Rejection is hard to accept, even more so from those who seem undeserving of the upper hand. For France and its former African colonies, this has led to bruised egos and impulsive actions that defy accountability.

To understand the depth of France’s roots in Africa, reference has to be made to the “Scramble for Africa” in the late 19th century, which saw European powers, including France, rapidly expand their territories. The Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 formalised this partitioning, allowing France to annex vast areas in West Africa, including present-day Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Benin, Guinea, Ivory Coast, and Niger Republic.

During this period, French policies were driven by economic interests, focusing on resource extraction and agricultural production. The imposition of heavy taxes and forced labour systems led to widespread dissatisfaction among local populations, as they were often exploited for their labour without adequate compensation or support.

Discontent began to manifest more visibly after World War I. The war had significant implications for colonial subjects; many Africans served in the French army but returned home with heightened expectations for rights and representation. Little of this was met. 

A similar pattern followed World War II as notable shifts in attitudes towards colonial rule began to spread. By the late 1950s, widespread protests and uprisings were triggered across French West Africa, culminating in a wave of independence movements.

Naturally, France backed off and could only play its hands on its former colonies from faraway Europe. Successes were recorded in some areas, like economic interventions, while other cultural tactics to ingrain France back into the hearts of citizens did not yield much fruit.

“Universally, a colonial policy can only have negative effects on those who suffer from it,” Barry Diawadou, a geopolitics and diplomacy expert based in Guinea, told TheCable.

“Colonisation consists of the domination of a culture, of a system of thoughts over another culture. From this postulation, which defines the reality of the phenomenon, no form of colonisation can have positive impacts, especially when we add time and demographic factors.

“French-speaking countries tend to compare French colonisation to English, German, Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch colonisation in Africa. From these comparisons, a trend emerges which establishes that French colonisation was the least successful in Africa.

“For example, in the concert of economic nations, apart from the French-speaking countries of the Maghreb, the most dynamic African economies remain the English-speaking countries.”

Diawadou said the relationship France had with its former territories was almost parasitic.

It was only a matter of time before the scales tipped against one of Europe’s strongest economies.

MACRON IN, ‘TERRORISM OUT’

France arguably maintained its distance in the face of the growing discontent, but not for long. Islamist militant groups began threatening the stability of the Sahel region, notably after the 2011 Arab Spring, with significant developments occurring in subsequent years. The Arab Spring was a wave of pro-democracy protests and uprisings that began in December 2010 and spread across the Middle East and North Africa. 

Soon, armed groups began to spread terror in the Sahel, killing hundreds and displacing thousands. Their sophisticated weapons were no match for armed forces maintained under weak budgets. 

The incursion saw Mali turn to France for help to combat the terrorists, with the primary goal of regaining control over territory and preventing further advances towards Bamako, the capital. France launched Operation Serval in January 2013 to achieve this.

Following the success of Operation Serval, which concluded in July 2014, France expanded its military presence in the region through Operation Barkhane, which commenced on August 1, 2014. This operation aimed to provide ongoing support to five Sahelian countries — Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Chad, and Mauritania — collectively known as the G5 Sahel. 

“France’s military presence was effective. It is not demeaning to recognise this,” Diawadou added.

“For a very long time, it was able to deter rebel attacks, intrusion, and the proliferation of armed groups in these former colonies. But it is true that with the implosion of Libya and the resulting circulation of weapons in the Sahelio-Saharan strip, terrorist incursions have literally reached their peak.”

Initially, French operations were welcomed, but as insecurity persisted and public dissatisfaction with local governments grew, many began to associate France with ineffective governance and continued violence. 

The military juntas that came to power in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger Republic often used anti-French rhetoric to legitimise their rule, portraying France as complicit in the failures of previous administrations. They framed their actions as a rejection of both corrupt leadership and foreign interference, particularly targeting France for its perceived role in perpetuating instability through its military presence. France’s condemnation of the coups and a demand that democracy return did not sit well with the junta leaders.

Soon, they began to eject French troops out of their countries, starting with Mali, which first sought the European country’s help, then to Burkina Faso, Niger, Chad. They turned to Russia and China for military and economic cooperation.

FAR-RIGHT POLITICAL IDEOLOGIES COMPOUNDING MATTERS

Late last year, Senegal and Ivory Coast, both democratic nations, joined the growing list of former French territories snipping ties with France after they announced in November their plans to expel French troops.

The announcement came as a shock considering that the countries did not have a “solid reason”, such as growing coups or worsening Islamist militants in their nations. 

Diawadou explained that the discontent grew from the growing far-right politics in France and its ideologies.

Diery Diagne, a journalist and disinformation researcher in Senegal, affirmed Diawadou’s position.

“The Senegalese are more and more developing sentiments of rejecting France,” Diagne told TheCable.

“Senegalese citizens are open to collaboration with all countries. But they want to see on the part of the partners that they respect the interest of Senegal,” she added, noting that Senegal’s turn away from France is to seek a “win-win” collaboration.

In many African nations, political movements have historically leaned towards leftist ideologies that emphasise socialism or anti-imperialism. Leaders often advocate for national sovereignty, economic independence from former colonial powers, and social equity.

Far-right parties, on the other hand, often emphasise nationalism, advocating for strict immigration controls and prioritising the interests of native populations over immigrants. 

With far-right politics emerging in France, particularly under the leadership of parties like the National Rally, a sharp discontent is stemming from concerns over the implications of immigration policies, human rights, and France’s historical relationships with its former colonies.

“Some cooperation agreements, particularly in economic matters, are considered far too unbalanced and not to the advantage of African countries,” Diawadou said.

“As examples, there are big gaps with the following topics: the purchase price of raw material, the local content issue, technology transfer, and the revenue sharing between partners.

“If you add the political climate in France and the feelings of Africans who feel rejected and deprived of their most basic rights in their quest to obtain housing and a job in France, you will easily understand why many Africans no longer believe in the French model and privileged cooperation with France. 

“Every day, African civil society observes and notes the decline in the rights of their peers in France, not only through the international media and certain French media, which clearly display their political positioning, but also through the stories of Africans on social networks.”

MACRON WIDENS DISTANCE WITH ‘UNGRATEFUL’ COMMENTS

While the rejection ripple has continued to spread, Macron has refused to take the hit.

In a speech to French ambassadors gathered at the Elysee Palace, the president described Sahelian leaders as ungrateful.

He said France was right in 2013 for its intervention to fight Islamist militants “even if those same states had now moved away from French military support”.

The French president dismissed the notion that his country had been kicked out of the Sahel region, insisting that France left after citizens decided that they no longer wanted to prioritise combating terrorism.

“France no longer belonged there because we are not at the beck and call of coup leaders,” he added.

He said Sahelian leaders forgot to thank France for combatting terrorism but expressed optimism that one day it would come.

Nina Wilen, an analyst at the Belgian Egmont Royal Institute for International Relations, said Macron’s remarks were likely a strategic error.

“It’s hard to know whether these are thought-through comments.” Wilen said, “or whether it’s something that he wants to get out there because he feels that it’s the correct thing to do.”

