“A Judge shall avoid developing excessively close relationship with frequent litigants – such as government ministers or their officials, municipal officials, police prosecutors in any Court where the Judge often sits, if such relationship could reasonably create an appearance of partiality.”

Rule 2.8, Revised Code of Conduct for Judicial Officers in Nigeria (2016)

Sylvanus Nsofor was a little known Justice of the Court of Appeal when he breathed oxygen into Muhammadu Buhari’s political aspirations with his dissent in the presidential election petition in 2007. Eight years earlier, he had launched a unique career in the history of political litigation in Nigeria.

The case arose from the election into the office of Chairman of the Obio/Akpor Local Government Area (LGA) in Rivers State in Nigeria’s Niger Delta on 12 December 1998. Cyprian Tasie Wike was the candidate of the All Peoples’ Party (APP). Cyprian Chukwu flew the flag of the Alliance for Democracy (AD). After screening aspirants on 24 November, 1998, the Peoples’ Democratic Party, (PDP) settled on Ezenwo Nyesom Wike as its candidate.

At the time, local elections were conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the PDP initially submitted Nyesom Wike’s name as their candidate. However, sometime before election day, the party substituted his name with Samuel Rogers Icheonwo. When it announced the results, INEC declared the candidate of the PDP as the winner with 40,370 votes, beating the candidate of the AD into second place with 11,441 votes.

Nyesom Wike sued, claiming that INEC had announced Icheonwo as winner when he was not lawfully sponsored by any party in the contest. The election petition tribunal struck out the petition, holding that it lacked jurisdiction “to resolve the issue as to who was sponsored by PDP.”

Nyesom Wike appealed. In his judgment on behalf of a three-person panel of the Court of Appeal on 6 March 1999, Sylvanus Nsofor nullified the result announced by the INEC and ordered a re-run of the election with Nyesom Wike as the candidate of the PDP. Wike duly won the re-run to emerge as the Chairman of the Obio/Akpor LGA.

Since then, Nyesom Wike’s political trajectory has been attended by what appears to be an unusual coincidence of mutually beneficial intercourse with the judiciary. In 2008, he became Chief of Staff to a Governor of Rivers State whose emergence rested on a somewhat improbable piece of judicial machination.

After a stint as Minister of State for Education, Wike emerged in 2015 as the candidate of the PDP for the governorship of Rivers State. Following the election on 11-12 April 2015, the INEC declared him as winner, ahead of  Dakuku Peterside of the All Progressives Congress (APC). Peterside petitioned challenging the result declared by INEC. The tribunal granted his petition and initially set aside the result. The Court of Appeal agreed with the trial tribunal.

On 12 February 2016, the Supreme Court set aside the judgment of the Court of Appeal on a specious technicality and restored Wike as duly elected. The author of the Supreme Court judgment was Kudirat Kekere-Ekun.

In the past week, she and Wike resumed mutual acquaintance. In the intervening nine  years, Kekere-Ekun had risen to become Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), while Wike emerged in August 2023 as Minister of the Federal Capital Territory. The venue was the flag-off of the construction by the Minister of 40 units of judicial housing in Abuja.

This was the latest chapter in Wike’s durable track-record as Nigeria’s most prolific judicial benefactor.

As Governor of Rivers State, he gave 41 Range Rover Sports Utility Vehicles(SUVs) to judges in the state. Customary Court judges were not left out. He gave them 29 Renault SUVs, while complaining about the “unfortunate and the unwillingness of the judiciary in Nigeria to seek true independence to discharge their functions.”

The irony was clearly lost on him.

In 2020, Wike donated 24 luxury duplexes to judges in Rivers State and reportedly “handed out $300,000 in cash to judges who preferred to build their own houses.” It was presumably tax-free. Then CJN, Tanko Muhammad, slavishly “applauded his generosity saying the gifts spoke of the ‘love the Rivers State governor has for the judiciary.’”

The love was fully requited.

The previous year, in January 2019, the judiciary had made Wike’s re-election an electoral non-event when it disqualified the opposition APC from fielding any candidate against him. Neutral observers did not need to wonder whether all the investment in the judiciary was without mutual benefit.

Before leaving office as Governor in 2023, Wike launched yet another construction of quarters for judges also in Rivers State, this time on a site “where his administration recently demolished flats initially belonging to Bayelsa State.”

This gubernatorial generosity to the judiciary went beyond the state level. Former presidential candidate, Omoyele Sowore, reported that as Governor, Wike awarded a contract to former President of the Court of Appeal (PCA), Zainab Bulkachuwa, “to build the Court of Appeal in Port Harcourt”, the capital of Rivers State. In return, he said “anything Wike wanted was granted before he asked.” Neither Wike nor Bulkachuwa has thought it fit to issue a denial.

Now, as Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Wike’s political generosity has become fully federalized under the judicial benediction of yet another CJN. At the launch of the 40 new units of judicial housing in Abuja this past week, the Minister had in attendance both the CJN and the PCA. Presumably keen to impress such high judicial presence, Wike serenaded them with testimony as to how he summarily revoked the land previously allocated to construction conglomerate, Julius Berger, in order to make it available for building suitable judicial digs.

The high judicial figures present looked nothing if not suitably impressed, but the Minister was only getting started. According to him, it was important “to build houses for judges so they would not be susceptible to temptations from unscrupulous politicians.”

No one around had the presence of mind to ask him to look in the mirror.

This has been described charitably as convenient overreach. A better description for it will be judicial subornation. In full public glare, the two senior-most judges in the country looked rather giddy as they advertised an undisguised breach of the Code of Conduct for Judicial Officers, whose effectiveness depends on their combined leadership and example.

There is no political litigant in the country more prolific than the current Minister of the FCT. He has an almost extra-terrestrial ability to normalise outcomes that defy all cannons of lawful judicial enterprise. If anyone fits the description of the prohibition in Rule 2.8 of the Judicial Conduct, it is Minister Wike. Yet, for him, the Chief Justice of Nigeria is happy to retrench that same Code of Conduct.

It was not supposed to be like this.

Jerome Udoji, one of Nigeria’s best known lawyers and public servants, was born in Ozubulu in present day Anambra State around 1912. Udoji was also the first indigenous District Officer in the colonial civil service. He ended his civil service career Chief Secretary to the government of the Eastern Region under the military coincidentally in 1967, the same year in which Wike officially was born.

