The Trumpet Newspaper Issue 588 (January 11 - 24 2023)

TheTrumpet
Africans now have a voice... Founded in 1995
V O L 29 N O 588 J A N U A R Y 11 - 24 2023
Pele (Photo - Fábio Rodrigues Pozzebom, Agência
Brasil. Wikimedia CCA 2.5 Brazil)
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Nigeria has
a coastal
litter
problem:
it’s time to
clean up
Pelé: a global
superstar
and cultural
icon
By Simon Chadwick
Continued on Page 2>
By Dr. Oluniyi
O Fadare
Bottles. Plastic bags. Surgical
facemasks. These are just some
of the 29,029 items we found
along the 180km Araromi coastline
Nigeria in nine months while studying
marine litter. The litter weighed in at a
hefty 465.54kg.
Our study took place along the
Araromi seaside in Ilaje, south-west
Nigeria, between January and
September 2021. A collaboration
between researchers at Centre for
Energy Research and Development
(CERD), Obafemi Awolowo University
and Marine Litter Watch Nigeria, a
student volunteering group, it aimed to
provide a baseline data about the area
and contribute to the growing body of
knowledge on marine litter monitoring
and prevention.
The study used the “clean coast
index”, a science-based estimation tool
used internationally, to assess the
cleanliness of the beach. The beach was
classified as dirty during the dry season
and extremely dirty in the rainy season.
Continued on Page 6

Page2 TheTrumpet JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
News
Pelé: a global
superstar and cultural
icon who put passion
at the heart of soccer
Continued from Page 1<
Professor Simon Chadwick
Pelé, soccer’s first global superstar,
has died at the age of 82. To many
fans, the Brazilian will be
remembered as the best to have ever played
the game.
For others it goes further: He was the
symbol of soccer played with passion,
gusto and a smile. Indeed, he helped to
forge an image of the game, which even
today lots of people continue to crave.
Pelé wasn’t just a great player and a
wonderful ambassador for the world’s
favorite game; he was a cultural icon.
Indeed, he remains the face of a purity in
soccer that existed long before big money
Pelé in Johannesburg, Souuth Africa in 2010 (Photo - Wikimedia CCA 3.0 Brazil)
and global geopolitics infiltrated the game.
It is testament to his legend that
everyone from English 1966 World Cup
winner Sir Bobby Charlton and current
French superstar Kylian Mbappé to Luiz
Inácio Lula da Silva – the former and
incoming president of Brazil – and former
U.S. President Barack Obama have led
tributes to him.
Early days at Santos
Pelé was born Edson Arantes do
Nascimento in Sao Paulo state, Brazil in
1940. His early years were the same as
many soccer players who preceded him and
countless who then followed and were
inspired by him: born into poverty,
introduced to the game by a family
member, later becoming obsessed by a
sport that taught him about life and gave
him opportunities.
Youth team football came first, in 1953,
when he signed for his local club, Bauru.
But it was his first professional club,
Santos, that propelled Pelé toward stardom.
Having moved there in 1956, he played 636
matches and scored 618 goals before
leaving in 1974. Not just the beating heart
of the team, Pelé was also an immense,
one-club loyalist.
Long before the feats of modern-day
stars Cristiano Ronaldo or Erling Haaland,
Pelé blazed a goal-scoring trail that marked
him out as being significantly different to
other players around him. Similarly, he
displayed levels of skill which even today
mean that some observers of the game
place the Brazilian ahead of the likes of
other contenders for the title of Greatest of
All Time: Lionel Messi and Diego
Maradona.
Within a year of signing for Santos, Pelé
made his debut for Brazil, three months
short of his 17th birthday. He scored in that
game against Argentina, and 65 years later
he remains the Brazilian national team’s
youngest-ever scorer.
A year later, in 1958, this young player
helped his national team win the World Cup
in Sweden. Then again in 1962, at the
World Cup in Chile, and once more at the
1970 tournament in Mexico.
Ultimately, Pelé played 92 times for
Brazil, scoring 77 goals. By comparison,
England’s Harry Kane has scored 53 times
in 80 matches. In addition to his national
team achievements, for his club Pelé won
six Brazilian league titles and two South
American championships.
The American years
Later, in 1975, he came out of semiretirement
to play for the New York
Cosmos in the North American Soccer
League. By then, Pelé was in his mid-30s
but still managed to score 37 goals in 64
matches. Some believe that it was his brief
stint playing in the United States that kickstarted
the country’s interest in football.
After his retirement, Pelé was
venerated, adored and remained influential.
Continued on Page 6<
PEER & CO
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Immigration, Appeals,
Deportations, and Removal cases.
* Judicial Review. * Prison and
Detention Centre Legal Visits.
* British Citizenship Applications.
* Visas and more...
Free Initial Consultation and Competitive Legal Fees
Birmingham: 0121 554 0565
London: 020 7183 3706
Watford: 01923 901150
Emergency: 07833 675415
Email: shiraz@peerandco.com
Head Office: 420 Witton Road,
Aston, Birmingham B6 6PP

