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Digital Misconduct and the Erosion of Public Trust: The Urgent Case for Removing Abike Dabiri-Erewa

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  By Ben Ahanonu The sustained public demand for the removal of Abike Dabiri-Erewa from her position as the Chairman of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM) highlights a profound, systemic crisis of accountability within contemporary public communication. As a high-ranking public official serving under the administration of President Bola Tinubu, Dabiri-Erewa occupies a role where her platform is never merely a personal outlet. Instead, it functions as an explicit extension of state authority. Consequently, such a position demands absolute sensitivity, deep institutional responsibility, and an unyielding respect for all Nigerian citizens, completely irrespective of their ethnic or regional backgrounds. When an official of this calibre interacts with online material that describes the Igbo people using deeply dehumanising slurs—labelling them with derogatory epithets and attaching laughing emojis to the interaction—the ensuing public outrage cannot be dismissed as a minor m...
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Motion Without Movement: How the Twin Perils of Profligacy and Impunity Are Stalling Nigeria's Progress

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 By Ben AHANONU Since Nigeria emerged as an independent nation in 1960, its socio-economic evolution has been trapped in a deeply frustrating and tragic paradox. It is a land blessed with vast natural wealth, boundless human talent, a vibrant youth demographic and immense agricultural potential, yet it remains firmly shackled by developmental stagnation. Critics, economic historians and policy analysts increasingly describe the nation's trajectory as a chronic state of 'motion without movement' – a perpetual, exhausting cycle of political activity, bureaucratic restructuring, national conferences and legislative pageantry that yields virtually no tangible improvement for the ordinary citizen. At the heart of this systemic failure lie two deeply entrenched, symbiotically linked structural crises: the unchecked pandemic of official corruption and a bloated, unsustainably expensive framework of governance. Until these issues are confronted with the most severe penalties imagin...
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OPOCA: ATTACK ON RT. HON. ENGR AKARACHI AMADI IS A RED LINE

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 ... QUEST FOR ORLU STATE UNDERMINES OWERRI ZONE, IMO STATE  By Ben AHANONU  For quite some time, the so-called Orlu Political Consultative Assembly, OPOCA, has been displaying much unfounded arrogance, unspeakable and reprehensible zonal primacy,  by constantly harassing with impunity, Imo people especially indigenous people of Owerri Zone, who hold contrary view to what it thinks is "Orlu interest" and which must be protected at all costs even when such interests only expand the Imo political fault line. One prominent son of Owerri Zone, who has often been targeted and lampooned in a manner that is quite provocative by OPOCA, for exercising his freedom of speech and expression as guaranteed by the Constitution is Chief Willie Amadi.  As OPOCA continues to showcase much nuisance value in the Imo political terrain, it becomes pertinent to remind the body that it has zero political relevance and the claim is not far-fetched. OPOCA, is a loose assemblage of self-s...
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WHY OHAKIM LOST RE-ELECTION AND WHY IT IS TIME FOR OWERRI ZONE TO PRODUCE THE NEXT GOVERNOR OF IMO STATE

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By Ben AHANONU  Of late, there had been boisterous noise or rather bombastic postulations and imputations that are more like emotional outpouring than factual attestations from some quarters and by some notable individuals about why Chief Ikedi Ohakim (whose emergence as the Governor of Imo State under the banner of Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA), a party founded and funded by former Governor Orji Uzor Kalu, was like an act of providence due to the failure of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to produce a candidate for the election) lost the 2011 gubernatorial election despite the advantage of incumbency - yet I know that such subjective claims are smartly pointless and to no avail. You may recall that the then ruling PDP expelled Senator Ifeanyi Ararume, who won the party’s primaries after which the  PDP, in obedience to the Supreme Court ruling affirming Ararume’s candidacy, withdrew from the election thus paving the way for the realignment of forces that eventually bro...
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Alleged land grabbing in Ohaji-Egbema: I have never, will never grab land - Nlemigbo

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  The Chairman and Chief Executive of MARCON Group, Barrister (Prince) M. O.  Nlemigbo has refuted the allegation that he grabbed land at Nkaraha, Ohaji/Egbema Local Government Area (LGA), describing it as calculated propagation of falsehood and a futile attempt to tarnish his image and hard-earned reputation by an ingrate called Chinedu Akpaelu and his fictitious group of misfits that benefitted from his scholarship programme but now masking under the aegis of an unknown and non-existent Ohaji-Egbema Youth Movement, OEYM, to accuse him of what he knows nothing about and has nothing to do with. In a press statement he personally signed, Chief Nlemigbo disclosed how he acquired the land in question, and how the father of the said Chinedu Akpaelu called Matthew Akpaelu had before now tried to seize the land but died in the process after swearing to an oath administered by selected traditional rulers of Imo State along with four others. The statement reads in full: "My attention ...
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EDO MASSACRE: IS NIGERIA ABOUT TO EXPLODE?

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By Ben AHANONU  Again, Nigeria is standing at the crossroads; in fact, on the edge of a precipice. Is the country about to explode? Tempers are rising, many are very angry, some are shouting blue murder, some are issuing threats, some are spreading falsehoods, others want instant justice, dark clouds hang forebodingly overhead, some are calling it karma, there are claims and counterclaims, some are indifferent, some are wailing and as usual, arrests have been made by the police in the aftermath of the Edo massacre and some of those arrested might be innocent citizens, who are unconnected with the heartless and condemnable killing of 16 people in Uromi, Edo State.  To say the least; it is absolutely wrong for one to kill a fellow human being with the flimsiest of excuses, and unjustifiable reasons - it is wicked in the main and unconscionable before God Almighty. I was utterly shocked and devastated when I learnt of the heinous incident. According to local reports, the victims,...
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WHY SENATOR ORJI UZOR KALU SHOULD NOT SUFFER DOUBLE JEOPARDY - A HUMBLE PLEA

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By Ben AHANONU  Recently, the Appeals Court in Abuja, gave the Federal Government (FG), approval to challenge the judgement that barred the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, from reopening the trial of former Governor of Abia State, Senator Orji Uzor Kalu. In two separate rulings by a three-member panel of Justices, the appellate court granted an extension of time to enable the FG to file processes to set aside the September 29, 2021, judgement of the Federal High Court in Abuja, which stopped the EFCC from prosecuting the former governor, who is currently representing Abia North in the Senate. Senator  Kalu, who was the Governor of Abia State from 1999 to 2007, was earlier convicted and handed a 12-year jail sentence by the Lagos Division of the Federal High Court. The trial court convicted him alongside his firm, Slok Nigeria Limited and a former Director of Finance in the state, Mr. Jones Udeogu, over an allegation that they stole about N7.1billion from the Ab...
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