When he got the opportunity to undertake a retrospective on his public tour of duty  in 1995, fifteen years before he died in 2010, Udoji chose to issue his memoirs with the title “Under Three Masters.” The three masters whom he served, of course, were colonial administrators, post-colonial civilian politicians, and their military usurpers.

Each set of masters was not without exertions in seeking judicial subservience. Until now, they had usually encountered judicial resistance. Under the current dispensation, however, it is almost as if government has a minister responsible for judicial subornation. To many, the leading judges have simply become Wiked and the country has a CJN who appears happy to have the judicial branch fully Nyesomised.

** Chidi Anselm Odinkalu, a professor of law, teaches at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and can be reached through This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

In the early days, my company sold one product.

Our flagship product. The bestseller. The one we're known for. We built our business around the wired bra. And as a result, in ThirdLove's building stages, we devoted all of our focus to positioning and messaging around one key product.

Last year, we extended into a number of new categories.

Our original product marketing cadence focused exclusively on the flagship. With irons in so many fires, we found that our strategy had to evolve.

Especially when you venture into new categories, customers will visit you (virtually and/or in person) at different stages of a lifecycle: new customers, repeat customers and lifers. Each group has its own preferences and needs, which should be reflected in your product marketing strategy.

Understand what they prefer – and when. A company with many products is like a house with many rooms. Almost everyone enters through the front door, where they're all greeted by your flagship product.

You should look at your product marketing cadence through the eyes of new customers, repeat customers, and brand loyalists alike. Which of your products brings people in the front door, and how can you tailor messaging funnels to the needs associated with that product? 

How do customers tend to move through your product's secondary rooms, and how can your marketing be an effective tour guide?

To see through customers' eyes, you need to know how they think. Talk to them in focus groups and leverage data to understand at which stages of the lifecycle customers purchase which products. This is the power of product marketing personalization at work.

Leverage personalization to amplify your strategy. Once you understand what customers want and when, make personalized modifications to your marketing imagery and content. This starts with your website's hero images – how different customers are greeted when they land on your site.

Generally speaking: Core products drive new business, while new products drive repeat business. So, different categories of customers will respond to different types of hero images.

When a new customer visits your site, they should see core products, core messaging, core imagery. When a repeat customer visits your site, they already know about your main products, so show them hero images of other parts of your product ecosystem. 

You've earned their trust with your main offering. Now extend that trust into other dimensions of their lives.

Admittedly, with evolving web/cookie regulations, it may be challenging to break out web messaging this way. If you run into digital obstacles, default to core hero images for all site visitors.

Preserve core narratives across different products. When we launched activewear, we launched three different collections: low, medium, and high-impact – all designed for different types of activity. Of those three, one sold much better than the others.

Why? In retrospect, we determined that its high sales were due to the way its messaging mirrored our flagship product's messaging. With this new product, we emphasized benefits very similar to those of our core products. 

What that told us was that when we're putting new products into the market, we need to stay true to core tenets. The same will be true for all companies, especially with today's values-forward standards.

Romeo & Juliet notwithstanding, most people won't enter your home by climbing the garden wall. Use quantitative and qualitative data to understand the path customers take from the front door to secondary rooms, and use your marketing cadence as a map from stage to stage. 

The better you understand each category of visitor, the more of a personalized, hospitable experience you'll be able to give them.

Inc

Standard Bank says Nigeria is losing an estimated $26 billion annually due to electricity shortages in the country.

In its latest Africa Trade Barometer report, Standard Bank identified electricity supply as a critical barrier to business operations in Nigeria and across other African markets.

The report also said businesses in the country spend around $22 billion yearly on off-grid fuel to offset the impact of unreliable electricity, further driving up operational costs.

“In Nigeria, surveyed businesses must contend with a national grid that frequently collapses as it fails to meet a daily peak demand which is nearly four times its generation capacity,” the report reads.

“Economic losses arising from Nigeria’s electricity shortages are estimated to be USD 26 billion annually, without accounting for spending on fuel for off-grid generators, which is estimated to be a further USD22 billion.” 

According to the report, power outages disrupt production, compromise the quality of temperature-sensitive goods, disrupt water supplies, and affect telecommunications infrastructure critical for payment systems.

The disruptions, the bank said, result in reduced sales and income for businesses.

“Across the 10 African markets, power supply infrastructure remains the most severe obstacle to surveyed businesses’ operations,” Standard Bank said.

“It is reported as one of the most poorly perceived infrastructural attributes as well as the one presenting the most severe obstacle to business operations. 

“Blackouts cause a downtime of production, risk the quality of goods that require controlled environments, impact water supply, and affect telecommunications infrastructure which businesses may rely on for payments. The result is reduced sales and income.”

To address the challenges, the report said there was a need for a diversified energy mix to reduce dependence on the national grid.

Standard Bank also called for policy interventions to stabilise electricity generation and attract investment into renewable energy solutions.

‘BUSINESSES EXPERIENCED LARGEST DECLINE DUE TO  NAIRA DEPRECIATION’

In the report, Standard Bank highlighted that Nigeria experienced the largest decline in business confidence among businesses surveyed in Africa.

“This was primarily due to the significant depreciation of the Naira,” he said.

“The primary driver of this was the liberalisation of the exchange rate by the central bank to consolidate the multiple 

exchange rate systems into a unified market.

“This aimed to let supply and demand dictate the rates, but in June 2023, the Naira fell further by 36% on the official market, showing notable devaluation amidst dollar scarcity and market unrest.

“Efforts to stabilise the Naira were further compromised by the removal and later partial reinstatement of the fuel subsidy, which had stoked inflation and sparked nationwide protests over increased living costs.”

On October 17, Wale Edun, minister of finance and coordinating minister of the economy, said the FX subsidy era was gone.

Edun said the subsidy had cost the country over 5 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP), causing financial strain.

Also, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), on October 23, said the naira is showing signs of stability due to interest rate hikes.

According to FMDQ Exchange, a platform that oversees the official FX window, the naira closed at N1,600/$ on Friday, compared to N464.51 per dollar when President Bola Tinubu’s administration began.

The Cable

The Nigerian telecommunication regulator, NCC, has disqualified Nigerians below the age of 18 from getting a Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) card.

Sources at the commission said that this policy is aimed to “protect minors” from the liabilities that arise from the usage of such SIMs.

