By Habib Aruna

Former Rivers State governor and now Minister of the Federal Capital City, Nyesom Wike is a politician that enjoys being in the news. If he’s not making news at state functions or political events, the loquacious politician would want to be in the news by organizing his now famous Media Briefings, where senior journalists will sit down as pupils while Wike talks to them like headmaster.

The last one held early this week kept me wondering what this circuit is all about. What does he really want to gain by the dozens of millions of Naira spent on press parleys and where is the money coming from? Is it from his private pocket or from the state? If it’s from the state, who is accounting for it? Or is he just dipping his hand into state coffers without subjecting himself to due process? And how is the money expended on these media briefings accounted for?

Because we need to begin to ask pertinent questions when taxpayers’ money is being used for purposes that are not directly beneficial to them. Wike did not start his media parleys in Abuja, it indeed started when he was governor of the oil rich state of Rivers. This was where he gained national prominence with the way he engaged national TV stations and paid for hours to air his views on critical and crucial national issues. He elevated this approach when he was appointed the FCT minister by President Bola Tinubu and he has used the platform to promote the agenda of the president while also using it to castigate his political enemies.

In truth, there is nothing bad for a politician in a democratic setting, to occasionally engage the media and by doing so, let the public know what his government, ministry or agency is doing. It is part of being accountable and responsible to the citizens, who constitutionally deserve to know how their commonwealth and resources are being spent. The worry however, is when these parleys are organized solely for political purposes or to target political opponents.

Television has been a major means of communication or passing information since the late 40s. Former United States President, John Kennedy made it the biggest and widest means of reaching the audience. Since then, political leaders have used the TV at every opportunity to send their messages to their targeted audience. We can remember how successive US governments used the daily White House daily briefings to explain cogent issues affecting the American people. Not to forget that television debates between candidates of political parties, for decades, became an integral part of the election process.

It’s however not every leader that understood the power of the tube and its efficacy; while leaders like United States President, Donald Trump would use every opportunity to talk to journalists on germane issues, others like Tinubu have not find it expedient to engage, even State House reporters, on burning issues in the polity. What stops the president to surprise Villa Correspondents and address the current disturbing security situation in the country and to use the auspices to assure Nigerians of their safety, while pledging the safety return of students and teachers recently abducted in Oyo State.

Through Former President, Olusegun Obasanjo’s quarterly media chat, we were able to know the thinking of Aso rock on major challenges facing the country and what the federal government is doing to fix them. The health challenges faced by Musa Yar’Adua had an adverse effect in the way he relates to the media. I can’t vividly remember any notable engagement he had with journalists before his passing. Gooduck Jonathan’s tenure was not in any way better, even though he had an effective Media team led by Dr Rueben Abati. Jonathan was not media friendly even with his gentle mien and harmless personality. He is a man of short words and not a robust communicator.

President Mohammadu Buhari was also not a man that is friendly with television cameras and microphone. Notably shy and not used to speaking too much! One can easily count the amount of time he spent speaking to journalists during his eight years in power. Needless to say that he also had top media advisers who have paid their dues in the profession and who should have insisted that he do more in talking to the media so that matters of public importance are not left in the realm of undue public speculation.

All our presidents since 1999 came in with the right media team, who can boast of requisite experience of managing the image of the number one citizen and his office. Curiously however, they all failed to make their principals more exposed to the klieg light, thereby denying Nigerians the opportunity of seeing and listening to their leaders directly. I can’t remember any of our presidents taking a stroll within the villa to eat lunch, using the opportunity to engage journalists at the Press Centre or granting interviews when the media least expected. That will absolutely be a day to remember!

That is why Wike supporters are quick to rise to his defence, for according to them, the minister is using what he has to get what he wants. They argued that the minister understood the influence and reach of buying TV time to send his message and ‘harass’ perceived political opponents. But at what cost? The last media parley was shown live on five national TV stations. That is hundreds of millions of Naira, and if you add other logistics it will be running to yet other millions. As already pointed out above, where is this money coming from? Is it from Wike’s pocket or from the FCT treasury? If it’s from the FCT, who approved it and who will account for it? Which of the Senate committees are looking at the books to make sure tax payers money are well accounted for and not wasted to promote the political agenda of Wike?

