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Muiz Banire > The Sun Articles (Page 12)
02 April
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Sanwo-Olu and battle against Covid-19

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

The fear of Coronavirus or Covid-19 is now the beginning of wisdom. Its effect on human life is no longer as important as the collective effort to find a solution to this pandemic attack. Also, the symptoms of Covid-19 are no more news to a large number of people globally. The treatment also has not escaped quite a large number of charlatans and their victims, starting with me, that continue to gulp herbs made of Neem tree leaves, (otherwise known locally as “ewe dongoyaro”) every other day. The whole world has been screaming from one corner of the globe to...

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26 March
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Nigerian politicians and election petitions (2)

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

Politicians engage miscreants, street urchins and at times even security agents to perpetrate violence on the electorate and electoral officials and fellow politicians in order to gain undue advantage in elections. As a consequence, they disrupt and frustrate elections in areas of their weakness and even manipulate in areas of strength. You can multiply the nefarious acts carried out in this regard. These form the basis for the inevitable contest of the results at the election tribunals. The rate of unemployment and unemployable youths also imposes on the system charlatans, brigands and other undesirable elements who do not understand what electoral...

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19 March
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Nigerian politicians and election petitions (1)

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

Recently, on February 18, 2020, I read the page of my friend, Onikepo Braitwaite, titled “Examining the Constitutionality of Independent National Electoral Commission’s Deregistration of Political Parties,” in Thisday newspaper, wherein she raised a pertinent issue of why there are always so many election petitions in Nigeria after every election. The amazement is what I intend to address in this piece. For non-lawyers, election petitions are cases instituted in specially created court-like judicial bodies, often technically and constitutionally referred to as election tribunals, in instances of elections into offices other than presidential, to address the dissatisfaction of a party/candidate on...

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12 March
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Imo and Bayelsa conundrums: Where are the Lawyers?(2)

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

I am not too sure my colleagues have lost their voices in this regard. Are the legal advisers of the political parties involved comfortable with the notorious acts? Where are the other giants in the profession? Where is the International Federation of Women Lawyers? The members of the public may view the failure to condemn these dangerous acts and utterances as a tacit endorsement. The Nigerian Bar Association, in a statement released on Monday, February 24, 2020, did right by condemning the attack on the judiciary. As the NBA also rightly noted, the mob action was a notice to all...

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27 February
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Imo and Bayelsa conundrums: Where are the Lawyers?(1)

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

“The bedrock of our democracy is the rule of law and that means we have to have an independent judiciary, judges who can make decisions independent of the political winds that are blowing.” – Caroline Kennedy In my last writeup on the issue, I addressed largely the indiscretion of politicians in decisions made by the judiciary. In this piece, however, I intend to evaluate the role of lawyers in the conundrum as well as in the administration of justice and the rule of law in recent times. I must confess that, in the last few weeks, I have had sleepless nights...

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20 February
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Oshiomhole, APC and Bayelsa conundrum

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

Just a few days ago, the apex court in Nigeria upheld the disqualification of the Deputy Governor-elect of Bayelsa State who came on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC). Consequently, the court voided the election of the party’s candidates in the gubernatorial election on the simple ground that no valid ticket existed at the time of the election by the ruling party. The electoral jurisprudence is settled for decades now that, for there to be a valid ticket, both the governorship and deputy governorship candidates sponsored by a political party must be qualified in all ramifications. Once there...

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13 February
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Voter Apathy: Albatross of Nigeria’s political representation (3)

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

The people have cited several instances where the judiciary has been helpless in safeguarding their votes. However, I shall deal with this separately in another column, as several factors account for this. Sponsorship of unqualified candidates and the failure to disqualify them: it is now the norm in Nigeria for political parties to sponsor unqualified or incompetent candidates, or fail to comply with the applicable laws, rules, regulations and their own constitutions in the process leading to the nomination of candidates. Where this occurs (as it normally does), the electoral body, INEC, more often than not, would allow these unqualified nominees...

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06 February
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Voter Apathy: Albatross of Nigeria’s political representation (2)

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

Such government, upon election, should immediately make it a focal point to identify the factors that necessitated the apathy, and find a cure for them. A failure to do this could cause a section of the citizenry to believe that voter apathy is a deliberate policy being encouraged by government. The most disturbing part of this saga is the stark nakedness of INEC’s assumption of pretentious ignorance. INEC has persistently sought refuge in a manufactured state of helplessness. I say “manufactured” because INEC is equipped with the wherewithal to address these situations but has (maybe deliberately) failed in this regard. I...

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30 January
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Voter apathy: Albatross of Nigeria’s political representation (1)

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

It is not in doubt that the average Nigerian has always possessed an appreciable knowledge of political happenings at the local, state and national levels. As a matter of fact, one may not be off the tangent to add “international” to these realms. From the cosmopolitans to the rustics, the Nigerian wants to know: the transistor radio, newspapers and newspaper stands and, lately, social media (particularly WhatsApp and Facebook) are willing tools that the Nigerian has adapted to his fulfilment of his quest of being politically savvy. For different reasons, Nigerians crave political knowledge and believe that information (particularly that...

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23 January
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Am I a Nigerian? (2)

Posted by gbolahanpost
in The Sun Articles

Identical experiments are currently ongoing and it is yet to be seen how sustainable the effort will eventually be. Due to the failure of the development visions and programmes in Nigeria as a result of poor handling by corrupt bureaucrats, growing poverty symptoms, including electoral fraud, untrue and inefficient political and economic representation, pervasive violence, religious crises, crises in the Middle Belt and Niger Delta regions, hostage-taking and cultism, food insecurity, low agricultural production, illiteracy (that also weakens democracy), crime, high mortality and morbidity rates, prostitution, poor health and national image, low GDP and GNP and high unemployment rate all...

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