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Opinion

Friday, 12 November 2021 05:50

A wealth of sorrow: Why Nigeria’s abundant oil reserves are really a curse - Kenneth Mohammed

In Nigeria, oil has been more of a curse than a blessing. Weak institutions of state and poor governance in managing the vast revenues have led the country to fail to realise its full potential in a textbook example of what academics know as the “resource curse”. First coined by Richard Auty in 1994, the term refers to the inability of nations to use their windfall wealth to improve their population’s lot and bolster their economies. The rich natural resources bring corruption and poverty to a nation, rather than positive economic development and, counterintuitively, these countries end up with lower…

Friday, 12 November 2021 05:49

Facebook's foreign disasters - Eric Posner

A long line of ugly Americans, mostly government officials, have believed that applying simple formulas based on idealized versions of US institutions could convert long-suffering places into Western-style consumer utopias. Today, the ugliest of all Americans is not a public official but a private citizen, Mark Zuckerberg. “The ugly American,” the title of a novel published in 1958 by Eugene Burdick and William Lederer, entered the language to refer to boorish American officials abroad who sought to improve the lives of natives without taking the trouble to learn their language, culture, or needs. A long line of ugly Americans, mostly…

Friday, 12 November 2021 05:48

This thing called aging - Azu Ishiekwene

The cold blast of the air conditioner from the room hit me by surprise as I opened the door. I wasn’t expecting a draught from inside at eight on a damp morning. But there was my cousin under the duvet, hugging what seemed like a pillow as he snuggled diagonally across the bed, deeply asleep.I grabbed the electric iron from the floor right next to the standing fan, which was purring at a speed that made the room even cooler, and left quickly. How could he be sleeping so comfortably with the AC at a cold blast on a wet…

Friday, 12 November 2021 05:46

Sex palaver: 'Clergy are men like others' - Michael West

I knew before hand that last week's topic would elicit reactions that would raise some profound underlying issues in the family life of the clergy. The reactions came from the Christian circle more because their issues are much more reported in the media than the others. There are reported cases of divorce involving Christians than the others. One of the reasons it is so is because of monogamous family lifestyle largely embraced and practiced by Christians. They have limited options on how to satisfy their sexual urges beyond the women they married. Expectedly, torrents of reactions poured in from different…

Thursday, 11 November 2021 06:03

Southwest: Fanning the embers of religious bigotry - Bola Bolawole

Religion is the opium of the people – Karl Marx (1843). In the aftermath of the collapse of the 21-storey Ikoyi skyscraper, conscious and deliberate efforts have been made in some quarters outside and within the Southwest to foul the air, pollute the age-old cordial relations amongst Yoruba Christians and Muslims, and trigger a religious crisis that will consume the Yoruba people and their civilization and cause them to remain slaves to the hegemonic, feudalistic and conservative forces fighting tooth and nail to maintain and reinforce their stranglehold upon the Nigerian polity. The “foreign” wing of this army of vile,…

Tuesday, 09 November 2021 05:47

Is multilateralism a fig leaf? - Ngaire Woods

International organizations must manage a constant tension between the interests of their most powerful member states and those of the rest. Three factors – leadership, effective internal processes, and transparency – are crucial to managing these strains. International organizations are currently plagued by allegations of powerful states wielding undue influence over outcomes. These include recent revelations about Australia, Japan, Saudi Arabia, and other countries pushing back against the United Nations on climate change, suggestions that senior World Bank officials intervened to boost China’s ranking in the Bank’s Doing Business index, and suspicions that China influenced the World Health Organization’s approach…

Monday, 08 November 2021 05:57

What N6bn can do for my state - Hassan Gimba

Yobe is a small agrarian state on the path to becoming great. All those who governed it ensured this. All the past governors, one way or the other, have taken the state beyond how they met it. There have been hiccups here and there, disappointments now and then, but that’s okay; that’s human nature for you, and how anything human grows. The current governor, Mai Mala Buni, has, since receiving the baton of the state’s leadership, been doing his best in the infrastructural development of the young, growing state that Yobe is. He is about commissioning thousands of houses built…

