I was born in Kaduna on the 26th of June I936, the fifth in a line of six children born by Amina Theodora to a polygamous husband, Thomas Adekunle. My father, a native of Ogbomoso, was domiciled in Kaduna as early as 1908. He had met my mother in her hometown Numan, during one of his sojourns to the Adamawa Province and married her in 1919. She was a member of the Bachama Tribe, an ethnic group noted for their fighting abilities. As one of the earliest converts to Christianity in her area, my mother was a staunch Christian. She succeeded in converting my father Thomas to Christianity in the course of their courtship and we were raised as Anglicans.

According to the legend repeatedly narrated to me by elderly female relations during my childhood, the circumstances surrounding my early entry into the world were somewhat portentous. They said I overstayed my time in my mother's womb by two months. Moreover, I am reported to have vacated this comfortable abode only after a series of local birth attendants had exhausted their entire repertoire of childbirth skills. These tales meant little to me at the time, but their chief significance was the special attention it secured for me from my family, particularly from my mother.

Both my father and grandfather served in the colonial army. My father later entered the carpentry trade where he made a sufficiently good living to fend for his large family of two wives (he later married a second wife, Christianity non-withstanding), a dozen children and numerous relatives. We all lived in the sprawling house that he built in the Kaduna Township. By 1945, at age nine, I had enough of both school and my unsatisfactory home life. The death of my father in this year strengthened my resolve to take matters into my own hands. I resolved to leave home and look for someone to serve, in exchange for educational support. On the chosen night, I gathered my few belongings and ran away from my brother's home. After several days on the streets, I found my way to one Reverend Ayiogu whom I persuaded to employ me as a domestic servant at the rate of one Shilling and six pence a month. With the assistance of the police, my elder brother soon traced me to my new living quarters. However, all entreaties, commands, cajolery and threats directed at me by the police officers, relations, and the Reverend to return with my brother fell on deaf ears; with Reverend Ayiogu I would remain or vanish again.

From this period, the influences to which I was exposed were more stabilizing. The Reverend proved to be a decent man and I lived with him for two years. By 1947, I came under the protection of a new Master. Under his guidance, I earned a scholarship to Dekina Primary School in Kwara State. My new Master was an extraordinary man though unimposing in appearance. In all the years I spent in the home of Mr. Quinni, a native of Ugep and employee of the Igala Native Authority, he never once raised his voice in anger. He was scrupulously just in his dealings with all persons around him. He was gifted with a formidable intellect, which was brought to bear in every situation. I was fascinated by his ability to win any argument by rigorous analysis. By the time he reached his conclusion, the parties present had little option but to agree, regardless of their own initial positions or whether his conclusion, conflicted with their own interests. It was for this reason that his polygamous home was calm, stable, and peaceful. Mr. Quinni taught me the strength in meekness, the honour in humility, and the dignity in labor. If I have not always succeeded in exhibiting these qualities, he blessed me with the ability to appreciate and esteem them in others.

Under his influence, I thrived at my new school (Dekina Primary School) to the extent that my progress caught the attention of the Head Master, Mr. Dokpong. Among my schoolmates at Dekina was the one time Director of the Nigerian Twelve Corps Service, Colonel Ahmadu Ali, who is still a friend. I passed the entrance examination to Okene Middle School in 1951 and left Dekina with many happy memories.

The Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration has again inadvertently revealed its penchant for dubious and shady deals in the face of this 700km Lagos-Calabar coastal highway.

This project returned to public discourse at the twilight of the Goodluck Jonathan administration in November 2014 wherein it was announced President Jonathan had signed the 10-state, 22-station project with China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC) at a cost of $11.97bn. However, former President Jonathan could not begin the project before he lost the election. But his successor, former President Muhammadu Buhari expressed his intention to begin it and announced in 2016 that the project had been renegotiated downward by $800m to $11.1bn and that it would be ready within three years. But it continued to stall.

It all began in 1977, when 3 young Nigerian Doctors, who just returned from overseas decided to come together to setup a hospital. One of them practiced Medicine, the other was a surgeon and the third was a gynecologist. They converted an apartment owned by one of them, which was located in Alhaji Danmole Street, Surulere, Lagos into their specialist hospital and shared the rent equally. They named the hospital Mercy Specialist Hospital, and began operations in 1977. They quickly gained popularity among lower and middle-class Nigerians and attracted many patients due to their versatility Interestingly, the 3 doctors worked at the teaching hospital in Lagos but managed their own hospital part time. A model still being used today by many medical practitioners. But as with anything in Nigeria, their luck would soon run out as the then Military Ruler General Obasanjo promulgated a decree. The decree said as a medical doctor you were not allowed to work in a teaching hospital and have a private practice at the same time. And so, the trio had a huge decision to make on whether to face the rough seas of the corporate world or remain employees of the government. After some advice and soul searching, they decide to take their fate in their hands, took a bank loan and went full time. And so, in 1982, Alexander Eneli, Sunday Kuku, and Augustine Obiora came together to cofound a hospital named EKO Hospital Ltd.

“Some judges have achieved a considerable degree of expertise….in displaying an immunity from contemporary knowledge and concerns.”
David Pannick, KC, Judges, p. 32 (1987)

Emmanuel Araka was 60 years old when Allison Madueke, then over 20 years his junior, a Navy Captain and military governor of Anambra State, terminated his judicial career in March 1985. At the time, Araka had been the Chief Judge of Anambra State for six years and a judge for double that. At the time, the retirement age of judges in Nigeria was 65.
Araka’s crime was that he took the job of the judge too seriously and believed that a judge should be manifestly independent of political and executive influence.
Araka was born in 1925 to a father from Onitsha who worked as head-teacher in a primary school in Agbor in present-day Delta State, where he was born. His secondary education took him through Hope Waddel Institute in Calabar, now in Cross-River State, where one of his teachers was Eni Njoku (the famous “Teacher Nwanjoku”), who was to become the first Vice-Chancellor of University of Lagos.

