Naija Political Blog

Iranians went to the polls on June 12, 2009 to vote during that country’s presidential election. They were however outraged when the results of the election gave incumbent president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a landslide victory over their preferred candidate Mir Hossain Moussavi in what they perceived as an election fraud. Unlike Nigerians, they took their outrage to the streets of Teheran and other cities in that country. Putting their bodies and lives on the line, tens of thousands of Iranians took to the streets in daily protest to challenge what they saw as a blatant theft of their votes. We have also witnessed on our television screens, More…

Ten years after Nigerians ushered in a new era of civilian rule, the PDP led federal government and the National Assembly, the country’s legislative branch of government are virtually non-existent in the lives of Nigerians. On my recent trip here, I was shocked to find a glaring lack of socio-economic and political progress in most of the country. Except for Lagos, Delta, Benue and a few other states where a new generation of governors are transforming their states, the executive and legislative branches of government have both miserably failed the Nigerian people. The conventional wisdom here is that the PDP led government is the worst and most corrupt in the history of Nigeria. The National Assembly is an embarrassment to all credible democracies around the world. It has failed to carry out its constitutionally mandated oversight responsibilities. More…

As Nigeria prepares for the next presidential election in 2011, are we confident that the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) led government can produce free and fair elections? Since the 2003 and 2007 elections were clearly a charade, can we infer that the power brokers and god fathers of the ruling PDP, already know who the next president will be? Due to the absence of a strong and viable opposition, Nigeria has been reduced to a one party State by the PDP which controls all three branches of government in the country. Having stolen the last two presidential elections, can Nigerians truly expect free and elections in 2011? More…

Fear has been defeated in Tunisia and Egypt. Once paralyzed by the fear of challenging the dictators that held a strangle hold on their nations, they can now breathe a sigh of relief after decades of living under totalitarian regimes. Fear has been defeated was the phrase aptly coined by CNN newsman Anderson Cooper in describing the recent revolution in Egypt. Like their counterpart in Tunisia, the people of Egypt are relishing their new found freedom. They woke up on February 12, 2011 to a new dawn, a dawn without Hosni Mubarak, the former strong man who for Egyptians under the age 30 years old was the only president they had ever known. How can one man rule a country for thirty years? Is he the only one with a brain in that country? May be he was the best thing that ever happened to mankind since sliced bread. This phenomenon is often described as the “sit-tight” syndrome, a syndrome that has plagued the African continent for decades. It is tragic that the African continent has continued to lag behind other continents in all areas of human development due largely to the poverty of leadership brought upon by sit-tight leaders who generally lack the vision to transform their respective countries. More…