News
JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
Convicted for triple stabbing
TheTrumpet
Page3
Following a London
Metropolitan Police
investigation which identified
the perpetrators of a triple stabbing
outside a north London music
venue, two men have been jailed.
Through diligent CCTV
inquiries, officers were able to
establish a definitive link to the
defendants when specific items of
clothing – in both cases a jacket –
were recovered from their homes.
Kieran Morgan, 23 (08.07.99), of
Berger Road, E9, and Daniel
Onyewuenyi, 30 (05.06.92), of
Forest Grove, E8, were sentenced at
Wood Green Crown Court
following the incident in April 2022,
which left three men injured. They
were jailed for a total of more than
13 years.
On the night of 19 April 2022,
Morgan and Onyewuenyi had been
attending an event at the Scala in
Pentonville Road, Islington.
Following the gig, a number of
people were milling about outside.
At around 05:20hrs, as the
defendants left the venue, they
instigated a row with a group of men
who were unknown to them.
During the disagreement,
Morgan pulled a knife from his
waistband and stabbed two of the
men – one in the head and the other
in the chest. Onyewuenyi stabbed a
third in the thigh. Both suspects then
ran from the scene.
Met officers and paramedics
from the London Ambulance
Service attended the scene, where
they treated the victims – all of who
were aged in their 20s – before
taking them to hospital. Luckily
none were seriously injured.
An investigation was launched
by detectives from the Specialist
Continued on Page 4

Page4
TheTrumpet
JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
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News
Convicted for triple
stabbing
Continued from Page 3<
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Daniel Onyewuenyi
Crime Command, who set about
carrying out a meticulous trawl of
CCTV footage. Through this work,
they were able to identify the - as
yet - unknown suspects. Captured
images of the pair were circulated
with colleagues and eagle-eyed
officers identified them as Morgan
and Onyewuenyi.
Morgan was arrested on 10 May
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and taken into custody. On the
balcony of his property, officers
found a black puffer jacket identical
to the one he was seen to be wearing
in the CCTV images.
Following a no comment
interview, Morgan was
subsequently charged and later
admitted to two counts of wounding
with intent and an offence of GBH
linked to the same incident. He
additionally pleaded guilty to
threatening a female known to him
with a knife in a public place; an
incident which had occurred just
days earlier. He was sentenced to
seven years, six months.
Onyewuenyi was arrested on 25
May. A search of his property led to
the recovery of the jacket worn by
the second suspect captured on
CCTV on the night of the attack.
Onyewuenyi admitted during
interview that he was outside Scala
that night and that the jacket found
was the same one worn by the
suspect in the CCTV. However,
when asked about the stabbing, he
responded with “I don’t know” or
“No comment”.
Kieran Morgan
He was charged and later pleaded
guilty to one count of GBH and two
of possession with intent to supply
Class A drugs, namely cocaine. He
was jailed for four years.
DC Luke Martinez, from the
Met’s Specialist Crime South, said:
“Morgan and Onyewuenyi were
intent on causing harm to others that
night and carried out a brutal attack
on three men following a minor
dispute. The fact that Morgan
stabbed his victims in the head and
chest shows he clearly had no regard
for their lives and it is only sheer
luck that the three all escaped
serious injury.
“This could easily have been a
murder investigation. There is no
place in a civilised society for
individuals who think these actions
are justifiable and without
consequence. That is why day in
day out, officers are working with
partners and communities to reduce
violent crime in our city and bring
those responsible to justice.”

