Opinion

By People&Politics By Erasmus Ikhide “To avoid giving an Edo gubernatorial ticket to an emergency Esan man, the election debate must be conducted in Esan dialect by eminent Esan men in Esan land.” ~ Sen. Adams Oshiomhole. I should have titled this piece “Adams Oshiomhole’s Double Standard on Language in Politics” for his banal revisionism as a man of duality and a double-faced character “who engages his mouth before engaging his brain.” Apologies to Patriot Chief John Odigie Oyegun. Oshiomhole’s major undoing is that either he has his memories to forget or he chooses to play on the people’s intelligence…

By Azu Ishiekwene Almost everyone thinks they know what is wrong with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and his government, except Tinubu himself. And to show that it’s not just bellyaching, there are plenty of examples to beat the president over the head. Headline inflation has risen from 22.2 percent in April 2023 to 33.7 one year after – and is still growing – while attempts by the government to tame it have been largely ineffective. Food inflation has nearly doubled. The naira has been devalued by 70 percent in one year, and poverty levels, even among the once-comfortable urban population,…

By People&Politics By Zainab Suleiman Okino On July 18, the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) held its 2024 policy meeting to determine modalities for admissions into tertiary institutions. However, the process was overshadowed by an age controversy. It began when the Minister of Education, Professor Tahir Mamman, reiterated his concern about underage students writing exams preparatory to becoming undergraduates, a point he had raised during the last Unified Tertiary and Matriculation Examination (UTME). Almost all the tertiary education administrators at the event unanimously opposed the minister’s suggestion of an 18-year-minimum age, forcing him to temporarily reverse and defer the…