Following successful studies at Trinity College, Dublin, Araka was called to the Nigerian Bar in 1951. Over the next two decades, he built a formidable career in private practice and in politics. 12 years after becoming a lawyer, in 1963, he became Queens Counsel, the equivalent of today’s Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN. Two years before that, in 1961, Chike Obi, who represented Onitsha Federal Constituency in the then House of Representatives, had to quit parliament after being convicted of the political crime of sedition. In his place, Onitsha people elected Araka to represent them in the Federal House.
The onset of military rule in 1966 interfered with Araka’s career in politics but did not entirely derail his availability for public service. At the end of the Civil War, he returned to legal practice, but not for long.
In 1972, Administrator of the East Central State, Dr. Ukpabi Asika appointed Araka, a judge of the High Court. When in 1976, the East Central State was split into Imo and Anambra States, Araka naturally became a judge in his home state, Anambra. Two years later, in 1978, Anthony Aniagolu, the first Chief Judge of Anambra State was appointed a Justice of the Supreme Court and Araka succeeded him in office, becoming the second Chief Judge of the State.

I am writing to bring to the attention of the public a grave issue that is plaguing the telecoms industry in Nigeria, and we seek your urgent intervention in addressing this matter.

A Chinese foreign entity that we all know has been exerting undue influence and engaging in malicious activities to dominate the telecoms space in Nigeria. This entity has been systematically discrediting local companies and sabotaging their contracts with major Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) in the country. These malicious actions include deliberate and coordinated attacks on the network infrastructure to degrade performance, giving them an unfair edge to reclaim contracts. Such attacks not only undermine the quality of service but also pose a significant threat to our national critical infrastructure. How could any country allow this? @PoliceNG and @OfficialDSSNG, should please look into this.

THE ODI MASSACRE:

On November 4th, 1999

An armed gang killed 7 policemen in the community of Odi, Bayelsa State. A few days later, they killed 5 more policemen.

President Obasanjo immediately wrote the excerpt below to the Governor of Bayelsa state, Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, giving him 2 weeks to fish out the members of the gang & arraign them in a criminal court.

Many may not know, but the gang that killed those policemen was used by the governor & his party (PDP) during democratic elections in February 1999 to commit illegalities, and Obasanjo already knew this

The problem was that Alamieyeseigha and the powers that be left them to run riot in various villages, towns, and communities in Bayelsa. After the two week ultimatum, the governor couldn’t seem to arrest a known criminal & political thug who he used during his elections in February 1999.

So Obasanjo sent the minister of Police Affairs, Major-General David Jemibewon (rtd.) and Senate President, Dr. Chuba Okadigbo to speak to Gov Alamieyeseigha.

He kept telling the same story, but as they pressed the governor harder, he gave up one name…

Ken Niweigha aka Daddy Ken

Ken Niweigha was said to be many things

- a gang leader
- a career militant
- a highway robber
- a renowned cultist
- a kidnapper
- a sea pirate on Nigerian waters.

Some say Ken was part of The Supreme Egbesu, aka Egbesu Boys & and the Asawana Boys, both affiliated with the IYC - The Ijaw Youth Council.

Here -

Ken was also said to be the son of a Police Officer who chased away his father’s wives & used their house as a commander for his criminal activities.

On October 29, 1974, the Nigerian Ministry of Defence, through the Ministry of External Affairs, wrote to Nigerian missions and embassies abroad that it wanted to buy tonnes of cement to build barracks for its post-civil war armed forces of 200,000 officers and men. The Nigerian Army had just about 8,000 personnel before the war. The ministry not only made that open call for supply of cement, it avoided competitive bidding; it fixed the price at $60/per ton. Analysts noted that that offer price was five dollars more than the prevailing world market price. But, no wahala. Price and pricing have never been a problem for Nigeria. In fact, at that point in our growth (or decadence), the problem we had wasn't money, it was what to spend it on.

So, between December 1974 and June 1975, our Ministry of Defence, which needed just 6 (six) million metric tonnes of cement, awarded 69 contracts for 16.23 million metric tonnes valued at almost $1billion. Other agencies and departments of government soon got on board the cement armada. History says half of the world's cement was diverted to Nigeria. One researcher (Fabian Ihekweme, 2000) found that "approximately half the merchant ships in the world which were suitable for carrying cement became involved in supplying Nigeria." An American newspaper reported that "the massive orders led to an armada of ships anchored off the Lagos coastline...stretching as far as the eye could see. Many were decrepit hulks manned by skeleton crews dispatched by ship owners to collect demurrage costs..." The end was the famous cement scandal of 1974/75 which The New York Times of June 28, 1976 described as "a web of kickbacks and bribes involving government officials, foreign ship owners, corrupt purchasing agents, unscrupulous middlemen, phony corporations, dubious letters of credit and Swiss bank accounts."

The scandal was not just about us biting more than our mouths could contain. We not only allowed and accepted substandard cement from suppliers, concessions were granted by Nigeria approving extension of expiry dates for expired products. Hanaan Marwah, an African infrastructure historian formerly with the London School of Economics, did a major work on this in 2020 for Business History. She places the scandal "in the context of debates about corruption, organizational failure and a 'resource curse' in Nigeria." We had a ports congestion of over 400 ships queuing to offload cement. To compensate for the delay at the ports, we offered generous demurrage. We increased payable demurrage from the standard $3,500 per day to $4,100/ per ship per day. Some ships came carrying nothing; some did not come near our ports at all; some never existed. Yet they all claimed demurrage. And we paid. An account says Nigeria ultimately paid an estimated $240 million in real and phony demurrage costs.

Dear Nigerians, do you know Houthi rebels are the reason you had a poor internet network yesterday?

Walk with me as I explain.

Before now, a lot of Nigerians probably might not have heard about the Houthi rebels, a ragtag militia, and a religious terrorist group from Yemen.

Even though the majority of Nigerians have not heard of these guys before, this ragtag militia is the reason why poor internet connection crippled the whole country today, which also affected the banking network as well. Houthi is an Islamic terrorist organisation based in Yemen.

They are in the same WhatsApp group with Boko Haram and Fulani herdsmen.