“But, for sure, there are quite a few French officials and military officers who are working hard to shed the image that France has in Africa as an arrogant former colonial power.

“Comments like these made by Macron really undermine their efforts in doing this.”

Last week’s ascension to the Alaafin of Oyo throne by then Prince Abimbola Akeem Owoade courted tremendous ruckus in Yorubaland. Why would an unseen Ifa deity and its cloudy, ancient system of divination choose an Alaafin? Implicated in the back-and-forth that followed was 92-year old Ògúnwán̄dé Abím̄bọ́lá, professor of Yoruba language and literature and one-time vice chancellor of the University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University. In 1981, a conclave of Ifa priests in Yorubaland anointed Abimbola as the Àwísẹ Awo Àgbàyé (World Ifa Priest). He was then investitured by the late Ooni of Ife, Oba Okunade Sijuwade.

It was to this man I headed on Sunday, January 12. Àwísẹ had given a 1pm appointment for an interview session to which me and two newspaper editor friends of mine – Lasisi Olagunju and Saheed Salawu – responded.

In one week or so, the fierce war between tradition and modernity became manifest. Where else could the war be waged other than Oyo Alaafin, a place which prides itself as the locus of traditional Yoruba society? Oyo was the centrifugal point where traditional power, culture, language, history collaged. When those powers were collapsed by British forces, Oyo manifested how the vapour of the powers drifted away. It was home to traditional heritage, political authority, power and influence. The power of its monarchy was awesome. Today, Oyo is a fragile carcass of the awesome and imposing Oyo Empire founded in the late 14th or early 15th century. That empire grew, in the words of historians, to become “the largest and most powerful of the forest states of West Africa.”

From its Old Oyo, located somewhere in the Savannah below the bend of the River Niger in the Bussa-Jebba area which was abandoned in 1835, Oyo showcased an extremely impressive internal organization, imposing military strength with the Alaafin as an Emperor. Alaafin, who was the sole king in Yoruba land, reigned over a vast empire. He was the sole king to bear the appellation, ‘His Imperial Majesty’, had governors called Ajele in all the regions. These governors ruled as suzerains from areas that extended as far as to the Popos, Dahomey, and parts of Ashanti, with portions of the Tapas and Baribas. Dahomey is in the present Benin Republic. The Alaafin also had Ilari, messengers who kept the Ajele in check from excessive wielding of power.

Àwísẹ himself affirmed the traditional truism which says that, one major way to ascertain the potency of one’s Ogun deity is to hit its metal insignia on the head. Unbeknown to Abimbola, that was what he literally did. On arriving at the ancient city of Oyo, how could his home be located? The Ifa priest merely told the journalist, “just tell anyone in Oyo town that you’re heading to my house.” The priest was dead right. “Follow me” was the simple retort from an Okada rider when asked for the description of the Ifa priest’s abode. In few minutes, we were inside an expansive compound which, from its outside, you needed not being told you were in the home of a quintessential traditional worship czar.

Oyo had been very cool this Sunday. It was oblivious to the social media uprising over its new king. As you drove past Ibadan, the state capital city, you felt the flavour of driving northwards in the air. The mangrove receded, giving way to an arid temperature and weather. A few kilometres from Oyo, a heap of dirt by the roadside confronted you, shattering the sanity of the beautiful forest zone. In this particular place, you could feel the texture of absent environmental enforcement and a people sworn to a life of filth. Then, a long file of articulated vehicles lined the highway, with northern traders surrounding this particular roadside. These telltale signs announced that our northern brothers hibernated there. They were dead to the stench of the heaps of filth and the diseases they harbour. They were almost indistinguishable from their dirty heaps.

Drummers welcome guests into what looked like Abím̄bọ́lá’s own palace. And a black statue, presumably of the Ifa priest, sat regally in the expansive compound, dead to the curious stares onlookers give it. The compound itself was home to a number of houses. It was built like a typical African family compound – agbo ile – with houses within it. The only difference is that this compound comprises semi-modern apartments.

Promptly, we were ushered into the Àwísẹ Awo Àgbàyé’s own section of the compound. He sat regally on a black-coloured elevated chair that mimics a king’s stool. He was dressed in an all-white attire, a brown native cap clinging to his low-cut grey-haired head. He had a dangling ring of coloured beads on his neck, with an elephant tusk-like traditional Ifa priest whisk, an insignia of office called Iroke, which he held in his hand. He flung this momentarily as the whisk makes a whooshing noise. Three white-headed effigies surrounded his seat, sitting regally on the terrazzoed sound. Once in a while, Awise dashed out to attend to the milling crowd of Ifa devotees who needed his attention, like the Oluwo of Oke and Isale Oyo. His brisk sprint, which belied his 92-year age, was an awesome spectacle to behold. His wife, a Causasian Ifa priestess, Iyanifa Ajisebo (one vast in daily spiritual offering and sacrifices) Mcllwaine, sat on the next black chair to him, pounding glibly on a Mic laptop. She occasionally lent her voice to conversations, especially when her husband demanded affirmation of a particular anecdote.

At a time, some Ifa priests divining within the premises came to ask Àwísẹ about a divination process and Iyanifa Ajisebo offered to go bring her own divination ring (opele) and Àwísẹ’s to the priests so as to aid their divination process. The living room was over-decorated with photographs hung on its walls. Abimbola’s parents’, as well as ones he took with Alaafin Lamidi Adeyemi, Oba Okunade Sijuwade, late Ooni of Ife, Pope Benedict, Deoscóredes Maximiliano dos Santos, alias Mestre Didi of Brazil and many more photographs majestically flaunted the fact that we were in the home of an iconic man of history.

Even at 92 years of age, a scholar of reputable intellectual prowess and achievements, who was vice chancellor and senator, Abimbola still mirrored the humility that his Yoruba race was known for. When he returned from his occasional dashing out which punctuated our interview session, at each of his returns, Abimbola bowed to his audience, all of whom his children were older than, mouthing the deep Yoruba greeting, “e ku ikale o”.

Professor Abimbola told us how he began divination and how he was taught by a Baba Lejoogun in Akeetan, Oyo, as well as how he was almost beaten by his colleague senators one day at the federal parliament. “It was God that prevented them from beating me. They could have beaten me but for who I am. O si ye, o bo, eegun o gbodo na babalawo” (It is beyond them; a masquerade must not beat a Babalawo).” he said. When asked what if they had beaten him, he said so little but so much, “Beat me? Parara l’ewe koko o ya. Parara (cocoyam leaf gets torn terribly; terribly is cocoyam leaf torn)” he replied.

On his role in the choice of the Alaafin, Baba Abimbola said: “I did not insist on the choice of the candidate, the kingmakers approved him. It turned out that the candidate is a good man when his file was presented. We did the divination a long time ago and as an academic, I wrote a 21-page report on the divination process. When they called me four or five days ago, I asked for the report. They said maybe it was with the governor and things like that. They asked if I remembered the name of number one (the first candidate). ‘But I wrote a 21-page report! Then I sent for my wife, with whom I carried out the divination process…She fished out a copy of the report. I did not choose the Alaafin, the kingmakers did. Ifa chose the person and they approved him. They expressed satisfaction with the choice. Maybe they had been scrutinizing him all this while to find out if he had done something wrong in a previous workplace or committed any kind of wrong before.”

