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ADC’s campaign council launch and Nwosu’s giant stride to Agu-Awka
“Let not my cold words here accuse my zeal: Tis not the trial of a woman’s war, The bitter clamour of two eager tongues, Can arbitrate this cause betwixt us twain.” When William Shakespeare wrote these lines in King Richard 11, one of his eternal epics, he was simply trying to emphasise the need to reduce noise and focus on the substance on whenever issues contend and clash against each other.
Fiery expressions neither supersedes, quiet, logical and concise argument, nor does it suggest the lack of zeal or energy. Matters must not be settled with the bitter clamour of eager tongues, like the trial of a woman’s war. This was what the iconic Shakespeare laboured to establish, using a depiction of the hot exchange that took place in the Court of King Richard 11, in that particular scene in the play.
Today, 427 years after that play, which debuted in 1597, the inherent message the renowned writer was passing is resonating in Anambra – achievements are not measured in the decibel of high-sounding words and cacophony of voices, but in the quietude of ideas and how they translate into real life.
So, as John Chuma Nwosu, governorship candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), the political platform under which Nigeria is finding a new essence as a nation, handed down the mandate to the 17-member John Chuma Nwosu Governorship Campaign Council (JCN-GCC), the message was very clear – this is neither a battle done with unsheathed swords or a bitter war by the clattering of eager tongues.
The event was the inauguration of the council on Friday, July 25, 2025 at the Number 4, Udoka Housing Estate Secretariat of the party, in Awka, the Anambra State capital. The event, which marked the commencement of one of the most significant steps in the move by the party, currently hosting the coalition movement by prominent Nigerians to take charge of the affairs of Nigeria, was another exhibition of great enthusiasm by party faithful, who came from all the nooks and crannies of the state to give fillip to the momentum in the new Nigerian political firmament.
The council made up of high-net professionals in different field, included Ike Iwenofu Campaign Chairman, an engineer, Ben Chuks-Nwosu, foremost lawyer, political icon and former Speaker of the Anambra State House of Assembly, Chief Of Staff, Celestine Okoye retired Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG), Security, Bonny Okoye Campaign Manager, Dr. C. C. Okeke, a renowned intellectual, Deputy Director General (DDG) Political Matters, Emeka O. Ekwueme Director Administration, Chief Emeka Anagor Director Finance, Reginald Akunekwe Director Mobilisation, Zelinjo Igweze, renowned academic, Director Women Affairs and Ricky Okechukwu, another erudite scholar, Director Research and Strategy.
Others were Samuel Ezedigbo Director Youth Affairs, Justina Nwafor Women Zonal Coordination South, Grace Oguelina Women Zonal Coordination Central, Christiana Iwuno Women Zonal Coordination North, Hygienus Anedo Coalition and Inter-Party Affairs and Paschal Azubuike Head Media Affairs, while Sunny Igboanugo, is to serve as the Director of Media and Publicity of the council.
His charge: keep it clean! No campaign of personalities, no name-calling, no mud-fighting. It must be all about issues in the state – about telling Anambra people the truth – about filling them in on the change that is coming and how the ADC bears the evidence of a major rescue and transformation of the land into a firmament of opportunities that it once was by tapping onto the ingenuity of its vast human and material resources.
The whole idea was encapsulated into the SHEEMS agenda – a template that outlines programmes to enhance the critical areas of development based on the prevailing issues in the state – Security, Health, Education, Economy, Markets and Social Welfare. His dissection of these seven critical areas, bore ample evidence of not only his clear knowledge, but the weight of his convictions and vision that they remain the Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) for preparing Anambra to take the giant leap into the enviable hub of world economies.
In his smart government idea, security will come onto the radar of technology rather than human elements. Tracking criminals and fighting crimes will be a function of hi-tech such as in modern societies where crimes could be detected in split-seconds through a network of alarm bells that would trigger off the relevant agencies that would move to check them within the same split-seconds.
The streets would be devoid of the eyesore optics of crudity where all manner of brutality are unleashed on citizens in the guise of fighting crimes, adding: “We will introduce the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI-enabled) security system that will run on face-recognition technology with a fully-equipped Command and Control (CAC) certre.”
Healthcare would also take similar pattern of modernity by procuring hi-tech medical facilities, with focus on first-class assessable and affordable programmes anchored on Primary Health Care (PHC), complete with Emergency Medical and Transport Services (EMTS), he said.
