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The abduction of Pa Reuben Fasoranti (OPINION)

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4 years ago

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By Festus Adedayo

In 1996, his car riddled with bullet holes inflicted by General Sani Abacha’s goons aimed at assassinating him, Yoruba Afenifere Leader, Senator Abraham Adesanya, had made a bullseye statement. That statement appeared to explain the raging furore among the leadership of the pan-Yoruba socio-cultural group today.

Adesanya’s father had 20 children. He was the only one initiated into the awo secret cult by the older Adesanya. As such, Senator Adesanya was known to be highly fortified with the powers of his ancestors. It was a time when the demonic Nigerian state under Abacha sought to wipe out any dissent to its infernal rule.

The then Lagos police commissioner had inspected the spatter of bullet holes on Adesanya’s car and concluded that no human being could have survived that assassination attempt. Alarmed and apprehensive of further associating with Adesanya, his driver, who survived the assassination attempt with him, had immediately eloped, sacked himself from Adesanya’s employ, fearful for his life. When told of his driver’s abscondment, Adesanya was said to have retorted in Yoruba that Omode lo’n se e. O ye ko mo wipe bi agbe o ba fo, omi inu re ko le danu – he is being childish; otherwise, he would have realized that if the gourd does not break, the water inside it cannot be spilled.

Last week, the gourd of Yoruba leadership broke – or was broken – and the water has since spilled like a burst cistern. The forceful break of the gourd however has a consistent tragic trajectory. The destruction of the gourd has a consistency in the recent hitorico-political tale of the Yoruba. The gourd was forcefully broken by the same evil dramattis personae, political merchants and vultures, who have consistently sought an option reminiscent of biblical Samson’s – to crumble a house that has proved impenetrable to their attempt to make it a house of Mephistopheles.

Since the founding in London in 1945 of the Egbe Omo Oduduwa, the progenitor of Afenifere, by Yoruba leaders – Adeyemo Alakija, president; Yekini Ojikutu, vice president; Obafemi Awolowo, General Secretary and others like Akinola Maja, Oni Akerele, Akintola Willliams, Saburi Biobaku, Abiodun Akerele, D.O.A. Oguntoye, Ayo Rosiji and others – five persons have made futile attempts to destroy this Yoruba foremost leadership organization and its Afenifere mutation.

The first anvil of its destruction was Nnamdi Azikiwe. Though his attack on the leaders of the Egbe preceded its founding, the tribal tension in the Nigerian Youth Movement (NYM) was Zik’s – as he was fondly known – opportunity to sound a death knell on Egbe Omo Oduduwa, the first major attempt at unity by the Yoruba. The Egbe had huge prospects to unite these people who had, for centuries, splintered in discord like the seeds in a walnut pod.

In the February 1941 split in the NYM over the contest for the Legislative Council seat between Samuel Akisanya (who later became the Odemo of Isara) and Ernest Ikoli, erstwhile Daily Service editor, Zik and his West African Pilot newspaper pitched their tents with Akisanya. Yoruba leaders queued behind and voted for Ikoli. This generated further tension between 1946 and 1948 in the NYM, eventually and effectively leading to the death of this anti-colonial government movement.

Azikiwe didn’t hide his disdain for the Egbe and its leaders. Indeed, Egbe Omo Oduduwa had not been formally inaugurated by the time Azikiwe’s NCNC, in December 1947, sponsored protest demonstrations against it, using the editor of the Pilot, F. O. Coker, as the peg of the protest. Zik and his party, the NCNC, went on to form the Yoruba Federal Union (YFU) as a counterpoise to and as such, weaken the Egbe. This was at a time of growing solidarity among the Yoruba. Zik and his crew launched the YFU on June 12, 1948, at Glover Hall, Lagos but were so tactless as to make the speakers at the inauguration be Azikiwe himself, Mbonu Ojike, a known Zik apostle and columnist in the Pilot, as well as Oged Macaulay, a known Zik ally. The YFU however suffered the fate of all politically concocted contrivances – it faded out.

Zik would however not relent. Deploying a weekly newspaper called Ijebu Weekly Echo to achieve their aim, Zik and his group pilloried the Egbe headed by Sir Adeyemo Alakija. Bitter, crude and vulgar personal insults were splashed on them by Igbo, mainly residents of Lagos, using such words as “bane of our age,” “a nihilist, totalitarian, fascist organization,” as well as “dirty exhibition of egocentric stupidity, ethnocentric arrogance and capitalized idiocy” on the Egbe Omo Oduduwa. This was followed by an incendiary editorial comment in the Pilot of September 8, 1948, which said, “Henceforth, the cry must be one of the battle against Egbe Omo Oduduwa, its leaders at home and abroad, uphill and down dale, in the streets of Nigeria and in the residences of its advocates… There is no going back until the Fascist Organization of Sir Adeyemo has been dismembered.” Osita Agwuna, a leading Zikist, after his conviction for sedition, had written an open letter he entitled “To all the people of Nigeria and all Zikists” where he advocated attacks on the Egbe.

