By Sunny Igboanugo

Journey began on Sunday, May 4 from the Babatunde Fashola Train Station at Agege. For others it started from the Ebute Metta. It was my first train experience in Nigeria. The executive train arrived on the dot of 3pm. Boarding completed, the pleasure trip commenced.

In this particular train ride, you could decide to cross your legs and be sipping your usual coffee, tea or whisky – just like you were in your sitting room or some lounges elsewhere. You could decide to move around engage friends as if you were in the club or just look through the windows and watch the beauty of the landscape speed away in a cascading swing of colours, just like the kaleidoscope.

I did all these without noticing any form of anxiety, or some sudden thrumbling of the heart, the way you felt in the sky in those troubling moments that dot almost every minute in the air. You were also immune to the bumping, tossing, swerving and bouncing dances and other nightmarish tales whenever the tyres hit the tars on most of the Nigerian roads.

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No! Sleek, smooth, effortless, noiseless – pure pleasure – pure joy – an experience that attracts, just like the bee to the nectar. That was how good it felt.

I remember asking myself and aloud too, what if this went round the country? How much of the tears would it save? 80, 90, 95 per cent? Perhaps, perhaps not. But surely something close to it. Then why not? Is it that Kadiri the barber has lost his skills or his hair clippers have gone blunt?

Of course, the answer to this could not only be obvious, but stretch as much in length as the number of compatriots Nigeria has happened to. The hyperboles, expletives and other nuances of these parlous tales are enough for me to add to the list.

Besides, the essence here is not to descend into the sad reality of the Nigerian story, past and present, occasioned by the wickedness of leaders and enabled by supine and recumbent followers whose only thought is self and not the whole. That should be left for another day, lest the test-bud went sour once again and the ecstasy of the tale diminished.

That addendum was introduced, just to emphasise that Nigeria could actually breathe and taste the milk and honey abundant in the country if only those in charge were willing and ready to donate just a fraction to touch the perched lips of the millions out in the streets. Imagine what it means to ride on such executive trains from Lagos to Enugu or Port Harcourt to Abuja. Just imagine! There I digress again. But back to the subject matter – the journalist clinic.

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The feeling from the thrills of the train ride continued in Abeokuta, the city on the hill. The welcoming scenery and ambiance of the ancient town had its one part of the enchanting story. The serene feel in the Academy Suites – a modest but sparkling affair, with clean rooms and appreciable cousins to the courteous staff, provided the setting for the hosting of the 60 – plus new entrants that came to town.

The noiseless environment and clement weather delivered the atmosphere for the needed rest with the nights breaking into refreshing and welcoming mornings that gave each new day a fresh zest for business.

Business? Themed: MARKET SQUARED: Turning Connections into Gold in the AI Age, the two days of intensive engagement provided a forum for a blend of the old and new techniques in the process of learning, unlearning and re-learning the profession.

Taiwo Obe, Convener-in-Chief and Founder/Director of The Journalism Clinic, organisers of the event, welcomed participants with an inspiring story of his own personal journey that swung from the tortuous and intimidating challenges to the alluring feelings of success.

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Thereafter, he yielded the floor for the sponsors of the event, who were present to deliver their goodwill messages, among them the Chief executives of NLNG, Nigerian Railway Corporation, Lagos State Government, Ogun State Government, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), as well as financial institutions like Fidelity Bank and Polaris Banks.

On hand too were media houses like The PUNCH, TheCable, Premium Times, The Nation, Business Day, Penpushing Media Newspaper Proprietors Association of Nigeria (NPAN), Innovation Media Consulting Group, Real Pharmaceuticals, Academy Suites among others.

Then the real business of the business. Dolapo Otegbayi, Principal Consultant at DKO Consultant, who captivated her audience in her delivery, themed: You & Your Market, led the flow with emphasis on the need for media organisations to understand their target audiences deeply as well the new impetus of the use of the AI to blend with relevant human insight and observation.

