Permit me to start by thanking Chatham House for the invitation to talk about this important topic at this crucial time. When speaking about Nigeria overseas, I normally prefer to be my country’s public relations and marketing officer, extolling her virtues and hoping to attract investments and tourists. But as we all know, Nigeria is now battling with many challenges, and if I refer to them, I do so only to impress on our friends in the United Kingdom that we are quite aware of our shortcomings and are doing our best to address them.
The 2015 general election in Nigeria is generating a lot of interests within and outside the country. This is understandable. Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country and largest economy, is at a defining moment, a moment that has great implications beyond the democratic project and beyond the borders of my dear country.
So let me say upfront that the global interest in Nigeria’s landmark election is not misplaced at all and indeed should be commended; for this is an election that has serious import for the world. I urge the international community to continue to focus on Nigeria at this very critical moment. Given increasing global linkages, it is in our collective interests that the postponed elections should hold on the rescheduled dates; that they should be free and fair; that their outcomes should be respected by all parties; and that any form of extension, under whichever guise, is unconstitutional and will not be tolerated.
With the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, the collapse of communism and the end of the Cold War, democracy became the dominant and most preferred system of government across the globe. That global transition has been aptly captured as the triumph of democracy and the ‘most pre-eminent political idea of our time.’ On a personal note, the phased end of the USSR was a turning point for me. It convinced me that change can be brought about without firing a single shot.
As you all know, I had been a military head of state in Nigeria for twenty months. We intervened because we were unhappy with the state of affairs in our country. We wanted to arrest the drift. Driven by patriotism, influenced by the prevalence and popularity of such drastic measures all over Africa and elsewhere, we fought our way to power. But the global triumph of democracy has shown that another and a preferable path to change is possible. It is an important lesson I have carried with me since, and a lesson that is not lost on the African continent.
In the last two decades, democracy has grown strong roots in Africa. Elections, once so rare, are now so commonplace. As at the time I was a military head of state between 1983 and 1985, only four African countries held regular multi-party elections. But the number of electoral democracies in Africa, according to Freedom House, jumped to 10 in 1992/1993 then to 18 in 1994/1995 and to 24 in 2005/2006. According to the New York Times, 42 of the 48 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa conducted multi-party elections between 1990 and 2002.
The newspaper also reported that between 2000 and 2002, ruling parties in four African countries (Senegal, Mauritius, Ghana and Mali) peacefully handed over power to victorious opposition parties. In addition, the proportion of African countries categorized as not free by Freedom House declined from 59% in 1983 to 35% in 2003. Without doubt, Africa has been part of the current global wave of democratisation.
But the growth of democracy on the continent has been uneven. According to Freedom House, the number of electoral democracies in Africa slipped from 24 in 2007/2008 to 19 in 2011/2012; while the percentage of countries categorised as ‘not free’ assuming for the sake of argument that we accept their definition of “free” increased from 35% in 2003 to 41% in 2013. Also, there have been some reversals at different times in Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Cote D’Ivoire, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Lesotho, Mali, Madagascar, Mauritania and Togo. We can choose to look at the glass of democracy in Africa as either half full or half empty.
While you can’t have representative democracy without elections, it is equally important to look at the quality of the elections and to remember that mere elections do not democracy make. It is globally agreed that democracy is not an event, but a journey. And that the destination of that journey is democratic consolidation – that state where democracy has become so rooted and so routine and widely accepted by all actors.
With this important destination in mind, it is clear that though many African countries now hold regular elections, very few of them have consolidated the practice of democracy. It is important to also state at this point that just as with elections, a consolidated democracy cannot be an end by itself. I will argue that it is not enough to hold a series of elections or even to peacefully alternate power among parties.
It is much more important that the promise of democracy goes beyond just allowing people to freely choose their leaders. It is much more important that democracy should deliver on the promise of choice, of freedoms, of security of lives and property, of transparency and accountability, of rule of law, of good governance and of shared prosperity. It is very important that the promise embedded in the concept of democracy, the promise of a better life for the generality of the people, is not delivered in the breach.
Now, let me quickly turn to Nigeria. As you all know, Nigeria’s fourth republic is in its 16th year and this general election will be the fifth in a row. This is a major sign of progress for us, given that our first republic lasted five years and three months, the second republic ended after four years and two months and the third republic was a still-birth. However, longevity is not the only reason why everyone is so interested in this election.
The major difference this time around is that for the very first time since transition to civil rule in 1999, the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is facing its stiffest opposition so far from our party the All Progressives Congress (APC). We once had about 50 political parties, but with no real competition. Now Nigeria is transitioning from a dominant party system to a competitive electoral polity, which is a major marker on the road to democratic consolidation. As you know, peaceful alternation of power through competitive elections have happened in Ghana, Senegal, Malawi and Mauritius in recent times. The prospects of democratic consolidation in Africa will be further brightened when that eventually happens in Nigeria.