Sunday, 07 November 2021 06:02

Lagos collapsed building: That this house may not fall - Festus Adedayo

Many atimes, Providence speaks to human beings in anecdotes. Unfortunately, man is too blind to even behold the foot of his nose; too lost in pursuit of earthly existential scrambles that the lessons of these stories are most times lost on him. Traditional Africa located the power in relating life experiences, as well as the experiences of living and non-living beings, especially those of animals, to the life of existing man. For centuries, not only did humanity learn to live by minding the landmines that consumed its recent and ancient ancestors, it also fashioned its life therefrom. The holy writs…

Sunday, 07 November 2021 06:01

Exploits of Humphrey Olumakaiye, fourth Archbishop of Lagos diocese Church of Nigeria - Lawrence Akinseye

Another History will be made on Sunday 7 November 2021 (today) at the Cathedral Church of the Advent Gwaripa Abuja when 52-year old Humphrey Bamishebi Olumakaiye officially becomes Archbishop, Ecclesiastical Province of Lagos, Church of Nigeria Anglican Communion. In July 2018 he was widely celebrated when he became the Bishop of Lagos Diocese after a keenly contested episcopal election. His enthronement ceremony attracted the who-is-who in the top hierarchy of the church as well as dignitaries from all walks of life. Just three years on, he was elevated to the position of Archbishop of the Lagos Province in September this…

Sunday, 07 November 2021 05:59

Necessary preparations for a stream of new things! - Taiwo Akinola

So Jotham became mighty, because he prepared his ways before the LORD his God ~ 2 Chronicles 27:6. Introduction: When you look closely into the life of any normal human being, one of the amazing things you will quickly notice is that unquenchable desire or dream for a better life. Happily, God Himself is in it! He designed us originally to dominate, and not to be dominated, curtailed or halted by the elemental forces here on earth (Genesis 1:26-28)! However, we have to get really ready to fully partake of the divine promises of new things in the realm of…

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Sunday, 07 November 2021 05:58

Article of faith: Jesus, the heavenly commando - Femi Aribisala

Jesus came into the world as a heavenly commando sent by God to destroy the works of Satan single-handedly. The devil holds men in bondage through the singular sin of the love of life; the foundation of all sin. We steal, cheat, fight, kill and commit adultery to save our lives. God required Jesus to call us to repentance and tell us about His spiritual kingdom. He would then demonstrate that our fear of death is baseless by laying down His life and then rising from the dead. Hebrews says of Jesus: “Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of…

Friday, 05 November 2021 05:55

What happens in Anambra on Saturday? It depends - Azu Ishiekwene

Just hours before voters in Anambra State decide the next governor, a party not on the ballot is getting serious attention. The Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), the separatist group demanding an independent homeland, has declared there would be no election on Saturday not only to press its separatist demand, but also to demand the release of its leader, Nnamdi Kanu, currently in his 17th week in detention in Abuja for alleged treason among other charges. IPOB is not a political party and Kanu, its leader, is not on the ballot. But the leaders of the 18 political parties, especially…

Friday, 05 November 2021 05:54

Sex palaver: A raging storm in clergy's homes - Michael West

In my days as a music critic and a columnist in foremost Nigerian newspapers many years ago, I avoided reviewing gospel and Islamic songs because of their spiritual contents. I believe that the songs were meant to propagate the gospel, teach doctrinal precepts and promote moral rectitude against deepening decadence, corruption and slopping societal values. Critiquing such works, I believe, may negate the messages they contain in the mind of music lovers. Until late 1997 when I stopped writing, I kept faith with that decision. However, some music companies did engage me privately to critique their spiritual songs in order…

Friday, 05 November 2021 05:53

The great supply-chain massacre - Diane Coyle

It is unclear whether current widespread product shortages are merely a temporary disruption or evidence of a global production meltdown. But today’s supply shocks offer striking parallels with the 2008 global financial crisis, and may require a similarly bold policy response. In the period leading up to the 2008 global financial crisis, a few prescient voices warned of potentially catastrophic systemic instability. In a famous 2005 speech, Raghuram G. Rajan explicitly cautioned that although structural and technological changes meant that the financial system was theoretically diversifying risk better than ever before, it might in practice be concentrating risk. At the…

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