Education would run basically on the STEM model of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics – the current global prototype to equip the children of the state with the ability of grappling with modern developments, in addition to the current system, with the focus of standing out once again as national bests in the West African Examination Council (WAEC) and the National Education Council (NECO) examinations.
Even though the economy would be private sector-driven, the ADC government would take bold initiative of investing heavily in creating enabling environment, including investing in the domestic power sector to eradicate the current parlous state of affairs in the state. It would practically take the gown to town to attract investments from national as well as global players, one of the major economic visions missing in the state at the moment.
Regarding the Environment, he said: “We shall deliver a new infrastructural map for Anambra State with a solid Road Maintenance Department (RMD) similar to the PWD (Public Works Department) in compliance with the Anambra Integrated Development Strategy (ANIDS).” Recall that ANIDS was the template with which Peter Obi, former Governor of the state, achieved the feat of becoming the national best in the global programme called Millenium Development Goals (MDGs), for which he was invited to give a speech by the United Nations in 2014.”
In his Markets programme, Nwosu spoke ending the excessive taxing in the state rather than choking the people, stating: “To enhance enterprises and improve ease of doing business, we will ensure tax reduction and our means of Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) recovery will have human face. We shall deploy technology in revenue collection instead of the use of thugs.”
Social Welfare – the last in his robust programme, he talked extensively on empathy towards the poor in the society, stating that the state would come into the aide of “members of our state population, who are indigent, fall on hard times or face catastrophes, especially in housing assistance, food and nutrition charity healthcare, orphanage or indigent child support while providing supplementary security income for the aged.”
Ndubuisi Nwobu, Deputy Governorship candidate, who was no less emphatic about task at hand – ADC berthing at Agu Awka by March next year as the government in power, spoke on the need for unity of purpose within the team, adding that all channels must be exploited, including knocking all doors to spread the message. “It’s not going to be easy, but it will be easier if we connect to the people with the right message.
The former Speaker, who expressed delight at the quality of the membership of the campaign council, maintained that with their experiences in their various fields and their individual attainments being fully unleashed and harvested during the campaigns, the envisaged victory dance at the end of the November 8, 2025 governorship election would be assured.
Earlier, Iwenofu, a renowned Engineer, had restated the need to staying on the path of the main issues and avoiding concentrating on personalities, adding that Anambra people already knew the issues at stake and why a change in the governorship of the state, remained the only option at a time like this in their history, promising to harness all ideas of the members in conducting the campaigns.
Indicative of high-profile the party has already assumed in the state, the increasing tempo and the momentum, the party officials moved from the inauguration to Ojoto, headquarters of Idemili Local Government Area to commission the main party secretariat and Oba, in the same local government, where two other offices were equally commissioned.
Addressing enthusiastic party members, who were waiting for him, Nwosu, reiterated the contents of the SHEEMS Agenda as the programme to drive the future of the state. “Our SHEEMS Agenda, is our roadmap for achieving Anambra of our dream. I take this opportunity to restate again that zoning has come to stay in Anambra. I’m going to do only one term to fix things and put the state on a sound footing to leap into the future,” he added.
Justice Muhammad Nuraddeen Bello of High Court sitting in Sokoto State has sentenced three men, including a foreign national, to death by hanging, after convicting them on charges bordering on terrorism and arms proliferation.
The convicts, Yusuf Muhammad (alias Sallau), a Nigerien; Jabbi Alhaji Yalle; and Kabiru Muhammad, were apprehended on 13th June, 2025, by the Department of State Services (DSS) Counter Terrorism Unit in connection with cross-border criminal activities bordering on arms trafficking and terrorism.
Bello, who found all three defendants guilty as charged and sentenced them to death by hanging, while also ordering the forfeiture of all monetary exhibits recovered from the convicts to the Federal Government, said: “The conviction is the latest in a series of successful prosecutions by the DSS in its sustained operations against terrorism and organised cross-border criminal networks across Nigeria.”
The sentencing is coming about two weeks after the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja sentenced each of the five suspects arrested on May 31, 2026, by the DSS for their involvement in the November 21, 2025, attack on St Mary’s Catholic School, Papiri, Niger State, to 25 years’ imprisonment.
Justice Binta Nyako, had handed down the judgment after the men, including two Nigeriens, pleaded guilty to all four terrorism-related charges, bordering on support for the commission of an act of terrorism, breaching both Section 16 of the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022, and the Firearms Act, were pressed against them.