The second attack on the Egbe was led by the mercurial Adegoke Adelabu, an acolyte of Zik. Though his disdain for both Awolowo and the highly perceived Ijebu people-dominated Egbe was historical, the incendiary age-long intra-ethnic fissure and struggle for power between the Ijebu and the Ibadan was the peg. By the 19th century, Ibadan had become a very potent military force but its prowess was crippled by the embargo placed on the importation of guns and powder on their routes by the twin nations of Ijebu and Egba. Peeved, Ibadan, in the rainy seasons of 1877, matched out its military arsenal against the Ijebu and Egba, with the aim of forcing open their roads to the coast and conquer, as well as absorb, their territories into Ibadan. Unfortunately, this expedition failed and the Egba and Ijebu thereafter aligned with all enemies of Ibadan like the Ilorin, reflected in the treaty of 1886 signed to recognize the independence of the Ekitiparapo. Even after this, their mutual hostility continued. The Ijebu distrusted and feared the Ibadan. These pre-colonial polities and realities gestated into and found their way to the founding of the Egbe Omo Oduduwa.

Ibadan elites, preening themselves as warriors who would not play second fiddle to the Ijebu, rallied around to thwart the emergence of Awolowo as the modern-day dominant power. They created a counterpoise to the Egbe which they called Egbe Omo Ibile, Society for Native Sons, and appointed as leader, Adegoke Adelabu, The Ibadan Egbe later coalesced into the Ibadan Peoples Party (IPP) or the Mabolaje. The sub-ethnic threat from the IPP to Awolowo’s Egbe was so intense that, apart from the cross-carpeting of five IPP House of Assembly members to the side of the Action Group which ensured that Awolowo’s AG formed the cabinet in 1951, the IPP subsequently won the 1954, 1956 and 1959 elections. A death knell on the Ibadan advocacy however came in the commission of enquiry into the affairs of the Ibadan District Council which indicted Adelabu of financial malfeasance and eventually his death via car crash in 1958. This led to an intra-national uprising in Ibadan, with Mabolaje splintering into the Mojid Agbaje and Adisa Adeoye factions. Both groups however failed to muster enough opposition to the AG and Egbe Omo Oduduwa which eventually swallowed them.

Erstwhile editor of the Daily Service, a lawyer and polemicist who took up the newspaper’s editorship from Sese Ikoli, Chief S. L. Akintola, was the third architect of the plot to destroy Egbe Omo Oduduwa. Akintola had come into journalistic prominence by launching one of the most visceral attacks on Azikiwe’s claim of an attempted assassination on him. As editor of the Service, Akintola cut the ground from under the feet of Zik when he published the whole pamphlet alleging Zik’s assassination in one issue of the newspaper with the title, Assassination de luxe, price one penny. In the thick of the AG rump’s attempt to remove him as Premier, Akintola also formed a counterpoise to the Egbe Omo Oduduwa which he called Egbe Omo Olofin, Olofin being one of the cognomens of Oduduwa.

Named at first Egbe Omo Yoruba and later on, Egbe Omo Olofin, the major undisguised aim of the group was to finally destroy Awolowo who was by then serving a ten-year jail term in Calabar prisons. This Egbe was conceived by political arch-enemies of Awolowo and new converts who believed that his jailing had put a wedge on his relevance. Some of the coupists were the former Administrator of the Western Region in the Emergency year, Dr. M. A. Majekodunmi, who was personal physician to the Prime Minister; Chief H. O. Davies; some high court judges and traditional rulers. Some leaders of the Awolowo’s Egbe were also seen in the new Egbe, Members of the new Egbe then issued a press release where they castigated Awolowo after their maiden meeting held on January 3, 1964.

The fourth threat to the pan-Yoruba socio-political group came from a man known as the Arole AwolowoIo, Awolowo’s heir, Chief Bola Ige. His loss in the Wednesday, January 27, 1999, electoral college of the Alliance for Democracy (AD) held at the D’Rovans hotel in Ibadan threw up the messy tussle in the fold of the political children of Awolowo. At the end of the exercise, Ige got nine votes as against 14 for Chief Olu Falae. Since that election, Afenifere and the post-Awo leadership of Yorubaland have never been the same again. Though he disguised his roiling anger at the Ijebu Four – Olaniwun Ajayi, Ayo Adebanjo, Abraham Adesanya, and Pa Onasanya – with the claim that he was “gaudily joyful” at Falae’s emergence, Ige’s actions and utterances thereafter showed that he was poised for a fight with the mafia. One of the things he did was to get his long-time friend and fellow Ijesa Yoruba, Justice Adewale Thompson, to form the Yoruba Council of Elders (YCE) to rival and indeed factionalize Afenifere. Alajobi, a group headed by Bishop Emmanuel Gbonigi’s intervention couldn’t stop the derailment. After Ige’s assassination, the crisis metastasized, so much that Afenifere was broken into two factions, one headed by Fasoranti who had been handed the leadership of the group after Adesanya fell ill and Ayo Fasanmi, Ige’s friend. By the time of his assassination in 2001, Ige left a Yoruba land that was roiling in leadership crises.