Even though they are fighting in the name of Islam, the global headquarters of Islam, Saudi Arabia, hates them with passion because they are Shia by faith, which is from Iran.

Iran practices what is known as the Shia brand of Islam.

Saudi Arabia's brand of Islam is Sunni.

This is akin to Christianity, where you have Anglicans, Catholics, and Pentecostals, even though we worship the same God.

Our marriage is only nine months old. We dated for four years before we finally got married. Within the four years that we dated, he was all about shuperu and more. He wanted it and I had no reason to keep it from him so I gave it to him whenever he wanted it. I won’t say it’s the shuperu that kept us glued together but its contribution can’t overemphasize. We could fight for days and it would the only thing that would bring us together. It was always different after a fight.

The way he gives his all and the way I put my all into it makes it look like it was the only thing we needed in our lives. We had a very good time while dating so my thinking was that it was going to get better when we get married. On our honeymoon, it was a disaster. I was too tired to care and he was too tired to want it. But we tried anyway. We were able to get some lousy rounds just to keep us going.

We returned from our honeymoon on Thursday. Everything was new. We couldn’t live in the house each of us was living in because they were too small to contain us. We had a new room that came with a new fragrance. We had new bedsheets that spiced our sleep. We slept with the music on just to musk up the noise that both of us produced during the action. Everything was stacked in our favor and everything around us screamed, “Get to it already, we can’t wait to see some action.”

WILLINK REPORT 1958 THE FOLLOWING ARE EXCERPTS FROM A THE REPORT OF THE COMMISSION APPOINTED TO “ENQUIRE INTO THE FEARS OF MINORITIES AND THE MEANS OF ALLAYING THEM”, OTHERWISE KNOWN AS “THE WILLINK COMMISSION REPORT OF JULY 1958”
THE HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL BACKGROUND.

A short thread 1. “More than 98% of people who inhabit this area (the ‘Ibo Plateau’ of the Eastern region) are Ibo and speak one language, though of course with certain differences of dialect. There are nearly five million of them and they are too many for the soil to support: they are vigorous and intelligent and have pushed outward in every direction, seeking a livelihood by trade or in service in the surrounding areas of the Eastern Region, in the Western Region, in the North and outside Nigeria. They are no more popular with their neighbours than is usual in the case of an energetic and expanding people whose neighbours have a more leisurely outlook on life.”

Teach your children history.

WHERE WERE YOU IN 1987?

Professor Yemi Osinbajo was then a Special Assistant to the Attorney General of the Federation.

That was the year Oba Yesufu Oloyede Asanike, Olubadan of Ibadan made history.

Olubadan installed Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola as the Bashorun of Ibadan.

It was a prestigious title befitting of a distinguished personality in the mould of MKO Abiola.

That was the title of the legendary Bashorun Oluyole who was the paramount chief of Ibadan in 1850.

It was also the title of Bashorun Ogunmola who reigned between 1865 and 1867.

It was therefore historic that exactly 120 years after the death of Ogunmola, MKO Abiola became the fourth person to be conferred with the prestigious title.

It was indeed a befitting honour for someone who had amassed chieftaincy titles from almost every town in Nigeria. As of the time of his installation in 1987, MKO Abiola was reputed to have over 150 chieftaincy titles.

He was the Bobajiro of Ode-Remo.

He was the Bada Musulumi of Gbagura Egba.

As he drove out of the palace of Oba Asanike that fateful day with his son by his side, MKO must have thought that he had reached the peak of traditional chieftaincy in Nigeria.

He was just settling down in his Ikeja home when he was informed that he had a call.

Who was on the line?

He asked before collecting the phone.

It was the Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Olayiwola Adeyemi III.

MKO snatched the phone.

“Iku Baba Yeye, Igbakeji Orisa! Kabiyesi!”

The newly installed Bashorun paid his homage to the foremost traditional ruler.

Alaafin must be calling to congratulate me, MKO thought.

Kabiyesi was however not calling to congratulate the business magnate.

Everyone in Kaduna knew Omobolaji Gaji. He was a solicitor and advocate of the Supreme Court of Nigeria. He was one of the leading lawyers in Northern Nigeria at the time. Rauph Omobolaji Gaji was an irrepressible advocate who was known far and beyond Kaduna where he had his base. However, he did not start his practice in Kaduna. It was in Lagos that he cut his legal teeth before he moved up North. If you had a complex case, one of the lawyers you would consider to stand in for you was Gaji, of counsel.

Gaji was as brilliant as he was versatile. He was at home with Land Law as he was comfortable with Law of Taxation. Criminal Law and Procedure was his forte, and hardly could you beat him when Law of Torts was on the table. Have I told you that he had a perfect mastery of English Language? His English was impeccable and flawless. This was years before written brief became the norm. Then, oral advocacy was the index the average man used for measuring the competence of a legal practitioner, and in this, Gaji excelled. No wonder he was known across the length and breadth of Kaduna as Gaji the Law or ROG.

He was the counsel for the appellant in the popular case of Ali Abadallabe v. Bornu Native Authority where he ingeniously asked my Noble Lords of the Supreme Court whether a burglar had a right to defend himself. He was also the defence counsel in the popular case of Queen v. Bello. Has Onigegewura told you that ROG was also popular? He was familiar to all the judges in Kaduna and was not a stranger to all the lawyers who practiced in the town at the time. There was even a rumour that ROG was a member of an exclusive club with some of the important stakeholders in the justice sector.

He belonged to the prestigious Lincoln’s Inn. Having been called to the Bar on 25 November 1952 and enrolled in the Supreme Court on Wednesday, 14 January 1953, he was already a senior lawyer when this tragic story happened. In fact, My Lord Justice Baptist Ayodola Coker described him as a “legal practitioner of many years standing.”

It was therefore only natural that he was the lawyer retained by Gladys Wey whose appeal was coming up before the Supreme Court. It was indeed an important matter and Wey had full confidence in her counsel. She had won the case in the High Court. The matter was now coming up before the Supreme Court to be determined with the finality which only the apex court could boast of. Onigegewura has already told you in the story of The Fall of a Godfather that there was no intermediate appellate court in other parts of the country outside the Western State before 1976.

