In the book titled the ‘protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism’ the German sociologist, Max Weber attributed the development of capitalism to the protestant ethic (protestantism is a form of christianity that originated with the 16th-century reformation, a movement against what its followers perceived to be errors in the Catholic Church). What then is the protestant ethic? Inclusively it consists of of the dynamic interaction of the the following elements, asceticism, discipline, virtue and the doctrine of predestination-as amended. Of all these elements, Weber argued, the reconceptualisation of the doctrine of predestination is the most decisive determinant in the…

In January 2019, the Daily Trust newspaper had its Maiduguri office shut down by the military over its reportage on the fight against insurgency. This made me think about governments and the failure of leadership, or, aptly, the king whose subjects saw through him. And so on January 14, 2019, on this page, under the title “The Military, Press and War Against Insurgency,” I gave that brief story. There is this fable of a king who, together with his palace courtiers and subjects, was scammed by a con artist who knew that people, rather than acknowledging the truth, would always…

For those who watch the complicated Nigerian security mess from afar, the killing of Japanese ex-Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe in Nara, Japan last Thursday and the ambushing, two days earlier, of President Muhammadu Buhari’s advance convoy in Dutsinma, about 152 kilometres from his hometown of Daura, Katsina State, both speak to rising global insecurity. A few hours after on that same Tuesday, that joke went burst. Approximately three hours after shelling the president’s advance convoy with an assortment of bullets, killing two people in the process, around 10pm, terrorists stormed the Kuje Custodial Centre in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT)…

Nigeria is awash with arms – guns, bullets, charms, drugs and local stuff. Not just Nigeria. The entire Sahelian and sub-Saharan African region is drowning in deadly small arms and light weapons – so-called because of their portability and ease of use and adaptation. The firearms may be out of the line of sight, but they are making the rounds in cars and motorcycles or as headloads and hand luggage, concealed in unimaginable places. Many are also believed to be siphoned from the armouries of security agencies, and are making their way into the hands of “unknown gunmen” with destructive…