One source, a senior official of the commission, told our correspondent that parents and guardians can acquire SIMs in their names on behalf of their children and wards and assume any responsibilities or liabilities that may arise from the use of such SIMs.

The overall intent, according to sources, is to protect minors and strengthen national security.

NCC has been tweaking its telecommunications policies to combat security threats in Nigeria.

Constitutionally, 18 years is the age of consent in Nigeria.

NCC believes SIM acquisition is a contract between service providers and their subscribers, which requires the subscriber to have proper legal status, be of mature mind and be rational enough to bear certain responsibilities, obligations and liabilities imposed by a contract.

In 2021, the NCC proposed a Registration of Telephone Subscribers Regulations where it suggested banning minors in Nigeria from acquiring a SIM card. That regulation is now in effect, officials said.

One of the NCC officials said the policy would place a significant responsibility on parents to monitor the mobile activities of their minors.

Reduction in subscribers

Data shows that Nigeria’s mobile subscriptions have dropped from 219 million in March to 153 million in September.

Officials said the decline was attributed to the removal of SIMs not linked to a verified National Identification Number (NIN).

Another reason was that there was a discrepancy in data submitted by a Mobile Network Operator.

One source said the NCC found that “one Mobile Network Operator incorrectly reported around 40 million subscribers as active, despite the absence of any revenue-generating activity over a 90-day period.”

“This was in direct violation of the Commission’s guidelines for determining active subscribers and led to an inflated report of the operator’s subscriber base, thereby skewing industry statistics.”

PT

Nigeria have been awarded a 3-0 victory over Libya, and three vital points, from their scheduled Africa Cup of Nations qualifier earlier this month which they refused to play after being stuck in a remote Libyan airport for half a day before the match.

The disciplinary committee of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) on Saturday awarded the match to Nigeria 3-0, putting them on the brink of qualifying for next year’s finals as they sit top of Group D.

The three points took Nigeria to 10 with two matches left to play, four ahead of second-placed Benin and five ahead of Rwanda. Libya have a single point from four games and are in last place. The top two teams in the group qualify for the 2025 finals in Morocco.

Nigeria had refused to play the match in Benghazi on Oct. 15, citing mistreatment on arrival in the country some 48 hours before the scheduled kick-off.

Nigerian players and officials were kept in a locked airport for more than 16 hours, almost 250km away from their intended destination, after their charter flight was redirected while on approach to Benghazi and instead landed in Bayda.

They said they had no access to food or water and no contact from Libyan officials during the episode, and they decided to fly back to Nigeria rather than fulfil the fixture.

The Libya Football Federation said the incident was not deliberate, adding that their players had also faced travel difficulties when they played in Nigeria four days earlier.

But CAF found Libya in breach of competition rules that stipulate visiting teams must be properly received by the host association, who must see them through entry formalities and put a bus at their disposal.

CAF said Nigeria were awarded the match with a 3-0 scoreline and that Libya had been fined $50,000.

Libya had earlier complained about the treatment of their players and officials on arrival in Nigeria for their qualifier in Uyo on Oct. 11, when their flight landed hours away from the match venue and the players endured long travel delays.

Nigeria won that match 1-0. Their treatment ahead of the scheduled return game four days later was seen as a tit-for-tat measure and widely condemned across the continent as Libya taking gamesmanship a step too far.

It also highlighted the consistently poor treatment meted out to visiting sides when playing around Africa -- in both national team and club competitions.

CAF president Patrice Motsepe said earlier this week his organisation was looking at tightening up rules and regulations to deter bad treatment of visiting teams.

African football is notorious for poor treatment of visiting teams, with common tricks being delays going through immigration on arrival, circuitous and lengthy bus trips and the allocation of poor training facilities.

Reuters

Iran plays down Israel's strikes, says they caused 'limited damage'

Iran on Saturday played down Israel's overnight air attack against Iranian military targets, saying it caused only limited damage, as U.S. President Joe Biden called for a halt to escalation that has raised fears of an all-out conflagration in the Middle East.

Scores of Israeli jets completed three waves of strikes before dawn against missile factories and other sites near Tehran and in western Iran, Israel's military said.

It was retaliation for Iran's Oct. 1 attack on Israel with about 200 ballistic missiles, and Israel warned its heavily armed arch-foe not to hit back after the latest strike.

Iran condemned the Israeli raid and its foreign ministry said Iran was "entitled and obligated" to defend itself. But it added that it "recognises its responsibilities towards regional peace and security," a more conciliatory statement than after previous bouts of escalation.

Iran's military said the Israeli warplanes used "very light warheads" to target border radar systems in the provinces of Ilam, Khuzestan and around Tehran.

"Enemy planes were prevented from entering the country's airspace ... and the attack caused limited damage," Iran's military joint staff said in a statement.

David Albright, a former U.N. nuclear weapons inspector, said low resolution commercial satellite imagery appeared to show that one Israeli strike hit the sprawling Parchin military complex near Tehran, damaging three buildings, including two where solid fuel was mixed for ballistic missile engines.

Decker Eveleth, an associate research analyst at CNA, a Washington think tank, said Israel also hit Khojir, a sprawling missile production site near Tehran.

Tensions between Iran and Israel have grown rapidly since the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Iran-backed Hamas, raising fears of a wider regional conflict that could drag in global powers and imperil world energy supplies.

Worsening conflict in Lebanon, where Israel is waging an intense campaign against Iran's main regional ally Hezbollah to stop it firing rockets into northern Israel, has raised the temperature still further.

The United States, which had pressed Israel to avoid targeting sensitive Iranian energy and nuclear sites, joined other countries in calling for a halt to the cycle of confrontation between Israel and Iran.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Saturday that Israel had chosen the targets in Iran based on its national interests, not according to what was dictated by the United States.

Biden said the strikes appeared to have only hit military targets and added that he hoped they were "the end".

Vice President Kamala Harris, who hopes to succeed Biden by winning the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election, said it was "the strong perspective of the United States that there must be de-escalation."

Two regional officials briefed by Iran told Reuters that several high-level meetings were held in Tehran to determine the scope of Iran's response. One official said the damage was "very minimal" but added that several Revolutionary Guards bases in and around Tehran were also hit.

Iranian news sites aired footage of passengers at Tehran's Mehrabad Airport, seemingly meant to show there was little impact.

Israel's military, signalling it did not expect an immediate Iranian response, said there was no change to public safety restrictions across the country.