Rasheed Adebiyi, PhD, Director of the Centre for Innovation, Research and Technology at Fountain University, Osogbo, followed with his equally captivating delivery on how practitioners could capture their audience by moving beyond demographic data and delving into psychographic and behavioral data to understand audience preferences and consumption patterns.

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On her part, Helen Emore, PhD, Managing Director of Scientia Partners Innovation Hub, in a delivery laced with hilarious and rib-cracking jokes, while stressing the need for media organisations to curate their narratives effectively, urged participants to build communities, engage authentically, and recognise the shift in economic power towards consumers.

Dan Mason, Trainer/Comms Consultant at Dan Mason Media, offered practical tips for “Finding the Unicorn” – compelling content that resonates with online audiences, demonstrated how AI tools could be used to generate story ideas, optimise headlines, and enhance storytelling, while stressing the importance of understanding audience priorities and adapting content accordingly.

Richard O. Ikiebe, Media Scholar and Adjunct Faculty at Pan Atlantic University, on his part roused the house to a hot debate regarding the old and new practitioners, when he examined historical trends in Nigerian media, urging participants to learn from the past while recognising the unique challenges of the present.

The event also featured Owners’ Forum, with prominent media executives including Joseph Adeyeye of Punch Nigeria Limited, Frank Aigbogun of BusinessDay, Betty Dibiah Akeredolu-Ale of Branama Children’s Television, Mojeed Musikilu of Premium Times, and Toun O. Sonaiya of Women Radio 91.7 FM, sharing their experiences and insights on audience engagement, revenue generation, and digital transformation.

In the end, participants agreed on the need for:

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* Increased investment in audience research and data analytics.
* Development of innovative content formats and distribution strategies.
* Enhanced collaboration and partnerships within the media industry.
* A renewed focus on ethical journalism and combating misinformation.
* Empowering journalists with the skills and tools to effectively utilise AI.

But it was not only about the business. The second day was punctuated with birthday songs and sharing of cakes to celebrate Gracie, daughter of the Masons, who just turned nine, and whose face featured in her little corners while tagging along her parents all through the programme.

Of course, that journalists are reputed to working hard and playing hard, was evident when everyone turned up at the poolside on the eve of departure, May 6, to share a wonderful time of food and drinks under the cool, sonorous voices of a life band delivering old and new renditions of both Nigerian and foreign songs.

Why not? How else to mark the good news? Earlier in the day the meeting hall had erupted when colleagues heard that the name of Lanre Arogundade, the effervescent and indomitable activist, composite fire-eating Nigerian media warrior, and former Chairman of the Lagos Council of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), had been removed from the watchlist of the Department of State Services (DSS).

For 40 harrowing years, the former President of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) and now Executive Director, International Press Centre (IPC), had borne the bitter imprimatur of that tag in his harassment at airports by security agents outside other forms of discomforts.

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Even with his resolve to fight on against the enemies of freedom, while expressing happiness at the development announced by Musikilu Mojeed, Edito-in-Chief of Premium Times and President of the International Press Institute (IPI), Arogundade’s special dig to the songs at the party, also underscored the raison d’etre for merriment.

The next morning of May 7, was marked by the visit to the Gateway International Cargo Airport, an ambitious edifice being built by the Ogun State Government, which authorities boast would host Nigeria’s best in the aviation industry, complete with smart – touch of the button facilities comparable anywhere in the world.

At the end of the guided tour where officials in charge of the tried to prove their words, it was back to the train station for yet another smooth, memorable ride to Lagos. Hours after that unforgettable event, the world itself rose on Thursday to the global cry – Habemus Papam – we have a Pope!

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At the inception of mobile telephony in Nigeria, the foreign operators came out with their Shylock knives ready to cut a huge chunk of flesh from Nigerians. Aided and abetted by their local collaborators in the name of regulatory agencies, they came out with the most outlandish business models never known to have been applied anywhere in the world where they had presence either previously or at the same time with Nigeria.

