Nigeria

Talking politics means talking good because politics is about the goodness of society. That is why political philosophers devoted all their lives in looking for the good of the state. 

By way of definition, Rumour is a Nigerian who knows what is happening or can correctly intuit the happenings in the country but does not have any official means of informing Nigerians.

For this category of Nigerians, it was their belief in Nigeria and hope for an inclusive country and new ways of doing things that made them take that chance.

The most important factor in the coming elections is that Muhammadu Buhari, the incumbent President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, a powerful chief executive of state, is a candidate. He is seeking re-election into the office of President.

Even the Marxist group, the ideological core and the most self-conscious subgroup of the Nigerian Left, is far from being homogenous or monolithic. It has been defined, in part, by many differences, some major, some relatively minor.

Let us begin by quickly recalling two bits of Nigeria’s recent history. First, at the close of 1983, a military junta overthrew and supplanted the elected civilian government of Shehu Shagari, the first and only president of Nigeria’s Second Republic (1979-1983).

That Moment.

I dream of it every night.

The late Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem, who was for many years the Secretary General of the Pan-African Movement, and a great intellectual, used to end his weekly “Thursday Postcard” with the following words: “Don’t agonise, organise”!

We are lucky and very fortunate that the members of the ruling class are fighting among themselves – conspicuously at the national level, which has percolated through to the states of the federation.

I cannot now remember exactly how I first encountered this phrase: “In defence of history”. But I think it was during my days on the Editorial Board of The Guardian newspaper, between mid-1980s and mid-1990s.