Mrs Wey, a health practitioner, had arrived in Kaduna from her base in Zaria on the eve of the hearing of the appeal before the Supreme Court, and being a stranger in the city, she decided to put up with her lawyer. Young lawyers who are reading this story might be wondering whether the Supreme Court was ever in Kaduna. At the material time, the Supreme Court used to practice what was then known as assize. You are wondering what the term assize stands for. Onigegewura will tell you. When a court decides to have periodic sittings in different places, it is called assize. In those days, the Supreme Court used to have assize in Ibadan, Enugu and Kaduna to ensure that the litigants in those far-flung places were not deprived of justice on account of cost of travelling to Lagos.

That was the reason Gladys Wey found herself in the residence of ROG that fateful day. She was not the only guest in the house that evening. Gaji’s friend, Isaac Oshonoike who was working with the Posts & Telecommunications (previously known as Posts and Telegraphs) was also around. At the time, P & T was the body responsible for postal and telecommunication services throughout the country. The body was later unbundled into Nigerian Postal Service and Nigerian Telecommunication Limited respectively. Wey and Oshonoike were soon joined by the duo of Cordelia Ego Ejiofor and Christopher Brown. Cordelia was Gaji’s girlfriend. She was a twenty-one year old teacher working in Kaduna. She had brought Brown to meet with her boyfriend that evening regarding possible employment as a legal secretary. Gaji had told her that he needed a secretary/typist and she promised to assist him to recruit a competent hand. Brown happened to have come from the same part of the country with her and she was confident that her ‘brother’ would get a job with her boyfriend. Gaji’s houseboy, Friday Igwegbu, was also in the house. He was the one who offered Brown a bottle of soft drink.

But their host was not around. Onigegewura has told you that Gaji was a master of English language. Perhaps that was the reason he was chosen to serve as the Master of Ceremonies at a social thanksgiving service which held that day at the Palace Hotel. He was at the event whilst the four guests and the houseboy waited for him at home.

Whilst Mrs Wey and Mr. Oshonoike were in their separate guest rooms, Cordelia and Christopher Brown were waiting for Gaji in the living room. The two of them heaved a sigh of relief when their host sauntered in. Their relief however turned into something else when they saw the countenance of the learned gentleman who entered. It was Gaji quite alright, but his visage was anything but friendly. He noticed that Brown was cradling a bottle of soft drink, perhaps this was what infuriated him. Cordelia must have sensed the change in her boyfriend’s temperament and she quickly explained that Brown was the male secretary they had earlier agreed she was to bring for interview. Gaji brusquely interviewed the applicant and immediately told him that he could not employ him.

Brown needed no further prompting. You already know that wọn kò fẹ ẹ niìlú, ó ń dárin, tí ó bá dárin náà tán, tani yóò ba ọ gbee? (You are not wanted in a town and you then decided to sing, if you sing who will join you to sing the chorus). Brown jumped up from his seat and bade goodbye to the assembly. At the door, he turned to wave at Cordelia who gave him a reassuring smile to signify that everything was under control.

If only he knew!

The following morning, Gaji appeared before the Noble Lords of the Supreme Court to defend the appeal of his client. It was ROG at his best. With his flawless command of English language, and his mastery of the law, he left no one in doubt that his sobriquet, Gaji the Law, was a deserving title. It was not the only case he did that day. He also argued a couple of criminal appeals bordering on murder.

Christopher Brown was waiting to hear from Cordelia on whether she had succeeded in convincing the lawyer to change his mind. He wondered what must have triggered the renowned legal practitioner to have reacted the way he did when they had never met before. He was not the only one waiting. Cordelia’s sister who lived with her, Nkemdilim Ejiofor was also waiting. Before Cordelia went out that fateful evening, she had instructed Nkem to prepare yam for dinner and that she would come back very soon. Nkem finished cooking and waited for her sister to return. But Cordelia never returned.

Of course, she knew Lawyer Gaji and of his relationship with her sister. The previous week when Nkem’s child had convulsion, Gaji was the one who took them to a native doctor who assisted in finding solution to the illness. She also knew that her sister had told her that she was taking Brown to Gaji’s house. When by morning Cordelia had not returned, she informed people in the neighbourhood. Her major challenge was that she did not know Gaji’s residence but she knew someone who did. Temilade Bepo was Cordelia’s friend and classmate at the Teachers’ College. Together, the two of them made their way to the lawyer’s house on Abuja Road.

Mauritania’s endless sea of sand dunes hides an open secret:

An estimated 10% to 20% of the population lives in slavery. But as one woman’s journey shows, the first step toward freedom is realizing you’re enslaved.

MAURITANIA BY THE NUMBERS
SLAVERY

Population: 3.4 million
Percentage living in slavery: 10% to 20%
Enslaved population: 340,000 to 680,000
Year slavery was abolished: 1981
Year slavery became a crime: 2007
Convictions against slave owners: One.

GEOGRAPHY

Area: 400,000 square miles, slightly larger than Egypt
Capital: Nouakchott
Bordered by: Mali, Senegal, Algeria, Western Sahara
Landscape: Sahara Desert, Sahel
Farmable land: 0.2%

PEOPLE
Languages: Arabic, French and regional languages
Official religion: Islam
Literacy rate: 51%
Unemployment: 30%
Population density: 8 people per square mile

ECONOMY
Percentage living on less than $2 per day: 44%
GDP (purchasing power parity): $7.2 billion, less than Haiti
GDP per capita: $2,200 (compared to $48,000 in the U.S.)
Currency: Ouguiya

POLITICS
Government: Republic (currently under military rule)
Legal system: Mix of Islamic and French civil law
President: Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz
Recent history: Gained independence from France in 1960. Aziz came to power in a military coup in 2008, overthrowing first democratically elected leader. Aziz was elected in 2009 as a way to validate his rule.
Sources: United Nations, Encyclopedia Britannica, CIA World Factbook, International Monetary Fund, World Bank, "Disposable People," BBC Country Profiles
Nouakchott, Mauritania (CNN) Moulkheir Mint Yarba returned from a day of tending her master’s goats out on the Sahara Desert to find something unimaginable: Her baby girl, barely old enough to crawl, had been left outdoors to die.