We were then interjected by a group of Ifa worshipers who came to pay obeisance to the Awise. They laid prostrate on their bellies while the Awise prayed for them, flinging his Iroke intermittently, “Ifa will fight for us… We will not fall into calamity. I pay respect to you. As we live to see this year, all of us and our families will celebrate more on earth”, which he said in Yoruba as “Ifa o se’gbe fun wa o… Aa ni si se. Mo gba fun yin o. As’odun yi, a o se’min t’omo t’omo, t’aya t’aya,” he prayed. Then he punctuated the prayers with the poetry that accompanies Ifa divination. Its alliteration, rhyme and onomatopoeia were fascinating and the rhythm enchanting to listen to. Awise, with a mellifluous voice, then began to chant the poetry of Ifa, which to a non-initiate sounded like gibberish

“Kekenke l’awo kekenke, gegenge l’awo gegenge,

A d’ifa fun Orimonike omo atorunke waye.

Ifa moo ke mi, o ge mi o; gege l’adiye nke’yin…”

At any point the Awise’s reference came to someone who had departed, a sobriety instantly overwhelmed him and his head dropped on his chest. For instance, when he referenced Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezeife, an SDP governor of Anambra State, he said he heard Ezeife had ‘gone to the Ogun deity shrine’ – “Idi Ogun” – Ifa diviners’ own way of euphemizing death and the dead.

Abimbola, the teacher, spent every minute of this session doing what he knew how to do best. While explaining how the former governor of Ogun State, Olusegun Osoba, attempted to bring sanity into the scramble for the Senate Majority seat of the Third Republic senate, as the Awise mentioned “Osoba” he taught all gathered that the pronunciation we were used to was faulty. “Oso,” he said, was the name of a deity, so the name is Oso-ba, just like Oso-nimore, the name of another deity, he said.

When asked why he doesn’t take alcohol, Abimbola had an Ifa poetry which named alcohol and all its local variants Oguro, emu and oti as “amuwagun eni,” – refiner of character. In other words, said the priest, Ifa does not frown at alcohol but hates over-indulgence in its consumption.

Abimbola said there was no knowledge that is as in-depth as the Ifa corpus in the world. It is a knowledge, he said, that is taught to a youngster for 20 years. Odu Ifa, he said, is 256 and the story in each of the Odu is 800. Thus, to know the stories in Ifa, you will need to multiply 256 by 800. “For example, in a university, if a postgraduate student wants to write a paper on everything Ifa says on cockroach, the student may need to visit about 20 babalawos, because the stories that Ifa tells on cockroach may be about one thousand. Stories on worm may be two thousand, and stories on a particular bird like Opeere may be one thousand. Ifa is a compendium of the experience of Yoruba people throughout the ages; experience about animals, trees and various mountains, about forests, about fish, about seas, about us, humans. It’s a whole library. This is the same Ifa that they are trying to extinguish, but it will not become extinguished in my lifetime.

“If Ifa becomes extinct, it is we, the Yoruba, that go extinct. There are no other people in the world who have the like of it. What they may have is part of what has been written down. I will tell you the reason why our forefathers did not write things down. If one begins to write things down, one’s mind will not be sharp again to remember. Writing things down may is an enemy of memory. People around the world invite me to come and give talks. Pope Benedict XVI invited me three times. He once invited me alongside other religious leaders from Japan, India, Russia, Syria, as well as the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Jewish religious leader,” he said.

By now, we had spent close to four hours of literally worshipping by the feet of Àwísẹ Awo Àgbàyé. We didn’t want to let go of one another. Baba Abimbola thoroughly enjoyed our first-time acquaintance while we relished his. He left a statement that rang in my subconscious as we prostrated in obeisance to him, ready to leave his home, his Iroke flaffing in salute. “Yoruba are standing by as they want to leave us in ruins – Won fe pa wa run l’e nworan!”, he shouted, his voice laced with a genuine agony. “Identity walks on two legs like a human being,” he said again, and continuing, Abimbola told us, “If they take Ifa, our identity, away from us, they have taken Yoruba from the face of the earth”. Awise then recited a traditional Ijala poetry chant of an uncle of his named Adeyemo, who he said, as far back as 1945, lamented that the culture, religion and language of Yoruba people were going extinct. Adeyemo, said Awise, described the potential collapse of Yoruba language, culture, religion and ways of life as “Kungu fo!” It was too dense for me to attempt an interpretation.

As we bade Awise bye, on the verge of leaving the ancient Oyo town, we prayed to Ifa to help us see Awise again so that we could drink, yet again, from the purity of his brooks of ancient knowledge and wisdom.

Colonial occupation and domination prospered by abducting and liquidating the most vocal Africans. Those whom it drove into exile were lucky. Sir Evelyn Baring invented the manual on this form of predation as governor of colonial Kenya for seven years until 1959. Six decades after independence, the man who rode to power in Nairobi two years ago by promising to make Kenya great again is unapologetically reprising Sir Evelyn’s manual minus the internment camps.

In June 2021, Abubakar Malami, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and Nigeria’s Federal Attorney-General, announced with some relish that Nnamdi Kanu - self-proclaimed leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) - had been returned to Nigeria after being “intercepted” in an un-named location. Malami had initiated the prosecution of Mr Kanu in 2015 for treason. In April 2017, the courts granted bail to Kanu. Five months later, he disappeared from public view after soldiers raided his country home in Abia State in south-east Nigeria leading to scores of fatalities. The following month, Mr Kanu was reportedly sighted in Jerusalem.

The circumstances of Mr Kanu’s return to Nigeria in 2021 degenerated quickly from mystery to controversy. The International Criminal Police Organisation (INTERPOL), whom Nigeria initially credited with assistance in the “interception”, firmly denied any involvement in the operation.
When he announced the “interception” of Mr Kanu, Attorney-General Malami claimed that it was accomplished by the “collaborative efforts of Nigerian intelligence and security services.” In October 2022, however, Nigeria’s Court of Appeal found as a fact that Mr Kanu “was in Kenya; was abducted therefrom and there were no extradition proceedings undertaken before his forcible abduction.”

Kenya unconvincingly denied involvement in the abduction. Very importantly, however, the Government of Kenya (GOK) offered no protest against what, was a spectacular violation of its sovereignty. The conclusion had to be that the GOK authorised Mr Kanu’s abduction from its territory. Prior and subsequent conduct by the GOK provide ample evidence to support this.

On 2 February 2018, operatives of Kenya’s security services used explosives to gain entrance into the premises of former student leader and lawyer, Miguna Miguna, from where they abducted him into detention incommunicado. After several days of keeping him out of circulation, they drove Dr Miguna to the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi, where they declared him a “prohibited immigrant” and deported him to Canada.