For sure, these live media broadcasts do not come cheap and if FCT money is being used for these shows, then there must be accountability and responsibility from Wike and his co-travellers. It is only then that we can be rest assured that those who are calling for equity are doing so with clean hands.

By Tayo Ogunbiyi

Umbrage, diatribes and polemics. The season is here again – the season of character assassination for political purposes.

There seems to be no other reason for the opinion article written by Mobolaji Sanusi, the one who was fired at The Lagos State Signage and Advertising Agency (LASAA) for alleged incompetence. He seems to have rediscovered his old vocation of stringing together words without respecting rules of semantics and grammar.

He has attempted to project speculative political alignments, reframe historical governance narratives, and introduce unfounded insinuations regarding the working relationship within the Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu administration in Lagos State.

Writing under the guise of political commentary, Sanusi deliberately constructs speculative narratives, distorts governance realities, and introduces unfounded insinuations regarding the leadership structure and internal cohesion of the State Government.

While the publication is acknowledged as an exercise of free expression, it is necessary to correct certain misleading interpretations, unfounded assumptions, and politically charged assertions that do not reflect the institutional reality of governance in Lagos State.

The suggestion of tension, rivalry, or institutional dissonance between the Governor of Lagos State and his Deputy, Dr Kadri Obafemi Hamzat, who is also the Candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the 2007 Governorship Election, is entirely unfounded and inconsistent with observable governance practice.

Lagos State operates a structured executive governance system anchored on constitutional responsibilities, collective cabinet responsibility, and clearly defined functional portfolios. The Governor and his deputy function as part of a unified executive council. Policy formulation and implementation are collaborative and institutional, not personality-driven.

The Deputy Governor’s office is integrally involved in strategic governance delivery, particularly in coordination, supervision, and assigned sectors.
Any attempt to construct a narrative of division is, therefore, speculative and not supported by administrative facts or operational evidence.

The article’s description of the present administration as lacking “legacies” or being “drab” is a subjective and vacuous political opinion rather than an empirical assessment. Its sweeping generalisations, describing the Sanwo-Olu administration in dismissive terms, are a bold reflection of Sanusi’s blindness (whatever happened to his glasses).

A more balanced evaluation would consider measurable governance outcomes, including the expansion in infrastructure across transportation, housing, and road networks, reforms in urban planning, and public service delivery, continued investment in digital governance systems, education infrastructure development, revenue optimisation frameworks, and the strengthening of security collaboration mechanisms and emergency response capacity.

The Opebi-Ojota Link Bridge, the Red Line and Blue Line rail that have transformed commuting and the beautiful ferries built by our young engineers. The iconic Tolu Group of Schools, 332 schools buildings, two new varsities and several other projects across all sectors. Twenty-three housing estates and hundreds of roads. Discerning Lagosians see them all; not blind and blank elements like Sanusi. The New Massey Children Hospital that is nearing completion is the largest pediatric hospital in West Africa. The food and logistics hud in Ketu Ereyun, Epe will be the largest food hub in Sub Saharan Africa when completed.

Though we are in a political season with its characteristic peculiarities, governance in a complex megacity such as Lagos cannot be reduced to rhetorical comparisons or partisan nostalgia. It is an evolving continuum built on the efforts of successive administrations.

*Tayo Ogunbiyi is the Director, Public Enlightenment & Community Relations, Ministry of Information & Strategy, Alausa, Ikeja*

By Wole Olujobi

Peter Obi! His persona contradicts his name in the true sense and essence of the first Peter because he has incredibly fleeting feet that melt like the ice when the temperature tilts.

The first Peter, Simon Peter, was resolute, loyal to his cause and took the sobriquet “the rock” because, for him, his life was cast in stone in simple faith even amid spiritual limits at the stroke of the third clock.

Granted that he faltered, after redemption in minutes, Simon Peter was favoured to be re-admitted into the Order of Saints, to lead the crusade that transformed Christianity into a world faith with the promise of salvation on the judgment day. Today, Simon Peter represents a pillar in the pantheon of the Holy Cross.

While Simon Peter represents a totem of the Christian faith, here in Nigeria is another Peter, Dr Peter Obi, a grand patron of guerrilla politics of “heat and flee” at the slightest sign of crisis that has nothing to do with recreating another Golgotha.