The usually stoic mother — whose jet-black eyes and cardboard hands carry decades of sadness — wept when she saw her child’s lifeless face, eyes open and covered in ants, resting in the orange sands of the Mauritanian desert. The master who raped Moulkheir to produce the child wanted to punish his slave. He told her she would work faster without the child on her back.

Trying to pull herself together, Moulkheir asked if she could take a break to give her daughter a proper burial. Her master’s reply: Get back to work.

“Her soul is a dog’s soul,” she recalls him saying.

Later that day, at the cemetery, “We dug a shallow grave and buried her in her clothes, without washing her or giving her burial rites.”

“I only had my tears to console me,” she would later tell anti-slavery activists, according to a written testimony. “I cried a lot for my daughter and for the situation I was in. Instead of understanding, they ordered me to shut up. Otherwise, they would make things worse for me — so bad that I wouldn’t be able to endure it.”

Moulkheir told her story to CNN in December, when a reporter and videographer visited Mauritania — a vast, bone-dry nation on the western fringe of the Sahara — to document slavery in the place where the practice is arguably more common, more readily accepted and more intractable than anywhere else on Earth.

The article below was published on June 28, 2021. It was written in response to the skirmish between Israel and Hamas earlier that year.

THIS ISRAEL ISN'T THE CHILDREN OF JACOB

"Israel" is believed to mean many things, but the most concise is "Triumphant with God." Jacob, who was renamed Israel by an angel with whom he wrestled all night, had twelve male children. He demanded a blessing from the angel he would not let go because he was terrified of the prospects that awaited him in the days following. His warrior brother (Esau), whom he had deeply offended, was advancing toward his small band of family, servants, and livestock. Laban, his uncle, was hot in pursuit of them because, among other things, Laban's fetish was stolen by Rachel, Jacob's favorite wife. None of the children of Jacob was called Ashkenaz. Ashkenaz was the son of Gomer. Gomer was the son of Japheth, Noah's son.

But since its founding in 1948, all the Israeli prime ministers were Ashkenazi Jews. The Ashkenazim were satirically referred to as the thirteenth tribe of Israel by Arthur Koestler, the author of "The Thirteenth Tribe." Arthur Koestler himself is an Ashkenazi Jew. There is no thirteenth tribe of Israel because the patriarch Jacob had only twelve sons. The Ashkenazim were originally “Caucasians” with no Semitic ancestry who converted en masse to Judaism around the 8th century.

There are other kinds of Jews in Israel today. The Mizrahi Jews, the Sephardic Jews, and the Ethiopian Jews are among that portion of the Israeli population referred to as Jews in that nation now. The Jews, as of 2020, make up about 74.2% of the Israeli population. About 20% of Israelis are Arabs that practice various religions, not necessarily Islam. But about 14% of the Israeli population are Muslims, 2% are Christians, and 2% are Druze. An overwhelming number of the Jews in Israel practice Judaism.

As the reader may have suspected, the word "Jewish" refers to the descendants of Jacob even though not everyone is descended from Judah. The descendants of Judah were the ones initially called Jews. Judah was the fourth son of Jacob by Leah, his first wife. Calling descendants of Jacob Jews is just like calling Europeans Caucasians, as they are sometimes referred to now. "Caucasians" originally referred to the people in the Caucasus Mountain range between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea.

The Ashkenazim is the most educated subgroup of Israeli Jews. And as a result, they control the political and economic life of the Jewish nation. Incredibly, however, they are also the ones who determine who is a Jew today. The Mizrahi Jews, the Sephardic Jews, and the Ethiopian Jews, who arguably have ancestry that went back to Jacob, are now so mixed up with the gene pools from other races and peoples that a lot of them are barely Jewish now. But a common characteristic of all "Jews" today is that they are all white or light-skinned. Of course, Israel was not white when they were carried away by the Assyrians and the Babylonians. But these are not the only children of Jacob in the world today.

The DNA test has proven that the Lemba tribe in southern Africa is descended from Aaron. Aaron was Moses’s elder brother. Moses was the Hebrews' foremost prophet. The Lembas are a dark-skinned group of people who, if you investigate them, still practice almost all the Old Testament Jewish laws and traditions. The percentage of the DNA match of the Lemba tribe compared to those of all the Kohanim (or Cohens, i.e., descendants of Aaron the high priest) scattered all over the world today makes the Lembas the purest Jews alive today. But do you see the government of Israel breaking down the doors to bring them back to Israel? The reason that will never happen is because the Lembas are black. One of the Ashkenazi Jewish leaders who was surprised and distressed by the Lemba DNA result was quoted to have said openly, "What are we supposed to do with such a result? Bring them here?" The question alone showed the disgust he had at the thought of bringing the Lembas to Israel. Meanwhile, Ashkenazi Jews from Russia, Poland, Ukraine, Hungary, etc., are coming in and are being resettled in Israel even now. Today, the Israelis sometimes derogatorily refer to the dark-skinned Ethiopian Jews as "Kushi," which would be the equivalent of being called "Nigger” in the USA.

Remember that the word "Jew" replaced the word "Hebrew" since it now refers to Jacob's descendants. But Abraham was the first person to be referred to as the Hebrew in the Bible. And that would make his descendant Hebrews too. You will remember that Abraham was the father of Ishmael and the grandfather of Esau whose descendants are Arabs today. That means that the Arabs are also Hebrews.

And then, there is this tribe in the southeastern part of present-day Nigeria. This group is also dark-skinned. Not as uniformly dark-skinned as the Lembas of southern Africa. This group was described variously at different times as the Hebrews, the Heebos, the Ebeos, the Ibos, and now the Igbos. But to get to the Igbos, we will first talk about the Sephardic Jews.