JANUARY 11 - 24 2023 TheTrumpet
Page5

News
Page6 TheTrumpet JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
Pelé: a global superstar and
cultural icon
Continued from Page 2<
He became FIFA’s Player of the 20th
century, an award he shared with
Maradona. In 2014, he was given FIFA’s
first-ever Ballon d’Or Prix d’Honneur, and
even Nelson Mandela spoke of his regard
for the Brazilian when presenting him with
a Laureus Lifetime Achievement Award, in
2000.
Pelé’s talent has never been in doubt.
Yet it was fortuitous that he played at a time
when soccer was emerging from the
shadows cast by global conflict, when the
world needed symbols of hope and sporting
heroes.
The Brazilian was able to serve this
purpose, though he did so during a period
when television – first black-and-white,
then color – brought soccer directly into
people’s living rooms. At the time, Pelé was
Messi, Ronaldo and Mbappé rolled into one
– made globally consumable by this new
technology.
Inevitably, during his life, Pelé
encountered problems: his commercial
activities were sometimes mired in
controversy; at one stage he was labeled a
left-wing antagonist of the Brazilian
government, then was later described as
being too conservative in his views of the
Brazilian dictatorship. He had numerous
children – some the result of affairs – and
one of them, a son, Edinho, was sent to
prison for laundering money made from
drug deals.
However, the abiding memory is of a
man who played soccer in a way that many
of us – both amateurs and professionals –
have all aspired to. Pelé was not only
skillful, he also brought great joy to
innumerable people across the world, over
a period of decades. For all of us, even
those with just the slightest interest in
football, we will never forget him.
Simon Chadwick is a Professor of Sport
and Geopolitical Economy at SKEMA
Business School.
This article is republished from The
Conversation under a Creative Commons
license. Read the original article.
Nigeria has a coastal litter
problem: it’s time to clean up
Continued from Page 1<
Over the past decade, marine litter has
become a growing global problem which
poses an increasingly serious threat to the
environment, economies and human health.
The global nonprofit organisation Ocean
Conservancy reported that in 2021 about
9,760,227 litter items were collected over
nearly 30,000km of the world’s coastal
areas.
At present, only 17% of world meat
production is food from the sea. But demand
is expected to increase strongly. Marine litter
is one of the threats to biodiversity, the
production of seafood and the maritime
economy.
It’s clear from our research and other
studies that West Africa’s marine litter
problem cannot be ignored. The region has
an estimated population of no fewer than
419 million people and is one of the
continent’s fastest growing regions both in
demography and economically.
The thousands of kilograms of litter
reported as clogging up the beaches of
Cameroon, Nigeria, Senegal and Sierra
Leone could also stymie the region’s
economic and tourism growth, as well as
putting people’s health at risk.
Piles of litter
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration defines marine litter as items
that have been made or used by people and
discarded into the sea or rivers, or on
beaches. It includes items brought indirectly
to the sea by rivers, sewerage, storm water
Diobu water front in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria (Photo - Berekara U. Pius, Wikimedia CCA Share
Alike 4.0)
or winds, or accidentally lost at sea in bad
weather.
Other sources include industrial
emissions, discharge from storm water
drains and untreated municipal sewage.
Our Centre for Energy Research and
Development analysed 29,029 beach litter
items found at Araromi seaside.
Araromi is a coastal town in Ilaje local
government area of Ondo State, south-west
Nigeria. It covers an area of 3,000km² and
lies 238km to the east of Nigeria’s most
populous city, Lagos. There are over 82
fishing communities on the coastline as
fishing and boat making are major sources
of income for the Ilaje people.
The motivation for this study was to
show that remote, less densely populated
communities along the coast are not shielded
from the impacts of marine litter.
As measured by the clean coast index,
the beach was dirty during the dry season
(7,358 litter items; 141.3kg) and extremely
dirty in the rainy season (21,671 litter items;
324.24kg). This implies that rain is a major
factor in transporting litter from inland to the
marine environment through various
waterways.
The items we found included glass,
metals, plastic (beverage bottles, caps,
disposable cups, cutlery), abandoned fishing
gear, ropes and wooden canoes, fabrics,
cigarette butts and medical waste (syringes,
facemasks, hospital PPE, intravenous drip
bottles and sanitary pads), among other
litter.
Most of the items were household waste
which was poorly disposed of. Some of it
stemmed from recreational (tourist) and
fishing activities (economic factors).
In a similar study conducted in 2016 on
lagoon beaches in Ghana, high litter
deposition (49,457 items) during the rainy
season was reported. This was attributed to
river runoff and flooding. Most of the litter
was plastic.
Nigeria and Ghana are both on the Gulf
of Guinea, which has a coastline of about
6,000km from Senegal to Angola. The Gulf
coast has the highest population density in
tropical Africa. It is also the site of growing
commercial and industrial activities. It is a
shipping zone for oil and gas, as well as
goods to and from central and southern
Africa. The region lacks efficient waste
disposal and management mechanisms and
policies. All these factors help explain the
state of the beach cleanliness and the likely
increase in the problem if nothing is done
about it.
Potential interventions
What can be done?
First, frequent and coordinated clean-up
efforts – by government, NGOs or
volunteers. We saw none during our work at
Araromi. There were no rubbish bins for
beach goers to use. Coordinated efforts
among the fishing communities could
address the disposal of old and abandoned
fishing gear.
Government at various levels must
create more awareness about the dangers of
marine litter and the legal, policy and
institutional frameworks that govern it. This
would help local communities to understand
that natural resources like beaches and
lagoons are their heritage, and need to be
protected.
Manufacturers must be involved in
monitoring and cleaning up their waste
(extended producer responsibility, EPR).
They also need to support awareness
programmes and sponsor clean-up activities.
Most importantly, manufacturers must
develop innovative materials which are ecofriendly
as alternatives for their product
packaging.
Oluniyi O. Fadare is a Research Fellow
at Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria.
This article is republished from The
Conversation under a Creative Commons
license. Read the original article.