For several months, they held everyone by the jugular and applied pressures and more pressures in a vice grip that ostensibly achieved more in asphyxiating the very people they were supposed to be serving and making their lives better, than provide the succour, as they saw people in neighbouring countries enjoying.

Indeed, Nigerians had welcomed the advent of these entities, after months of dilly-dallying, shillyshallying and vacillation, as the remedy from the decades of equally harrowing experiences from the hitherto government-owned entities, particularly the now godforsaken Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL).

They simply wanted to be like their neighbours. Recall that by this time, countries like Togo, Benin Republic, Ghana and others, were already enjoying the services and Nigerians, who went there could not wait to enjoy the same experiences, which many of them could not finish describing, while wondering why their own country, the giant of Africa should not be the first.

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It eventually came. But, alas! What did it bring along? Excruciating pains, loads of tears, mindless exploitation – obstacles, frustrations and sorrow! To buy a simple SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) card, they had to stand for hours to pay with all the shenanigans by bank staff, then affidavits from the courts, where they contended with a separate set of mischiefs. That was before they could pay N25,000 asking price.

After that came the real exploitation. Every call made or received generated N50 charge, including drop calls. Even just hello, that lasted for less than a minute, attracted the same rate, while text messages cost N15. Nigerians cried out. They protested, they remonstrated, they prostrated, they begged. But the merciless shylocks in the names of MTN and ECONET, never budged.

Attempts to coopt the regulatory agencies into the campaign to redeem the situation, were futile. Bodies like the National Communications Commission (NCC), that were supposed to call the companies to order, simply shut their doors against the faces of the complainants. In fact, they even had more explanations to offer on why there could not be any succour for anybody.

That was before the advent of Globacom, the Nigerian player owned by Mike Adenuga. A few months after the company entered the scene, the story changed completely. First, the company in a sharp contrast to what it meant, announced per minute billing in the rate of the making calls. Suddenly all the argument that it was not possible offered by the companies, the government and the scores of enablers who occupied the media space, explaining the bizarre cost model, were thrown into the dustbin as everyone quickly adjusted.

Imagine what the situation would have been today if Globacom did not change the narrative. In 2001, when a SIM card was N25,000, Naira was just N104 to a dollar. Today the same Naira is N1,500, meaning that the same SIM card would have been going for between N360,000 to N400,000, ceteris paribus – because no one knows what other charges could have been unleashed on the way, while the cost of making and receiving calls, could have jumped to N2,000. But picture the situation today – all because of one man and his initiative to save his country.

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Pan to 2024, about two decades after. The country has descended into a similar situation once again. The evil forces which drove the telecoms argument, are it once again, telling the same story – it is not possible. Some people had actually argued that if they had ever guessed that Adenuga and his people would pull the rug off their feet by crashing the cost of telecoms, they would have done everything in their powers to sabotage his entry into the market, just as they have successfully done with the pay television market, where Nigeria is the only country where the cost of DSTV is fixed, rather than pay as you view as in other environments.

Their next victim today is Dangote. The richest man in Africa is currently running from pillar to post trying to save his $20billion investment. His Dangote Refinery at the Lekki Free Trade Zone in Lagos, is under heavy threat of being wound up as the hounds harry him by the day and haunt him at night, all because he dared enter a forbidden territory.

On Wednesday, July 19, Farouk Ahmed Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (MDPRA), came out with a damning report, that akin to the deadly hammer-blow with which the Jews nailed Jesus Christ to the cross some 2,000 years ago. He told a totally confounded audience that the refinery was not even half-way complete, revealing that the company had done only done 45 per cent.

He did not stop there. Not only he reveal that seemed the strange claim that the company, which was inaugurated in 2023, by then President Muhammadu Buhari, with many world leaders in attendance, and billions of eyes glued to the event, as the ceremony was beamed live to the world, had not been licensed, he also talked about how the 650-barrel per day capacity refinery, reputed to be among the best in the world with the biggest chain in Africa, was producing substandard products.