'MESSAGE TO IRAN'

Beni Sabti, an Iran expert at Tel Aviv's Institute for National Security Studies, said the Israeli strike appeared designed to give Tehran an opportunity to avoid further escalation.

"We see that Israel wants to close this event, to pass this message to Iran that it is closed and we don't want to escalate it," he said.

Videos carried by Iranian media showed air defences continuously firing at apparently incoming projectiles in central Tehran, without saying which sites were coming under attack.

Israel's military said its jets had struck missile manufacturing facilities and surface-to-air missile arrays, and safely returned home.

"If the regime in Iran were to make the mistake of beginning a new round of escalation, we will be obligated to respond," the military said.

U.S. Defense Secretary LLoyd Austin, in a statement, said Iran "should not make the mistake of responding to Israel's strikes." Austin said he also stressed in a call with his Israeli counterpart diplomatic opportunities to lower tensions in the region, including in Gaza and Lebanon.

Israel notified the U.S. before striking, but Washington was not involved in the operation, a U.S. official told Reuters. Targets did not include energy infrastructure or Iran's nuclear facilities, a U.S. official said.

In the days after Iran's strikes on Israel this month, Biden had warned that Washington, Israel's main backer and supplier of arms, would not support a retaliatory strike on Tehran's nuclear sites and had said Israel should consider alternatives to attacking Iran's oil fields.

Arab states situated between Israel and Iran have been particularly worried that use of their airspace could prompt retaliation against them.

Jordanian television quoted a source in the country's armed forces as saying no military planes had been allowed through its airspace. A Saudi official also said that Saudi airspace had not been used for the strike.

A regional intelligence source said Israeli jets had flown across southern Syria, emitting sonic booms near the Jordanian border, and then across Iraq.

Saudi Arabia, which has mended fences with Iran after years of regional rivalry, and had been edging towards better ties with Israel before the war in Gaza, condemned the attack as a violation of Iranian sovereignty and international law.

LEBANON CONFLICT

Israel's military eased some safety restrictions for residents in areas of northern Israel late on Saturday, a possible indication that it does not expect any immediate large-scale attack from Iran or its proxies in the region.

The decision followed a "situational assessment", it said in a statement.

Still, Lebanon's Hezbollah warned residents of more than two dozen towns in northern Israel to evacuate immediately, saying they had become legitimate targets because it said Israeli troops were stationed there.

Israel meanwhile said it had struck Hezbollah facilities in Beirut's southern Dahiyeh suburb including a weapons-making site and an intelligence headquarters.

The conflict in Lebanon, which has greatly intensified in recent weeks, has also led to strikes on sites linked to Iran and Hezbollah in Syria.

Israel launched airstrikes against some military sites in central and southern Syria early on Saturday, Syrian state news agency SANA reported. Israel has not confirmed striking Syria.

Efforts to secure a ceasefire and hostage-release deal in Gaza, which could help cool the wider conflict, are expected to resume in Doha when negotiators fly there on Sunday.

Reuters

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Ukrainian troops in Kursk Region oblivious to being encircled – Putin

Ukrainian military units in Russia’s Kursk Region, which have been cut off from the border, are apparently not aware how bad their situation is, President Vladimir Putin has said.

On Thursday, Putin claimed during a press conference that up to 2,000 Ukrainian troops had been encircled on Russian soil. In a follow-up interview overnight, published by Russian media on Friday, he made more comments on the situation.

Several Ukrainian units have been cut off in the Russian region, where Kiev had launched a cross-border incursion in August, the president said. The troops themselves and their commanders may underestimate the gravity of the situation, he suggested.

”Our feeling is that the people who were encircled are not fully aware that they are in an encirclement,” he said. Russian intelligence suggests that “stable command and control of the troops has been lost.”

Putin added that Ukrainian forces have been trying to break through to the group in question, but had not been successful. Overall, Russian troops are making progress across the conflict frontline, while Kiev is making no gains at all, he reported.

However, neither Ukraine nor its Western backers are willing to end hostilities, so the Russian military must stay focused on the mission, Putin stressed.

The president attributed Russian battlefield successes to a combination of a bolstered defense industry and troops learning how to use modern military technology and to quickly adapt to changes in Ukrainian actions. Some of the innovations in the use of drones are achieved right on the front line and showcase the high engineering skills of Russian service members, he said.

”This experience in warfare with modern tools is very important,”Putin said.

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Russian drone hits Kyiv high-rise building, kills one, injures five

A Russian drone struck a multi-storey residential building in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on Friday evening, triggering a fire in the top floors and killing one person and injuring five, officials said.

Serhiy Popko, head of the capital's military administration, said more than 100 residents were evacuated from the high-rise in Solomyanskyi district, just west of the city centre.

Air defence units were in action during the hour-long air raid alert and two hours later a new alert was declared in the city for incoming drones.

"Apartments from the 17th to the 21st storeys were damaged in the apartment building in Solomyanskyi district," Popko wrote on the Telegram messaging app. "Apartments were on fire on the 20th floor."

Mayor Vitali Klitschko said a teenage girl had died. One of the five injured was being treated in hospital and a first aid tent was set up at the site.

Emergency services said the fire had been brought under control. Photos and videos posted on their site showed firefighters using long hoists to battle the blaze.

Popko also said drone fragments had fallen in an open space in the central Shevchenkivskyi district. No casualties were reported.

RT/Reuters

As I was concluding this piece, my eyes caught a presidential sledgehammer which landed on the head of Conscience Nurtured by Truth – The Guardian. In a release issued by the State House yesterday, authored by erstwhile Editor-in-Chief of TheNews, Bayo Onanuga, the newspaper was accused of a crime almost similar to what General Sani Abacha accused it of in 1994 which led to its closure. The “NADECO government” of Bola Tinubu merely rehashed the allegation. I will address it presently.

All over the world, the Lady Justice is sacred, representing the divine order, law, and custom. It is also an allegorical persona depicting the moral force of the judicial system. Originating from the Ancient Roman goddess called Justitia, her attributes are a blindfold, scales and a sword. When a leader is depicted to have raped this personification of justice, he has violated the deity of goodliness in society. Last week, Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister, Nyesom Wike, narrated how he revoked the Certificate of Occupancy (C of O) of some plots of land allocated to Julius Berger in the Katampe District of Abuja. It was shortly after he had dinner with the Managing Director of Julius Berger. By his own admission, he then deployed same for the construction of 40 Judges Quarters. Wike’s revocation of the land is most likely justified if indeed the German construction giant held it undeveloped for fifteen to twenty years.