But there are other reasons why Nigerians and the whole world are intensely focussed on this year’s elections, chief of which is that the elections are holding in the shadow of huge security, economic and social uncertainties in Africa’s most populous country and largest economy. On insecurity, there is a genuine cause for worry, both within and outside Nigeria. Apart from the civil war era, at no other time in our history has Nigeria been this insecure.
Boko Haram has sadly put Nigeria on the terrorism map, killing more than 13,000 of our nationals, displacing millions internally and externally, and at a time holding on to portions of our territory the size of Belgium. What has been consistently lacking is the required leadership in our battle against insurgency. I, as a retired general and a former head of state, have always known about our soldiers: they are capable, well trained, patriotic, brave and always ready to do their duty in the service of our country.
You all can bear witness to the gallant role of our military in Burma, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Darfur and in many other peacekeeping operations in several parts of the world. But in the matter of this insurgency, our soldiers have neither received the necessary support nor the required incentives to tackle this problem. The government has also failed in any effort towards a multi-dimensional response to this problem leading to a situation in which we have now become dependent on our neighbours to come to our rescue.
Let me assure you that if I am elected president, the world will have no cause to worry about Nigeria as it has had to recently; that Nigeria will return to its stabilising role in West Africa; and that no inch of Nigerian territory will ever be lost to the enemy because we will pay special attention to the welfare of our soldiers in and out of service, we will give them adequate and modern arms and ammunitions to work with, we will improve intelligence gathering and border controls to choke Boko Haram’s financial and equipment channels, we will be tough on terrorism and tough on its root causes by initiating a comprehensive economic development plan promoting infrastructural development, job creation, agriculture and industry in the affected areas. We will always act on time and not allow problems to irresponsibly fester, and I, Muhammadu Buhari, will always lead from the front and return Nigeria to its leadership role in regional and international efforts to combat terrorism.
On the economy, the fall in prices of oil has brought our economic and social stress into full relief. After the rebasing exercise in April 2014, Nigeria overtook South Africa as Africa’s largest economy. Our GDP is now valued at $510 billion and our economy rated 26th in the world. Also on the bright side, inflation has been kept at single digit for a while and our economy has grown at an average of 7% for about a decade.
But it is more of paper growth, a growth that, on account of mismanagement, profligacy and corruption, has not translated to human development or shared prosperity. A development economist once said three questions should be asked about a country’s development: one, what is happening to poverty? Two, what is happening to unemployment? And three, what is happening to inequality?
The answers to these questions in Nigeria show that the current administration has created two economies in one country, a sorry tale of two nations: one economy for a few who have so much in their tiny island of prosperity; and the other economy for the many who have so little in their vast ocean of misery.
Even by official figures, 33.1% of Nigerians live in extreme poverty. That’s at almost 60 million, almost the population of the United Kingdom. There is also the unemployment crisis simmering beneath the surface, ready to explode at the slightest stress, with officially 23.9% of our adult population and almost 60% of our youth unemployed. We also have one of the highest rates of inequalities in the world.
With all these, it is not surprising that our performance on most governance and development indicators (like Mo Ibrahim Index on African Governance and UNDP’s Human Development Index.) are unflattering. With fall in the prices of oil, which accounts for more than 70% of government revenues, and lack of savings from more than a decade of oil boom, the poor will be disproportionately impacted.
In the face of dwindling revenues, a good place to start the repositioning of Nigeria’s economy is to swiftly tackle two ills that have ballooned under the present administration: waste and corruption. And in doing this, I will, if elected, lead the way, with the force of personal example.
On corruption, there will be no confusion as to where I stand. Corruption will have no place and the corrupt will not be appointed into my administration. First and foremost, we will plug the holes in the budgetary process. Revenue producing entities such as NNPC and Customs and Excise will have one set of books only. Their revenues will be publicly disclosed and regularly audited. The institutions of state dedicated to fighting corruption will be given independence and prosecutorial authority without political interference.
But I must emphasise that any war waged on corruption should not be misconstrued as settling old scores or a witch-hunt. I’m running for President to lead Nigeria to prosperity and not adversity.
In reforming the economy, we will use savings that arise from blocking these leakages and the proceeds recovered from corruption to fund our party’s social investments programmes in education, health, and safety nets such as free school meals for children, emergency public works for unemployed youth and pensions for the elderly.
As a progressive party, we must reform our political economy to unleash the pent-up ingenuity and productivity of the Nigerian people thus freeing them from the curse of poverty. We will run a private sector-led economy but maintain an active role for government through strong regulatory oversight and deliberate interventions and incentives to diversify the base of our economy, strengthen productive sectors, improve the productive capacities of our people and create jobs for our teeming youths.
In short, we will run a functional economy driven by a worldview that sees growth not as an end by itself, but as a tool to create a society that works for all, rich and poor alike. On March 28, Nigeria has a decision to make. To vote for the continuity of failure or to elect progressive change. I believe the people will choose wisely.