Hear him: “Well, just like you rightly asked, there are lots of concerns about the supply of petroleum products nationwide and the claims by some media houses that we were trying to scuttle the Dangote refinery; that is not so. Dangote refinery is still in the pre-commissioning stage. It has not been licenced yet. We have not licensed them yet. I think they are at about 45 per cent completion. So we cannot rely heavily on one refinery to feed the nation because Dangote is requesting that we should suspend or stop all importation of petroleum products, especially automotive gas oil (AGO) or jet kero and direct all marketers to the refinery.

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“So, in terms of quality, currently, the AGO quality in terms of sulphur is the lowest as far as West Africa’s requirement of 50 parts per million (ppm). Dangote refinery, as well as some major refineries like Waltersmith refinery, produce between 650 ppm to 1,200 ppm. So, in terms of quality, their quality is much more inferior to the imported quality.”

Ahmed’s demining comments was obviously a clapback to Dangote’s consistent outcries in recent days that the International Oil Companies (IOCs) were frustrating the operations of the refinery, by refusing to sell crude to them. But on what grounds did he stand to make those heavy declarations? What keen observers have unearthed about him, indicates that the MDPRA boss is not smelling roses.

For instance, in February 2024, the same Ahmed had his feet on fire, for his role in the importation of adulterated Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) into the country. Nigerians have since dug up this report to indicate that the same man speaking about bad product, had no moral justification to do so.

In fact, that the same man even favours continuous importation of fuel, seen as the source of the scarcity of foreign exchange in the country that has given birth to the biting hunger in the land, over local production, actually tells where he is coming from. Only an agent of the vested interests, which has held Nigeria hostage over the years, could toe that path.

Of course, Dangote, has since pushed back against the obtuse arguments by the MDPRA boss and the tendency he represents. On Saturday, while conducting members of the House of Representatives round the facility, he took time to answer all the questions raised, which practically put a lie to all the allegations. He even went ahead to conduct a test on the products with samples obtained from the local filling stations and the one produced in his refinery to prove same.

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Aliko Dangote, President of the Dangote Group, even pushed further by accusing the regulators of underhand practice, when he told his visitors: “The most important thing, is to note that the imported one they are encouraging, is the spec in test, but in certain cases when you check (independently), different results will show. This is because those people who have the lab have been told what to write. The best way to determine the quality of products being imported and sold to Nigerians is by going to the filling stations, buying and testing them.”

Now the challenge has been thrown, Nigerians are watching Ahmed and group would accept it. Incidentally, these are the same people under whom more than half of crude oil produced in the country disappear into thin air and their proceeds end up in private pockets.

These are the same people that have kept the government-owned refineries comatose for more than three decades – the same people drawing billions of Naira in salaries and allowances without producing a single drop of fuel – the same people who could not prevent hundreds of tankers carrying cheap fuel on which subsidy has been paid from escaping into neighbouring countries to empty their contents in their filling stations.

No doubt, Dangote is the only hope presently to replicate what Globacom and Adenuga did in the telecoms industry in the petroleum sector. A success of his current effort could trigger off many more private entities coming on stream, which would obviously lead to competition and lower prices.

Unfortunately, not every government is like that of President Olusegun Obasanjo, which not only gave them the platform, but the protection against the hounds that are after Dangote today. Unlike that era, today presents a completely different scenario where a set of complacent, indolent, if not vindictive government is either looking away while the predators circle around but are actually enabling them to attack.

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As Dangote himself observed recently, no African country has been able to build a refinery in the last 35 years due to the evil hands of the cabal outside the shores of the continent. Therefore, it is clear to him from whence his travails are coming. Just like in the telecoms, they foreign enemies but with local collaborators. But their success or failure depends on how Dangote relents or fights on to defeat them. It may be more difficult now, but like Adenuga and Globacom, triumphed over them, he too, could.

