The #EndBadGovernance protest, which started on August 1, 2024 and formally ended on August 20, 2024 has continued to raise discussions across the country and beyond, especially within civil society groups. More than 1,400 people who took part in the protest have reportedly been arrested and detained by security agencies with indications that the government is still trying to hunt-down suspected sponsors of the protest. One of the important lessons from the protest is that the storm clouds seem to be really gathering towards a totalitarian state – a system characterized by a strong central rule that attempts to control…

Following the seizure of the country’s assets based on the ruling of a French court, former Ogun governor Ibikunle Amosun, put out successive press releases clarifying his role in the embarrassing situation. The first, explaining his responsibility in the matter between Ogun State and two Chinese companies (which culminated in the seizure of three presidential aircraft), was just as self-indicting as the second, a rejoinder to economist Pat Utomi. Both succinctly summarise everything wrong with leadership in this part of the world and why we just never seem to move forward. It is no longer news that we have bad…

The proof that madness is running wild in the National Assembly is that the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Abbas Tajudeen could dare to propose the contentious Counter Subversion Bill 2024. The proposed law sought, among other things, to impose a 10-year prison sentence or a fine of N5 million — or both— on Nigerians who refuse to recite the National Anthem. The bill was introduced following the May decision by President Bola Tinubu to revert to Nigeria’s old National Anthem, “Nigeria, We Hail Thee,” which was written by Lillian Jean Williams in 1959 and composed by Frances Berda.…

The global significance of the July 4th, 2024 election, in which the British Conservative Party suffered its greatest loss in its 190-year history, marks the symbolic death of the neo-liberal economic policies that British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and U.S. President Ronald Reagan globalized over 40 years ago. Initially termed Neoconservative or neoclassical economics, these policies essentially negated the social contract between governments and the governed, shifting social responsibilities to free-market principles. This shift resulted in widespread poverty, sociopolitical destabilization, and the rise of money politics devoid of ideology worldwide. In response to the 1929 Great Depression, economists like John…