As the news filter through the media spaces one always hopes to hear good news but the reverse has been the case in my country, Nigeria, in the last couple of weeks. In fact in the past few years one can, on finger tips, count the number of good and cheering news that have made it to the public space [...]

We need to tackle an emergency that has our children live like dogs in the name of some higher but unconscionable goal.

by Akin Akintayo
President Goodluck Jonathan gave a speech at an interdenominational service celebrating the 51st Independence anniversary of Nigeria and it was replete with utterly dreadful analogies – it was awful, awful, awful.

Hilarious! She said Somehow, there are certain trends I do not react to or acknowledge until it catches the eye of certain members of my social network at which point my curiosity might be engaged to have a look just to appreciate what might have piqued their interest. This topic had been around for over a week until it came [...]

Fayemi and the Usual Suspects: The evil that walked the rugged landscapes of Ekiti was not Segun Oni. The evil was a brand of regressive political system that President Obasanjo promoted since 2003. The guy was said to be a gentleman, Segun Oni, personable and humane, but so was Chris Ngige, who, however, would get an Abiku redemption, partly because [...]

Through the aspirations of the day of independence in 1960 we look beyond 2010 for a new Nigeria.

It didn’t take me long to locate him at Rayfield where he teaches in a private school. Once upon a time, he was in Riyom, a local government that has now made a name for itself in the spots of unrest around the state. On my way there, there were at least ten military checkpoints along the way so I [...]

Though identity, as a category of self perception and self-determination, is considered unhelpful and mischievous because of its tendency towards entrenching xenophobia and ghetto mentality in globalised discourse, but one might be persuaded, in the light of recent ethno-religious violence in Jos, and especially the politics of responsibility that attends it, that what can be indeed helpful for Nigeria’s federated [...]

I’m working on a collection of poems investigating hate, fear, and loathing: Under the banner of peace and brotherhood, my body to be scattered in bits in the noisy, sudden, non-peaceful tearing of flesh. My body a weapon against cousinhood. I have many cousins – one that smokes by the Ganges and really hates blood. one that used to be [...]