The judiciary is reputed in the playbook of democracy to be the last hope of the common man. Of recent, stenchy oozes coming out of this last bastion of hope for a regressing Nigeria are really scary. In the triad of Wike-judges-Julius Berger above, the major fear is how judges who benefitted from allocation of those lands will, without favour, dispense justice in any matter that has to do with Wike, now or in the future? It is most likely the avoidance of such dalliance that Rule 2.8 of the Judicial Code of Conduct frowns at unholy matrimony between judges and would-be litigants. It says “A judge shall avoid developing excessively close relationship with frequent litigants – such as government ministers or their officials.” It goes ahead to say that any of such appearance of alliance is incestuous and “could reasonably create an appearance of partiality.” A last week editorial of the Nigerian Lawyer affirms this when it states that the relationship was questionable. It also says that, “beneath the surface of this supposedly ‘noble’ project, serious concerns about integrity, impartiality and manipulation may emerge.” If in the near future, Wike and Julius Berger engage in a legal tango, can FCT courts be impartial arbiter?

The above incestuous relationship between the executive and the judiciary reminds me of my March 6, 2022 piece with the title, Buhari’s serial rape of the Lady Justice. It referenced an award-winning cartoon published on September 7, 2008 by the Johannesburg-based Sunday Times authored by Jonathan Shapiro. Shapiro’s cartoon identity was Zapiro. That cartoon triggered a huge ball of fire in South Africa. Named ‘Rape of Lady Justice’, it bore then leader of the African National Congress (ANC), who was to later become the South African president, Jacob Zuma, loosening his trousers’ zippers for a sexual romp with the effigy of the Lady Justice. He had a shower tap placed on his head. An impish but salacious smile lit his face. Before him, flung on the bare floor, was a blindfolded lady with a lapel inscribed, “Justice System” hung on her chest. Four hefty and menacing-looking men knelt by the Lady Justice’s side, holding down the “wench”, whose skirt was half peeled off. They were political surrogates of Zuma in the ANC, which included Julius Malema, then leader of the ANC Youth League, among others. The scale of justice had fallen down beside the Lady Justice, with Mantashe smilingly beckoning on Zuma to clamber her for a rape binge, “Go for it, boss!”

That cartoon shot Zuma into a fit. Indeed, he immediately sued Zapiro for £700,000. Massive reactions followed it, ranging from the condemnatory to the laudatory. The ANC, SACP and ANC Youth League pilloried it as “hate speech,” “disgusting” and “bordering on defamation of character” and then petitioned the South African Human Rights Commission for redress.

Zapiro’s cartoon depicted the rape of the South African justice system, as well as other institutions, by Zuma. “He (Zuma) is raping the justice system and they (Zuma’s political allies) are complicit in that,” said the cartoonist in an interview. By this time, Zuma, a notorious polygamist who had six official wives as president, many more by unofficial account and 22 children from the liaisons, was a kingpin of lechery. Not long ago, the court discharged him of a rape romp with an HIV-positive AIDS activist, who was the daughter of his friend. Though Zuma pleaded that the sex was consensual, he however admitted that he had unprotected sex with the lady. He then stunned the world when he maintained that he had “showered afterwards to cut the risk of contracting the infection.” The shower tap Zapiro placed on his head represented this bombastic claim.

If Zapiro were to sketch that cartoon in Nigeria today, he will replace Zuma with the Bola Tinubu administration. His groveling National Assembly and its coterie of fawners would be Malema and co. Together, they can be more fittingly described as in a serial rape of our country. Virtually all institutions and systems in Nigeria today are being mercilessly raped to a point that they lack energy to saunter on. Tinubu, through surrogates, is presiding over a literal rape of the Lady Justice. However, his government’s version of executive rape of the judiciary is of different colour. Only recently, while Rivers State was undergoing its local government election, the name of Wike and alleged interference in judicial decisions became a singsong. Courts of coordinate jurisdictions at both state and federal levels issued contradictory rulings which were felt to have political imprimaturs. These have made the judiciary a laughing stock. In Kano State, similar rape of the judiciary was at play with the state and federal judiciary issuing rulings at loggerheads with each other.

The dilemma of Nigerians today isn’t different from that of the traditional clothes launderer the Yoruba call the Alágbàfò . The river constitutes his major economic source. He depends on it for his existential survival. As the Alágbàfò  goes into enmity with the water/river at their own peril, so also will the enmity of the akara (bean cake) seller with the frying oil surely end in disaster. So, in a case where the Alágbàfò heaves the load of white clothes to the river for laundry but finds out that the river is polluted, the Alágbàfò 

finds self at the three footpath juncture that troubles the stranger to a town. Like the Alágbàfò  above, Nigerians are marooned on an island. Their waters, the main source of their existential survival, are polluted. President Olusegun Obasanjo put their dilemma in perspective. In an interview on the News Central Television on Thursday, he painted the canvass of hopelessness very meticulously. This he did in a narrative of “a Nigerian president” – the people’s water, the river of their existence – who they voted into office but who rules like a voodoo priest. Voodooism isn’t about science but probability and permutations. While not specifically naming anyone, Obasanjo told the tale of “a Nigerian president who came to office without a plan” and who “then… woke up and just said, ‘three-point plan.’ What are the three points? What are they going to achieve? Who are the people who have worked on it? You came and you just opened your mouth and made a pronouncement on something that has not been.”

Everywhere you turn in Nigeria today, the river is tainted, polluted and coffee-brown. For the people, it is double jeopardy. Two sayings of the Yoruba encapsulate the Nigerian dilemma. They both border on a raped trust. One, which mirrors frustration, asks whether, in the rules of fidelity, the one upon whom a disabled reclines, if they are about to shift from the space they occupy, should not have the honour of notifying the disabled of their intention to shift? (Eni a f’èyìn tì, bí ó ba yè, wíwí ní í wí). Nigeria today runs a struggling economy powered by trust deficit towards leaders who are believed to have questionable financial and moral fidelity, who flex misplaced ability. Nigerians are powerless like the disabled. Their leaders, upon whom they reclined for social good, have broken their spines.

