By Olukorede Yishau THERE ARE places we live in, and there are places that live in us. Houston, one of America’s many cities, is where I have called home since the first quarter of 2022. Lagos is a city in which I have spent substantial parts of my life. I have lived in different parts […]
By Steve Osuji They didn’t know that we knew. There was a popular joke of the 90s christened: they didn’t know that we knew. It is actually best rendered in Yoruba. The title, which is in itself hilarious in its native state is: Eyin o mo pe awa mo. Let’s attempt a go at the […]
By Chidinma Eferebo WHAT HAPPENS when a campaign promise leads to an election, but no one tracks it? The consequences go beyond public disappointment; they also show up in misplaced priorities, a lack of accountability, and delayed development. Nigeria has seen how swiftly political commitments disappear once the rallies are over. Following t...
By Owei Lakemfa Slinger Francisco, better known as Mighty Sparrow, the “Calypso King of the World”, flew away on September 27, 2026. He was ninety. CALYPSO MUSIC was invented in the seventeenth century by African slaves in Trinidad who had mainly been taken from the Ibibio, Efik and Igbo peoples in present-day Nigeria and Congo. [&...
By Olufunmilola ‘Funmie’ Aluko On any ordinary day, in any large city, the same moment plays out thousands of times. A woman calls her mobile network because her line has been barred and she cannot reach her children’s school. A man rings a hospital switchboard, trying to find out which ward his father has been […]
By Bola BOLAWOLE LAST THURSDAY’s kidnapping of two busloads of National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members said to be travelling from Ibadan, the Oyo state capital, to locations in Imo and Akwa Ibom states raised many troubling questions, one of which is the continued relevance, if any, of the NYSC scheme. I have asked that […]
By Bolanle BOLAWOLE When my alma mater, the University of Ife (aka “Great Ife”) was renamed Obafemi Awolowo University by the military junta of Gen. Ibrahim Babangida on May 12, 1987, it was as if a dagger was thrust into my heart. This is despite the fact that I had graduated five years earlier. Also, […]
By Owei Lakemfa LINDSAY CARLTON Eseoghene Barrett was a twenty-five-year-old Jamaican when he came from Britain to Nigeria in July 1966 on a few weeks’ visit. Those weeks have stretched to over sixty years, with the playwright, poet, journalist and photographer becoming one of the best-known Nigerians. He was eighty-five years on Septem...
By Babafemi Ojudu MY DEAR brother, Welcome home. Today, as Nigeria marks the anniversary of her independence, we are reminded that the promise of freedom must find meaning in the dignity, security and well-being of our people. I hope your time away has brought you some rest and renewed strength. The months ahead will test […]
By Steve Osuji IT IS a heinous crime to humanity no doubt. In ordered climes, he would be in jail already for vicarious economic malfeasance. Or at the least, he would be hounded into a one-way exile, never to return to the land he desecrated and abused exceedingly. Olawale Edun was Nigeria’s Minister of Finance […]