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The daughters of veteran Yoruba actor Taiwo Hassan, popularly known as Ogogo, have appealed for urgent medical assistance for their father, who they say is battling stage-four cancer.
Lima and Kira Taiwo made separate emotional appeals on Instagram, asking Nigerians, medical professionals, cancer specialists and well-wishers to help the actor access further treatment.
The family stressed that the appeal was not for financial donations but for medical intervention and access to specialists or healthcare facilities capable of reviewing the actor’s condition and determining whether further treatment options are available.
In an emotional video, Lima said her father’s condition had deteriorated significantly and claimed that hospitals were no longer willing to continue treating him.
She explained that the family only became aware of the seriousness of his condition about three weeks earlier, noting that his appearance had not initially suggested that he was seriously ill.
According to her, the family was willing to explore any legitimate medical option that could give the actor another chance.
Lima appealed to anyone with connections to oncologists, hospitals or other qualified medical professionals to contact the family.
She also acknowledged the support of a relative who, according to her, had stepped in to assist the family during the difficult period.
Kira, in a separate video, disclosed that her father had been diagnosed with stage-four cancer and said the hospital treating him had informed the family that he could no longer continue with chemotherapy.
She similarly appealed for medical assistance, asking anyone with access to cancer specialists or facilities capable of managing advanced cancer to reach out to the family.
Kira also mentioned the support of Senator Yayi, whom she said had been helping the family with medical expenses.
While pleading for help, she became emotional as she described the pain her father was experiencing and said he had expressed his fear of dying.
The daughters' appeals have since attracted support from several prominent figures in the Nigerian entertainment industry.
Actor and filmmaker Femi Adebayo urged the public to rally around Hassan and help the family connect with qualified oncology specialists and advanced treatment centres.
Adebayo said the family's immediate need was medical direction rather than financial assistance. He encouraged people with contacts in the oncology field, both in Nigeria and abroad, to help the family have the actor's medical records reviewed and identify possible treatment options.
Actress Toyin Abraham also shared the family's appeal on Instagram, asking anyone who could assist to contact Kira, Lima or her directly.
Meanwhile, medical doctor Olusina Ajidahun, known on X as The Bearded Dr Sina, offered a different perspective on the daughters' description of the situation.
Ajidahun cautioned that saying hospitals had “refused to treat” the actor could create the impression that medical professionals were deliberately abandoning him.
He explained that patients with advanced, stage-four cancer may sometimes be moved from active cancer treatment to palliative care after available chemotherapy and other therapies have been considered or exhausted.
Palliative care focuses on controlling symptoms, relieving pain and improving quality of life when a disease can no longer be effectively cured. It does not necessarily mean that healthcare professionals have simply abandoned a patient.
Ajidahun also warned the public against unverified claims that herbal preparations can cure advanced cancer. He said such remedies could potentially cause additional complications, particularly if they interfere with established medical treatment or damage other organs.
He further explained that stage-four cancer generally indicates that a cancer has spread from its original site to other parts of the body, although the exact implications and available treatment options depend on the particular cancer and the individual patient's medical circumstances.
The doctor clarified that he was not involved in Hassan's treatment and was commenting independently in response to the videos posted by the actor's daughters.
Taiwo Hassan, 66, is one of the most recognisable figures in Yoruba-language cinema. With a career spanning more than four decades, he has appeared in hundreds of Nigerian films and has built a reputation as one of the industry's veteran performers.
As of the time of the reports, Hassan's management and family had not released a detailed official statement identifying the type of cancer, the hospital where he is receiving care, or the specific treatment he has undergone.
The family's appeal has nevertheless prompted renewed calls for qualified medical professionals and cancer treatment centres to review the actor's case and advise on any medically appropriate options that may remain available.
News
Twenty-four companies now account for nearly three-quarters of the total value of Nigeria’s equities market, highlighting the growing concentration of market wealth among a relatively small group of large-cap stocks.
As of August 17, 2026, the companies had a combined market capitalisation of N117.01 trillion, representing 74.8 per cent of the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) equities market, whose total capitalisation stood at N156.52 trillion.
The NGX market capitalisation has increased by N57.14 trillion, or 57.5 per cent, from N99.38 trillion at the end of 2025.
The sharp rise has been supported by strong gains across several sectors, particularly banking, consumer goods, industrial goods and energy. However, the concentration of market value means that the performance of a relatively small number of heavyweight stocks can have a significant influence on the broader market.
Large-cap stocks dominate the market
Dangote Cement Plc emerged as the most valuable company on the NGX, with a market capitalisation of N17.15 trillion, overtaking MTN Nigeria Plc.
BUA Foods Plc and BUA Cement Plc followed with N13.69 trillion each, while Aradel Holdings Plc was valued at N6.72 trillion.