As a prominent student leader during the regime of President Daniel Arap Moi in the 1980s, Miguna was exiled to Canada. From there he sought several times without success, to renew his Kenyan nationality documents. Canada eventually granted him refugee status and he travelled initially under documentation provided by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees before eventually being forced to acquire Canadian nationality.
Upon returning to Kenya in 2007, Dr Miguna enrolled as a lawyer; served as senior adviser to the Prime Minister and subsequently ran for high public office. It was not in dispute that his parents were Kenyans or that he was Kenyan by birth and descent. In a decision on 14 December 2018, the High Court of Kenya found that the government of Kenya abducted and deported Dr Miguna “despite court orders directing that he be produced in court,” noting that “it is inconceivable that the state can deport its own citizen to a second country without due regard to the constitution and the law.”

William Ruto was Kenya’s Vice-President when Mr Kanu and Dr Miguna were abducted. In 2022, he became president.
On 16 November 2024, leading Ugandan opposition politician, Dr Kiza Besigye, who was in Nairobi to attend the launch of a book by former Kenyan Justice Minister and senior lawyer, Martha Karua, disappeared. Five days later, he surfaced before a military tribunal in the custody of the Uganda Peoples Defence Force (UPDF) on fanciful charges of illegal possession of firearms. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, expressed shock at “the abduction of Ugandan opposition politician Kiza Besigye on 16 November 2024 in Kenya and his forcible return to Uganda.”

Dr Besigye’s experience was not the first abduction of Ugandan opposition in Kenya. In July 2024, Kenya’s security services similarly snatched 36 members of Dr Besigye’s Forum for Democratic Change (FDC) who were in the country for a meeting and expelled them to Uganda into the arms of the UPDF, who promptly charged them with “terrorism” before a military tribunal. The United Nations later expressed concern that President Museveni’s practice in Uganda of charging civilians before military tribunals was “in contravention of the country’s obligations under international human rights law.”

In October 2024, Kenyan authorities similarly abducted seven Turkish refugees and refouled them back to Turkey into the arms of the government that had exiled them.
In the period since the anti-Finance Bill protests in the country from June to December 2024, Kenya’s National Human Rights Commission has reported the abduction and disappearance of at least 82 persons. Some of the abducted have turned up dead. When young people in Nigeria protested two months after their colleagues in Kenya, the Nigerian government decided to borrow a leaf from President Ruto’s playbook.

Back in Nairobi, one of the victims of these abductions by the GOK was Leslie Muturi. His father, Justin Bedan Muturi was Cabinet Secretary (Minister) for Public Service in President Ruto’s government. Around June 22, 2024, Leslie Muturi disappeared. At the time, his father, Justin, was the Attorney-General of Kenya and sat in the National Security Council with the Director of National Intelligence Service, Noordin Haji.

In the past week, Justin Muturi has narrated how his effort to locate his son took him through the entrails of the High Command of Kenya’s deep state to the presence of his boss, President Ruto, who ordered Noordin Haji to release Leslie. Less than an hour thereafter., Leslie returned to his family.
Justin Muturi’s clinical account of what transpired in the disappearance of his son clearly establishes the culpability of Kenya’s president and the security high command under him in resuscitating a culture of state-sponsored abductions redolent of the worst excesses of Sir Evelyn Baring’s colonial era abuses.
After denying culpability last November, President Ruto promised on 28 December 2024 to end the abductions, in effect admitting state complicity. Two days later, the continental human rights body of the African Union expressed “profound alarm over reports of abductions and enforced disappearances in Kenya.”

Less than a fortnight into the New Year, Tanzania’s leading independent journalist, Maria Sarungi Tsehai, survived an abduction from a shopping mall in Nairobi. Ms Tsehai and her family have been exiled in Kenya for over four years. Maria was lucky. Two years earlier, Kenyan police officers murdered exiled Pakistani journalist, Arshad Sharif, in Nairobi. Despite a court order and appeals by the United Nations, his killers continue to escape accountability.

When they re-established the East African Community in 1999, the original partner states in East Africa - Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda - desired to advance transactional life and spaces in the region. Under current leadership, however, these states are now using regional integration to advance the expendability of African civic and transactional life. They are collaborating across inter-state borders to liquidate critics and perceived enemies and make their lives precarious.
It seems clear that these abductions in Kenya are taking place under the direct command of the government or, even more frightening, have been outsourced to non-state actors acting under the authority and protection of the State. The latter may explain the intractable nature of the abductions and the inability of Ruto’s GOK to bring the crime under control despite the assurances of the President and the escalating diplomatic costs and investment runs.

This was hardly what Kenyans or the rest of Africa hoped for when the people chose President Ruto’s vision of a “hustler” nation over the other options in Kenya’s 2022 presidential election. The only hustle now under his watch is the hustling of innocent citizens and visitors into enforced disappearance and exile. Sir Evelyn must feel exceedingly proud of William Ruto from the comfort of his grave.

A lawyer and a teacher, Odinkalu can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

With only 15 months left for banks to meet the deadline for the new share capital benchmarks, the Central Bank has warned that the March 2026 deadline will not be shifted. Speaking to this writer, a CBN director said, ‘’the idea of extension or shift of the deadline does not arise. They were given more than two years to meet the new threshold, and by our calculations, that is enough time. We are not contemplating an extension’’. So far, of Nigeria’s 36 lenders, only Access Holdings has concluded the capital raising exercise, bringing in a little over N351 billion from its Rights Issue of 17.772 billion shares that sold for N19.75 per share. The offer closed in August. With this, Access Bank has thus become the first to meet the CBN’s N500 billion minimum capital requirements for Banks with International Authorization well ahead of the March 2026 regulatory deadline. The bank’s share capital would increase to N600 billion, N100 billion above the regulatory minimum requirement.

 For the other 35 banks, the next one year will be a crowded and busy period. A few have gone far while many others are yet to make appreciable progress. Some like the other four tier one lenders – GT; UBA; First Bank and Zenith – have already announced their offers, but are yet to conclude the process, others, especially the small regional and some national banks are still lagging behind. There have been a host of challenges, though, even among the big ones. FBN Holdings, the parent company of First Bank, has had its programme slowed down considerably by Boardroom crisis. The long drawn battle between Femi Otedola and Oba Otudeko for the control of the company has just been settled, with Otedola emerging chairman of the holding company. While Zenith Bank has had to juggle both capital raising with reconstituting itself into a holding company at the same time, GT Bank has just survived a major service disruption and customer backlash due to migration to a new IT platform.

 To meet the new capital requirement, the banks are expected to go for public offers; rights issues; private placements; mergers and acquisitions or a combination of these. In terms of mergers and acquisitions, there are indications that two banks, Providus and Unity, are in talks to merge together. Both are national banks, but with a combined market share of less than 20 per cent in terms of deposit liabilities. Providus has a huge Lagos State shareholding just as Northern State governments hold huge interests in Unity Bank. ‘’That’s the only discussions in the market for now for mergers and acquisition; but I won’t be surprised if more candidates join the discussions in the next few months’’, said a senior executive of a bank.

