Category: Opinion

Leadership like fire: Akpabio’s path to greatness By Sufuyan Ojeifo

Emporium Reporters

History, in its long and patient arc, is a master storyteller. Its finest tales often begin with conflict rather than applause, with accusation rather than acclaim. Before the garlands and the gratitude, there is the crucible, the fire through which greatness is tested and purified. The recent wave of false accusations against Nigeria’s Senate President, Senator Godswill Obot Akpabio, belongs to this ancient pattern. Far from diminishing him, they place him squarely in the historical company of giants like Socrates, Mansa Musa, Patrice Lumumba, and Nelson Mandela, whose trials became…

Ted Cruz’s genocide, blasphemy and Ida the slave boy By Festus Adedayo

Emporium Reporters

Today, Nigerian leaders are busy playing the biblical couple, Ananias and Sapphira, on allegation that they abet genocide in Nigeria. They do this while being enveloped in how to rig the 2027 elections. As they do, Citizen Yahaya Sharif-Aminu is on a death row. On February 23, 2020, this then 22-year-old was arrested for posting blasphemous statements on WhatsApp against Prophet Muhammad. The Kano bigoted mob, renowned for its hyena-like thirst for flesh and blood, immediately burnt down Sharif-Aminu’s family home. A musician, what Sharif-Aminu posted was, “there is no…

Dr Madu, the Shamaki of Fika, who became a doctor through providence, by Hassan Gimba

Emporium Reporters

Locally known as Dr Madu in his youth and later more commonly addressed as Dr Mamman, Dr Madu was an Iroko tree of a man, full of compassion and a burning desire to spread health wherever he found himself. His six-foot-three-inch height and athletic build — which a champion heavyweight boxer would envy — would melt whenever a situation requiring compassion arose.   Perhaps this was because he was sired by two noble people from the two most illustrious professions — that of the nobility and that of the clergy…

Between the 2025 Budget and Wale Edun, Who Is Ailing? By Adeyemi Jackson

Emporium Reporters

That Nigerian’s feel the pinch of the ongoing reforms of President Bola Tinubu’s administration is something that could be blamed on the shoddy implementation of the ₦54.99 trillion 2025 Budget or a total lack of it.   It is farcical that implementation of the nation’s 2025 spending plan did not begin until late September, actually, effectively in October, when the year is almost over, with scant three months left. For a government that market itself as reform oriented, this failure to restore the budget to a January to December circle…

REP. KALAMBAINA AND HIS RARE PARLIAMENTARY LEADERSHIP By Idris Aminu

Emporium Reporters

Among the very few names that resonate very loudly and command profound respect in the politics of the ancient Caliphate is Rep. Ahmad Abdullahi Kalambaina, the distinguished Honourable Member representing Kware/Wamakko Federal Constituency with unwavering dedication and exceptional prowess.   Known for his unparalleled grassroots mobilisation and far-reaching positive impact, Hon. Kalambaina is highly favoured and widely celebrated for his high-scale performance that touches directly and profoundly on the well-being, empowerment, and sustainable economic development of his constituents in every corner of the constituency.   As the Deputy Chairman of…

Dauda Lawal: Between Leadership Award and Zamfara Reality By Silas Ajogwu

Emporium Reporters

There are moments when public honours become mirrors that doesn’t reflect virtue but to magnify dissonance. Governor Dauda Lawal’s recent acclamation as “Governor of the Year” by Leadership newspapers should, in a sane political economy, invite sober celebration only if the facts on the ground corroborate the plaudits. But in Zamfara, where villages are sacked, whole communities flee in fear, educational system keep declining in the wake of violence, and mass abductions have become grim headlines, the award reads less like recognition than a rhetorical conjuring trick. The editorial board…

NUPRC AT 4 AND TRIBUTES TO MODEL OF EXCELLENCE By Nnoli Okojie

Emporium Reporters

Four years ago, a quiet ceremony in Abuja marked the birth of a new institution. The Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) was not launched with fanfare or fireworks—just a signed document, a handshake, and a promise to fix what had long been broken.   From that modest beginning, under the steady hand of Engr. Gbenga Komolafe, appointed Chief Executive in October 2021, a regulator once seen as a mere successor to legacy bodies has emerged as the architect of Nigeria’s upstream renaissance. This is not a tale of slogans,…

Morgan Omodu: The measure of a life By abiodun KOMOLAFE

Emporium Reporters

I was a year ahead of Temidayo Morgan Omodu at the University of Ilorin. We were from separate faculties: Morgan, Education (Mathematics), and I, Science (Statistics). Prior to our meeting, I had been invited by Bashir Tayo Lawal, then President of the National Association of Statistics Students (NASS), Unilorin Chapter, to help revive its editorial platform, a role I gladly accepted. Omodu was fascinated by my writings on the board, particularly ‘The Man from Essex’, a piece on Professor I.O. Osungade, who died on June 15, 2024. He approached me…

Tinubu and the significance of yesterday (1) By abiodun KOMOLAFE

Emporium Reporters

The great British Rock Band, ‘The Beatles’, eulogized ‘Yesterday’ in one of its most memorable hit songs. In the lyrics of the song, the past is framed by the line, “Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away,” culminating in a definitive “longing for yesterday.” This is the melancholic interpretation of that great band who defined an era which was a combination of tumult and hope – quite a bizarre cocktail! On the contrary, in Nigeria, only those into self-abnegation, interpreted as a craving for punishment, long for yesterday.  …

Olowo; Two years Renewed Hope, Transformation at FRC By Abubakar Yusuf

Abubakar Yusuf

The appointment of an erudite academic cum financial expert and administrator, Dr Rabiu Onaolapo Olowo by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu as new Chief Executive officer and Executive Secretary, Financial Reporting Council FRC on October, 24 , 2023 was a major breakthrough to the council in so many ways.   Having embraced the template of the Renewed Hope Agenda of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration and the determination to sustain the success already achieved from the cosmopolitan Lagos state after overseeing the financial affairs of the state as Commissioner for finance…