Other companies among the most highly capitalised stocks included First Holdco Plc, HBM Nigeria Plc, Zenith Bank Plc, GTCO Plc, Stanbic IBTC Holdings Plc, Transcorp Hotels Plc, Presco Plc and Nestle Nigeria Plc.
The 24 companies are spread across several major sectors, with banks accounting for a significant portion of the list.
Banks maintain a strong presence
First Holdco led the banking stocks with a market capitalisation of N6.37 trillion, followed by Zenith Bank at N5.04 trillion and GTCO at N4.70 trillion.
Stanbic IBTC Holdings was valued at N2.56 trillion, while United Bank for Africa (UBA) stood at N1.99 trillion.
Access Holdings and Fidelity Bank had market capitalisations of N1.45 trillion and N1.38 trillion respectively. Ecobank Transnational Incorporated and Wema Bank followed with N1.27 trillion and N1.16 trillion.
The strong performance of banking stocks has been linked to improved investor sentiment and the sector's recapitalisation programme, which has encouraged expectations of stronger balance sheets and greater capacity for future growth.
Consumer goods stocks remain prominent
BUA Foods was the largest consumer-related company on the list, with a market capitalisation of N13.69 trillion.
Presco followed at N2.40 trillion, while Nestle Nigeria was valued at N2.22 trillion.
Nigerian Breweries and International Breweries recorded market capitalisations of N2.10 trillion and N1.79 trillion respectively.
Although consumer-facing companies have benefited from expectations of improved operating conditions, the sector continues to contend with elevated production costs, inflationary pressures and weak household purchasing power.
Industrial giants drive market value
The industrial goods sector is another major source of market concentration.
Dangote Cement led the sector with a market capitalisation of N17.15 trillion. BUA Cement followed with N13.69 trillion, while HBM Nigeria had a market value of N5.38 trillion.
The size of these companies means that changes in their share prices can significantly affect overall market performance.
Energy stocks gain prominence
The energy segment also featured prominently among the largest companies.
Seplat Energy and Aradel Holdings each recorded market capitalisations of N6.72 trillion, while Geregu Power stood at N2.06 trillion and Transcorp Power at N1.65 trillion.
The growing representation of energy companies reflects increasing investor interest in Nigeria's oil, gas and power businesses.
Market rally masks wide differences among stocks
Despite the strong performance of the broader market, individual stocks have produced vastly different returns.
Zichis Agro Allied Industries was the best-performing stock year-to-date as of August 17, gaining 1,744.22 per cent to N18.35 per share.
SCOA Nigeria rose 365.49 per cent to N33.05, while Infinity Trust Mortgage Bank gained 221.43 per cent to N11.25.
Berger Paints Nigeria increased by 207.50 per cent to N147.60, while Premier Paints appreciated by 204 per cent to N30.40.
Other major gainers included First Holdco, up 198.51 per cent to N140; Vitafoam Nigeria, which gained 153.04 per cent to N194; and HBM Nigeria, which rose 149.25 per cent to N334.
However, the market rally did not benefit all investors.
Sovereign Trust Insurance was the worst-performing stock, falling 50.39 per cent to N1.89.
Ellah Lakes declined 41.52 per cent to N8.10, while Guinea Insurance dropped 43.37 per cent to N0.76.
SUNU Assurances Nigeria fell 39.64 per cent to N3.32, while Austin Laz declined 39.06 per cent to N2.84.
Royal Exchange, Triple Gee & Company, Champion Breweries and Universal Insurance also recorded significant declines.
Transcorp Power fell 28.45 per cent to N219.60 despite the overall strength of the market.
Asset size paints a different picture
Market capitalisation is not the only measure of corporate size.
When companies are ranked by total assets, the picture changes considerably.
Ecobank Transnational Incorporated had the largest asset base in the second quarter of 2026, with total assets of N49.15 trillion.
First Holdco followed with N30.65 trillion, while Aradel Holdings recorded N10.88 trillion.
FCMB had total assets of N8.36 trillion and Oando N7.89 trillion.
Dangote Cement reported N6.62 trillion in assets, followed by MTN Nigeria with N5.97 trillion and Sterling Holdings with N4.67 trillion.
BUA Cement and BUA Foods recorded total assets of N1.92 trillion and N1.67 trillion respectively.
However, a large asset base does not necessarily translate into high profitability or strong shareholder returns. For financial institutions in particular, substantial assets are often accompanied by significant liabilities.
Negative equity raises investor concerns
The second-quarter balance sheets also highlight differences in financial strength.
Ecobank Transnational had shareholders' equity of N3.17 trillion, while First Holdco recorded N3.63 trillion.
MTN Nigeria had positive equity of N930.61 billion, while Sterling Holdings reported N547.67 billion.
Dangote Cement had equity of about N3.17 trillion. Jaiz Bank and United Capital recorded positive equity of N93.6 billion and N187.09 billion respectively.