The fifth threat to the Afenifere and the quest of the Yoruba is Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Using his singular win in the 2003 governorship election and the loss of his AD colleagues in the west as the propelling force, Tinubu immediately began what ostensibly was the reunification of Yoruba politics under his roof. It was however a veneer for his presidential and prebendal ambition. Deploying a huge war chest of resources of his Lagos State, he funded virtually all political activities in the region, literally heaving all his ex-AD governor colleagues, except Adebayo Adefarati, inside his pocket. By then, it had become clear to him that the Afenifere mafia who collectively ensured his emergence against Funsho Williams in 1999 would fight him to a standstill, having fallen out with him.

 

With all he had, Tinubu battled this Yoruba leadership hegemony, infiltrating their ranks and creating a counterpoise, the Afenifere Renewal Group (ARG). At Fasanmi’s death, his group appointed Senator Biyi Durojaiye as Afenifere leader to further delegitimize Fasoranti’s leadership. When Durojaye also died, the Tinubu group appointed another Afenifere leader. With the support of his governor colleague, Bisi Akande, who had become his bag carrier, Tinubu dismantled the AD which was the most impregnable political base of the Afenifere socio-political group, formed the Action Congress, later with Atiku, and which, in 2013/2014, went into alliance with the ultra-conservative north to form today’s All Progressives Congress (APC).

In the build-up to the 2023 presidential election, there has been a frenetic scavenging by candidates for ethnic legitimacy as affirmation of their bids. Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Abubakar, began the forage when he asked his kin at an Arewa event in Kaduna to vote for him. Being a northerner, he told them, he was the most suited to know where the shoe pinched the region. Southeast is already agog with Peter Obi. His presidential bid is almost an obsession for a region which sees in his presidency the first opportunity for a “highly vilified” Igbo stock to come back to the mainstream.

Until the Akure fiasco, Tinubu wore the Olusegun Obasanjo visor of 1999. In that year’s presidential election, a high chunk of Yoruba leadership openly disclaimed Obasanjo who was seen as a Yoruba enemy. This antagonism led to Obasanjo’s election by “outsiders”. Frustrated by the prospect of a repeat of the route Obasanjo trod, Tinubu’s desperation to procure Yoruba leadership legitimacy, no matter how crooked or brimming with fraud, becomes understandable.

His recent visit to the Akure home of Pa Reuben Fasoranti has been generating a lot of seismic comments. Like Michael Adekunle Ajasin and Abraham Adesanya before him, Fasoranti had ceded his headship of Afenifere to Adebanjo almost two years ago when it became clear that age would impede his leadership. This same Fasoranti was fought to a standstill by the Tinubu group whose goal was to make his leadership inconsequential. Most of the pilgrims with Tinubu to Akure were conscripts of the coup that unsuccessfully delegitimized Fasoranti and serially appointed renegade leadership for Afenifere.

Tinubu, acting as if coerced to go pay this same man a condolence visit after his daughter was brutally killed by Fulani herdsmen, literally urinated on the balcony of the Yoruba leader. In an attempt to deflect arrows shot at Muhammadu Buhari’s marauding, bloodthirsty kin, Tinubu had asked “where are the cows?” He similarly exhibited such conceit to highly respected Chief Olu Falae during the invasion of his farm by Fulani herdsmen.

The Akure pilgrimage was an abduction of 96-year-old Fasoranti by elements who spent over a decade undermining his Yoruba leadership. They took advantage of Baba’s advanced age and the suspicious company of turncoats who enveloped him to get Tinubu to reap where he did not sow. The coup reeked of corruption, abduction, and coldblooded execution of a most clinically infernal hijack of ‘power’ in Yoruba history. It was originally convoked by a group of hungry lay-about who went by the name Conscience of Yoruba Nation, a name reminiscent of a Babangida era ragtag military apologia crusade which was masterminded by a man who claimed to be driven by conscience but whose spineless interventions brimmed of a ‘conscienceless conscience’ even as he sought to grease his esophagus from crumbs that fell off Babangida’s table. In Akure, that Conscience of Yoruba Nation gathering was then criminally labeled with the mis-biology of an Afenifere endorsement of Tinubu.

The fraudulence of the whole enterprise was to be revealed when the coupists issued a communiqué, not under the conscienceless banner with which they invited conferees to Akure but Afenifere. Respected Prof Akin Onigbinde said that not only was the assemblage “essentially a gathering of chieftains of APC in the South West,” many of them couldn’t claim linkage to Afenifere nor did they attend its meetings in the last ten years. They were just interested in the spoils of dollars allegedly left after the disastrous show. They then added a disgraceful icing on the cake of the infamy when they concocted a Fasoranti claim that he had taken over the headship of Afenifere which he vacated almost two years earlier. This lie thrived for a few hours, landed with a thud thereafter and scattered into smithereens.

