war has not ended, it is still on in 2025; you have it being fought in inter-communal skirmishes; in sub-ethnic and obaship supremacy contests.

I read R. C. C. Law’s ‘Yorubaland and its History’ and the reviews therein of ‘Yoruba Warfare in the Nineteenth Century’ by J. F. Ade Ajayi and Robert Smith; ‘Owu in Yoruba History’ by Akin Mabogunje and J. D. Omer-Cooper; ‘Revolution and Power Politics in Yorubaland 1840-1893; Ibadan expansion and the rise of Ekitiparapo’ by S. A. Akintoye; ‘The Political Development of Yoruba Kingdoms in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries’ by Peter C. Lloyd; and ‘Yoruba Towns and Cities: an enquiry into the nature of urban social phenomena’ by Eva Krapf-Askari. R. C.C. Law reviewed those works and zeroed in on Akintoye’s submission that the successful revolt of the north-eastern Yoruba (the Ekiti, the Ijesa, and the Igbomina) against the rule of Ibadan in 1878-93 determined “that no one Yoruba state would (again) attain the position of primacy earlier enjoyed by Oyo.” The present pushing and shoving should be read as an attempt to assert or put a lie to that determination.

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If you are implicated in this crisis that started three weeks ago, I urge that you calm down, reflect deeply and ask what benefits will accrue from this dog-eat-dog war of histories. In the present controversy as in all previous ones, I see manipulation and exploitation of history. I see attempts being “made to take political decisions which did not recognize the nineteenth-century changes.” I see history, particularly of the 19th century, being put to different uses by the disparate peoples and interests in Yorubaland. This insight is not mine; it belongs to Professor Falola who notes in the 1988 piece cited above, that “the ‘new Oyo empire’ of the twentieth century benefited from the achievements of the Old Oyo empire before the nineteenth century; (that) Ibadan suffered political decline because of the interpretation that it was a satellite of Oyo with rulers whose appointments were sanctioned by the Alaafin; (that) Ile-Ife ignored its military defeats and humiliation in the nineteenth century and quickly resorted to the Oduduwa myth to attain political prominence and (that) those who had no claim to previous glories, whether on the basis of pre-1800 power or myth, (have) adopted several other innovative strategies.

I am not done with the historian, Falola. He reminds us that in the last century, “traditions played a dominant role” in Yoruba politics, but often not in their purest sense. Rather, what different subgroups stressed were those aspects of history that could best serve their “sectarian and political advantages.” Thus, Ibadan, seeking legitimacy for the Olubadan title and later a crown, popularized the myth of Lagelu, an alleged Ife prince and founder of the city, even though, in Falola’s words, Ìbàdàn’s early settlers were “Oyo-Yoruba refugees.” Oyo itself, after relocating under Atiba to Ago Oja, downplayed the new order while clinging to the grandeur of the old. It still does. The Ijesa, for their part, highlighted their imperial past to assert superiority “over their neighbours (including Ife),” conveniently ignoring myths that would place them in a subordinate lineage to Ile-Ife. Ile-Ife,
as stated earlier, “ignored its military defeats and humiliation in the nineteenth century and quickly resorted to the Oduduwa myth to attain political prominence.” Across Yorubaland, even communities of relatively recent origin have invented traditions to trace their roots to Oduduwa, all in a bid to “derive certain political advantages.” Falola’s conclusion is that such “deliberate distortions of history and traditions” were strategies of survival in the turbulent eras of the past.

If 2025 feels like 1825 in crises and controversies, it would mean that two hundred years of Yoruba education and civilisation are a waste. Unprofitable exertions and meaningless supremacy contests between revered thrones repeat a dangerous cycle. The Yoruba elite should reflect and ask themselves if fetishising history and myths is the solution to insecurity and poverty that wrack their people’s present and imperil their survival. The wise does not fight himself. Enough should be enough.

News

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

Published

3 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.

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

Published

4 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!

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

Published

4 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.