The second jeopardy also hangs on a misplacement of trust. The one the people thought would save them from captivity has eventually turned out to be their captor. Uttered in a moment of underwhelming results from overwhelming expectations, Yoruba say, eni a gb’ójú okùn lé, kò jo eni agba. It is similar to the tale of the Alágbàfò and a dirty river.

What Nigerians are doing today is, like the hopeless drycleaner, sitting by the dirty river bank and watching whether indeed, from within the constricting thorns (ìgbágó), the palm-frond (màrìwò) shoot out. Which is very unlikely. Our dirty river has equalized and democratized suffering and hopelessness. While Nigerians are daily engrossed in a festival of lamentations and regret everywhere, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that our dirty river is clean and snow-white. Bretton Woods gave our hunger pass-mark. Homeless roam-about children, hitherto exclusive preserve of the north, are today everywhere in the southern part of Nigeria, too. The Olubadan of Ibadan, Oba Olakulehin Owolabi, raised this alarm last Thursday when the Executive Secretary of the National Commission for Almajiri and Out-of-School Children paid him a courtesy call in his palace. All over the streets of Nigeria, the hungry and ferocious looks on the faces of children and even elders are frightening. Under this government, Nigeria has become one huge IDP camp and everybody is a scrounger and scavenger.

If the executive is a true reflection of the dirty waters that have constituted existential turbulence for our Alágbàfò , the legislature is an affliction. Nigeria’s twin legislature is struggling to outdo itself in the fawning sprint and self-mockery. Take for instance the bill for the establishment of a Bola Ahmed Tinubu University of Nigerian Languages. It has gone through the second reading. Sponsored by Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Benjamin Kalu and eight others, the bill sponsors said their aim was to have a university for the promotion of the learning of Nigerian languages which will “encourage the advancement of learning and to hold out to all persons without distinction of race, creed, sex or political conviction, the opportunity of acquiring a higher education in Nigerian languages and cultures.” Brilliant conception.

But, why then do Kalu and his legislative cohorts think that the man worthy to have his name affixed to the university is the president? If they were not suffocated by the smell of legislative groveling, no university of Nigerian languages should be named after any other person than Ayọ̀ Bámgbóṣé. Bámgbóṣé was an academic linguist and the first professor of Linguistics in Nigeria. In 1984, Bámgbóṣé became the first African linguist to be conferred the honorary membership of the Linguistic Society of America (LSA). He made tremendous contributions to education and linguistics. Bámgbóṣé’s 1963 journal article titled “A study of structures and classes in the grammar of modern Yoruba” is a locus classicus in linguistics. So, what qualifies Tinubu to be so named? In which of the Nigerian languages did he excel? Certainly not Yoruba, a language he speaks with bumbling understanding. His English is almost an aping of the Cockney. So where did Kalu and his fawners of power get their wild muse?

If the House of Representatives is a home for grovelers by the feet of the executive, the senate is worse. Godswill Akpabio, head of the senate, figuratively wears the Tinubu lapel on his arm and cap literally on his head with baffling shamelessness. He is reputed to adjourn senate sessions to enable him quickly shuttle to Aso Rock to ask for its mind. Thus, if Nigerians expect a legislature that will hold the executive to account, they are waiting for Samuel Becket’s legendary Godot in their legislators.

The combination of a dilemma of the Alágbàfò and the serial rape of virtually all institutions in Nigeria today foretell a grim tomorrow for the Nigerian people. It was the palpable frustration of Nigerians that The Guardian lead story of October 25, entitled “Calls for military intervention: misery, harsh policies driving Nigerians to desperate choices,”reflected. It warned of chaos in the polity if the Tinubu government does not stop its bumbling misgovernance. “Nigerians were exhilarated with the return of democracy in 1999, but 25 years on, the buccaneering nature of politicians, their penchant for poor service delivery, morbid hatred for probity, accountability, and credible/transparent elections, among others, are forcing some flustered citizens to make extreme choices, including calling for military intervention in governance... Deep despondency permeates every facet of the polity consequent upon soaring cost of living. And while the political elite splurge on fine wines and exotic automobiles amid poor service delivery, calls for regime change could become more strident in the days ahead even though military insurrection holds no solution to the country’s woes.”

As usual, Onanuga, in his servile reading of every criticism, took time to pen a presidential doggerel as reply to the story. He called it inflammatory and an open advocacy for regime change. Are we sure this Onanuga is not the doppelganger of the Onanuga we used to know? Does he know that that The Guardian story is a cyclostyle of what Nigerians are saying on the streets? If it is, want does he expect the respected newspaper to write? What “deliberate agenda” could the newspaper harbor other than newspapering? What “fairness and objectivity” is he talking about if not a reportage of the narratives on the street and the hopelessness encircling the air? If you read through the so-called State House release of Onanuga, it bears semblance with Sani Abacha’s criminalizing of journalism, leading to the jailing for life of the Kunle Ajibades, his colleague in TheNews. It appears to me that Onanuga, like the Shappiro cartoon, is one of those fawners holding the wench of good governance by the thighs while his boss smilingly loosens the rope of his trousers. If you know what happened to that dog that was given a bad name, you will appreciate why all genuine democrats must rise in protection of the truth.

Dupe Baruwa-Dada: I lost a sister

In 2011, less than six months into the birth of a new government in Oyo State, a proposal was brought for the celebration of a festival in the state. The memo got to the topmost decision-making organ of the state, the Executive Council. At the Exco, a very suave and articulate man marshaled points on the need for the festival and everybody who spoke gave the memo thumbs-up. However, I constituted the one-man kanda, the stone in the bowl of his rice. So, I raised my hand and the governor, Abiola Ajimobi, gave me the go-ahead to speak. “Your Excellency, sir, beautiful as this proposal is, if we go ahead with it, the people of Oyo State will stone us. Our administration hasn’t constructed roads nor succeeded in bringing development to the people. A festival now will be a disaster,” I said. God bless his soul, without mincing words, the governor immediately canceled the memo.  

As I stepped out of the Exco Chambers, someone called my number. It was my friend of, by then, 15 years, Dupe Baruwa. She said, “Boda Festus, tomorrow, my children and I will pack our baggage and move to your house for sustenance.” Alarmed, I asked why. “You just shot down the memo presented to the Oyo State government by my husband!”