Instead of going through the futile attempt to abduct Afenifere and its leadership, I wonder why the group behind this penkele mesi – the offerees and offerors of legitimacy – did not deploy ARG for the legitimacy-hunting game; or simply create a brand new organization. That would have been neater in this last-minute tan’na w’ebi – grope in the dark for kin – that they are engrossed with.

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STATE OF THE NATION: INSECURITY IN NIGERIA AND MATTERS ARISING

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3 days ago

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July 11, 2026

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BREAKING: Kidnapped Oyo Pupils, Teachers Regain Freedom After 55 Days + VIDEO

STATE OF THE NATION: INSECURITY IN NIGERIA AND MATTERS ARISING

THE OGBOMOSO RESCUE: CELEBRATE THE VICTORY, PRESERVE THE LESSONS

By Group Captain Sadeeq Garba Shehu Rtd

Amplified by the Good Governance Group (GGG)

—

ABUJA – The safe recovery of the remaining pupils and teachers abducted from schools in Oriire Local Government Area of Oyo State has been met with nationwide relief and celebration. After 56 days in captivity, the children and teachers have been reunited with their families, marking the conclusion of a tense hostage crisis that gripped the nation.

According to the Presidency, the victims were recovered through a sustained military, police and intelligence-driven operation. Eight suspected kidnappers have been arrested and placed in DSS custody, while some members of the group were reportedly neutralised. The Presidency has also stated that no ransom was paid and no prisoner exchange took place, with the terrorist kingpin demanded by the abductors remaining in custody and facing prosecution.

—

OPERATIONAL SUCCESS OR PROFESSIONAL RESTRAINT?

Security expert Group Captain Sadeeq Garba Shehu Rtd has offered a comprehensive analysis of the operation, emphasising the professional dilemmas inherent in hostage rescue missions.

“Knowing where hostages are located is not the same as possessing a safe opportunity to rescue them,” Shehu stated. “Before action can be taken, commanders must understand the disposition of the captors, the exact location and condition of the hostages, the terrain, and whether an assault is likely to trigger the execution of the hostages.”

The retired officer stressed that hostage rescue operations frequently involve prolonged surveillance, human intelligence, communications interception, and meticulous preparation before force is finally employed.

“The objective is not merely to reach the kidnappers. The objective is to recover the hostages alive,” he added.

—

INTELLIGENCE: THE DECISIVE WEAPON

Perhaps the most significant feature of the operation, according to Shehu, is the apparent success of intelligence gathering.

“Popular imagination often credits hostage rescues to the soldiers seen during the final assault. Professional practitioners know differently. The visible rescue is merely the final phase. The decisive work usually begins much earlier,” he explained.

Shehu noted that intelligence officers identify patterns, communities provide information, technical surveillance tracks movement, and communications are analysed before any tactical commander can intervene with an acceptable level of risk.

“Firepower may conclude an operation. Intelligence makes it possible,” he said.

—

INTER-AGENCY COOPERATION

The reported cooperation among the Armed Forces, the DSS and the Nigeria Police Force has also been highlighted as a critical success factor.

“No single institution possesses every capability required to resolve a complex hostage crisis,” Shehu noted, pointing out that Nigeria lacks a dedicated Hostage Rescue Unit comparable to France’s GIGN.

“The Armed Forces contribute operational reach, tactical capability and specialised combat assets. The Police contribute investigative powers, local policing structures and criminal justice responsibilities. The DSS contributes specialised intelligence capabilities. Each institution performs a distinct but complementary function,” he explained.

—

THE HUMAN COST

Despite the successful rescue, Shehu emphasised that the incident was not casualty-free.

“From official snippets, a couple of security personnel were lost. Lives were lost during the initial attack. Most painfully, Mr. Oyedokun, one of the abducted teachers, was murdered while in captivity. His death reminds us that this was never simply a kidnapping. It was a brutal act of terrorism against innocent civilians,” he stated.

“Our celebration must therefore be accompanied by remembrance. Our relief must be accompanied by compassion.”

—

SAFE SCHOOLS: FROM POLICY TO PRACTICE

Perhaps the most critical lesson emerging from the Ogbomoso incident, according to Shehu, is the urgent need to strengthen Nigeria’s Safe Schools Programme.

“The 3 affected schools—Community Grammar School, Baptist Nursery and Primary School, and L.A. Primary School in Oriire Local Government Area—like most schools in Nigeria, were in every practical sense UNSAFE SCHOOLS right from the beginning,” he asserted.

Shehu argued that the ultimate objective of security policy is not to rescue children after they have been abducted but to prevent schools from becoming targets in the first place.

“A nation that continually celebrates successful hostage rescues without making its schools safer has addressed the symptom while leaving the underlying vulnerability intact,” he warned.