JANUARY 11 - 24 2023 TheTrumpet
Page7

Page8 TheTrumpet JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
Opinion
2023: Before the elections By Reuben Abati
Nigeria elections 2019 (Photo - The Commonwealth Observer Group) b
BY REUBEN ABATI
This certainly promises to be an
interesting year for Africa where
a total of 24 general, legislative
and local elections would take place in
the course of the year in Republics of
Benin, Comoros, Cote d’Ivoire,
Djibouti, Egypt, Gabon, Ghana,
Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Libya,
Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania,
Mozambique, Nigeria, Sierra Leone,
Somaliland, South Sudan, Sudan,
Swaziland, Togo and Zimbabwe. For a
continent that has had issues of military
truncation of democratic processes or
threats thereof in recent times – Libya,
Egypt, Congo, Burundi, Central African
Republic, Ethiopian, Mali, Guinea
Bissau, Chad - any indication of the
sustenance of democracy in any part of
the continent would be simply good
news. But the one that concerns us most
is the fact that Nigeria in 2023 is
scheduled to have general elections, the
sixth since the return to civilian rule in
1999, with the possibility, if that be the
case, of the outcome of a transition at
political party level at the centre.
This would perhaps turn out to be
the most important event in Nigeria’s
political calendar in 2023. The question
as framed in not so many words is: who
will succeed President Muhammadu
Buhari? If the race had been somewhat
measured, it can be safely imagined that
as we enter the New Year, it would
possibly take no more than two weeks
from this moment, before the entire
Nigerian landscape lights up in frenetic
election frenzy as the various parties
and candidates begin the final dash
towards the Presidential election on
February 25, 2022, and the
Gubernatorial and Legislative Elections
scheduled for March 11. For now, there
seems to be an informal consensus that
out of the 18 political parties in the race,
only four political parties and four
candidates can be taken seriously: the
Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and
Waziri Atiku Abubakar; the All
Progressives Congress (APC), and
Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu; the
Labour Party and Mr. Peter Obi; and the
New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP)
and Dr. Musa Rabiu Kwankwaso. In a
recent, robust, thumb-of-the-rule,
analysis of projections, ThisDay
Newspaper, reduced the race to a
straight, all-out fight between the APC
and the PDP and the possibility of a
run-off. This may however change,
given the volatility of political
permutations.
But what lies ahead has already been
signposted by a series of events. Just as
the year was about to end, Prince Arthur
Eze, the Igbo billionaire and
entrepreneur and the Godfather of some
people, announced at an Ofala festival,
that he had told Peter Obi of the Labour
Party not to run for the Presidency
because he is not the chosen one. He
said he told Peter Obi not to waste his
money and when it is the turn of Igbos,
it would not even be him, but Professor
Charles Soludo, the incumbent
Governor of Anambra State to whom
whoever wins the Nigerian Presidency
in 2023 would hand over. Prince Eze’s
intervention generated not a little
ruckus, more so as he had arrogated to
himself the power and privilege to
determine the political future of
Igboland and the political fortunes of
Peter Obi. This was made a tad more
interesting by the fact that Professor
Charles Soludo whom he announced as
the Igbo choice for the Presidency of
Nigeria had in fact written in November
2022, in a piece titled “History Beckons
and I will Not Be Silent (1)” that Peter
Obi’s presidential ambition is a wild
goose chase that will amount to
nothing, and that his claim of extraordinary
performance as Anambra
Governor is at best a scam. Soludo has
not published the Part II of his 2023
political homily. But while he and
Prince Eze have the right to their own
choices, it cannot be confirmed that
they speak for all Igbos or the Nigerian
elite, even if there has been very loud
silence among the Igbo elite about Peter
Obi’s candidacy. His constituency is the
ordinary Nigerian who wants to take his
or her country back, who believes that
the best way to move Nigeria forward
is to disrupt it, do something different,
think out of the box. Either by default
or design, Peter Obi, more than
Omoyele Sowore, candidate of the
Continued on Page 9