By Ben Benson-Okoli

A very prominent priest once sent a woman, who had come to baptise his son back. Why? The mother had chosen the name, Thomas. “Didn’t you read the bible to know the role of Thomas?” he had asked the utterly bemused mother. “Thomas was a doubter. So, I’ll not name him Thomas. Go home with your child. When you choose an appropriate name, come back for the baptism,” he added.

It might sound funny, as it did to the many people who heard the story of the encounter in that little village and beyond, but there was no doubt as to the point the priest was trying to make. Even though today, many people still bear that name, he was simply trying to emphasise the position that there is something to a name. So many people have made a similar point about the names they choose for their children.

Nobody knows what influenced his parents to name him Benjamin. But going by the narrative about the original bearer of that name in the scriptures, it seems to be turning prophetic in the place  of Benjamin Kalu, the new kid on the block in the trajectory of Ndigbo in the Nigerian political firmament.

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Recall the biblical story. Jacob the father of Benjamin loved Rachael so much that he had to work for the father for years to marry her. But tragedy came when she died while at childbirth. But not before she named her son Benoni – child of sorrow. But instead of retaining the name, that would have reminded him permanently of the trauma of losing his beloved wife, Jacob had to change his name to Benjamin – child of my right hand, in other words, child of consolation rather than pain

So, will Benjamin Okezie (made perfect) Kalu, bring the succour and consolation to Ndigbo as the biblical namesake did to the father? That journey has begun for the 52-year-old lawyer, thinker and purveyor of fresh ideas. Somehow, the answer is also becoming more germane now that a new perspective is opening to the consistent community builder, conscientious agitator, eloquent pleader, awakened mind, and transformational leader.

He might be seen as a man ahead of his times, but he seems to be aware of the task ahead, hence he had started early to prepare as if he knew that at a point, the task of carrying on where others stopped would one day rest on his shoulders.

That day seems to have come as he would definitely become the highest ranking Igbo political leader at the national level, by the time he assumes the position of the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, by the time the National Assembly is inaugurated on Tuesday, June 13, going by the choice of the All Progressives Congress (APC), which specifically named him for the job, last month.

At 23, the same age Thomas Sankara took over the affairs of his country as President of Burkina Faso, Kalu was already on top of the game in student union politics at the University of Calabar. And before his 35th birthday he had served in various capacities in his Abia State, including Senior Special Adviser (SSA) to the Governor on Mellenium Development Goals (MDGs) and International Relations, which further prepared him as a leader of the people, apart from opening new vistas in politics. For close to two decades, he has demonstrated strong passion and commitment to the things that bother his community, the Bende people in the same state. Devoting himself in the area of human capital development, he invested heavily in scholarships for students, giving business grants and offering employment opportunities through his Benjamin Kalu Foundation.

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Even outside the shores of Nigeria, he never forgot home. During his period as diaspora Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), then Africa’s largest party, controlling about six provinces, while on a short stint in South Africa, he led the campaign for Nigerians in the diasporas to be given the right to vote in elections.

Apart from playing strong roles in the formation of the Nigerian Community in South Africa, he also promoted groups like the Ohanaeze Ndigbo, South African chapter, which he led. Typical of people like him, his unquenchable appetite to learning, saw him picking up an MBA from one of the best Business Schools in the world to further equip himself before returning to Nigeria.

A proven grassroots player, who prides himself as a messenger of his people rather than their boss,  his leadership trajectory, was one in which he held weekly engagements with his constituents as a member of the House of Representatives, a sharp deviation from what obtains in most places, where his contemporaries are merely seen but always out of reach to those they represent.

As Chairman of the Committee on Media and Public Affairs, of the Green Chambers in the ninth assembly, he was both the voice and the face at the same time, assuming the responsibility of selling it favourably to the public, a job entrusted in him, ostensibly due to not only his versatility and communication abilities, but his appealing personality.

