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Opinion

Sunday, 08 December 2019 05:27

The world is doing much better than the bad news makes us think - Arthur C. Brooks

“Major portions of the world are in conflict and some, in fact, are going to hell,” President Trump said two years ago in a speech before the United Nations. Most things the president says are controversial, but the only disagreement most Americans across the political spectrum might have had with this statement was his use of “some.” As a rule, we tend to believe — mistakenly — that the world is getting worse. There is a natural human bias toward bad news. The title of a 1998 article in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology sums it up: “Negative…

Saturday, 07 December 2019 05:06

Time to do something different - Dare Babarinsa

It is almost normal now to take the television for granted. Yet when we were young, everyone appreciated the magic of the television. In recent months, old veterans have been drumming it to our ears that 2019 marked the 60th years of television in Nigeria and Africa. When Mr Obafemi Awolowo commissioned the Western Nigerian Television in 1959, it was the first time the magic box would beam on the African continent. Mrs Anike Agbaje-Williams became the first person to appear on television. Mr Kunle Olasope, who died in October 2019, became the first man on television. Thus it became…

Friday, 06 December 2019 05:52

Inequality could be lower than you think - The Economist

Even in a world of polarisation, fake news and social media, some beliefs remain universal, and central to today’s politics. None is more influential than the idea that inequality has risen in the rich world. People read about it in newspapers, hear about it from their politicians and feel it in their daily lives. This belief motivates populists, who say selfish metropolitan elites have pulled the ladder of opportunity away from ordinary people. It has given succour to the left, who propose ever more radical ways to redistribute wealth. And it has caused alarm among business people, many of whom…

Thursday, 05 December 2019 05:54

Recalling Tai Solarin’s prediction - Edwin Madunagu

Nigeria’s 2019 elections, particularly the recent governorship contests in Kogi and Bayelsa states, have forcefully brought back a prediction which the late Tai Solarin made about 40 years ago in the aftermath of the 1979 elections. Of course, recalling this prediction is also recalling my response to it at the time. I was then 33. It is appropriate to begin any story I might wish to tell here by introducing Tai Solarin to young Nigerians who were not born when the prediction was made. This set of Nigerians now constitutes the majority of the Nigerian population. Tai Solarin was a…

Wednesday, 04 December 2019 05:49

Clipping the wings of Alapere canal - Bola Bolawole

Akure is the Ondo state capital. The panegyric of the people runs thus: Akure l’omi meji/O p’ejeji l’Ala/ Ala se bi ere bi ere/Ala d’omi ebo. Translated: Akure has two rivers/It named both Ala/Like play, like play/Ala became rivers you must worship. In those days, human beings were offered as sacrifice to the gods. So, Akure might have sacrificed two human beings to its two Ala every year. That was double jeopardy. What could have been responsible: Carelessness, carefree attitude or lack of deep thought and reflection? Akure indigenes to the rescue, please! It could also mean that Akure did…

Wednesday, 04 December 2019 05:48

The billionaire problem - Simon Johnson

Writing in the 1830s, as the Industrial Revolution gathered pace, Honoré de Balzac anticipated the broader social concern: “The secret of great fortunes without apparent cause is a crime that has been forgotten, because it was properly carried out.” But today's billionaires make forgetting impossible. Our billionaire problem is getting worse. Any market-oriented economy creates opportunities for new fortunes to be built, including through innovation. More innovation is likely to take place where fewer rules encumber entrepreneurial creativity. Some of this creativity may lead to processes and products that are actually detrimental to public welfare. Unfortunately, by the time the…

Tuesday, 03 December 2019 06:34

From Daura to Lagos, they eat up the little ones - Lasisi Olagunju

"You were given job slots, you gave them to your children. You were given ten forms for jobs, you gave them to your mother's children. You cannot end well..." The Muslim cleric who made this statement is the Chief Imam of one of the major towns in Kwara State. He talks straight and tough; video clips of his strong views there online, trending. Sometimes, his voice hovers around the uncomfortably graphic. There is one clip where he asks men to go and marry "these widows" because "they are too young to be left roaming." His latest message is a direct…