 Younger and better managed banks seem to be doing better generating new capital. Nixon Iwedi, executive director of Globus Bank said his bank is on track to meet the deadline. ‘’We are raising N150 billion through a private placement and Rights Issue. The first has been successfully completed and we are on the second phase now’’, he said, noting that they prefer to approach the process in a rather quiet and restrained manner. Globus has a national license and the minimum for this category is N200 billion.

 For Access Holdings, the process has become quite a momentous. It has become the first Nigerian financial holding company to successfully execute a fully digital Rights Issue embracing the power of technology to improve access to equity capital market. By leveraging the NGX’s E-offer platform, the company provided its shareholders with a convenient and efficient subscription process, leading to the participation of many of its retail shareholders in addition to institutional investors. Speaking on the successful offer, Board Chairman Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede, said: “The Access brand has always resonated strongly with the local and international capital markets. Since 2004, Access Bank has raised billions of dollars in capital to meet successive CBN recapitalization directives. We are pleased that this time we are the first to breast the tape. The success of the Rights Issue demonstrates the resilience of Nigeria’s capital market and reinforces our shareholders confidence in the present value and potential of our company’’.

 While a few banks are already set on a course of action to meet the deadline, many others are still weighing their options. As a CEO pointed out to me, ‘’it is too early to understand the options that they would explore. It would become clearer as we get into the second half of 2025’’.

Nonetheless, the Nigerian capital market has once again demonstrated capacity and depth to meet the expectations of investors, issuers and professionals. We saw this during the indigenization programme of Gen. Yakubu Gowon; the privatization programme of Gen. Babangida and the consolidation programme of President Obasanjo. Its mutualization a decade ago also signified the market’s ability to adapt to change.

We wish to clarify that the recent adjustment in our ex-depot price of Premium Motor Spirit (Petrol) is directly related to the significant increase in global crude oil prices. As crude remains the primary input in the production of PMS, any fluctuation in its international price inevitably impacts the cost of the finished product. At Dangote Petroleum Refinery, we recognise the critical importance of affordable fuel for all Nigerians, and we remain committed to offering the best value with guaranteed quality to our customers. While we have made a 5% adjustment to our ex-depot price from N899.50 to N950 per litre, it is important to note that this increase is considerably lower than the 15% rise in global crude oil prices, which has seen Brent Crude rise from $70 to $82 in a matter of days, in addition to the premium for Nigerian crude (approximately $3 per barrel) in international markets. Furthermore, Dangote Refinery has maintained the Single-Point Mooring (SPM) ex-vessel price at N895 per litre.

All our partners, including Ardova, Heyden, and MRS Holdings, will offer petrol to Nigerians at a retail price of N970 per litre nationwide. We have absorbed the increased logistics costs to guarantee uniform pricing across the 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

Dangote Refinery has absorbed approximately 50% of the cost increases in the international oil market. This is due to our unwavering commitment to quality and affordability, as well as the ownership of the refinery by Nigerians, which remain central to our mission. If Dangote Refinery were to pass on the entire increase in the price of crude oil to the market, the retail price of PMS would be approximately N1,150 to N1,200 per litre in some locations, compared to the current price of N970 per litre.

We are committed to providing reliable, top-quality petrol to the Nigerian people at competitive prices. In these challenging times, we continue to prioritise the best interests of Nigerians, striving to shield consumers from the full impact of global price volatility while adapting to evolving market conditions. 

We sincerely appreciate the continued trust and support of Nigerians as we strive to deliver the best value for their money and contribute to the development of a self-sufficient economy that is resilient to international price fluctuations.

In the interest of transparency and good governance, Dangote Refinery will commence publishing its ex-depot price, ex-vessel price as well as pump price on a weekly basis so that consumers are not exploited.

We would like to express our gratitude to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for the introduction of the visionary Naira for Crude Initiative. This groundbreaking initiative has enabled consistent access to high-quality PMS for all Nigerians, while also insulating the Nigerian consumers from the volatility of the global oil market. 

Anthony Chiejina,

Group Chief Branding and Communications Officer

Democracy offers citizens the choice to freely make political decisions by majority rule. It was defined by Abraham Lincoln as government of the people by the people and for the people. This concept of representative government has been positioned as the best and globally accepted. Where democracy works, it is people-centred. Citizens wield absolute powers to choose who leads in every tiers of government. To this end, people are at liberty to vote any candidate of their choice without let or hindrance. United States of America, Britain and most European countries  practice this form of government and have been at the fore front of ensuring that this ideology takes over global governments. 

However, some countries have no regard for the western kind of democracy. They have developed home grown system of government peculiar to their needs, aspirations and it serves their purpose better. From available development indices and statistics, those countries are making tremendous progress despite the fact that democracy has nothing to do with their system. China has confounded the world and demystified the notion that democracy is the best form of government. What Africa needs is her peculiar form of home grown democracy to function optimally.

The proponents of democracy as the best form of government hinged their argument on the following principles governing the practice. First, sovereignty of the people. The people wield absolute power to determine who occupies any elective position and govern them through their votes. Second, equality before the law. People are equally protected by the law regardless of their status in the society. The law treats everybody – young, old, male and female, rich or poor same. 

Third, majority rule. This is a democratic principle which gives the power to make decisions to the group with highest numbers in the community. It is a social choice rule which permits that when comparing two options, the one preferred by more than half should be considered. Fourth, upholding of minority rights. It upholds legal provisions in democracy intended to recorgnise and accommodate the distinctive needs of non-dominant ethnic or racial groups. Fifth, guarantee of basic human rights. Democracy makes the protection of the fundamental freedoms and rights of all people paramount - this includes right to life; freedom from slavery, torture and freedom of expression. 

Sixth, free, fair and credible elections. Democratic practice ideally offers an election comparatively devoid of coercion and manipulation. No rigging, snatching of ballot boxes, shutting down the iREV portal or killing. Seven, rule of the law. It is a state where citizens elect their own leaders and the government itself is bound by the law while also helping to ensure that the law is respected among citizens of the state.  Eighth, constitutional limits on government. These are democratic legal and institutional restrictions on the power of the government. They are intended to protect the rights of individuals and minorities. 

However, the pitfall of African democracy is evident in the manipulation of electoral system and crooked leadership recruitment process. This has led to abysmal level of development in all sectors across the continent. The imposed version of democracy obtainable in Africa runs short of true representative government. It is a colonial-legacy nailed to the necks of African countries. 

Suffice it to say that, the challenges confronting Africa is erected on the weak pillars of her democracy driven by external forces of neo-colonialism. Many Africans have come to the realisation that what is obtainable is akin to voodoo practice tailored to satisfy more of the interest of colonial masters than that of the citizens. This common African democratic system offers the neo-colonialists opportunities to rule by proxy through their anointed rich and powerful puppets who represent their overall interests. 

Many African leaders who fit into the above description were/are largely made up of leadership charlatans without character or integrity. They are ready to negotiate away their countries for any amount. Despite the above shortcomings, the colonial powers who cannot tolerate such misgivings in their countries continue to romance and sustain such leaders. The reigns of such leaders only end with military interventions as seen recently or when their people rise and disgrace many of them out of office.  