Opinion
2023: Before the elections
JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
TheTrumpet
Page9
Continued from Page 8<
African Action Congress (AAC) who in
fact generated that lexicon in 2019, has
taken ownership of it and given it
velocity and currency. But to what end?
There is considerable disagreement
over what the Peter Obi phenomenon
means.
What has lent it further oxygen,
however, is the New Year endorsement
by President Olusegun Obasanjo who
says Peter Obi in his own estimation
has an “edge” over other candidates in
Nigeria’s Presidential race. Having
been an issue in Nigerian politics for
more than five decades, Obasanjo has
learnt the artful game of owning the
moment and that is precisely what he
has done this time around. Weeks to the
election, on the first day of the new
year, he announced his preference, and
he drew attention to himself, and made
himself an issue. There are persons who
have expressed the view that President
Obasanjo should be quiet. I disagree.
He has every right under the law to
offer an opinion, just like Governor
Charles Soludo, Prince Arthur Eze, and
the rest of us. Nobody should be
crucified for speaking their mind, since
we all know in any case that nobody, be
it a former President or a serving janitor
has more than one vote. The only
difference is that some people imagine
that with their celebrity endorsements
or condemnations, they can influence
the votes. This is why the most
important person in the forthcoming
general elections is the voter. The
Nigerian voter must stand up, be
resolute and make an informed choice.
There is no individual in this country
that has powers under the law to dictate
how others should vote. The operative
rule is one man, one vote. Whether or
not the elite prefer a particular
candidate, what matters is what that
average voter wants, and chooses. It is
hence important that the Nigerian
people vote according to their
conscience. This is the area where the
civil society has a responsibility to act
in the people’s interest by
conscientizing them that the best way
forward for Nigeria is to vote for those
who will make Nigeria a better place.
Nobody must be allowed to play God in
2023. There are no messiahs in this
country anymore. We only have the
people and the people have a duty to
save themselves.
Why? Because the leading political
parties are in disarray, and do not seem
to care about the electoral framework.
The Electoral Act 2022 has been touted
as a major step forward in Nigeria’s
process of democratic consolidation but
there is no concrete evidence that the
political parties, their candidates and
supporters have taken time out to study
and internalize its provisions. There is
too much bad conduct on the political
scene. The political parties signed a
peace accord brokered under the
leadership of General Abdulsalami
Abubakar, the Sultan of Sokoto, Bishop
Matthew Hassan Kukah and others but
the campaign process has been far from
peaceful. It has been abusive, toxic,
abrasive and uncivil. The major
political parties are all guilty, and the
surrogates, the hired Vuvuzelas, half of
whom are hungry and angry have been
unhelpful to the country, the process
and the candidates who give them just
barely enough to keep their stomachs
alive. Under such circumstances, the
people of Nigeria have a responsibility
to save their country from all those
elements, the termites, the fortuneseekers
who have crawled out of the
woods to hold the country hostage.
We have been told by the
Independent National Electoral
Commission (INEC) that the only way
to do this is for the people to get their
voting cards. Unfortunately, the ongoing
PVC collection exercise is a
nightmare. In the South West, there
have been allegations that non-Yoruba
persons are not allowed to collect
PVCs. In the East, there are allegations
that militant groups are chasing people
away from PVC collection centres. In
the North, it is alleged that under-aged
children are being given PVCs. Across
the country, it is said that some
unscrupulous elements are buying up
PVCs and Voter Identification Numbers
(VIN), apparently to reduce the number
of voters on election day, and induce
poor voter turn-out to serve a purpose
in specific constituencies. INEC
through its spokespersons has been very
eloquent in dismissing all of these
allegations and in boasting that it is
prepared, so prepared it has even
printed extra ballot papers should the
country be faced with the possibility of
a Presidential run-off and the activation
of reverse logistics. This is not the time
for empty boasts. INEC must address
the challenges it faces. It must
investigate the allegations that have
been raised and take appropriate action.
Less than eight weeks to the election, it
has been said that people cannot get
their PVCs! The collection process has
been chaotic from Lagos to Anambra. It
is not juju. It is organizational
dysfunction! Indeed, in Lagos, many
non-Yorubas complain that in the few
local government areas where PVCs are
given out, anybody bearing a non-
Yoruba name is discriminated against
and denied a PVC. Now, that is
unacceptable. INEC must look into
that and ensure that there is smooth,
non-discriminatory collection of PVCs
across the country, especially now that
the adoption of BVAS – the Biometric
Verification Accreditation System - has
eliminated the recourse to incident
forms. Everything in the coming 2023
elections depends on INEC and the
integrity of its systems, and further, the
commitment of President Muhammadu
Buhari to his promise to ensure a
peaceful and credible transition. INEC
needs more ad-hoc staff. It needs hands
on the ground. How it manages this
make-or-mar election should mean a lot
to its staff. INEC must stop making
promises and get to work.
The promises should be left to the
politicians. As things stand, the two
major political parties are in a battle to
the finish. The APC is so arrogant, and
confident in a most insufferable manner
that it is again the turn of the party. APC
is the ruling party, and so there is
probably something to be said for the
power of incumbency. The only caveat
there is that the sitting President has
cultivated a seeming air of neutrality in
the matter. He is leader of the party and
Chairman of the APC Presidential
Campaign Council but except I am
missing something, and I stand to be
corrected, the President has told
everyone whoever has ears to hear that
he is committed to leaving behind a
legacy of free and fair elections and he
wants Nigerians to vote and choose
freely according to their conscience. In
other words, he, President Buhari
belongs to everybody and nobody in
particular, even if he has also been
quoted as saying that he wants his party,
the APC to win. He has in that regard
shown up in one or two campaigns. His
wife too. But is that how a sitting
President campaigns for a successor
that he wants? Politicians don’t tell
people to vote according to their choice.
They go out there to drive their own
choice down the people’s throats. In
2007, President Olusegun Obasanjo
was more active on the stumps than his
chosen successor, Umaru Yar’Adua. He
was the one going around selling the
sick Yar’Adua to Nigerians, and he had
his way willy-nilly, even if years after
the fact, he is now the same man saying
a Presidential candidate needs the gift
of mental and physical agility. Do you
see how Nigeria has suffered in the
hands of its leaders? In comparison to
Obasanjo, President Buhari has been
rather reticent. He wants Nigerians to
decide for themselves. While that
comes across as good statesmanship, it
reduces the force of the Tinubu
campaign. Why would a sitting APC
President not energize his proverbial 12
million voters in support of his own
party by going out there to rally the
base?
The rival, the main opposition party,
the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)
has issues of its own too. The party is
divided as it were into three factions.
Yes, three. There is the Atiku faction:
the traditional PDP group, the die-hards
who are eager to return to power and
displace the ruling APC. They are not
saying it is their turn, but they are
convinced that power belongs to them,
they only just missed it in 2015 and
2019, and they want it back desperately.
But there is this other faction: the
Nyesom Wike faction. Wike, the
inconsolable, cry-baby of the PDP
Presidential primaries who missed the
presidential ticket, and also lost out in
the running mate race who has now
ganged up with other Governors of the
party to form a G-5 and other members
to form a rebellious Integrity Group –
he says in the name of justice, equity
and fairness, Senator Iyorchia Ayu must
go as Chairman of the party – an
irreducible minimum. The party has
since passed a vote of confidence on
Ayu, and in the last few days, the PDP
has made it clear that both the G-5 and
the Integrity Group can do their worst,
because they do not matter. The way I
see it, I think Wike and co. have
overplayed their hands. Apart from
Wike who is not seeking any elective
post, all the other principal partners are
in a Catch-22 situation. Seyi Makinde
in Oyo State wants a second term.
Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, Samuel Ortom, and
Okezie Ikpeazu want to go to the
Senate. Governor Ugwuanyi is old and
experienced enough to know that
Enugu is a traditional PDP State. He
can follow others to Port Harcourt and
London to drink pepper soup but in his
private moments, he knows that he
should not jeopardize his own political
interest. Okezie Ikpeazu, the Malabitic
Ph.D Governor of Abia State is
presumably too intelligent to go and
follow Wike and others to drink
poisonous soda. Ortom has been very
diplomatic all along, dancing this way
and that way, knowing that there are
more than enough formidable PDP
forces in Benue who can bury his
political career. Right now, most of the
aggrieved members of the PDP political
family are orphans in search of shelter.
They also need to be reminded of what
happened to the Alliance for
Democracy Governors in the 2003
elections in the South West due to
mixed messaging. Tinubu was the last
man standing in that debacle. They
should learn from him.
This may well be a general election
of surprises in Nigeria. The story has
just begun.

