One of the obvious lessons of the takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban is that building a nation is squarely the historic duty of its people. The import of the troubling developments in that south Asian country is that no country, however powerful, can build another nation on behalf of the people. The United States, which toppled the Taliban regime 20 years ago, and its allies have blamed the government of President Ashraf Ghani for failing to muster the necessary capacity to govern and keep the country stable. Ghani fled the capital, Kabul, as the Taliban approached the city a…

To many Nigerians, Covid-19 remains the invincible force. Like the Ozone Layer, you know it exists, but you don’t feel it. This weekend, starting from Thursday, millions of Nigerians would troop out to attend social events, weddings, funeral services, birthdays, and others totally ignoring all warnings that Covid-19 is creeping back. On Monday, the government of Osun State issued another warning to its citizens that Covid-19 remains a danger to public health. Casualties are being recorded. People are being hospitalized. But death and life are normal and despite the worries of Governor Gboyega Oyetola, the people of Osun State and…

As an Octogenarian inching towards becoming a Nonagenarian, Stephen Adebanji (Banji) Akintoye (born 1935), should be enjoying a well-deserved retirement and rest rather than being in the trenches against retired Gen. Muhammadu Buhari’s creeping fascism, complicity with, and duplicity on the vexed issue of insurgency and the Fulani expansionist aggression that have combined to lay to waste a sizeable portion of the country while also endangering the peace and security of virtually everyone else. Akintoye has laboured and deserves to have some peace and rest in the twilight years of his sojourn on Mother Earth; he deserves to look back…

There was this conversation between President Muhammadu Buhari and Al Jazeera television held in Qatar in March, 2016. That interview explains the imperialness, the Kabiyesi-ness in Buhari and his feudal reasoning which often clashes with the constitutional requirements of his office as president of Nigeria. It also rubbishes Nigerians’ hoopla against the president’s oft recourse to medical exile in the United Kingdom at the drop of a hat. The conversation came at the height of a foreign exchange crisis that the Buhari government sank Nigeria into. Sitting regally like the Emir of Daura on a gold-plated chair, in the front…