—

A CALL FOR COMPREHENSIVE REVIEW

The security expert has called for a thorough after-action review of the Ogbomoso incident, examining intelligence indicators, emergency response procedures, and security architecture around vulnerable schools.

“These questions are not criticisms. They are the foundation of professional improvement. Security institutions that refuse to learn eventually repeat their mistakes. Those that institutionalise learning become progressively stronger,” Shehu stated.

—

PSYCHOSOCIAL RECOVERY

Shehu also emphasised that the Government’s responsibilities continue beyond the rescue operation.

“The rescued pupils and teachers are survivors of a traumatic experience. They now require protection of a different kind: medical examinations, psychological first aid, trauma-informed counselling, family reunification, educational reintegration, and long-term psychosocial support,” he said.

“Children emerging from prolonged captivity should never become media spectacles.”

—

THE ENDURING VICTORY

“Recovering the remaining children and teachers was the immediate victory. Making every Nigerian school a genuinely safe school will be the enduring victory,” Shehu concluded.

“That is the lesson we must preserve.”

 

 

STATE OF THE NATION: INSECURITY IN NIGERIA AND MATTERS ARISING

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Opinion

Nobody needs NYSC reform – Reuben Abati

Published

7 days ago

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July 7, 2026

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Nobody needs NYSC reform - Reuben Abati

Nobody needs NYSC reform – Reuben Abati

Peter F. Drucker, the Austrian-American management guru (1909 -2005), it was who opined that change is an inevitable constant in human situations and that innovation is important in the 21st Century where skills become obsolete at the speed of light and what was deemed essential yesterday sooner or later becomes irrelevant, requiring new thinking, new styles, new modes to remain relevant and to gain new knowledge. But the proposed plan by the Federal Government of Nigeria to reform the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) programme does not fit into this pattern. It is a classic case of majoring in the minors, a misplaced priority, a wasteful adventure whose long-term subliminal objective may be mere self-enrichment that would not change much but rather cause unwanted confusion.

The Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration has advertised itself as a reform-minded administration. But certain reforms do not come across as a priority, and this NYSC reform is one such thoughtless proposition, like, if we may cite an earlier example, the decision to revert to the old Nigerian national anthem. I watch people at public events, they sing along most reluctantly because there was no consensus, nor has there been any buy-in, that Nigeria needed to change its National Anthem. It is important that policies are not enacted or revised simply to satisfy the personal fancy or the whims of anyone, no matter how highly placed. In the case of the NYSC, nobody was consulted. We woke up one morning only to be told by the minister of state for youth development, Ayodele Olawande, that a decision had been taken to reform the NYSC programme. Nobody needs NYSC reform.

The NYSC is 53 years old. Established in May 1973 by the Yakubu Gowon military administration, it was a post-civil war measure in pursuit of the objectives of the three Rs: reconciliation, rehabilitation, and reconstruction, to reintegrate Nigerians and reunite them and heal the wounds of the civil war. The fratricidal war divided Nigeria and watered the seeds of ethnicity and difference.

Over 50 years later, the wounds are yet to heal. The NYSC was an attempt at reconciliation. It started with the posting of graduates of tertiary institutions to cities and states far away from their homes and places of graduation, to allow them to live among other people, get to understand Nigeria and learn to serve Nigeria selflessly. The emphasis was on service. When the late sage Chinua Achebe wrote that “there was once a country”, the NYSC was part of that effort at the making and remaking of Nigeria. It is the case that when the country began to fail on all fronts in terms of security, institutional integrity, and increased ethnic and religious division, a group of Nigerians began to agitate that the NYSC was no longer serving its purpose and it should be scrapped.

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Except that the problem is not with the scheme but the Nigerian factor: the inbred tendency by those in charge to minimise every good thing and ruin it. It is instructive that the Tinubu administration is not contemplating an abandonment of the scheme. Apart from the fact that this would be a disservice to the father of the NYSC, General Yakubu Gowon, who is still alive, it would amount to an unconscionable erosion of a significant aspect of collective public memory. Those who participated in the scheme in the earlier days have fond memories.

On Saturday, during a radio programme, Professor Seun Omotayo, a professor of sports psychology, currently based in Ghana, recalled that when he completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Ibadan, he was posted for National Service in Ogun state. He was not happy that he was being sent to his home state. He personally went to the NYSC office in Lagos and asked to be posted to the northern part of Nigeria.  I doubt if anyone would request such a change of posting these days. On Sunday, I had a conversation on the NYSC with Emeritus Professor Duro Oni of the University of Lagos, in the course of which he held the view that the NYSC remains relevant to Nigeria’s growth and development. The NYSC gave him his wife. He met her when she came to participate in the scheme in Lagos. Today, the woman from Ogoja in Cross River state has given him four sons and six grandchildren. “I probably would never have met her if there was no NYSC.”