In 1996 or 1997 – I can’t remember now – a ravishingly beautiful lady was posted to the Sunday Desk of the Nigerian Tribune newspaper and we became very good friends. We became each other’s confidants and advisors. Dupe confided in me on virtually every issue of her life and I did same to her, too. At some point, she even took me to Ijebu-Ode to go see her mother. When it came to my life-time consort, Dupe’s decision on who I would marry was the loudest and carried the day.

As fate would have it, in 2019, while in a tutorial class at the Nigerian Law School, Lagos, one evening, I beheld a man downstairs. He looked like the man I was his nemesis in 2011. So I called his name. As he turned, I knew he was the man whose memo I voided in the Oyo State council, Dupe’s husband. We hugged and became even closer during our period at the Law School, sharing same Group 8 class together. His family became mine, too.

When I woke up last Sunday to check the social media, I saw a post that nearly ran me mad. The post wished the soul of Dupe Barruwa-Dada a sweet repose. I was alarmed and aghast. How could Dupe die? Why did Dupe die? It must be a daydream. I had called her a few months earlier to commiserate with her on the loss of her mother and was waiting to attend Mama’s burial in Ijebu-Ode. It was not until I attended her funeral in Ikeja last Thursday and Dupe’s casket was wheeled into the church that it dawned on me that the angel had flown away afterall.

If angelic behavior could confer immortality on one, Dupe will be alive today. She symbolized the sapphire in intelligence, good-naturedness and purity of heart. She was amiable, obliging and amiable to anyone she came in contact with. Dupe’s death at the age of 48 tells me further about the brevity of life and its comparison by the Holy Writ with vapour which whooshes with such vigour but disappears in a minute.

Sleep well, my friend of 27 years, confidant and sister.

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord ~ 1 Corinthians 15:58.

Preamble:

Joyous accomplishments in God’s kingdom belong only to those who effectively labour in the fields of divine services, not to idle talkers who never get round to accomplishing anything for God, nor to armchair critics who relish badmouthing achievers and pointing accusing fingers to where the doers of good deeds got it wrong.

Mere talk is cheap, and any idle mind can easily find free engagements in it. Lazy louts always enjoy wearying serious labourers in the Lord's vineyard, organizing bumps on their ways, placing booby traps on their paths and criticizing them endlessly.

However, bonded servants of Christ are aware that critics always dog the tails of achievers! Besides, they’re very conscious that true honour of eternal dimension lies in the dignity of their work in the Lord’s vineyard.

In John 9:4, Jesus Christ Himself struck a chord of imperativeness in respect to this when He said, “I must work”. Thus, for the normal believers, serving the Lord here on earth always comes with a side-note of “must do”. Kingdom service cannot be an optional extra, it’s a royal duty and it’s voluntarily compulsory!

Comparing and Contrasting Busyness and Effectiveness

Many a time, people confuse busyness with effectiveness, and some people even trade busyness for effectiveness. This is rather unfortunate.

Activity is not productivity! Movement doesn’t always translate to motion, just like somebody could be running on a treadmill, sweating very profusely, and yet remain on the same spot.

Good works and great works are not always the same. More does not always mean better. In fact, sometimes, the greatest enemy of productivity is busyness. “Jack of all trades”, people say, “is a master of none”.

You are only productive to the extent that you are effective. Working effectively is working circumspectly. On the contrary, zeal without effectiveness (or winsomeness) is like energy without wisdom.

Being busy like a bee isn’t really an indicator of accomplishment in your kingdom services. Being effective is what produces eternal results because it focuses on getting souls saved and joining hands with fellow believers to raise a glorious Church.

You may at this juncture pause and ask yourself: “am I truly following the footsteps of the Master, Jesus Christ, in intentionally pursuing and doing the things that would please the Father”? (John 8:29). “Am I effective in touching lives for God”? “How many souls can trace their joy in the Lord to me today”?

God prefers that His people be engaged in activities that will provoke positive results and durable rewards. And, when He signals ideas to His set-men on earth, He expects them to pass the same to like-minded faithfuls (Psalms 68:11; 2Timothy 2:2). God save your soul if you become the hand the devil uses to stall God’s work!

Effectiveness in kingdom service is eternally rewardable (Matthew 19:27-29). It provokes gracious accomplishments here on earth, and hereafter, joy and durable bliss that lasts forever (Daniel 12:3; John 4:36). Observably, there are no heavenly rewards allocated for those who trade busyness for effectiveness on earth.

Moving From Just Being Busy To Becoming Effective

Now, let’s take a close look at what we must put in place in order to be effective in our kingdom services. Please note that these may change your worldview permanently!

Basically, you must accept responsibility for your assignment. Jesus Christ said that doing the will of God was His necessary “meat” (John 4:34). He also clearly identified His life’s purpose: “to seek and to save” (Luke 19:10).

Great Christian souls must equally know and accept that the task of winning the lost back to the Savior is every believer’s responsibility. If you aren’t thriving in it, don't blame anybody else, look critically inwards.

In this regard, choose to be faithful, available and teachable (F.A.T). There's no way you can be effective without these in place. Prioritize your life in such a way as to be enabled to render effective kingdom services, and please remember always that every excuse (or justification for ineffectiveness) is a lie wearing, perhaps, the garb of reason.

In addition, be positive in all you do and say. What you say and how you act are reflective of the state of your heart. And, what you say is a seed, which defines what you eventually get or become.

Stop dwelling on dismal issues, like bad economy, poor business climate, etcetera. Be exciting in your mandate delivery. Work zealously and tirelessly. Go to the highways and byways, and maximize opportunities.

Be deliberate in hitting your targets, and intentional in your quest to publish God’s Word. Be energetic and enthusiastic about what you are doing. Passion is life, and if you can add it to your kingdom services, you will certainly obtain the tangible results (Ecclesiastes 9:10).

Furthermore, avoid distractions by all means. Reduce the clusters in your schedule and live a less encumbered life. Say “no” to any inappropriate demand on your time. Your time is your life; you don't want to just spend but invest it. Be focused. Be heavenly-minded, and be upward-looking, consistently.

Again, identify your core talents and the key activities that will make you reach your kingdom goals (Revelation 1:6). You are somebody: be the best at whatever you do. Engage your influence. Let the world be impacted by your currency of light (Matthew 5:13-16). Never bury your talents, you will answer to God for them.

Train and remain trainable

A major hallmark of true intelligence is trainability, and this is a critical requirement in raising resourceful disciples (or apprentices). You cannot say you are a disciple if you aren’t trainable. No apprentice ever became a master without training.