Tuesday, 03 December 2019 06:32

As nepotism soldiers on - Sonala Olumhense

The most important news story in the Nigerian press of the last five years was published last week. But it was neither news, nor story. It didn’t make the front page. It was not written by a reporter. It was not written in Nigeria. Farooq Kperogi’s “Government of Buhari’s Family, By His Family, and For His Family” was diligently written in Georgia, in the United States. That is: the story, with its challenging eye for detail, was reported by a teacher and writer who lives thousands of miles away across the Atlantic. Not by a reporter in Daura or Abuja…

Monday, 02 December 2019 04:39

Zamfara leads, will others follow? - Bolanle Bolawole

The saying, usually, is: Who bells the cat? The story is told that rats met one day and the agenda was how to put a halt to the havoc the cat was wreaking in the rats’ midst. Suggestions after suggestions were considered before the rats, in their collective wisdom, decided on the one that appeared to them the most suitable: They will get hold of a bell and fix it on the cat’s neck so that any time this enemy approaches, the jingling of the bell on its neck will send an alert to the rats to vamoose and go…

Monday, 02 December 2019 04:37

What should economists be doing? - Kaushik Basu

Economics is now at a stage when we need to examine the assumptions in the woodwork that are hindering our ability to understand and map the new world of digital technology and inter-linkages that we are just beginning to inhabit. “Normal science” must continue, but it also is time for paradigmatic thinking. The unexpected financial crash of 2008, the persistence of the slowdown that occurred in its wake, the failure of conventional monetary and fiscal policies to revive economies, and the cracks in global trade that we are witnessing now have all given rise to a widespread disquiet about conventional…

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Sunday, 01 December 2019 05:38

Between the Nigerian police and Abdullahi’s Hate Bill - Festus Adedayo

In fulfilment of the Socratic dictum which says that an unexamined life is not worth living, I want to begin this piece by playing the devil’s advocate to the Hate Speech Bill sponsored by Senator Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi, which is provoking scalding reactions within and outside the shores of Nigeria at the moment. And my peg for the advocacy is the detestable story that emanated from the Police Service Commission (PSC) recently. PSC had announced the appointment and promotion of officers within the police force, one of which was the promotion of 14 commissioners to the rank of Assistant Inspector…

Sunday, 01 December 2019 05:33

We need a major redesign of life - Laura L. Carstensen

It’s time to get serious about a major redesign of life. Thirty years were added to average life expectancy in the 20th century, and rather than imagine the scores of ways we could use these years to improve quality of life, we tacked them all on at the end. Only old age got longer. As a result, most people are anxious about the prospect of living for a century. Asked about aspirations for living to 100, typical responses are “I hope I don’t outlive my money” or “I hope I don’t get dementia.” If we do not begin to envision…

Wednesday, 27 November 2019 06:07

What goes round comes around... - Bola Bolwaole

If a writer does not generate hostility, he is dead – Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul, Nobel Laureate in Literature (2001). In any man that keeps silent in the face of tyranny, the man dies – Wole Soyinka, Nobel Laureate in Literature (1986). Those who vote (in elections) decide nothing; those who count the votes decide everything – Maximum Leader Josef Stalin of the now defunct USSR. Those who fail to learn from history are often condemned to repeating its mistakes – George Santayana. After the uprising of the 17th June/The Secretary of the Writers’ Union/Had leaflets distributed in the Stalinalee/Stating that…

Tuesday, 26 November 2019 05:50

The failing judicial system (1) - Ebun Olu-Adegboruwa

My phone rang repeatedly so I thought it must be something very urgent and serious. The caller on the other side was furious and agitated. He wanted me to step into a matter very urgently, to rescue him and his group from their lawyer, whom he claimed has been acting as if he has compromised their case. What really happened, I asked him, still maintaining my cool on this side. They have a case in the Court of Appeal somewhere and they got to court and were told that the matter has been adjourned to October 2020, for hearing and…

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