AHANONU KINGSLEY BLOG

 I do not know much about the young Chadwick Boseman, as I'm yet to watch any of his acts. So, I never felt need, never wanted to be drawn to the tributes. But I have begun to reconsider, obviously out of the push from the cacophony of voices that attest to his impacts. If he could have touched such lives as cut across different backgrounds and statuses, he could as well have touched mine! Please permit me to salute such a young man, who within such a short time of living was able to move so much crowd of inspiration. Rest in power, Chadwick! On Captain Ernest Chika Permit to also send my tribute, a hearty one indeed, to the pilot of the helicopter that crashed in the Opebi area of Lagos. Chika Ernest died, thinking of the last impact he would make even as he struggled for life. The young pilot left a great legacy in death. He saved more lives by that heroic act of emptying the aircraft's fuel! And whilst the late Chika thought nobly for the people behind, those behind who in t...

Shinzo Abe has stepped down from his official service as the Prime Minister of Japan. Mr Abe, who has been the country's head of government since 2012 premised his resignation on health ground. Abe is concerned that his health is worsening. He's diagnosed of ulcerative colitis since age 15. Just this week, Mr Abe achieved a milestone of being the longest serving PM of Japan and still has one year to go. The nation's parliament is yet to announce the successor of the outgoing Prime Minister.

 Interday was August 12, and globally as has become customary, the UN marked it as International Youth Day in celebration of the global young population. As the world and especially the youths relished the day with the topic ''Engaging the youths for global action, I just had to swerve between two emotions, one of great excitement and the other of deep disappointment. #IYD2020: I'm Happy... I am a youth, by international description, and as such I'm happy that today I'm celebrated alongside my peers through the auspices of the International Youth Day as set aside by the United Nations to re-echo the importance attached to the young population in fostering governance and building strong advocacy. #IYD2020: I'm Not Happy... At the same instance, however, I am not just happy that I am a youth in a nation that has no value for its future and its youth, where instead their future has become mortgaged through the incessant and crippling loans, especially from China, r...

Each time I feel that the killings in Southern Kaduna have stopped, I become nudged to the reality of its persistence, now and again. The continuous coming to terms of the subsistence of the carnage just does well to reveal how a designed and conscripted silence had pushed it below the radar. The killings have been ongoing, and every day. We might not be fed with them, the mainstream media may not carry them, and the government might denounce or play down the reality. But lives are lost daily, just as people are been butchered daily. By SUSPECTED herdsmen. Life is going on. We have just so many things to practically keep up with. The novel Coronavirus pandemic (or scam pandemic as some may posit), the Big Brother Naija TV reality show, the resumption of the foreign football leagues' season, the politics of Edo and Ondo polls. Differently, we have varying things that have kept us fully engaged in, based on predilection. And indeed, we're fully committed to them, as definitely, l...

I heard with disconcertion the news of the action by the Nigerian police against members of the Islamic Movement if Nigeria, IMN. It was learnt that the movement had embarked on a peaceful protest aimed at commemorating the deaths of their members, who had paid the supreme price especially in the hands of the Nigerian security forces. But in the line of this, the police swooped on them and violently dispersed them. In a statement which seems not to proffer a genuine reason as to why they were stopped from holding their legitimate right of protest/paying respect to their dead loved ones, the Nigerian police concurred that the protest was a peaceful one, but had only the purported proscription of the sect as the reason to have attacked their assembly. It's pathetic how the Nigerian police has refused to face reality in what is their responsibility to protect citizens and fight crimes and has resorted instead to harass and intimidate people who mean no harm. It is indeed condemnable h...

If there's one recreational activity that brings you close to nature, and exposes you to the untrammeled vicinity of the environment and its wide and open space of just air, water and sky. It's canoeing. Introduction Paddling in the canoe, one experiences the hilarity of the water body through which the journey is made. Yes, it is a journey, but also a sport; more like an adventure that you neither could place it as an everyday engagement or an exercising activity. However, the truth of the matter is that canoeing is both a normal activity as well as an exercising one; the reason it falls in the description of a leisure game! But then, how do you journey through the wavy water and still describe it as recreational? For some, it is difficult to be paddled through the sea for an important venture and very unthinkable to paddle through for just fun. The jinx breaker for this incredulity is to first understand that the canoe is configured in such a way as to float on water- yes, ev...

The Speaker of Nigeria's House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, in palpable defense of his family of legislators has dared the Minister in charge of the Ministry of Niger-Delta Affairs, Sen Godswill Akpabio, to name those legislooters that alleged have 60% of the contracts in the NDDC. Earlier, in the course of answering questions from members of the House committee sitting over alleged recklessness in the NDDC, Akpabio had claimed that some of the members of the National Assembly are contractors handling almost 60% of the NDDC projects. Obviously this did not go down well with the members, who tried severally to shut him up. But I call on Sen Akpabio to heed to this call and beat the 2 days ultimatum given him by the HoR. And I believe other Nigerians too are waiting for, not just the talking session of this sitting, but a tangible framework subsequently that will tackle the issue of sleaze and recklessness in this agency. It is a wonderful opportunity to throw open the deba...