There are many Nigerians who have a similar experience: inter-ethnic marriages being one of the gains of the NYSC. Those who would probably never have left their hometowns discovered Nigeria through the eyes and experiences of other Nigerians and communities. Life-long friendships have been formed over the years. I know Shedrack Akolokwu from Omoku-Ogba in Rivers state, for example. I was a young secondary student when he came to serve Nigeria in Abeokuta, Ogun state. He was so much a part of the community. He and I have remained in touch over the years. The last time I saw him in Port Harcourt, he was asking after everybody in the neighbourhood, mentioning each person’s name as if he had left Abeokuta yesterday, and it has been over 45 years since he participated in the NYSC.

My service year was spent in Benin City, old Bendel state. A few years ago, I found myself in Benin. I quickly asked the driver to take me to the compound where I lived. I also went to the department where I was a graduate assistant at the University of Benin, reliving old memories.  I find it shocking, therefore, that one of the reforms being proposed by the Tinubu administration is that corps members may not be posted to conflict areas where insecurity may be a challenge, to ensure safety and reduce the anxiety of parents. Only indigenes of those areas or graduates of schools in such locations would be sent there. This defeats the fundamental objective of the NYSC: to promote unity and open up Nigeria to its young persons. And who the hell came up with the twisted logic that graduates and indigenes from conflict zones are better off in those zones? Every life is important. No Nigerian, whether a graduate or not, should be exposed to danger. It is the duty of the government to address the challenge of insecurity and make every part of Nigeria safe for all.

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Minister Olawande also said the NYSC uniform will be changed, although a final decision on this has not yet been taken.  But the government is considering Ankara or the adire batik fabric. The idea is to promote locally made fabrics and support the Nigerian textile industry.  I dare say that there is nothing wrong with the current NYSC uniform. The khaki fabric and the vest are more durable than either Ankara or adire that would start fading or get torn within a short while. The proposal is also likely to evoke ethnic comparisons and sentiments. Adire batik is largely produced in the south-western part of the country, made for the most part in Ogun, Osun and Kwara states. It may be dismissed as an opportunity to create business for only one part of the country. Igbos are likely to demand that the Isiagu should also become part of the NYSC uniform. Northerners are likely to ask for babanriga in the spirit of federal character. Other ethnic nationalities may also make a case for their own local attire. Nobody needs such confusion.  What can be done is to improve the quality of the present uniform. In our time, the khaki had better quality, the vest and the boots too, but these days, the uniform is so poorly made, its cheapness is unmistakable.

The orientation camp for the NYSC, we are told, will be extended from four to six weeks, and the deployment will be restructured based on choices and processes during the camp, as the new NYSC will offer 11 specialised streams ranging from agriculture, education, technology and digital, healthcare, infrastructure, public service, legal, paramilitary and security, the economy, to enterprise. Corps members will be required to choose any of these streams, where within six weeks they can be trained in entrepreneurial skills and prepared for the job market. We are missing the point. The NYSC orientation camp is not a training school. It is meant to be an experience. If the plan is to teach entrepreneurship, that should have been done at the university level. It is the college curriculum that needs to be reviewed, and entrepreneurship built into the various disciplines in order to ensure a proper alignment between scholarship and the labour market, for a purposeful school-to-work transition.

In its original design, the NYSC was meant to provide paramilitary training and inculcate the values of discipline and service. Indeed, there is nothing new about the six-week proposal. During the 1990/91 batch, corps members spent six weeks in camp and were even taught how to handle small arms and light weapons. But the military government soon abandoned the idea out of fear that the state may have unwittingly been training potential coup plotters. The so-called streams actually exist. In our time, corps members were assigned to specific responsibilities: persons who manned the kitchen prepared the meals and served others, some corps members served as Platoon commanders while everyone marched, we had press club, drama club, and it all worked out smoothly. Part of the reform is to place the NYSC under civilian leadership. Under the present arrangement, the director-general may be from the education corps of the Nigerian military, but at the state level, the NYSC secretariats are manned by civilians, and so changing the headship of the scheme will not make much difference as long as standards are maintained.

What the federal government needs to do is to make the NYSC experience richer and more exciting for those who participate in it. The monthly allowance for corps members should be increased, and feeding at the orientation camps should be improved. Scrap the monthly community development exercises. Ensure that the orientation camps are properly secured to eliminate the risk of bandits and terrorists attacking those camps to kidnap corps members. Corps members should be deployed to places of primary assignment relevant to their fields of study. There is no point in changing from a passing-out parade to a graduation ceremony. Will corps members now wear graduation gowns?  That is not necessary. Will the proposed reforms modernise the NYSC? No. Will they improve employability? I don’t think so.