However, Aradel Holdings reported negative equity of N2.16 trillion despite having total assets of N10.88 trillion.
Oando also recorded negative equity of N530.45 billion against total assets of N7.89 trillion.
Negative equity does not automatically mean that a company is incapable of recovering, but it warrants closer examination of its debt obligations, cash flows, capital structure and plans to strengthen its balance sheet.
Analysts urge investors to look beyond the index
Market analysts have cautioned investors against interpreting the NGX's strong headline performance as evidence of a broad-based improvement across all listed companies.
David Adonri, an analyst and Chief Executive Officer of Highcap Securities Limited, said the concentration of market value among a relatively small number of companies makes it important for investors to examine individual stocks rather than rely solely on the All-Share Index.
According to him, strong market performance can conceal significant differences in company fundamentals, earnings and valuations.
He also warned investors against buying stocks simply because they have recorded exceptional year-to-date gains, noting that substantial price appreciation does not necessarily correspond with an equivalent improvement in underlying business performance.
Another analyst at InvestData Consulting Limited advised investors to pay particular attention to companies with negative shareholders' equity.
The analyst said investors should determine whether negative equity is temporary, whether management has a credible recapitalisation or restructuring strategy, and whether the underlying business generates enough cash to meet its financial obligations.
Analysts divided on investment prospects
Analysts' recommendations also show that the market rally has created both opportunities and valuation concerns.
Of the 32 stocks assessed, 17 received Buy or Strong Buy ratings, while 12 were rated Sell or Strong Sell. Three stocks received Neutral ratings.
Among those rated Buy or Strong Buy were Aradel Holdings, Access Holdings, Dangote Cement, Dangote Sugar, FCMB, GTCO, Guinness Nigeria, HBM Nigeria, Honeywell Flour Mills, Nigerian Breweries, Nestle Nigeria, UACN, Transcorp Corporation, UBA, Zenith Bank and Cadbury Nigeria.
Stocks receiving Sell or Strong Sell recommendations included BUA Cement, BUA Foods, Conoil, First Holdco, International Breweries, Julius Berger, Okomu Oil, Presco, PZ Cussons, Stanbic IBTC, TotalEnergies Marketing and Unilever Nigeria.
Fidelity Bank, Ecobank Transnational Incorporated and NASCON Allied Industries were rated Neutral.
The divergence in recommendations suggests that investors are becoming more selective as valuations rise.
Analysts said investors should focus on earnings growth, dividend potential, debt levels, cash generation and return on equity when assessing individual stocks.
Concentration presents both opportunity and risk
The dominance of 24 companies in the NGX's total market value underscores the growing influence of large-cap stocks on Nigeria's equity market.
For investors, the strong market rally presents opportunities, but it also highlights the importance of distinguishing between rising share prices and improving business fundamentals.
A stock market can deliver a strong headline return while individual companies experience very different outcomes.
With nearly three-quarters of market capitalisation concentrated in a small group of companies, movements in these stocks will remain critical to the direction of the NGX.
The message for investors is therefore clear: a rising market is not necessarily a uniformly attractive market. Understanding valuations, earnings, balance sheets and cash flows remains essential when deciding where to invest.
Business
In The Spotlight
The Osun election is over, and Governor Ademola Adeleke has won another term. That fact invites a revisit of the prophets, defectors and sages who explained why Osun voters must reject him. Hubris, the Greeks knew, often enters wearing wisdom’s costume and leaves carrying its shoes. In politics, certainty is often merely ignorance wearing a tailored suit.
The first lesson is elementary, yet apparently postgraduate in Nigeria: voters are not an audience waiting for pundits to announce the correct answer. Temitope Ajayi, a Senior Special Assistant to Mr President wanted the voters to elect a “CEO rather than an entertainer”. APC’s National Publicity Secretary, Mr Felix Morka called Adeleke first term “very dismal” and “lacklustre.” Benjamin Adereti called the administration a “colossal failure,” while Oluremi Omowaye predicted voters would remove him. Ajibola Basiru, Tajudeen Lawal and Iyiola Omisore joined the indictment. Their criticisms were legitimate; their certainty was the experiment.
The Court of Adjectives
One can accuse a government of failure; one cannot appoint oneself clerk of the voters’ conscience. “Dismal,” “lacklustre,” “colossal failure” and “incompetent” are adjectives, not polling units. A ballot does not admire rhetoric; it asks citizens what they think. This does not sanctify Adeleke or invalidate criticism. It demonstrates the difference between argument and verdict: one belongs to commentators, the other to citizens.
Then came the entertainment thesis. Ajayi and others treated Adeleke’s dancing as though Terpsichore had amended the Constitution. Monday Okpebholo, the Governor of Edo State mocked the dancing, questioned meeting attendance and joked about “dancing roads.” Bashir Ahmad, the Former Personal Assistant to President Buhari reportedly bookmarked Davido’s post, anticipating an APC victory and future victory lap. What a museum of premature triumph! As the Yoruba proverb says, when the drummer changes rhythm, the dancer must listen; here, the electorate changed the rhythm.