The Sephardic Jews, also described as the "Jews of the Iberia Peninsula," are the Jews who are descended from the Jews who lived in Spain and Portugal before the Alhambra Decree. This decree is also called the Edict of Expulsion. The Alhambra Decree was issued jointly on March 31, 1492, by the Catholic Monarchs of Spain (Castile and Aragon). The decree ordered the expulsion of practicing Jews from the two kingdoms and their territories and possessions by July 31, 1492. King Manuel 1 of Portugal followed up with his decree of expulsion of the Jews in 1496. At the time of the Spanish expulsion, over half of Spanish Jews had been forced to convert to Catholicism. The reason for the Alhambra Decree was "to eliminate [Jewish] influence on Spain's large converso (converted) population" and to make sure those converted did not go back to Judaism.

The Spanish and Portuguese decrees ordered their Jewish citizens to choose from these three choices: 1. To convert to Catholicism and be allowed to continue to live within their kingdoms, 2. To keep practicing Judaism and be expelled from the kingdoms by the stipulated dates, and 3. To remain in those kingdoms and be summarily executed as practicing Jews. King Manuel 1 of Portugal, who did not want the Jews to leave because of their usefulness to his kingdom, blocked the Jews from leaving. But even though he blocked those who wanted to depart from leaving, he maliciously ordered that any Jew found in Portugal on the date the decree took effect had become a Catholic by default.

Recently, however, Portugal passed the "Law on Nationality" on April 11, 2013. This law allowed descendants of the expelled Jews in 1492 to apply for citizenship in Portugal. Spain also passed a similar law in 2014. Both laws expired in October and September of 2019, respectively. During the medieval era, many Ashkenazi Jews moved to the Iberia Peninsula to study Kabbalah and Torah under the Sephardic Jewish Rabbis. That became necessary because the Ashkenazim converted to Judaism because they were being squeezed on one side by the Christian Roman Empire. On the other side was the Islamic juggernaut that was barreling through Europe at the time. So, the Ashkenazim became Jews without knowing anything about Judaism. At present, a fraction of the Sephardic Jews have moved to Israel since its founding in 1948.

The size of President Tinubu’s delegation to the COP28 Climate Summit in Dubai has raised a bit of dust. On closer examination, I think it was unnecessary noise based on incomplete understanding of the president’s sense of mission. In these matters, context is everything. There is a sense in which Mr. Tinubu’s presidency straddles two opposing traditions of sovereign authority. The man is first and foremost an elected president of a constitutional republic. But he acts and carries on more like an African king with more of ceremonial authority inspired from some primal ancestry. In the formal context of an elected presidency, a 1,411 (or the officially admitted 422) strong size of the Nigerian delegation to just one conference is undisputedly scandalous. With hardly any roles specified for this huge train, the entire mission smacks more like a jamboree than anything else. For an elected executive presidency, accountability also implies accountancy, close attention to numbers in terms of cost. Ferrying either 1,412 persons (or even 422) to a jamboree in Dubai at a cost of N3bn cannot be badge of honour for a Nigerian government no matter where and when.

One of the students in my career coaching class shared his challenging journey through secondary school. His father, despite holding a lowly office position, insisted on sending his only child to one of the state's best schools. Each term, roughly every three months, the father sought a substantial pay-ahead loan from his boss, amounting to more than half of his monthly salary.

This continued for the entire six years of secondary education, until the embrace of a low-tuition fee university relieved his father's finances. It seemed peculiar that the company allowed this, but given his long service, it appeared to be a form of loyalty being rewarded. Unfortunately, while his colleagues could afford career advancements by changing jobs and, naturally, better pay, his father remained stuck in the same job for many years, with little chance of promotion. Such was the price he paid for ensuring his son received a solid foundation.

In 1989, Nigeria LNG Limited (NLNG) was established, operating as a liquefied natural gas-producing company and having a liquefied natural gas plant on Bonny Island, Nigeria. Interest in LNG emerged in the 1960s when the concept of monetizing flared gas was introduced. Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), commonly known as cooking gas, is a byproduct of refining petroleum (crude oil) or extracting it from natural gas streams.

Before Abuja, there was Lagos as our Federal Capital. And this is where I would want to believe that there is something about our North and Federal Capital Territories. Before independence and immediately after independence, Lagos had a succession of two ministers of Lagos Affairs, both were northerners. One was Alhaji Musa Yar'Adua, father of the late President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua. There was also Muhammadu Ribadu, grandfather of our immediate past First Lady, Hajia Aisha Buhari. Years later, Nigeria moved to Abuja and a long line of FCT ministers was recorded for the North. Now, some of the power elite from the north are said to be bellyaching over a southerner currently holding the steering wheel of Abuja, Lagos' successor as the Federal Capital Territory. Leading the ground troops is fiery cleric, Sheikh Ahmad Gumi. He and his army of angry purists are not happy with Nyesom Wike's presence as minister and with his ways in the FCT.

Juju musician, Ebenezer Obey, sings in one of his records that there is nothing new under the sun (Kò s'oun tuntun l'ábé òrun mó...). There is nothing the current FCT minister, Wike, is doing in Abuja today that was not done in Lagos of the first republic by Minister Ribadu in his days as Lagos Affairs Minister. Ribadu and Wike are more than two generations apart but if you ask 18th century Irish writer, poet and lyricist, Thomas Moore, to study the two and describe his findings in a poetic phrase, he would likely say he discovered a pair of kindred spirits. Guts for guts, tongue for tongue, their adjectival numerals would be six and half a dozen. Wike can talk and do anything; Ribadu could talk and do anything. He did what he had to do in Lagos before he was moved to the Ministry of Defence, then he died suddenly on May 1, 1965 at the age of 55. This is what Ribadu's biographer wrote on him and how he ran the affairs of Lagos: "Before going over to Defence, Ribadu held the post of Minister of Lagos Affairs where he was so effective for his admirable performance. He was in charge when the city was being rebuilt. He had several decisions not being implemented because of the opposition of some people to move out of their places of abode to new sites given them by the government after they had collected their compensations... (They) refused to move out in spite of constant reminders. One morning, he visited the area and to the surprise of the Power of Powers (Ribadu's nickname), instead of those people to come and plead, they shouted at 'Gambari'. He parked his car and sent a message for a tractor (a bulldozer) which he personally supervised (while it) pulled down buildings owned by those residents. From then, when Ribadu was seen, he was called 'Baba Eko' - the father of Lagos.