There are far more important and urgent issues that the federal government should be concerned about at this moment. One, the terribly embarrassing disclosure that a certain Prince Adeniyi Adeyemi Matthew set up a fake Presidential Agency – the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC)  and Presidential Economic Advisory Council (PEAC) – which the Presidency now disclaims as a scam operation, and yet the said Prince had been operating openly – meeting with key government officials, receiving ambassadors in audience, and running an office at the Federal Secretariat that was duly allocated to him by the Office of the Sectary to the Government of the Federation. He has over 300 staff, including directors, who are all on the government payroll. His fake agency even got a N1.3 billion allocation in the 2026 Budget. He runs 39 bank accounts and even has accounts with the Central Bank of Nigeria. He has since been charged to court, and his matter comes up on July 27. The man is in no way apologetic. He says he has a letter of appointment and that he paid N600 million to the president’s chief of staff, Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, to get appointed. Trouble started when his sponsor wanted a lion’s share of the budgetary allocation to his office. He says one Babatunde Tanimola facilitated his appointment, but now Tanimola died in a hotel room in Abuja just before he, Adeniyi, was arrested in November 2025. Indeed, who knows tomorrow?

What we know today is the spectacle before us: a spectacle of institutional failure, incompetence, collusion, corruption and the failure of due process. If it is possible to manufacture a non-existent government agency and operate openly and brazenly, then there are persons within the entire government machinery who must answer questions. A thorough investigation must be conducted to find out if there are other similar agencies in the Federal Capital Territory. Prince Adeniyi’s boldness is so shocking. He should have his day in court. He should be allowed to say all that he knows, and no attempt whatsoever should be made to intimidate him. It is wrong, as the police reportedly did yesterday, to arrest Adeniyi’s father in lieu. Police allegedly stormed his parents’ home in Ogbomoso and arrested his father and a family friend. It is illegal to do so. Criminal liability is personal. It is not transferable in light of Section 7 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA), 2015. The Nigerian Police, not knowing this, is scandalous.

The other urgent issue would be the observation by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that the Nigerian government has frittered away 2% of GDP (about N8.8 trillion) on off-budget spending. The prompt reaction from the Minister of Finance, Taiwo Oyedele, is to deny and insist that Nigeria does not have any ghost budget. This does not call for bluffing. The same government that introduced Executive Order 9 to ensure transparency and accountability in government finances should take allegations of hidden deficit, opaqueness and failure of oversight more seriously. Finally, it is about time Nigeria took South Africa to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on its request for compensation over xenophobia losses, the genocide in South Africa and that country’s institutionalisation of hatred. On the question of NYSC reform, it is in the best interest of the Nigerian government to listen to the people’s responses and retrace its steps forthwith.

Nobody needs NYSC reform – Reuben Abati

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Opinion

Dr. Dayo Mobereola at NIMASA: Over two years of Reform, Stability, and the Road Ahead

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July 7, 2026

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Dr. Dayo Mobereola at NIMASA: Over two years of Reform, Stability, and the Road Ahead

Dr. Dayo Mobereola at NIMASA: Over two years of Reform, Stability, and the Road Ahead

By Kolawole Ojelabi

When Dr. Dayo Mobereola assumed office as the Director-General of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) in March 2024, expectations were high. With an extensive background in public sector administration, transport infrastructure, and institutional reforms, stakeholders anticipated a leadership that would reposition Nigeria’s maritime sector to support economic growth better. Dr. Mobereola was the first Managing Director of the Lagos Metropolitan Area Transport Authority (LAMATA), and while at LAMATA, he implemented most of the reforms in the public transport space that are today yielding lots of fruits.

More than two years into his administration, the agency has recorded progress in several key areas. The achievements recorded during this period have been driven not only by Dr. Mobereola’s administrative reforms but also by the strategic policy direction and unwavering support of His Excellency Adegboyega Oyetola, Minister of Marine and Blue Economy. Since the creation of the Ministry, Oyetola has provided the political leadership and international engagement necessary to reposition Nigeria’s maritime sector within the Federal Government’s Renewed Hope Agenda.

However, significant challenges remain, requiring sustained reforms if Nigeria is to harness the enormous potential of its blue economy fully.

The achievements recorded during this period have been driven not only by Dr. Mobereola’s administrative reforms but also by the strategic policy direction and unwavering support of His Excellency Adegboyega Oyetola, Minister of Marine and Blue Economy. Since the creation of the Ministry, Oyetola has provided the political leadership and international engagement necessary to reposition Nigeria’s maritime sector within the Federal Government’s Renewed Hope Agenda.

One of the notable achievements under Dr. Mobereola’s leadership has been the continued consolidation of maritime security gains. NIMASA has maintained collaboration with the Nigerian Navy and other security agencies in sustaining the Deep Blue Project, which has contributed to the reduction of piracy and armed robbery in Nigerian waters.

The improved security environment has enhanced Nigeria’s reputation within the Gulf of Guinea, encouraging greater confidence among international shipping companies and insurers.

The administration has adopted a more consultative approach with industry stakeholders. Shipowners, terminal operators, labour unions, maritime training institutions and government agencies have enjoyed increased engagement on policy matters. This dialogue has helped improve confidence in the agency and encouraged greater collaboration in addressing industry challenges.