There is a deeper irony. Governance is not judged by whether a governor looks miserable while working. A dancing governor can fail; a solemn governor can fail magnificently. An exuberant politician can govern competently. The serious questions are roads, schools, health, jobs, debt, investment, institutions and outcomes. President Olusegun Obasanjo’s counsel to Adeleke – do not stop dancing, but work – contains more wisdom than the anti-dance industry. The dance is personality; the work is the test.
The Insiders’ Paradox
Morka, Adereti, Omowaye, Basiru, Lawal and Omisore should not confuse electoral disappointment with a prohibition on criticism. Democracy needs vigilant opposition. But the stronger the allegation, the stronger the evidence required. If the government was catastrophic, show figures, baselines, procurement records and outcomes. In the Republic of Evidence, adjectives are unemployed.
Then there are former insiders: Moyoade Lukman and Azeez Kazeem, who served as Adeleke’s aides before breaking ranks and campaigning against him. Lukman called his APC move a “homecoming”; Kazeem abandoned his appointment for Bola Oyebamiji. Yet a riddle remains: if the house was uninhabitable, why did the discovery arrive after you acquired a room key? They were inside the kitchen, not tourists at the window.
Dr Leye Olagbaju and Asamo Gbenga, from the Accord camp, also rejected Adeleke’s candidacy and questioned his leadership capacity. Yet Nigerian politics turns former companions into overnight Herodotuses, each suddenly possessing the definitive history of the man they once embraced. Proximity gives information, not omniscience. A former ally may know where the furniture is kept and still misunderstand why guests keep arriving.
The Missing Political Arithmetic
The APC and ADC also appear to have overlooked a stubborn feature of Osun politics: power shift. All three leading contenders – Ademola Adeleke, Bola Oyebamiji and Najeem Salaam – came from Osun West. Osun Central and Osun East could ask: if the West retains power now, when does our turn become plausible? Adeleke’s second term potentially creates a clearer succession horizon. Some voters may have seen not merely a candidate, but a timetable. Electoral arithmetic is rarely as simple as campaign arithmetic suggests.
This is Nigerian politics 101, though campaign strategists treat it like an optional seminar. Identity politics does not always arrive with drums and banners. Sometimes it whispers in compounds, markets, party meetings, families, traditional circles and WhatsApp groups. It asks: whose turn, from where, and after whom? Zoning can function as an informal bargain over inclusion where groups fear exclusion. Disliking that logic does not make it disappear.
The Humbling of the Sure
That is where campaign confidence became comic weakness. Critics saw a referendum on Adeleke’s performance; many voters were also seeing a referendum on succession. The opposition could present promises, yet voters could calculate geography, identity and tomorrow simultaneously. Politics is not Euclid’s geometry; it is a marketplace of memory, expectation, fear, interest and hope. The television winner may lose at the polling booth. Aristotle understood persuasion requires knowing the audience; Nigerian politics adds that audiences may smile politely and vote differently.
And so, certainty met the old proverb: the person who says the road is clear may be the one who has not looked around the bend. Oyebamiji ran a serious race and should not become a punchline. Salaam also contested seriously. Their defeat is not evidence of incompetence; their coalitions simply did not assemble enough votes. Democracy becomes vulgar when every winner becomes a genius and loser a fool.
These political actors should resist explaining Osun back to Osun. Lukman and Kazeem may retain their convictions; Olagbaju and Gbenga theirs. Ajayi may keep believing in CEOs. Ahmad may keep his bookmark. Okpebholo may keep dancing around dancing. Morka can scrutinise. Basiru, Adereti, Omowaye, Lawal and Omisore can oppose. None must surrender principle; all should surrender the fiction that confidence equals knowledge.
For Adeleke, victory is not absolution. A second mandate is a heavier moral contract. He must make critics eat their words through roads that last, schools that function, hospitals that heal, agriculture that produces, jobs that endure, institutions that strengthen and public money that survives scrutiny. The finest reply to “entertainer” is development; the finest answer to “dismal” is performance.
Democracy is the institutionalisation of uncertainty: nobody owns the future, and nobody is entitled to permanent correctness. Socrates understood that wisdom begins with recognising the limits of knowledge. Shakespeare gave Prospero’s reminder that certainties are fragile. Parties that ask why predictions failed may become wiser; parties that blame voters will merely become louder.
The election has answered them all – not by proving Adeleke flawless, but by puncturing the conceit that declaration can substitute for persuasion. Osun voters weighed performance, personality, identity, geography, loyalty, fear, hope and succession, then chose. We may dispute their arithmetic, but cannot confiscate their answer. The ballot is the people’s footnote, sometimes rewriting the book.