"A particular incident which made him more feared was the house of one feared babalawo or juju priest. Some prominent Lagosians who were good friends of Ribadu pleaded with him to skip that man's house for fear of serious consequences befalling him, but he ignored them. The chief priest himself visited Ribadu's quarters pouring some powder, and three times, deposited chained chickens, goat and even a ram. On Ribadu's order, his houseboys made feasts whenever these were brought in. Finally, he went to the (juju man's) house the day it was to be broken down. Today, the place is occupied by a multi-storey building housing several offices. This, indeed, was the man Ribadu. Contrary to what the Babalawo and his friends believed, not even a headache troubled the indefatigable Ribadu. Had he not put his feet firmly on the ground, probably we could not have done any development in Lagos as it is today" (see page 21-22 of 'The Power of Powers: A biography of the Late Alhaji Muhammadu Ribadu' by Sidi H. Ali). There are speculations about errant churches and mosques being threatened by Wike's bulldozers. Mosques are sacred; churches are sacred. But Islam and Christianity are against persons who disdain the law and break it with impunity. The two religions have special hell fires for law breakers. If a mosque or a church finds itself running foul of the law, should it not willingly pay the price? A priest's house was caught by the law in Lagos in the early sixties, Muhammadu Ribadu, the minister of Lagos Affairs, pulled down the sacred house. I do not think Wike would be doing anything new or strange if he also moves against sacred structures that offend the law.

Sheikh Gumi and his supporters spoke on the ownership status of Abuja. The sheikh has not stopped being in the news since then. (Apologies to Justice Victor Ovie Whisky and his Verdict '83), the Supreme Court and its Verdict '23 of last Thursday hasn't stopped Gumi from trending. Nor has the ghastly parting gift of filth and odium from Justice Musa Dattijo Muhammad who declared that our judiciary had "become something else." Gumi said some things that were as weighty as heavy. He spoke about Abuja and its ownership. He spoke on who was qualified to wield power there and who was not. He called the FCT minister "a satanic person" who should never have occupied a space reserved for Abuja, a city of saints. Gumi said “The Minister of the FCT is a satanic person; I said it before when he was appointed and some people were grumbling." The sheikh said other things and it was from him that I learnt that nepotism has tribe and it is better in some than in others. Gumi said "Yet they kept blabbing about Buhari's so-called nepotism. There was an element of nepotism under Buhari, I reckon. But our (northern Muslim) nepotism is not evil because it does no harm to anyone. If it cannot promote your interest, it won't harm it either; here is the difference. That's why I keep warning that power should not slip from our hands into theirs. Look how they took over all juicy and lucrative positions in the country. And they believe they'll continue to govern us in the next four years and beyond. They think through their tricks they'll get re-elected for another four-year term to make eight years in power. But that will not happen while we're here by the will of God. Their ultimate goal is to impoverish the North..."

I asked questions and I was told Bola Tinubu's choice of a southerner as FCT minister is heresy to the powers in the North. They think Abuja is the North's property and a northerner must be in charge there in perpetuity.

But, shall we ask who really owns Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory? General Murtala Muhammed, the Kano man who created it, asked and answered that question at the very beginning. In his February 3, 1976 broadcast announcing that area as our new Federal Capital, he said it would "belong to all Nigerians" of all tribes and tongues. Here, I think I should quote him copiously: "The area is not within the control of any of the major ethnic groups in the country. We believe that the new capital created on such virgin lands as suggested will be for all Nigerians a symbol of their oneness and unity. The Federal Territory will belong to all Nigerians. The few local inhabitants in the area who need to be moved out of the territory for planning purposes will be resettled outside the area in places of their choice at government expense." But, until Tinubu's appointment of Wike to man that space, Abuja had been ruled as northern Nigeria's 20th state to the shame of its history and the promise that birthed it.

Protocol.

Gentlemen of the Press.

Someone asked me what I would do if I lost my election petition appeal at the Supreme Court. In response, I said that as long as Nigeria wins, the struggle would have been worth the while. By that, I meant that the bigger loss would not be mine but Nigeria’s if the Supreme Court legitimizes illegality, including forgery, identity theft, and perjury.

If the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, implies by its judgment that crime is good and should be rewarded, then Nigeria has lost and the country is doomed irrespective of who occupies the Presidential seat. If the Supreme Court decides that the Electoral umpire, INEC, can tell the public one thing and then do something else in order to reach a corruptly predetermined outcome, then there is really no hope for the country’s democracy and electoral politics.

Obviously, the consequences of those decisions for the country will not end at the expiration of the current government. They will last for decades. I am absolutely sure that history will vindicate me. We now know what the Supreme Court has decided. At critical points in my political life, I always ignored the easy but ignoble path and chosen the difficult but dignified path, the path of truth, of morality, of democracy and rule of law.

I always chose freedom over servitude, whatever the personal discomforts my choice entails. When I joined politics, the critical challenge was easing the military out of power so that civilian democratic governance could be restored in Nigeria. It later became a very defining struggle, and, as one of the leaders of that struggle, I was targeted for elimination.

In one incident, nine policemen guarding my home in Kaduna were murdered in an attempt to assassinate me. I was also forced into exile for nine (9) months. In addition, my interest in a logistics company that I co-owned was confiscated and given to friends of the military government. As Vice President in the civilian government that succeeded the military, I, again at great personal cost, chose to oppose the extension of the tenure of the government beyond the two four-year terms enshrined in our constitution.

In response to the official backlash against me, I instituted several cases in the courts, which led to seven landmark decisions that helped to deepen our democracy and rule of law. At the current historic moment, the easier option for me would have been to fold up and retreat after the mandate banditry perpetrated by the APC and INEC.