Page10 TheTrumpet JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
Opinion
2023: Let us pray for Nigeria!
By Abiodun Komolafe
This is the year 2023! As the
New Year comes, it is
custom for people to look
towards new things. Unarguably,
improvement over the present has
always been the desire of human
beings. The same goes with nations,
which collectively look forward to
improving their lot. Just as human
beings make predictions, nations,
too, do make projections. With a
particular reference to Nigeria, to
say that her present situation is
revealingly appalling is not an
overstatement. So, she needs
prayers for the cure of her maladies
and the betterment of her future!
As Nigeria approaches the 2023
Nigerians go to the polls next month
General Elections, it needs to be
noted that the mood of the season is
not smiling. Generally speaking, the
society has become more polarised
along ethno-religious divides and
theatrical performances. It is like a
moribund situation! At the base of
this are negative social indices such
as terrorism, banditry, armed
robbery, kidnapping and arson, all
which have become frighteningly
alarming! The pressures of Yuletide,
fuel scarcity, among others, have not
helped matters either. Even when
the much-celebrated subsidy regime
is alive and kicking, Nigerians are
already feeling the pains of its
looming removal. They are already
bearing the brunt of a nation that’s
blessed with so much but dwelling
in the kingdom of ‘so little.’ To say
the least, the country is at the tipping
point!
Matter-of-factly speaking, events
around us have again shown that
empires, by philosophy, are destined
to collapse. They rise and they go
away! In the global civilisation
agenda, democracy is also key! It is
the only legitimate way of getting
the impossible done! However, in
this clime, the institutional attributes
of democracy have been
compromised. Hence its inability to
yield optimum benefits to the
people. For the wise, therefore, the
destiny of an empire is enough
lesson that what goes around must
surely certainly come around.
Party discipline has taken flight
in Nigeria. Of course, without party
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discipline, there can’t be reasonable
order; and, without reasonable
order, there can’t be feasible and
sustainable development. Tragically
too, the leadership of the Church has
no clear vision as to what it should
stand for. Hence, it’s being
propelled by the sour broth of the
passion and impulses of the political
gladiators.
The late Chief Obafemi
Awolowo once said that in a society
where dogs kill tigers, grave danger
is on the prowl! Needless to repeat
that Nigeria presently harbours a
spiral chaotic social situation; and
the social response of individuals,
groups and social institutions has
been largely negative, selfish,
divisive and un-coordinated. Out of
sheer ignorance, people are working
against the interest and survival of
the country. It is a chaotic situation
with no remedy in sight. The
emphasis here is about cohesion in a
democratic society, not a concoction
of forced orderliness through
dictatorship or state-induced
society-policing, which is outright
repression. For Nigeria to survive,
there must be collective political
will to survive! The more reason
Nigeria needs prayers!
Time it was in Nigeria when
seeing a corpse by the roadside was
a major issue. Then, the affected
Local Government officials would
not only do all that was necessary to
remove the remains in record time
but also deploy environmental
health experts to sanitize the area to
prevent the possible spread of
epidemics. Even traditionalists
within the locality would want to do
conduct ‘special prayers’ to ward
off evil spirits. Since times and
things have changed, these days,
watching in amusement while the
victim groans to death has become
a trophy for civilization.
In the olden days, if a report was
made to a Local Government
Chairman about dilapidated portions
of a road in his or her domain, rest
assured that he or she would not rest
until such a road was fixed. These
days, the chairman will even
sponsor social media campaigns to
Continued on Page 11