Dr Peter Obi of APGA, PDP, Labour Party, semi-SDP, ADC, PRP applicant and now member of NDC is a deft and mobile political nomad with the combined fleeting feet of Segun Odegbami, Adokie Amasiemeka, Diego Maradona, Austin JJ Okocha and De Lima Ronaldo, changing political habitat like the African thicket squirrel (emi ko sun ile ana) that changes nests like the skin of the chameleon.


Today, while the Jews can read and count the gains of the salvation missions led by Simon Peter, Anambra people only read their alleged pains in the logs of Panama Files where their patrimony allegedly sits pretty far away from home, to allegedly swell the heritage of the smart one that knows and understands the game of makeshift politics.

From all accounts, Obi has demonstrated that politics is not about vision, discipline and morality, but an inherent mission dictated by self-glorification by exploiting cyber crowding for Jason and the Argonauts’ prize of a golden fleece.
From all accounts, this Peter does not know how to build. Like locusts, he is adept at harvesting without sowing. Which explains why on numerous occasions in crisis situations, Obi bolted, jumping boat instead of standing as the rock to resolve and build, to harvest the dividends of his efforts. He prefers and relies on investing in online politics of sophistry to harvest cyber loyalty.

Such a digital politician neither builds faithful followership, trust nor enriches vision that are critical for leadership discipline that shaped the lives of the great ones, such as the late Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Alhaji Ahmadu Bello and Alhaji Tafawa Balewa.

In contemporary Nigeria’s politics, Obi’s leadership style is at variance with the leadership politics of Dr Michael Opara, Dr Chuba Okadigbo, Dr Alex Ekwueme, Dr Ogbonnaya Onu, Senator Ken Nnamani, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, Dr Alex Otti, Dr Dora Akunyili and Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, among other disciplined Nigerian leaders in the East, who are all renowned for disciplined lifestyles of visionaries.
Conversely, Obi of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) is a fluid political entity, who before the cock crows twice, would have snapped liaison with his party and followers six times, to seek self-glorification, leaving his political family to their miserable fate.

This is what Imanuel Jannah highlighted on October 10, 2014, after Peter Obi declared for PDP on October 8, 2014, to the dismay and disappointment of Anambra people.
Jannah explained that Obi not only left APGA, but also gave a clue as to why he dumped the party. His reason for joining the PDP, according to Obi’s own statements on the day he defected to PDP, was not about the crisis in APGA, but because of his personal desire to compete and not spectate in national affairs; a clear mission for self-glorification, instead of a nobler context of community spirit that should ordinarily underpine corporate interest in a complex federal set-up like Nigeria.
Yet, Obi had earlier sworn to quit politics if any circumstance would force him out of APGA.

Jannah’s rebuke of Obi was reinforced by Nyesom Wike’s vilification of former Anambra’s helmsman over overt false claims to deceive the people to allegedly attain personal goal.

The minister of FCT once explained his experience when he joined a delegation to Anambra State where the host (Peter Obi) served them Cristal Brut (an expensive brand of champagne).

Urging politicians to practise what they preach, Wike had said: “When PDP had no problem, we went to Anambra State for a gubernatorial campaign, and when we finished that campaign, we went to somebody’s house. I just sat down. Come and see the best of drinks, this and that. So, I called him, I said you are providing Cristal Champagne here, but every day, you tell people that you wear only one shoe, you carry your bag. But look at the champagne here. Not just champagne, but Cristal.

“Why do we deceive Nigerians? Why can’t we tell ourselves the simple truth? What you preach is not what you practise….

“I always tell Nigerians, look, don’t allow people to deceive you. People who are preaching that they care for you, they don’t care for you, they don’t think about you. They only try to use you to climb up.”

Obi’s politics of “heat and flee” and deceit is at variance with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s leadership etho, which he brought to bear when former President Olusegun Obasanjo unleashed his terror on the nation in his “do or die” politics when he sought to corral the South West into his elaborate power grab scheme to dominate South West politics by winning his second term election at all costs.

While virtually all governors in the South West caved in to Obasanjo’s shenanigans, Tinubu stood with his principle, refusing to work in the political environment incongruent with his political ideal. Even though a tough engagement, he survived the ordeal to spend time and fortunes, including instituting vast mentoring across the country, to build his political followership that is today yielding him political capital.

