PITY FEMI ADESINA

Short of saying Shame to Femi Adesina, Buhari's media man, we say pity him.

You could see this man struggling through a media chat on Channels TV this evening on the security situation in the country. Femi could tell bold-faced lies saying Nigeria's present security state is better than they met in 2015.

Haba, Femi!
Even if you were talking to babies who cannot think!

Thank God Aisha Yesufu was also later interviewed. At least one person with a national conscience spoke. The Co-Convener of BBOG Movement could point out things that Femi decided to deliberately ignore. Before 2015, people could travel through roads in the North without fear, but today you can't. Northern roads are now death traps, a safe haven for terrorists to operate without security agents disturbing them. And Femi would still say it is better now than then.

Please Femi, we know you are doing your work. It is what puts food on your table. Your physical appearance also shows you are doing well.

But we must say: you are feeding off the tears of many. You are revelling over the sorrows of many homes. We believe you have conscience, that part of us that cannot be silenced, though may become hardened following frequent silencing. PLEASE PUT YOUR CONSCIENCE TO WORK AND STOP FEEDING OVER THE TEARS AND SORROWS OF FELLOW NIGERIANS.

LATEST ON LEAH SHARIBU

It is said Leah has been forcefully converted to Islam and married to a Boko Haram Commander. She is said to have delivered a baby boy about this January 26 for the said man.

Our take on this is: So long as God Almighty is on His throne, and so long as He reigns and rules over human affairs, Leah who, by God's grace, stood for Him, has not been undone. Not so long as God lives, and not so long as He controls human affairs. Leah remains a strong and faithful Christian, Islamic ablutions and hijab donning notwithstanding.

Whatever evil men do to Leah ends only in her body. and the Lord Jesus said, "Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul" (Matt. 10: 28). Leah may have been abused, but that is only her body. Her soul, by the grace of God, is preserved unto eternal life in Christ Jesus her Saviour and Lord.

Leah remains a heroine of the Christian Faith. We praise her courage. She is not defeated. She is a victor. She remains victorious through time and eternity.

May God Almighty who never fails those who trust in Him, continue to preserve Leah, and through her, light the Christian torch in Nigeria and the world at large.

We love you Leah.
You are our shining example
God's grace will continue strong with you.
You are blessed. 

Christians will benefit from conference on witchcraft -UNN

The University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) says the interdisciplinary conference on witchcraft being organised in the university is not a gathering of witches.

In a statement on Monday, the university said Christians will benefit from the programme, and that the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) and Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) are all invited to partake in it.

IT'S BEEN QUITE A WHILE

GLAD TO BE BACK
A LOT OF TRENDING ISSUES.
WOULD FOCUS ON A FEW

THANKS FOR KEEPING FAITH
GOD BLESS YOU

Is Nigeria Really One Nation by Femi Fani-Kayode

I love this country with every fibre of my being.
For three generations before me my forefathers, including my great-grandfather, my grandfather and my father, have made solid and notable contributions to the development of this country in both the private and public sectors.
My great grandfather, Rev. Emmanuel Adebiyi Kayode, studied theology at the great Fourah Bay College in Freetown, Sierra Leone and Durham University in the United Kingdom after which he returned to Nigeria.
He was ordained as an Anglican priest, was the first Nigerian to take Christianity to our hometown Ile-Ife and was the first to build and pastor the first Anglican Church in that ancient town.
Throughout his life and ministry he

Cardinal Onaiyekan slams Nigeria’s membership of Saudi-led Islamic coalition

Cardinal John Onaiyekan, the Catholic Bishop of Abuja Diocese, has described President Muhammadu Buhari’s dragging of Nigeria into the Saudi-led Islamic coalition as dangerous and unwise.

In a recent interview in Abuja, Cardinal Onaiyekan said Mr. Buhari’s decision posses great danger for Nigeria’s armed forces as well as for Nigeria as a nation.

“I am not sure it is a wise thing,” Onaiyekan said. “Once you talk of an Islamic coalition and you are bringing Nigerian armed forces into it, my fear is that this is a dangerous step.”

“We have been trying, and I think successfully, to keep religion out of our armed forces. Can you imagine what will happen if Nigerian armed forces were fighting in the North-West on the basis of religion?”

International honour for Dr Goodluck Jonathan

Goodluck Jonathan

I thank The African Sun Times for naming me as its International Person of the year, 2015. I am indeed humbled by this honour. When I think about it, I understand why this medium may have thought me worthy of such an honour. However, I believe that my people, the Nigerian people, are more deserving of this honour. We, the Nigerian people put to shame naysayers and prophets of doom and in 2015, we held a most transparent, violence free and credible elections that transferred power from one political party to another and from an incumbent to the opposition, without rancour, bitterness or strife. In the process, we proved that nobody's political ambition is worth the blood of any Nigerian or any national of any country for that matter. That to me, is a most worthy testimonial of the character of the Nigerian nation and the resilience of our people which is why I dedicate this honour to them. May God continue to bless Nigeria and Nigerians. GEJ.