Congratulations to His Excellency, Senator Ademola Nurudeen Jackson Adeleke, on his re-election. Let the music become measurable progress, not merely memorable choreography. Dance, Governor, but let every step move Osun forward; let every turn open a road, every rhythm create opportunity, every flourish produce measurable public good. Dance past the pothole, classroom deficit, hospital queue and unemployment line. Dance Osun into development, prosperity and institutional seriousness through 2030. If you do, your reply to the prophets will require no press release. The results will speak, and history will applaud.
By Abdulrauf Aliyu
In The Spotlight
I had initially planned that Long Range would address a troubling scenario in our nation’s beleaguered history, where religion appears to have stolen the leaders’ and the citizens’ brains while we all scheme to glorify ourselves and vainly attempt to scheme against the one we claim to serve. Have you ever wondered why evil continues its ascendancy in the land when churches and mosques grow uncontrollably in every nook and cranny?
These organisations are mostly meant to conceal our shady interactions, criminal corruption and moral somersaults. This will have to wait today, though, till another auspicious time.
A recent visit by the Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers to President Bola Tinubu on Thursday has put paid to this plan (at least temporarily) to avoid being carried away by the much religious matters while the nation embarks on another fruitless venture to please some self-serving, transactional unionists whose actions have done more than enough damage to the progress of the country.
I have waited for three solid days for Tinubu to stoutly refute a statement ascribed to him to revive the nation’s dead refineries during the visit of NUPENG leaders to the Villa led by its Executive President, Salimon Oladiti. It might not be out of place to suggest that the President might have been humbled by the ‘executiveness’ of the union president’s office. I hope I didn’t hear you complain of Nigerians craze for titles.
I may be wrong, but I have a feeling that our dear President must have started hearing some strange voices that sane Nigerians might not be able to understand concerning the promised revival of the dead refineries. If I may ask you, which refinery is Tinubu planning to revive among the obsolete plants in Port Harcourt, Warri or Kaduna? Thank goodness, he hasn’t specified yet.
At the risk of telling the President what he already knows, it may be necessary to remind Tinubu that former President Olusegun Obasanjo sold 51 per cent stake of the refineries in Port Harcourt to an Aliko Dangote-led consortium for $56m before he exited office as President in 2007. NUPENG’s sister labour union, the Petroleum and Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, desperately opposed the sale of the refineries.
OBJ characteristically dismissed the association’s threats by selling the refinery to the Dangote-led Bluestar consortium, but PENGASSAN still pressured the late President Umaru Yar’Adua to reverse the sale of the refinery, correctly described as scraps by Obasanjo, immediately after Yar’Adua mounted the saddle in 2007. Not only that.
The nation opted to pay $25m for cancelling the sale, apart from paying back the initial agreed sum, a development some Yoruba will describe as an ‘Akotileta’ economic model.
Aside from the fact that the refineries hadn’t produced fuel since the regime of the Minna dictator, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida (1985 – 1993), Obasanjo, on the recommendation of some experts, said the refineries had become obsolete while the contractors that produced the equipment of the refineries no longer existed. He might have been correct to have described the refineries as scraps.
That the four refineries did not produce a litre of petrol in about three decades did not stop the drama. The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation continued to pay idle workers, including hundreds of members of the amorphous NUPENG and PENGASSAN excos, huge wages and maintain comatose facilities for years for zero productivity.
As if the scandalous payment of salaries to idle and non-existent workers was not enough, the former Group Managing Director of NNPCL, Mele Kyari, negotiated and secured a $3.3bilion loan-for- crude deal with AFREXIM Bank under a dubious claim of repairing long-forgotten refineries and boosting crude production in August 2023, right under Tinubu’s watch.
All the consortium of lies to bring back the Port Harcourt refineries to justify the brazen theft of the humongous $3.3bn loan fell flat in 2025 when the facility ignored all human pressure to make it work while more lies continued to fly. So, where is the loan? Where is the money? And where is the working refinery?
While the racketeers are licking their cursed soup somewhere, Nigerians are slaving to pay for this barefaced robbery that took place under our dear President, who is equally planning to bring back dead refineries to life. I never knew before now that, apart from being a deft politician, Tinubu is equally a very powerful prophet, especially at giving life back to dead facilities; this could partly have motivated his promise to resurrect dead refineries.
Can someone do me a favour by reminding the President of the February 4, 2026, testimony of the current NNPCL’s GMD, Bayo Ojulari, concerning the dead refineries Tinubu had promised to bring to life? Ojulari emphatically stated that the corporation was operating the refineries at “monumental losses”, producing comparatively low-value products and that NNPCL presently lacked the capacity to operate them profitably.
I once learnt that Tinubu’s fuel stations in the United States helped to fund the activities of the operatives of Radio Kudirat (including former Ekiti State governor, Dr Kayode Fayemi) and National Democratic Coalition’s chieftains in the Diaspora. I, however, doubt if Tinubu’s current knowledge of the workings of the refineries can match or beat Ojulari’s. In Fela Akikulapo’s word, who is the teacher teaching Tinubu nonsense about the refineries?