But I went to the Nigerian courts to seek redress. I even went to an American court to help with unravelling what our state institutions charged with such responsibilities were unwilling or unable to do, including unravelling the qualifying academic records of the person sworn in as our President and by implication, hopefully who he really is.

Two things stuck out to me on my way back to Toronto.

Firstly, in Frankfurt, where I stopped over on transit since I was flying Lufthansa, there were a lot of Nigerians.

Young Nigerians.

A couple of them with their mothers.

On their way back to school in Canada.

I got talking to a mother and her two twin daughters and a son.

She was excited that I was living in Canada and wanted me to keep an eye on her children for her.

Then, the introductions began.

Meet this... meet that.

Somehow, all these kids seemed to know each other.

47 children in all.

Children of the Rich.

The mother had said to me earlier...

"It's worth it spending the extra money it cost for them to school abroad, at least you are sure of quality education and no strikes. At the end of it all, unlike the UK, in Canada, they can ultimately become Canadians. Because with the way Nigeria is going, those who have money and sense must invest in alternatives."

The poor have no alternatives but to argue over tribe, religion, and political affiliations, while the rich and the powerful are preparing to abandon ship.

I had said to her.

"But the private universities don't go on strikes, and their quality seems pretty good."

She laughed.

"Let the ones with new money send their children there after all they have to protect them from the sickness in that country but we who God has blessed so richly, we have to differentiate ourselves and our children from the masses if we hope to get the masses to continually give us access to power."

"To power?"

"Of course, people trust what they hope to become and not what they are. The more different, rich, and successful you are, the more the common man will trust you with their future. That is why the truly rich must invest in their children in as different a way from the way the ordinary man invests in their own children if they want to perpetuate their wealth and hold on to power. It is called succession planning."

I allowed the words to sink into me with an expressionless face. She continued.

"You an intelligent young man. You surely must agree with me that power and wealth if not consolidated and defended will be lost and the only hope of the poor is that the rich remain rich from one generation to the next so that informed leadership is guaranteed and the chaos that ensues when the poor are led by the poor is prevented. Look at the Niger Delta and the East where charlatans have risen to positions of power; see the raucous and mayhem they have enshrined. Only we who were born into power and wealth know how to control it and use it for the common good because power and money are a spirit, and it will destroy the unprepared."

I was flummoxed.

"Did you say that you are a home manager?"

She laughed.

"Of course I am. I take care of the home while my husband brings in the funds. People are always surprised when I speak. They think all home managers are dumb, and little do they know that it is the woman in the shadows that is the power. We are the puppeteers. The whisperers. The kingmakers. Especially if we have breeding. The same breeding I am giving to my daughters so that whatever they decide to do in their future, they will do it exceedingly well. Since they will understand the secrets of acquiring, keeping, and mastering power to perpetuate the family legacy."

"Everything has an end."

"Not when you plan ahead, and you prepare even the unborn for its inheritance. No one is born to lead. We are taught to lead. That is the difference between the nouveau riche and the elites. The elite has proven that we have through time mastered the art of making money and acquiring power, not as an end in itself but as a tool of the ultimate."

"What is the ultimate?"

She smiled.

It was barely discernable, then she whispered.

"Control."

I let it sink in.

"Why aren't you flying in your own private jet."

Again, the smile flashed across her face.

"That is what those who chase money and power for its sakes will do. It's all loud and ever so obvious. But we who have evolved past that through generations of breeding live outwardly rich enough to be respected and privately anonymously to control without being identified as the ones who are in control."

Her words swirled around me like fireflies as she spoke on and on, after which she said as though in an afterthought.

"There is something about you that makes people who barely know you trust you. I don't know what it is, but you are very easy to talk to."

I smiled in appreciation.

"You should learn to make it work in your favor."

I smiled again.

"I can teach you if you want."

TODAY NEWSPAPER, AUGUST 18-24, 1996 – FROM THE ARCHIVES

Fraudulent Academic Claims: Wole Soyinka exposed

By Our Correspondent

The claim by Professor Wole Soyinka that he obtained First Class bachelor's degree in English Literature from Leeds University has been challenged.

Instead, what the Nobel Laureate actually obtained from Leeds was a Second Class degree. This startling revelation was made by Professor James Gibbs who has closely monitored the activities of former Leeds students in English literature.

Professor Gibbs remarked that in arriving at the facts he has on Wole Soyinka's academic records, "I have drawn on a variety of sources including contemporary Leeds publications, archival material, Soyinka's work and interviews I had with him".

In a 1983 interview with Mike Awoyinfa published by Sunday Concord of February 27, Wole Soyinka claimed that after his first degree in Leeds he did not feel like going for any postgraduate studies saying "I was bored, I felt that I had grasped enough of what I wanted from my literature studies. So I felt I wanted to get out and write. I believe that the student period of one's existence should be short and intense ů so after three years I felt I should go out." However, Professor Gibbs told TODAY in an exclusive interview in Accra, Ghana, that the claim was also a blatant lie since Professor Soyinka had duly completed his MA programme in English literature but failed in the Autumn of 1957.

Professor Gibbs referred TODAY to his latest publication on Wole Soyinka entitled TALKING WITH PAPER which contained details of the Nobel Laureate's academic and private life while a student at Leeds University.

The publication, made available to TODAY, states that Soyinka had applied for an MA programme at Leeds from an address given as "P.O. Box 192, Abeokuta" to work on English: American Literature (1920s), Eugene O'Neill and Shakespeare, revealing further that he was offered an admission along with Barbara Dixon whom he (Soyinka) was later to make pregnant and then abandon.

Asari Dokubo's Younger Brother, Goodhead Dokubo Lambasts Asari on Diatribe Against Igbos
TI Editor June 23, 2023

US based Professor Goodhead Dokubo has lambasted his senior brother Alhaji Mujahid Asari Dokubo on his diatribe against Igbos on a viral video days after his visit… twitter.com/i/web/status/1… He continued...,

" His utterances in this video are absolutely deplorable. I felt like throwing up after watching it. Something gave inside me. I wept. What a country! What a shameless country!

I was also made nauseous by your statement that you wonder why after making these… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…