Coming at this time when Ndigbo seem to be in sorrow, due to their parlous political situation, Kalu – like Benjamin, who was a consolation to his father, Jacob might well be what the South East need at the moment to ease their pain. Pain! Bruised and wounded! Pain, because a once strong, vibrant leg of a tripod now appears very weak, if not broken by continued and deliberate pummelling! Bruised because many years after the civil war that ended with no Victor no Vanquished, there is still the obvious vanquished! Wounded, because of an obvious conspiracy against the Reconciliation, Rehabilitation and Reconstruction – the three Rs agenda of General Yakubu Gowon. All now seem evidential that the Igbo lot has been accentuated by recent years of political wandering.

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Would Kalu be the Benjamin, expected to be the ravenous wolf whose hunger to redeem his people meet that expectation? He is expected to employ his attributes as a servant leader with the generational balance, to re-engineer a fresh path to birth a new Nigeria, one where all citizens would have a sense of belonging – a Nigeria where there will be no second class citizen – a Nigeria where no citizen will be judged by his or her sex, creed, language, religion, culture and tribe – a country where no citizen will be inhibited from rising to his or her full potentials. Will he come through?

This was the Nigeria former President, Muhammadu Buhari had the greatest opportunity to create, but squandered by leaving Nigeria in the worst form of division and disunity in its history, a disastrous outcome for which he now awaits the sad verdict of posterity, which would surely come at the appropriate time.

Though President Bola Tinubu might not have indicated his reason for personally endorsing him, there is no doubt that with his propensity as a go-getter, and a man of the people, Kalu might be needed to bring the planks, which when nailed together, would become the platform for the President and APC’s much needed inroad into the South East.

He emphasised this need recently during his appearance on Politics Today, a current affairs programme on Channels Television, when he told his host: “When you talk about nation building you forget about sentiments, you forget about emotions and look at the strongest argument and the strongest argument here is how do we make a diversity sensitive leadership, nation-building effort that will incorporate all the beautiful efforts of all the diverse part of the country coming together to work for what we peach? It’s by unity, peace and progress.

“You may recall that in the last four years, the South-East was not holding any of the presiding officers’ position and it has impacted on this election, among other things. I can assure you, if you neglect South-East again, a whole zone in such sensitive position, then you battle again in 2027, that is a big risk for any great planner to take. If you start now to plan and adopt this spirit of inclusion, South-East is going to yield a better harvest than what was yielded before.”

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Kalu’s astuteness, resilience, versetality and ability to play a central role wherever he goes are no longer in doubt. In the ninth Assembly, he moved the first motion, House Motion 001, to address the ecological problems that threatens his people to near extinction which became such a huge success that he received a huge honour from his people, by way of a chieftancy title.

Conscious of the diversity insensitive in Nigeria, he has demonstrated the knack for pursuing his goal with the diligence and resilience that could only produce positive outcomes. This, he has demonstrated to his Bende people.

With Aliyu Betara and Yusuf Gagdi withdrawing from the race for the Speakership contest in the Green Chambers for the Tajudeen Abbas-Benjamin Kalu combination as Speaker and Deputy Speaker, respectively, after a meeting with President Bola Tinubu and Vice President, Kashim Shettima, on Sunday, his ascendency to the new position, is almost a fait accompli.

Now the world awaits him to do what he did for his constituency on a larger scale. Would he be the one to deliver Jonah from the foggy, smelly belly of the fish? Would he be the one to break the glass ceiling for Ndigbo? Would he be the plank for the erection of the platform that would link his people to the national politics, which had left them political orphans in the last eight? Would he repair and strengthen the leg of the tripod that has since become weak and broken? The waiting game begins. Welcome, Tuesday, June 13, day of new beginning! Welcome to history!

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Benson-Okoli Esq., a journalist and lawyer, writes from Johannesburg (benchinee@yahoo.com)