Opinion
2023: Let us pray for Nigeria!
JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
TheTrumpet
Page11
Continued from Page 10<
discuss ‘Rome-burns-Nero-fiddles’
tales, just to divert the people’s
attention and sway opinions from
such a burning issue.
Many years ago, Professor Ango
Abdullai described Nigeria’s
university system as ‘a bottomless
pit’, notorious for collecting money
without producing anything. Well,
that was many years ago! It is
unfortunate that, many years later,
the university system still produces
nothing! While institutions of higher
learning elsewhere are attempting,
even solving problems of various
patterns, what Nigerians have on
their hands is a country whose town
is being deliberately tormented by
the gown. For instance, where is the
Nigerian Institute of Social and
Economic Research (NISER) in the
scheme of resolving Nigeria’s
socioeconomic woes and what’s its
impact on the exchange rate
currently threatening the country’s
economy?
Once upon a country, Michelin
Tyre Factory was sited in Port
Harcourt, Rivers State and Dunlop
was in Lagos State. Berec Battery,
Hegemeyer, Chellarams, UTC
Motors and others also pitched their
tents in Nigeria’s future ‘Centre of
Excellence.’ Ditto for Kingsway and
Leventis Stores in Lagos and Oyo
States! Osogbo Steel Rolling Mills
and Nigeria Machine Tools were
established in Osogbo in the old
Oyo State. Ajaokuta Steel Company
Limited was in Kwara before
relocating to Kogi State! At a point
in Nigeria’s chequered history, we
were not importing rubber because
it was readily available in our
backyard. Buying a good car battery
wasn’t also a problem because
Exide Battery, among others, was
being manufactured in Ibadan.
However, these industries have long
walked away and it’s as if the gods
were angry!
Compare also the contents of
Coke in the 1980s with what we
now have and one will realize that a
society without firm control will
soon become a lawless society! Yet,
nobody is drawing world attention
to what is likely to kill us dead!
Fellow Nigerians, this is a New
Year! It is also another defining
moment in the life of Nigeria.
Precisely, it is a year power must
change hands at her topmost
political level! As a praying nation,
we are optimistic that, with God
taking the front seat in the affairs of
our dear country, the Year 2023 will
bequeath to us fresh hopes and new
gifts; new opportunities and new
beginnings!
Great things, they say, start with
little steps and those who cannot
manage stardom cannot manage
crises. So, our Father and our God,
we beseech Thee, shower on our
leaders the wisdom to dream dreams
and the energy to pursue them to
fulfilment. Grant them the wisdom
to use the opportunity that the
situation presents to become
masters of brilliant ideas and
innovations that’ll push
development forward. In this
hurting world of mixed fortunes,
teach them to rearrange the eye of
governance with a view to repairing
the country’s problems. Grant unto
them the power to picture into a
future that is waiting to unleash its
punishment for their failures.
You’re the Prince of Peace! You
are also our Buckler and the Key of
Life! As we go to the polls early this
year to elect new leaders for this
‘Giant of Africa’ and its component
States, command peace to our
country! Deliver us; be our stay!
Light our candle and enlighten our
darkness. Gird us with strength and
subdue under us those that rise
against us. ‘Lift us up above those
that rise up against us and let our
cry come before You, even unto Your
ears.’ Steer our country’s ship of
state away from the locust years of
uncertainty and ravenous culture of
impunity and give us a Nigeria
where, in the words of Governor
Nyesom Wike, “every Nigerian can
have hope of becoming something
tomorrow.”
May the Lamb of God, who
takes away the sin of the world,
grant us peace in Nigeria!
*Komolafe wrote in from Ijebu-
Jesa, Osun State
(ijebujesa@yahoo.co.uk)