According to Count One, the men were accused of jointly conspiring to assist a terrorist by agreeing and intentionally playing various roles towards conveying 15 AK 103 rifles as well as about 1,434 rounds of 7.62mm live ammunition from the Diffa region, Republic of Niger, to one Malam Ahmad, a member of the Boko Haram terrorist group based in Borgu, Niger State, and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 26(1) of the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022.
Primate Elijah Ayodele, is on the verge of coughing out a whopping N10billion, if he fails to offer unrestrained apology to Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, former Governor of Kano State within the next 24 hours, and retract his claim that the former Minister of Defence is bidding his time to betray Peter Obi, to whom he is to contest the 2027 presidential election as a running mate.
Without doing so, the controversial cleric, should be ready for a major court battle with the vice-presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), the platform on which the pair is to contest the election.
In a letter indicating a legal action against Ayodele of the INRI Evangelical Spiritual Church over defamatory remarks, Kwankwaso, through Magaji Mato Ibrahim, SAN & Co., his lawyers demanded an immediate retraction and apology from the cleric over the allegations.
Details of the letter, dated June 11, and unveiled through the X platform of the legal team, was based on a viral video recorded during a live-streamed church service, where the preacher made allegations targeting Kwankwaso’s integrity as Peter Obi’s running mate under the NDC.
Quoting the cleric as stating: “KWANKWASO IS A FAKE TO OBI, KWANKWASO WILL BETRAY YOU. KWANKWASO HAS BEEN PAID TO BE VICE PRESIDENT TO OBI AMONG OTHER LIBELOUS COMMENTS WHILE PRETENDING TO BE A PREACHER,” the former governor said the comments were unprovoked, grossly unfounded, and carefully designed to create a rift within the ranks of the political party and its supporters.
Handing Ayodele a 24-hour ultimatum to publish a full and unequivocal retraction across all social media platforms and news outlets with the same prominence as the original video, they also demanded a written undertaking that he would cease and desist from making any further malicious statements against their client, warning that failure to comply, would lead to full legal actions.
The letter stated: “We shall claim substantial damages to the tune of Ten Billion Naira and cost of the action on a full indemnity basis amongst other reliefs.”
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Tuesday demanded the immediate end to the exportation of minerals from countries in Africa in their raw forms, which he said had led to massive exploitation of the continent.
The President, told member countries of the African Minerals Strategy Group (AMSG), a forum of Ministers in charge of Mining and Solid Minerals on the continent to speak with one voice to promote, collective interests, ensure value addition, and prevent the continent from becoming merely a source of raw materials for the rest of the world.
As the Grand Patron of the group, chaired by Dele Alake, Nigeria’s Minister of Solid Minerals Development, gave the charge while receiving a delegation of AMSG in the State House, Tinubu told the delegation that the group had a critical role to play in strengthening Africa’s bargaining power in the global mineral market and ensuring that the continent derives maximum value from its natural resources.
His words: “ What we should do is avoid bureaucracy and deceit; we must put an end to exploitation. The rest of the world won’t mind if your country is a cesspit of dams and rubbish and excavates your raw materials without giving value.
“It is our responsibility to collaborate and cooperate to ensure that these metals and minerals bring value to us, bring technology to us, and we can do it. It is how much each country will put into the research, development and refinery. I don’t see reasons we cannot demand centralisation of that conversation somewhere on the continent. So why not utilise that in our research and development and knowledge-based economy to enhance the quality of life and bring prosperity to our people.”
Emphasising that Africa possessed enormous mineral wealth that should be strategically harnessed to drive industrialisation, create jobs and accelerate economic transformation across the continent, the President, said the era of exporting raw minerals without local processing and beneficiation must give way to a new model that encourages investment in local industries, technology transfer and the development of value chains that retain wealth within Africa.
Alake, who had earlier expressed gratitude to the President for his exemplary leadership under the Renewed Hope Agenda, said the gesture had shown support for Nigeria’s mineral sector, especially in the local value-addition and economic diversification drive, where artisanal miners are empowered.
He told the President: “You encouraged us to look at the focal point of the establishment of this group, which is to ensure that the African natural resources, especially with regards to minerals, critical matters, are localised, the beneficiation coming directly to Africans generally.
“You charged us that we should set our sails very high and ensure that local value addition is a pivot around which all the objectives of this organisation should revolve.
“So, sir, we have gone implemented your charge and we are quitted that today local value addition is reverberating all over Africa.”
He added that some member countries have gone ahead to ban the export of raw minerals.
He explained members of the body were in Abuja for the Fifth edition of the African Natural Resources and Energy Investment Summit (AFNIS 2026), to push for a new continental approach to resource management and industrial development.
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