While, the early African democratic processes were beset with naivety, fraud, corruption and electoral irregularities leading to military interventions; the trend has remained the same over the years. The colonial masters pretend to nurture democracy in Africa but they simply manipulate the process to suit their whims. This has led to failure to produce the rightful winners through transparent electoral choices and processes. Who could boldly assert that what is obtainable in Africa and nay Nigeria is ideal democracy? 

The electoral processes are marred by obvious state or externally sponsored irregularities to favour certain candidates. They are blatantly flawed and manipulated. With the connivance of some developed countries what is seen as democracy is a selective appointment of their favourites to political offices in the name of election. Nigeria and nay almost African nations have got people with leadership qualities to transform their countries but they are frustrated. The corrupt electoral system gives them no chance. At every electoral recruitment process, they are either rigged out using the electoral umpires, security agencies and even the judiciary. 

This disappointedly threw up unpopular figures as leaders who are often forced down the throat of citizens. No time in Nigeria’s political history was the best elected into office. It was deliberately orchestrated to perpetually make Nigeria non-functional. Early in the life of the country, the so-called owners of Nigeria were quite aware that Chief Obafemi Awolowo and Nnamdi Azikiwe were both better leaders than Shehu Shagari but they lost eventually in a keenly contested election to a neophyte through a manipulated process. One wonders why election observers from the west and Europe always spend time and money to monitor and ensure supposedly free and fair elections when they sit on the fence in the face of obvious electoral irregularities whenever they release their reports. 

No matter how beautiful democracy is burnished, it represents nothing more than scrap-colonial-legacies, a transition of old feudal and oligarchical systems indirectly imposed on the people as the best form of government. Time has proven that good leadership does not necessarily evolve from democracy. The resounding ovation President of Burkina Faso - Ibrahim Traore received in Ghana as he attended the inauguration of President John Mahama was a pointer to the fact that what people desire are service, patriotic and committed leaders who proffer solutions through developmental strides for the common good. All African leaders who are products of democracy in attendance were jolted at the acceptance and warm reception of a man who is not in their ideological league. This should serve as a lesson and a moment of sober reflection for African leaders who think every election cycle which they will rig to win or sit tight is more important and a reflection of democracy or good governance. 

Sunday Onyemaechi Eze, lecturer Department of Mass Communication and Head Internationalisation and Partnership, Coal City University, Enugu State.

Nduka Obaigbena Leads ARISE News Teams to Washington DC for Trump Inauguration and then to Davos for World Economic Forum 

Led by Chairman and Editor-in-Chief Nduka Obaigbena, at the invitation of a former ARISE News Staff who is now a Trump Surrogate, the ARISE team landed in Washington DC for a robust coverage of Donald Trump's inauguration as the United States 47th President. The ARISE team includes Ohi Odiai, Adefemi Akinsanya ( who flew in from Turkey) and Opeyemi Adenihun. 

ARISE will give you a blow-by-blow account of events as they occur - in the spotlight and behind the scenes.  

Meanwhile, ARISE News Anchors, Rotus Oddiri, Adesuwa Omoruan and Ivica Babic have landed in Davos for on-the-spot coverage of global business leaders at the World Economic Forum annual gathering where Vice President Kashim Shetima is leading the Nigerian economic team.

Stay tuned to ARISE News platforms to get all the latest news.

ARISE News is the world’s standout news channel and broadcaster from Africa.

He is not just a deputy of the gods, he is the father and mother of death, the offspring of perdition, of metaphysical ruination and wanton loss. His suzerainty over Oyo Empire in its glory days was the stuff of which legends have been made. The long list of his forebears and their unique individual legacies beggar belief. He is the Alaafin, the king of Oyo, “owner of the palace”.

Now, things are quieter in the capital city of the Yoruba empire, no thanks to the rude intervention of British colonialists whose contempt of the traditional institution was exemplified in their classifying the seat of the African traditional ruler as a “stool” instead of a “throne”. Unfortunately, many scholarly Africans still carry on with this insult.

Pedigree is everything in Yoruba philosophy of life. A mango tree will never produce guava. An elephant will never beget a rat. The Alaafin of Oyo’s ancestry is traced to Oduduwa, the famed progenitor of the Yoruba race.

Forebears

The Oyo Empire was not a purely hereditary monarchy, nor an absolute one. The Oyo Mesi selected the Alaafin. He was not always closely related to his predecessor, although he had to be a descendant of Oranmiyan royal family.

The Brave And The Bold

In the past, the Alaafin’s eldest son usually succeeded his father on the throne. This sometimes led the crown prince, known as the Aremo, to hasten the death of his father. To prevent that, the traditional authorities enacted a law for the crown prince to be made to commit ritual suicide upon his father’s death. This practice was the subject of Wole Soyinka’s “Death and the King’s Horseman”.

The founding of Oyo is estimated to have happened around 1300. The kingdom has had a storied past. In the beginning before history was born, Oduduwa’s son, Oranmiyan, was the first Alaafin. He was succeeded by Oba Ajaka who was eventually deposed because he lacked Yoruba military virtues of sternness, ruthless efficiency and subterfuge. His junior brother, Shango, was thought to cut the right picture: militant, mystifying and gifted with an infernal temper.

The story of how Shango ended up is well known. His earlier identified virtues turned out to be his Achilles heel. But he had become the personification of vital energy, occult manifestations and cosmic inter-relatedness that he was consecrated as the god of thunder and lightning. There is a huge corpus of work on Shango in many libraries and his devotees are scattered all over Yorubaland and in the Diaspora, especially in Oshogbo, parts of Brazil, Cuba, etc. and wherever Yoruba immigrants and former slaves can be found

Shango’s predecessor, the formerly tame Ajaka, was allowed to return to the throne after the tragic death of his brother. Since that time, Alaafins have come and gone. By tradition, after the demise of an Alaafin, the Oyo Mesi, a body of seven high chiefs, are tasked with superintending the appointment of a new monarch. Their work is well cut out and is usually believed to be facilitated by Ifa divination.

Oyo once had a female king, Alaafin Orompoto, who ruled from 1554 to 1562. She ascended the throne after her father and brother died without producing male heirs.

Process

At times, the laid down process is side-stepped as happened recently with the appointment of Engr. Abimbola Akeem Owoade by the Oyo State government. Alleging that he had proof that six of the kingmakers had been serially bribed by one of the contending princes, the governor had sought the help of another son of Oyo, the famed Professor Wande Abimbola, a noted former vice-chancellor of the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife and world renowned babalawo (diviner) who holds the title of Awise Awo Agbaye. Abimbola has now disclosed that the Ifa oracle chose 47-year-old Abimbola Akeem Owoade of the Owoade-Agunloye, Agure Compound, as the 46th Alaafin.

It will be recalled that In October 2023, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) quizzed some Oyo kingmakers over allegations that they took bribes of N15 million each from one of the candidates.

Flashback

Those who are old enough would remember that the immediate reaction of contending rival princes to the choice of the then Prince Lamidi Olayiwola Adeniran Adeyemi as Alaafin of Oyo several decades ago will tell you that the choice of an Alaafin through a process sidestepping the established route for one reason or the other, is not unprecedented.

