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Yele Sowore and the renewal of radical politics in Nigeria

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On Friday, 20 September, the federal government   of Nigeria filed seven counts of treasonable felony and money laundering against Omoyele Sowore, publisher of Sahara Reporters, and National Chair of the African Action Congress. Four days later, the court granted him bail, with conditions which included his lawyers’ submission of his (Sowore’s) international passport to the court. The conditions were immediately met by the radical lawyer, Femi Falana. But the state refused to release him, only to drag him to a more pliant court where horrendous bail conditions were set, including: a bail bond of $280,000; no public speaking, including to the press; restriction of his movement to Abuja, the federal capital territory. Olawale “Mandate” Adebayo, the 21-year old #RevolutionNow activist who was equally charged with him had his bail bond set at $140,000. The lifelong activist was arrested on 3 August by the Department of State Services (DSS, the secret police). This was an ...

debate with the CWA on TIB/AAC

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Goke Akinrinde of the CWA majestically receiving participants The Campaign for Workers and Youth Alternative (CWA), the Nigerian section of the International Marxist Tendency (IMT) held a symposium with the theme “The 2019 General Elections & the impending Nigerian Revolution” on 8 December 2018. It posted its report of the meeting a few days later. The   the intention of the symposium, according to its organisers was t"o provoke a debate among the Left on the state and stage of class struggle in Nigeria and the best way to prepare for the impending class war". This is itself a good thing. The report threw up debate with a handful of comrades involved. I joined the fray at the point where there seemed to be contradictions between the conclusions in the course of discussion at the symposium by some of the leaders of the CWA and others that participated in it. For example, Akinrogunde Goke Tosin claimed that “whereas the discourse tilted towards an ackno...