Before our dear President ‘carry out his threat’ to embark on the revival of the moribund refineries, which I must admit is ill-advised with due respect, it may be necessary to remind him of a few critical issues to take care of. One of these is to beg him to carry out a comprehensive audit of the funding of previous Turn Around Maintenance of the refineries since 1999 to date.
For some of you who may not know, most of the TAMS contracts in the years past had always been awarded a year before general elections (in the mode of this promised resurrection). Don’t ask me the reasons; I don’t have an idea, but the outcomes had always been the same – dead on arrival, journey to nowhere.
There was a time the Kaduna refinery went up in flames a week after its TAM was completed. A key witness equally died in a strange accident during the probe of the strange fire. Another fire occurred in the facility on November 4, 2002. The fire damaged its Fluid Catalytic Cracking Unit — the section essential for producing higher-value products such as petrol. Other incidents before this in other plants were not less predictably curious. Na so we dey run am o!
Like the litany of probes instituted by the National Assembly into many deserving and flippant issues, none of the panels which had sat on the probes of the refinery fire had ever completed their job – no report. Tinubu, therefore, needs to exhume these reports (if ever they exist) from their eternal graves before embarking on another ritual of attempting to start a project that will never be fruitful. It’s not a curse.
Servicing a $3.3bn AFREXIM Bank crude-for-loan deal (as negotiated by Kyari) in a highly controversial manner remains questionable, scandalous and outlandish. The President must tell the nation the status of this fraud-laden deal before ever initiating another move to waste huge sums of our dollars on reviving the nation’s refineries that the NNPCL has equally passed off as operating at “monumental losses”.
I can assure our good-hearted Jagaban, in case he might have been overwhelmed by the pressure of his office (it’s a hot seat, really), that all Nigerians are equal stakeholders in the Nigerian project. A few can’t be swimming in the ocean of our collective sweat while the rest slave daily to shoulder the burden of a debt they never enjoyed the benefits.
If the President fails to act on this complicated $3.3bn loan, I may be forced to leak to him what some concerned personalities have imputed to him concerning this transaction, which would have been impossible without anyone empowering Kyari to ‘take the laws into his own hands’. To learn that the Economic and Financial Crime Commission is not looking into this legacy theft is mind-boggling, very strange.
The President can’t sleep on this deal and mouth the moral right to embark on another wasteful venture to revive dead refineries. This is surely not the way to build a nation that everyone will be proud of no matter the current economic scenario.
Meanwhile, recently, I read about former Vice President Atiku Abubakar carpeting Tinubu for blaming past governments’ actions and inactions for the failure of the refineries. Permit me to briefly transform my presentation into our local mode: Our leaders no get shame at all!
Should an Atiku ever feel he has the moral authority to advise anyone on integrity and moving the nation forward? How can leaders, who took delight in selling state assets to themselves, think that the citizens have forgotten their roles in stripping the nation of its commonwealth? It took Obasanjo as President to practically ‘retrieve’ the old African Petroleum from his VP, using his proxies as fronts. Who has forgotten about other controversial deals perfected as personal entities while serving as a government official?
I make bold to say that Tinubu is not a saint either, just as others who are now parading themselves as presidential candidates in our current political experiment (this word sha after 65 years!) but for some goons to assume the moral vanguards of the nation, which they never possess, is not just inappropriate; it is sour and distasteful.
Those who destroyed the Peoples Democratic Party on the altar of unbridled, self-serving ambition are the same set of people lamenting the death of viable opposition in our political system and expressing the fear of a one-party state. Most times I laugh aloud when I hear our online political warriors trying to sell and defend their ‘heroes’ among Nigerian politicians. The reality in our own clime, at least, is that there is only one political contracting party with many franchising outlets. The practitioners belong to the same political family, no difference, simply substituting themselves at regular and irregular intervals.
It is heartwarming to learn about the housecleaning that Ojulari is reported to be carrying out at the nation’s apex oil corporation, asking some principalities in the firm to volunteer to leave ahead of their original exit time. He needs to go further. Those refinery workers, especially the rapacious unionists, who have been earning wages for doing nothing for about three decades, should all be eased out immediately.
The workers should then be paid from the money realised from the current Chinese investors instead of Tinubu dancing to the manipulations of the unionists by shelling out huge sums on some vague revival of dead entities that won’t birth any fruitful result. If any investors should be supported to succeed, the current loafers feasting on the comatose state of the nation’s refineries should be allowed to take a well-deserved rest at their homes.
The President should be told in clear terms that Nigeria does not need the revival of dead refineries at any moment, no matter the pressure from any quarter. The thought itself should not even come up, let alone the project.
By Ademola Oni