Thank you, Governor Ayade - Esesien Ita

I have not yet met Prof. Ayade. I did not know of him either until I was posted to Cross River University of Technology (CRUTECH), Okuku Campus. The name made an impression when I learnt of a certain Ayade Motors that charged a thousand three hundred naira (N1,300) from Ogoja to Calabar at a time other transporters charged up to two thousand naira (N2,000). It aroused my interest and I asked to know who Ayade was. On knowing he was a Senator, I said to myself that Nigeria needed such leaders – people who care about the masses. I was to know later that the subsidized transport was only one of the man’s many people-oriented programmes even as a Senator. The rumour mill has it that the man was quietly preparing to return to Senate when fate played on him, and turned him into the Cross River State Governor.

O Nigeria, return to the LORD! - Esesien Ita

Congratulations Nigeria! Fifty five years of Independence have rolled by. Reflecting on a period like this, opinions are bound to be diverse. Some believe we have cause to celebrate. Others think there is nothing to cheer. To this writer, there are both things to cheer and to lament.

First, we must thank God for the relative unity and peace we have enjoyed. We say ‘relative’ because we have not yet arrived at where we can proudly say Nigeria is truly one. Ethnic and religious affinities and sentiments still line the implementation of our national policies. But we must still be grateful to God that, unlike how such sentiments tear other nations apart, Nigeria has been held on as one by the hand of Providence. And like former military President, Ibrahim Babangida said during the

An Open Letter to President Buhari

Your Excellency, I don’t know if this letter will ever get to you but I pray it does. May I use this opportunity to congratulate you on your second coming to the throne in Nigeria. The fact that you defeated an incumbent at the polls in a democratic setting attests to your acceptability among Nigerians. All may not have voted for you but you remain the people’s choice nonetheless. We write this letter based on your inaugural speech dictum: “I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody”. We interpret that parable as meaning you will serve everybody fairly and discriminate against none. We therefore expect your second coming to right many wrongs and put our nation in a better position than you inherited. Many things have gone wrong in our country and it is on one of such ills that I am writing to you. It is about admission into tertiary institutions in Nigeria.

What Buhari should do - Esesien Ita

 The main outcry against the out-going government of President Goodluck Jonathan is corruption. It is not that he started it or even made it worse, but that he, as President, having the instruments of power in his hands, refused to check it. Many who sympathize with him on his ouster blame it on his subordinates – the Governors, lawmakers, Ministers, Local Government Chairmen and heads of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs). These people had almost absolute powers. They operated as though they had their own country separate from the one Goodluck Jonathan was President, and the President kept mute. They could fix jumbo salaries and allowances for themselves while spreading crumbs to the over 90% of the population. They could use State allocations the way they liked without any asking them questions. They could unjustly

14 Secrets of Really Persuasive People - Dr Travis Bradberry

Whether you’re convincing your boss to fund your project or your preschooler to wipe his own hiney after using the bathroom, persuasion is a skill that's instrumental to your success in life.
Persuasive people have an uncanny ability to get you leaning toward their way of thinking. Their secret weapon is likeability. They get you to like more than their ideas; they get you to like them.
Here are the 15 tricks of the trade that exceptionally persuasive people use to their advantage.
They Know their Audience
Persuasive people know their audience inside and out, and they use this knowledge to speak their audience’s language. Whether it’s toning down your assertiveness when talking to someone who is shy or cranking it up for the aggressive, high-energy type, everyone is different, and catching on to these subtleties goes a long way toward getting them to hear your point of view.

NIGERIANS AND THE EFFECT OF FALLING OIL PRICES

Since oil prices took a dip some months ago economies across the world have been adjusting their spending to cushion the effect on the citizenry. According to Ikenna Ifedobi, a Consultant Economist with the American Petroleum Institute, Nigeria anchored her 2014 budget at US $77.50 per barrel of oil with an estimated 2.39 million barrels a day but the actual production fell to approximately 2.25 million barrels a day due to activities of oil vandals. Excess crude account also fell from an estimated 9 billion naira to 4.1 billion. Worse still, Nigeria is removed from the list of countries selling oil to the United States (US), further reducing our revenue. Besides, US also has Shale oil which makes her less dependent on external oil. This is happening to a country whose economy is over 90% dependent on oil. It is then clear why the Coordinating Minister of Nigeria’s Economy, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, repeatedly tells Nigerians that 2015 will be a difficult year. She leaves some hope though that the difficulty would be overcome.

This reality is not peculiar to Nigeria. Mexico’s 2015 budget was based on an oil price of US $79 per barrel, but

10 Reasons To Quit Your Job In 2015

You only live once, so you may want to reconsider spending the rest of your life working for someone who gets rich using your ideas, forgets to thank you, and then swaps you for someone who can do it for less. Working countless hours every day in a dead-end job that doesn't make you happy, suppresses your creative nature, and barely allows you to make ends meet is a depressing thought.
So why not take that long-awaited, exciting step forward and quit your job in 2015? Here are the reasons you should go independent:

1. Work from Anywhere

It is becoming increasingly easy to make money using the Internet, no matter where you're based. You can work from anywhere—from a café, your bed, the train, your summer home, you name it. As long as you have a laptop and a fast Internet connection, there is nothing stopping you from becoming your own boss.