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In alignment with the Federal Government’s Renewed Hope Agenda and the creation of the Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy, NIMASA has increasingly positioned itself as a strategic driver of Nigeria’s blue economy.

The agency has continued to promote investment opportunities in shipping, fisheries, maritime transport, offshore services and marine environmental protection.

NIMASA has maintained support for the Nigerian Seafarers Development Programme (NSDP), while pursuing initiatives aimed at increasing the employability of Nigerian cadets.

Nevertheless, the long-standing challenge of securing mandatory sea-time training for graduates remains unresolved, limiting the country’s ability to produce internationally certified seafarers in sufficient numbers.

The agency has continued its statutory responsibilities in ship registration, flag-state and port-state inspections, marine pollution control and enforcement of international maritime conventions.

There have also been sustained efforts to strengthen Nigeria’s compliance with International Maritime Organization (IMO) standards through improved regulatory oversight, maritime safety initiatives, and institutional reforms. These efforts culminated in Nigeria’s successful election back into Category C of the IMO Council, a significant diplomatic and maritime achievement. The victory reflected the combined efforts of the Federal Government, with Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, His Excellency Adegboyega Oyetola, leading Nigeria’s diplomatic campaign and international engagements, while NIMASA, under Dr. Dayo Mobereola, provided the technical and regulatory foundation that reinforced the country’s credibility before the global maritime community. Despite these positive developments, several critical issues deserve greater focus.

There is a need to resolve the issues of thousands of Nigerian cadets unable to complete their certification because of insufficient sea-time opportunities.

NIMASA should work with indigenous shipowners, international shipping companies, and the Nigerian Navy to establish structured sea-time programmes. Incentives should also be introduced for vessels that provide cadet placements.

The decline of Nigerian-owned vessels continues to limit indigenous participation in international trade. The agency should accelerate reforms that promote fleet expansion, improve access to financing, and encourage local ship ownership.

A vexed issue is the implementation of the Cabotage Vessel Financing Fund (CVFF). Perhaps no issue has generated more industry debate than the prolonged delay in disbursing the Cabotage Vessel Financing Fund.

Incidentally, the agency a while ago opened its portal for qualified indigenous shipping to apply for the fund. Transparent implementation of the fund would certainly significantly strengthen indigenous shipping companies and create employment opportunities for Nigerian seafarers.

Further digitization of ship registration, licensing, certification, and regulatory processes would reduce bureaucracy, improve transparency, and enhance operational efficiency. Digital platforms should enable stakeholders to complete transactions seamlessly without unnecessary delays.

There is also a need for closer partnerships between NIMASA, maritime academies, and universities. This would improve curriculum relevance and align training with international standards.

Investment in simulators, research facilities, and modern equipment is equally important.

Beyond training, greater attention should be paid to the welfare, insurance, medical support, and career progression of Nigerian seafarers.

Implementation of the Maritime Labour Convention should remain a priority.

Climate change is increasingly influencing global shipping. NIMASA should continue promoting cleaner shipping practices, marine pollution control, ballast water management, and decarbonization initiatives consistent with IMO regulations.

Although port operations involve several government agencies, NIMASA can continue collaborating with the Nigerian Ports Authority, the Nigerian Customs Service, and other stakeholders to reduce vessel waiting time, eliminate operational bottlenecks, and improve Nigeria’s competitiveness.

At the time he took over at NIMASA, Dr. Dayo Mobereola inherited an agency operating within a maritime industry facing numerous structural challenges. His administration has demonstrated a commitment to institutional stability, stakeholder engagement, maritime security, and regulatory effectiveness. Working in close alignment with Minister Oyetola’s vision for the marine and blue economy, the agency has also helped restore confidence in Nigeria’s maritime governance. Their collaborative approach—combining ministerial policy leadership with institutional execution by NIMASA—has strengthened Nigeria’s standing among regional and global maritime stakeholders.

However, the true measure of success will depend on translating policy into measurable outcomes—particularly in indigenous fleet development, implementation of the Cabotage Vessel Financing Fund, creation of employment for Nigerian seafarers, digital transformation and strengthening Nigeria’s position as a leading maritime nation in Africa.

The opportunities within the blue economy are immense. With sustained reforms, stronger public-private partnerships and consistent policy implementation, NIMASA under Dr. Dayo Mobereola, working in tandem with the strategic leadership of His Excellency Adegboyega Oyetola, has the potential to play a transformative role in unlocking these opportunities. Nigeria’s return to the IMO Council demonstrates what coordinated political leadership and effective institutional execution can achieve. Building on that momentum will be critical to expanding indigenous shipping, creating jobs, attracting investment and positioning Nigeria as Africa’s leading maritime nation.

 

Dr. Dayo Mobereola at NIMASA: Over two years of Reform, Stability, and the Road Ahead

 

Kolawole Ojelabi, a developmental journalist and public commentator, writes from Lagos.

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