Back then in 1970, some of Adeyemi’s rivals argued that he should be disqualified because his father, Oba Adeniran, had been dethroned by the Western Region government after his public spat with council chairman Bode Thomas which eventually led to the strongly held view that he had pronounced a hex on the politician (or bewitched him) leading to his almost immediate death in bizarre circumstances defying medical science. Oba Adeniran, famed husband of 200 wives, died in exile in Lagos.

But fate has its ways. Lamidi, son of Adeniran, whose father had been deposed and exiled in 1954 was announced by the military government as successor of Alaafin Gbadegesin Ladigbolu II in 1970.

In his excellent article titled: “Making of an Aláàfin: Bribes or the gods?”, Festus Adedayo of the Nigerian Tribune asked some very important questions regarding the allegation made by the government of Oyo State that some princes had attempted to win the royal race by resorting to bribery. Hence the government’s resort to Awise Agbaye who himself is one of the highest authorities in the field.

As a people, the Oyo have seen it all: civil and external wars, strife, slavery, colonialism, foreign trade, the trans-Sahara trade route and many other events that shaped their philosophy. The people went through an interregnum of 80 years as an exiled dynasty. Perhaps, they needed that exile because when they started rebuilding, they created a government that established its power over a vast territory that stretched from parts of present day southwest Nigeria to Benin, Togo, Ghana, all the way to parts of Cote d’Ivoire.

Cavalry was the game-changing arm of the Oyo Empire. Late 16th and 17th century expeditions were composed entirely of cavalry. This columnist’s forebears, as related in the family’s “Oriki” (praise name) travelled on horse and camel back as part of a caravan for the annual Muslim pilgrimage in Mecca, a three-month religious cum commercial adventure in those days. It will be recalled that itinerant Islamic scholars had brought Islam to Oyo centuries before the Dan Fodio Jihad.

Urbanised

As a highly urbanised people, Oyo ran a sophisticated and efficient government which guaranteed that the wealthy paid their fair share of tributes to the king who, in turn, gave leadership to the military as the sovereign generalissimo as well as give direction to civil and religious institutions.

Generally speaking, Yoruba people live, breathe, drink and honour their culture. As far back as anyone can remember, Oyo, like other Yoruba groups, had thriving traditional industries with cloth weaving as one of the most lucrative occupations. No wonder, Yorubas have always had different costumes for different occasions.

Relics of architecture within the Oyo Empire, exhibited an intricate built environment showcasing a distinctive architectural style, highlighted by intricate sculptures that symbolised the status of the inhabitants.

There you have it, folks – a glimpse into the kind of people, challenges, and socio-political milieu that the mint-fresh Alaafin Abimbola Akeem Owoade has been endorsed to serve as king. Long may he reign!

We have been told that as we approach the end-time, there is nothing we shall not see or hear! All things become possible. Yinka Aiyefele told us in one of his songs that Ifa now shouts Alleluia (Ifa n ke alleluya). Now, in the ensuing melee over the appointment of a new Alafin of Oyo, we have witnessed allegations of bribery and corruption fly in all directions, Ifa’s sacred groves inclusive. If gold rusts, what will iron do?

Do we have any institution left that is spared the corrosive influence of corruption? Politicians and civilian governments are corrupt. Soldiers and military governments are corrupt. Judges and the entire judiciary, including the Bar, are corrupt. Lawmakers are corrupt. One speaker of a House of Assembly was removed last week over allegations of corruption, among others. Civil servants are the engine room of corruption. Imams and pastors are corrupt. The common man on the street is corrupt. Traditional rulers are corrupt. Even journalists and writers are corrupt! Everyone is corrupt.

Corruption oozes from every nook and cranny of our national life. But that Ifa, the Yoruba god of divinity that is renowned for purity, has also now been cornered by corruption baffles me! If the government cannot help; if lawmakers cannot help; if judges cannot help, if we cannot seek refuge with the men and women of God; if our traditional institutions are of no consequence; if we all sleep - snoring - with all heads facing the same direction, where will salvation come from?

That there is a tussle over the Alafin stool is normal; princes everywhere contest vigorously for vacant stools. In times past, virtue, not filthy lucre, most of the time determined the winner. I said “most of the time” because history records the shenanigans of princes and kingmakers that truncated virtue even in those very distant times. Since colonial rule and after, Government interference has meant that laws enacted by the government determine succession and whatever disputes that may arise therefrom.

Look around and tell of the occupant of any throne today whose ascension has not been influenced one way or the other by the powers-that-be! The difference, usually, is not in substance but in appearance. To all intents and purposes, traditional rulers today are appointees of the government. They ascend to, and occupy the throne at the pleasure of the government. They spend time there at the mercy of the powers-that-be. They get promoted and can be removed at will. They are glorified artefacts and relics from the past.

The Alafin stool is not new to controversies; if anything, controversies and troubles have been its second nature from time immemorial. However, the intrigues this time around are of a dimension that has repercussions that will reverberate throughout the length and breath of the Yoruba nation. One: If it is true that the choice of the Oyo traditional kingmakers is beholden to the Sokoto caliphate, and that money was used to “press” the hands and pockets of the kingmakers, then, he stands disqualified. Yorubaland must not allow Ilorin to happen again - and not to Oyo of all places!

Scripture says affliction shall not rise a second time (Nahum 1:9). Even if inducement was not involved, the very fact of a cozy relationship with the caliphate automatically disqualifies any candidate to the Alafin stool - indeed, any stool in Yoruba land. Once bitten, forever shy! On the basis of the allegations of financial inducement, the Oyo State Government cancelled the exercise conducted by the kingmakers and embarked on another. Good idea, but bad implementation. That is the problem we run into when we employ half-measures when we ought to have gone the whole hog.

Allegations of giving and receiving bribes are grievous. Trying to sell a throne as important as that of the Alafin is sacrilege. With regard to the importance of the Alafin throne to the entire Yoruba race, it is a treasonable act of unimaginable proportions, especially considering the Yoruba experience with Ilorin. The Oyo State Government was too lenient - too laidback, too lackadaisical, too carefree - in its disposition to those involved in the giving and taking of the alleged bribe - if any. They should have been arrested and handed over for prosecution before warrant chiefs were appointed to fill the vacancies thus created. Assuming that was done and they are by now having their day in court, they would not have been in the position to flex muscles with the government as is currently the case. Besides, the government would today have stood on high moral ground rather than have its back to the wall like the kingmakers and their supporters are trying to do at the moment. But it is not too late for the government to do the needful.

Two: The Baba who was contacted by the Oyo State Government to consult Ifa is known by all to be beyond reproach. His records of probity and integrity are in the public domain. His expertise in Ifa divination is also not in contest. So, I was satisfied when he was said to have been the one who said Ifa chose the prince that was pronounced as the new Alafin by the Oyo State Government. Regardless of whether or not he was the statutory Ifa priest so recognised by law, I go with his recommendation because the occasion was not normal after those with the statutory roles have (allegedly) compromised themselves and their offices.