Armed with a superior political strategy and tactical finesse, Tinubu in 2003 shamed Obasanjo in his Friday, April 4, 2003 PDP’s Tsunami Rally at the Tafawa Balewa Square in Lagos and later rallied to become a political kingmaker, crowning a President and becoming a national rallying point in the dialectic of the Nigerian politics.

Tinubu is today a classical political model in visionary leadership after battling the Obasanji challenge, tact for tact, in a sustained manner that elevates him to a political compass while Obasanjo only attends living room rallies of disoriented politicians that are seeking tents to mend their souls to save their political careers.

As Obi has demonstrated, failed and inconsistent leadership is characterized by inability to maintain stable, clear or fair direction, leading to eroded trust and low morale. This largely accounts for why Obi often suffers “analysis paralysis,” frequently changing his mind on directions and providing contradictory instructions, which cause his teams to scramble and their work wasted. Clearly, this leadership failing is where Obi holds a national trophy as a vagabond salesman of his own political ambition, as he cannot count 10 core loyalists that still remain with him since he started his political gambling in Anambra State.

This explains why his former campaign spokesman, Kenneth Okonkwo, severed relations with him.

Obi’s inconsistent lifestyle, alleged flair for lying and rabid tribal chauvinism rob him of any grace to be admitted into the hub of missioners that Nigeria needs to shape her destiny.

In 2013, Obi was quoted in the media as saying: “I will not only remain in APGA, I will also die for APGA.

“The day I quit APGA is the day I will quit politics.
“APGA made me what I am today. APGA is like a movement.
“The day I leave APGA, which I have made up my mind never to leave, I will quit politics.
“Igbos don’t need APGA in Aso Rock for them to achieve their aims. (Really? Why did he start nursing presidential ambition since his days in APGA)?

“APGA is the identity and the reflection of Igboman .
“Anambarians should not vote for PDP. PDP is a party alien to the Igbo.
“PDP is synonymous with destruction.”

Didn’t Obi eventually leave APGA? Did he die for APGA? Did he quit politics after he eventually left APGA? Didn’t he seek presidential office while still in APGA? Did he still believe that APGA is the identity and reflection of Igboman?

That is Obi for you: the double-faced Janus that speaks from both sides of the mouth, abandoning noble ideal for personal comfort!

When a nation is left in the hands of jugglers to play ludo with the lives of the people, then the nation becomes a casino for the game of chance in the Annaniah and Sapphira’s orchestra.

How does a man who has consistently demonstrated this trait be trusted with the destiny of a complex country like Nigeria?

Clearly a knight of “buy and sell” economy, Obi is a poor parody of Tinubu, sadly lacking in form and content of Jagaban’s development economy that makes the welfare of the people and the glory of the nation the centre of development plan in politics. For effect, the Pandora Files that chronicled the alleged Obi’s mission in politics explained a hoax that was patented and presented to Anambra people as a development agenda as corroborated by
Obi’s aide and close confidant, Benji Obi; the allegations that Obi doesn’t have the liver to dispel up till now.

Who Nigerians need to lead the nation is a man that can stay the course to fight a national cause, not an opportunist or a man that runs and ducks at the slightest personal discomfort.


It is on record that Tinubu was actively involved in building Social Democratic Party (SDP) when PDP founded on August 31, 1998 by a group of decent Nigerian leaders, including Dr Alex Ekwueme, Chief Solomon Lar, Malam Adamu Ciroma, Bola Ige and Sule Lamido, among others, was hijacked by retired military officers, who recruited elements of their sorts in the civil society, to ruin Nigeria. The more decent among PDP leaders have since returned to their natural political habitat in APC to join Tinubu in the business of nation-building, but Obi, who makes scavenging a pastime, was jumping boats to several parties to reap where he is not prepared to sow, his latest port being NDC that has dashed out its presidential cake to Sapphira.

Courage, determination, capacity, ability, trust, faith, vision and mission are the virtues needed to grow the nation and not the nation that is thrust in the hands of the Annaniahs and Sapphiras; the King and Queen of lies in the Bible, who will sell Nigeria in the black market and tuck the proceeds inside their pants.

* Olujobi, a journalist, writes from Ado-Ekiti