Page12 TheTrumpet JANUARY 11 - 24 2023

JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
TheTrumpet
Page13
“It’s an
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Page14 TheTrumpet JANUARY 11 - 24 2023

Opinion
JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
TheTrumpet
‘Emi lo kan’ syndrome: The bane of
Nigerian politics
By Tony Ogunlowo
Page15
First of all, ‘emi lo kan’ for my
non-Yoruba readers simply
means ‘it’s my turn’ in
English. In Nigerian politics it’s a
syndrome which affects a narcissistic
few who believe they’re entitled to
something they’re not. And because
they’ve been kingmakers
themselves, in the past, hand picking
leaders to rule the country, a favour
is owed and its now their turn to
collect.
It’s not something that started
recently, as is widely believed, it’s
been going on for awhile.
When Murtala Muhammed
overthrew General Gowon in 1975
there was no real reason to do so
other than the latter believed it was
his turn to be at the helm of affairs:
the country was relatively stable,
growing economically, redeveloping
after the civil war and en-route to the
return to civil rule before the end of
the decade, so there was no need for
a change of government.
Tel: +44 (0) 7956 385 604
Coming up to when Babangida
ousted then Head of State Buhari in
1985, he had no real policies of his
own to prove he was better than his
predecessor other than ‘emilokan’
and ended up implementing the
Structural Adjustment Program,
SAP, a disastrous economic policy,
of which the country hasn’t been
able to escape from thirty-six years
later.
Sani Abacha sacked the
Shonekan-led Interim National
Government in 1993 because he
believed it was his turn to be Head of
State despite being warned off by
then General Colin Powell, who was
at the time - the United States
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, but to no avail. He took power
anyway and cluelessly led the
country for the next five years,
nearly looting its coffers dry and
racking up human rights abuses
unlike any other Nigerian leader. Not
even the late Chief Awolowo was
Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) ballot box
exempt from this syndrome: he was
so hell-bent on leading his party,
from Action Group to Unity Party, to
become President that more
competent people, like Chief Lateef
Jakande, who could have done the
job better were left in the shadows.
Those who suffer from ‘emi lo
kan’ syndrome believe it’s an
entitlement bestowed upon them at
birth (- or the last thing on their
bucket list!) and not through some
sort of old feudal hierarchy. Yes, an
Oba or King’s son can succeed him
on the throne because that’s how the
royal hierarchy system works just
like Prince Charles became King
upon the death of his mother, Queen
Elizabeth. But when you’re talking
of a country of more than 200
million souls, the process to elect a
leader has to be democratic, the
aspirant has to be competent enough
to do the job and have the welfare,
protection and advancement of the
people at heart, unless Nigeria is
turning into North Korea or China
where they just stick the next idiot in
power. Not one person, or persons,
can be allowed to hijack the system,
because they have the means to,
simply to satisfy a personal
ambition. In my opinion, all the
primaries held by the two major
parties, APC and PDP, to elect a
Presidential candidate, were all a
sham: everybody knew who the front
runners would be even before a
single member cast their votes! The
‘emi lo kans’ had already cornered
the market!
Reason should come into this:
sometimes one has to realise one is
past it, too old and or not competent
enough, and gracefully step aside
accepting the fact it’s one dream you
can’t fulfil in this lifetime. At my age
it would be foolhardy to think I can
win a race with Usain Bolt simply
because I believe it’s my turn to be
World 100m champion. The other
day a whole African President,
clearly with incontinence problems,
wet himself in public on national TV
– too old and dumb to know when to
step aside. Na by force to be
President?
When it comes to running a
country, the aspirant needs to be
competent enough and up to the task
at hand along with being healthy and
intelligent because one person’s
selfish ambition can plunge millions
into poverty and uncertainty. An ‘emi
lo kan’ aspirant is not patriotic,
they’re simply in it for themselves!
And they’ll do anything (- especially
when they have the clout and
financial superiority) to get what
they want - at the expense of the
masses. So, in a country like Nigeria
where you can ‘buy’ the Presidency,
an ‘emi lo kan’ can easily get the top
job.
You can follow Tony Ogunlowo
on Twitter: @Archangel641 or visit
http://www.archangel641.blogspot.c
o.uk

Page16 TheTrumpet JANUARY 11 - 24 2023
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