Steve Jobs’s 10 Principles to Success That Everyone Needs To Learn - Julius Babatunde

Though Steve Jobs has passed away, his legacy will be with us forever. Steve was undoubtedly a very successful entrepreneur. Here are ten life lessons about success that we can learn from him:

1. Learn how to anticipate the future

Steve Jobs once quoted Wayne Gretzky, saying:

“I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.”

Steve Jobs has been a living proof of this quote all of his life. Apple has reaped the benefits from Steve’s ability to anticipate future trends. They dominated the digital music sales (shrinking the market of CD music sales), while the iPhone has also revolutionized the phone industry by introducing a very sophisticated touch screen based phone.
The ability to anticipate the future is very important if you want to achieve your goal and be successful. An example of how we can apply this to our life is by visioning what we want to be in one year (or five years, ten years, and so on) from now. By having the vision, we can anticipate future roadblocks and prepare to overcome them. For example: if you are currently working as an employee, but see your future self as an entrepreneur, you can start learning the skills that might be beneficial for the future you.

HAPPY NEW YEAR, DEAR FRIEND!

It's a miracle of sorts that God has brought us by His grace into the year 2015. Individuals may have made resolutions, seeking to do better this year than last year. Families, organizations, and communities would have done same. As a nation we also expect the best. The President in his New Year message promised to consolidate on the gains of previous years. Our prayer is that God would guide us through successfully in this task of nation building.
Of particular interest to us should be the oncoming general election of next month. President Jonathan has promised a hitch-free election by giving a free hand to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to conduct the election. He reiterated his one-man one-vote, one-woman one-vote position to ensure a free and fair election, and also warned whoever thinks to make trouble before, during or after the election of

Boko Haram is not doing God’s work, they are working for Satan - Tinubu

A national leader of the All Progressives Congress and former Governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, says the attack on a mosque in Kano last Friday, which left over 100 worshippers dead, has shown that Boko Haram is not doing God’s work. Tinubu said rather, the sect was doing the bidding of Satan. The former governor said this in a statement on Sunday.

Boko Haram: A Call to a Common Cause - Esesien Ita

It is now glaring to all that Boko Haram has all along been misunderstood. They were initially seen in the same light as the Niger Delta militants, which made some request that government go into negotiation with them as Late President Yaradua did with the Niger Delta militants. But four years running into Jonathan’s presidency, Boko Haram has become more deadly and malignant that Nigeria’s North East has literally become a theatre of war. They are said to capture towns and set up their ensign in parts of the North. Men, women, children, the Police, the Military, Christians, Muslims, Traditionalists, Free thinkers, citizens, foreigners, and even neighbouring Cameroun have all tasted the bitter venom of the wicked sect. Many lives have been lost, some, in the most barbaric way, as also much property has been destroyed. Civil entreaties by well-meaning Nigerians have made no impression on the blood-drunk vipers. The Police and Military have been reorganized more than once. State of emergency has been declared and even extended in the affected zone, all to no avail. Foreign aid has been sought. Some responded, but chose to remain fringe players in the matter. Government has consulted widely on the issue as reported in the media. George Sekibo’s Senate Committee on Defence recently invited the Military to brief them on the current position. Good effort, but must we continue to play this civil game with a Group whose language is otherwise?

The Impending Betrayal of Muhammadu Buhari - Femi Aribisala

The 2015 election will likely be, to all intents and purposes, a contest between two PDP politicians.
When Muhammadu Buhari ran for president in 2011, he made a solemn pledge to Nigerians: “This campaign is the third and last one for me. I will not offer myself again for election into the office of president.” Buhari was persuaded to break this pledge because Bola Tinubu made him an offer he could not refuse.  He would merge his ACN party with Buhari’s CPC party. Tinubu’s putative South-West strength would be combined with Buhari’s mythical North-West supremacy. The result of this alchemy would be politically unstoppable: next stop Aso Rock!

Slum in oil prices: A progressive way out, By Bola Tinubu

Awash in the great tide of politics, we must not forget why politics can be a noble endeavor. It leads to governance. When done correctly, governance can reform a nation and improve the lot of the people. In the hands of the ignorant and the mean, governance cast abundant misfortune upon a nation and upon the welfare of its citizens.

This commentary concerns governance and policy more than it does politics. I offer it to generate debate on an important economic issue. No matter who is in power, we must do whatever is in our capacity to steer the nation away from economic woe. The people have suffered too much hardship already. Neither side of the political divide should seek to purchase transient advantage at the high price of dousing the people in greater economic calamity. Thus, I suggest this progressive’s position on how best to shape economic policy during this period of falling oil prices. I state this hoping those in charge will