A desperate situation, they say, demands a desperate solution. This was one such occasion and I salute the Oyo State Government for rising to the occasion. The snag, however, is a news report that says the “authentic” prince chosen by Ifa (which Ifa and by which Ifa priest again?) is neither the one being flaunted by the kingmakers nor the one pronounced as the Alafin by the government. That angle needs to be critically looked at and straightened out. If we are against the injustice of some elements who chose to sell the throne and we insist on the right thing being done, then, we must not, in the same breath, perpetrate injustice in another direction. Like Caesar’s wife, everyone concerned must wash clean on this score.

Otedola, Obaigbena: When two elephants fight …

One good turn deserves another. Our people say if you pour water ahead of you, you will surely step on wet ground. In other words, it is give-and-take. Scripture says if you want to receive, give. “Give and it shall be given unto you…” (Luke 6:38). There are other biblical quotes that support giving as a prerequisite for receiving. Trade by barter, kind of! If you don’t sow, you don’t reap, and whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he reap also (Galatians 6:7). For someone who is slothful and does not want to work, the Bible says such a fellow “shall not eat” (2 Thessalonians 3: 10). A musician converted it into a song thus: if hunger whacks the indolent; let him die! From the above, it is not all giving that is charity. Some giving is a hook meant to attract or draw benefits.

So, when a news organization known for its truculence towards President Bola Ahmed Tinubu suddenly made what looked like a volte-face and announced him their Man of the Year 2024, tongues wagged. One reader callled me and said, “Oga Bola, I smell a rat! Don’t you think this is a Greek gift?” I was surprised that he reasoned that way because I, too, had concluded that Tinubu qualified as my own “Personality of the Year 2024”.

It is not everything that is a Greek gift. Yes, the media establishment in question may have been overly antagonistic to the President; there is nothing extraordinary or unusual about that. In fact, the media by its orientation and calling is supposed to be more adversarial than friendly with any government in power. It is a watchdog and has the constitutional obligation of holding the government accountable to the people. The media must be critical of the government. It must at all times hold the government’s feet to the fire to be able to do that.

That, however, is not to dismiss suspicion. Going forward, the same news organization has made a very influential, even if controversial, ally of the President its Minister of the Year 2024! Pray, what is it gunning for and what is a Greek gift? Greek gift is a gift given with the intention to trick and thereby harm the recipient or receive an intended reward through the back door.

Greek poet, Homer, in his Iliad, tells the story of the war waged by the Greeks against the city-state of Troy but the Greeks were unable to penetrate Troy after a long period of battle. So Agamemnon, king of the Greeks, devised a trick: he constructed a big horse, hid some of his soldiers inside of it and left it at the firmly-secured gate of Troy, after which his troops withdrew into the distance, giving the impression that they had not only abandoned the battlefield but had also left the horse-loving Trojans the gift of a horse, maybe as a form of appeasement and sign of friendship.

The Trojans joyfully dragged the wooden horse into their city. In the night, the soldiers hiding inside the horse came out, slaughtered the guards and opened the gate for Greek soldiers to troop in and capture the city. Hence the saying to this day, “Beware of Greeks bearing gifts” or simply “Beware of Greek gifts”!

Last week when news broke that a first generation bank had instituted court action against the owner of the news organisation that awarded the Man of the Year award to the President, the reader in question called me again and said, “Oga Bola, did I not tell you that I smelled a rat? Will the President sit idly by and allow a man who just gave him the Greek gift of Man of the Year to be ridiculed or will he step in to arrange some sort of soft-landing for him?”

Later, we saw pictures of the bank boss with the President: Has he been reported to the President? Was he summoned? Or did he go on his own volition to counterbalance influence? The bank boss gave his own side of the story to the media, which painted a gory picture of corruption in high places. Did he sway the President? When the news media concerned responded with their own explanation, I honestly was convinced they, too, had a good case. But when the bank responded again, I got confused! There were a lot of technical terms and jargons traded to and fro. I am neither a lawyer nor a financial expert. The courts should be allowed to comb through the jig-saw puzzle in a way that will, in the end, serve the public interest.

But note that Greek gifts, once received, become a bait. And any trap that fails to make the intended catch must return the bait to the owner!

As the duly recognized National Caretaker Committee Chairman and Secretary of the Labour Party, we, on behalf of ourselves and other members of the National Caretaker Committee, deem it necessary to issue this Press Release to clarify and set the records straight.

Firstly, today, 17th January 2025, the Court of Appeal of Nigeria, Abuja Division, in Appeal No: CA/ABJ/CV/1217/2024; SEN. NENADI ESTHER USMAN & ANOR v. LABOUR PARTY & ANOR, unreservedly allowed our appeal against the judgment of the Federal High Court, Abuja Division, in Suit No: FHC/ABJ/CS/1271/2024, delivered on 8th October 2024 by Hon. Justice Emeka Nwite.

In its judgment delivered today, the Court of Appeal upheld the following:

1. Lack of Jurisdiction: The Court of Appeal affirmed that Suit No: FHC/ABJ/CS/1271/2024, filed before the Federal High Court by Barr. Julius Abure, was a leadership dispute, over which the Federal High Court has no jurisdiction.
2. Error by the Federal High Court: The Federal High Court erred and acted without jurisdiction by entertaining the leadership dispute brought before it by Barr. Julius Abure.
3. Violation of Fair Hearing: The Federal High Court violated our right to fair hearing by failing to consider our Counter-Affidavit filed in opposition to the suit before it.

Accordingly, the Court of Appeal struck out the suit filed before the Federal High Court for lack of jurisdiction.

It is important to address the erroneous and unsolicited finding by the Court of Appeal that, in a judgment it delivered on 13th November 2024 in Appeal No: CA/ABJ/CV/1172/2024; LABOUR PARTY v. OLUSOLA EBISENI & ORS, Julius Abure was “admitted as the National Chairman of the Labour Party.” This finding is completely inconsistent with the substantive judgment delivered by the Court of Appeal.

For clarity, the judgment delivered on 13th November 2024 in Appeal No: CA/ABJ/CV/1172/2024 pertains to the nomination of a Governorship Candidate for the Ondo State Governorship Election. It has no connection whatsoever to the leadership dispute, which was the crux of the instant suit.

Furthermore, we reiterate the established legal principle in Nigeria that courts lack jurisdiction to interfere in the internal affairs of political parties, including leadership and management issues. Therefore, we commend the Court of Appeal for upholding the position that the leadership dispute in Suit No: FHC/ABJ/CS/1271/2024 is non-justiciable and outside the court's jurisdiction.

Finally, we wish to remind the public that on 4th September 2024, the Labour Party constituted a National Caretaker Committee, appointing the undersigned, Senator Nenadi Esther Usman, as the National Caretaker Committee Chairman, and Senator Darlington Nwokocha as the National Caretaker Committee Secretary. Both have been diligently and effectively carrying out their duties to the admiration of stakeholders and the entire membership of the party.

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Signed:
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SEN. NENADI ESTHER USMAN
National Caretaker Committee Chairman
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SEN. DARLINGTON NWOKOCHA
National Caretaker Committee Secretary