Sadly, some Christians act as if they’re untrainable (2Timothy 3:7). They become like millstones around their leader's neck. What a shameful liability to God’s kingdom!

Friends, take a cold, hard look at yourself, and evaluate the quality of your accomplishments in God’s kingdom services so far. Be honest to yourself, and arise to train smarter wherever you are missing the mark (1John 3:20-21).

Moreover, you must be prayerful if you hope to be effective. You need quiet moments to be alone with God and connect with Him as your true Source once in a while, or else you can't be energized for effectiveness. Those who talk too much, and are given to idle jesting, drain themselves so easily.

Consider your end (Deuteronomy 32:29). There is an exceptional joy reserved for good finishers. But to partake of this, you must constantly ask yourself, “What will God say about me at the end of time”? You must not faint, and you must never throw in the towel (Proverbs 24:10).

Brethren in Christ, let’s serve God fervently and effectively, now! Refuse to go empty-handed. You won’t see shame, and you won’t be disappointed at last, in Jesus name. Happy Sunday!

____________________

Bishop Taiwo Akinola,

Rhema Christian Church,

Otta, Ogun State, Nigeria.

Connect with Bishop Akinola via these channels:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/bishopakinola

SMS/WhatsApp: +234 802 318 4987

Have you ever been to an expensive wedding that was a no-holds-barred affair? I am talking about that wedding in which a fortune was spent. The champagne was ordered custom-made from France. The wedding cake was a three-story building. Forget about the wedding but tell me, what happened to the marriage? One year later, they got divorced. What a waste of money. All that expenditure went up in smoke. You did not know that the best man was a divorce lawyer. 

Have you not noticed that the rich tend to be more security-conscious than others? Why is that? They have more to lose and therefore have more to protect. What about you? Do you have anything to protect? Have you received anything that you need to protect? If indeed the thief has come to steal, kill, destroy, what kind of security system do you have against the thief? Do you have anything worth stealing? The songwriter says: “Let the poor say that I am rich because of what the Lord has done for him.”

Your uncle gave you an exclusive car. It was a Lexus SUV, custom-made. It was one of a kind. When they made it, they broke the mould. Everybody came and admired it. But what happened to the Lexus? Within two weeks, you had crashed it into the Carter Bridge. They had to use a chainsaw to remove you from the wreckage. What happened to the car? It was damaged beyond repair. Whose fault was it? Yours, because you despised, in effect, the gift of your uncle.

Grace of God 

The Bible tells the story of two women. Both of them were sinners: harlots as a matter of fact. Nevertheless, the merciful Lord who is not a respecter of persons, who makes the sun shine on the good and the bad, blessed them both with children. 

But one was careless with her gift, so careless she slept on her child and suffocated him to death. Afterwards, she envied the other for her living child and stole it. Her game plan was simple. Either I end up with the child, or neither of us would have a child. When the matter was brought before the king, she readily accepted his verdict to cut the child into two. She said: “Let it be neither yours nor mine.”

That woman was working for the thief. The devil has lost out. He lost his inheritance and was cast out of heaven. But he is determined that you should also not come into your inheritance. It all depends on whether you know the value of what you have. 

It is only your virtue, so why is that man so determined to sleep with you and to defile you? It is only a birthright, so why is Jacob so determined to get it from Esau?

Despising the Grace 

Out of the blue, God sent Samuel to anoint David as King of Israel. God trained him for the assignment in the furnace of affliction. He was on the run for his life from Saul for years, with God as his only help. But after David became king, he relaxed. He became careless. 

It happened in the spring of the year, at the time when kings go out to battle, that David sent Joab and his servants with him, and all Israel; and they destroyed the people of Ammon and besieged Rabbah. But David remained at Jerusalem. (2 Samuel 11:1).

What was David doing in Jerusalem? He was checking out the scenery. And he ended up taking another man’s wife and killing her husband.

In his carelessness, David trusted the wrong people. He lamented: “Even my close friend, whom I trusted, he who shared my bread, has lifted up his heel against me.” (Psalms 41:9).

In the end, David was nearly overthrown, not by the Philistines, but by his own son Absalom. In forty years, Absalom stole the hearts of the men of Israel. 

Beware

Jesus warned his disciples:

“Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves.” (Matthew 10:16).

David learnt his lesson. No more Mr. Nice Guy. On his deathbed, David planned the death of Joab and Shimei.

Salvation is free. The Bible says: “Freely have you received.” The kingdom of God is free. But please don’t get carried away with the freedom, or shall I say with the “free-ness.” Although it is freely given and freely received, you still have to work it out.

“Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” (Philippians 2:12).

The word of God says: “Build a wall, invite a burglar.” (Proverbs 17:19 MSG) Salvation is such a big gift that it makes you a prime candidate for armed robbery. Your salvation was announced on the airwaves, and the prince of the power of the air heard it. The men of the underworld were all waiting outside during the award ceremony. 

“We will see how you will carry it home,” they say. “We will see how you will enjoy it.” So although the gift was freely given, although you did no work to receive it, my friend you are going to have to do a lot to keep it and to enjoy it.

Christian Thieves and Robbers

Who are these armed robbers and where are they exactly? Listen and understand. The worst armed robbers of all are in the church:

Then He taught, saying to them, “Is it not written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations’? But you have made it a ‘den of thieves.’” (Mark 11:17)

“For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works.” (2 Corinthians 11:13-15).

It does not matter what part of town you live in. Jesus says the whole place is full of armed robbers. They have come to steal, to kill and to destroy. Therefore, you need to make some hard choices. 

You have just come into a complete set of the most incredible electronic system, with some cold hard cash thrown in for good measure. But the problem is that the whole thing was carried in the newspapers and on television. And the whole neighbourhood gathered when the trailer came bringing in everything. 

How are you going to enjoy the abundant life that Jesus has promised, in that particular neighbourhood? Will you save your life by returning the gift so that you can at least live in peace? Or will you receive the gift and get ready to fight for your rights?

“And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.” (Matt 11:12)

The dress was so beautiful, so lovely. You’ve just got to have it. Until you found out the price. How much does it cost? Five hundred thousand naira. 

Well it is not that good a dress after all. 

What if I buy it for you? 

Oh yes, please. 

I thought you said it was not good anymore. 

Well, I just could not afford it. 

Not exactly, you were not prepared to pay the price. But you would not mind me buying it for you.

CONTINUED.

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