Baba Aye's

"Baba Aye...who also spoke to Sunday Independent, said that whistle blowing is es­sential for entrenching trans­parency and democratic values in any society. He, however, lamented: “But, not surprising, the class of ex­ploiters are hardly ever comfort­able about it. “They use states, which are primarily their means of repres­sion, to silence would-be-whis­tleblowers, or punish those who have successfully exposed them. “See what happened to Ed­ward Snowden and Chelsea Man­ning. See what is happening with Julian Assange. “So, it is not surprising that the Nigerian ruling class and its state are also not best friends with whistle blowers. “In my view, the best form of encouragement and support for whistleblowers can only come through organising from below. “Organised labour, radical civ­il society organisations and the mass media must support and encourage whistle blowing and whistle blowers.” Extract from:  Sunday Independent 29 June 2025 p.4

Scores of thousands of young people took to the streets across Nigeria in October 2020, to protest police brutality. Their primary demand was for government to end the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), an elite and particularly vicious unit of the Nigeria Police Force. This mass movement was thus defined as EndSARS. It was sparked when the video of a young man who was allegedly killed by SARS operatives in Ughelli, a small city in the Niger Delta region went viral on 3 rd October. There were over twenty-eight million tweets and retweets of the video and calls for protest within three days. In Ughelli and neighbouring towns there were immediate spontaneous actions by aggrieved youth. By 8 th October, hundreds of protesters set up camp in front of the Lagos State House of Assembly in Nigeria’s most populous city and its commercial hub as well as in the city centre of Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory. Within a few days, these numbers had increased to thousands and demonstration...

Kuli kuli is a delicious peanut-based snack. It is probably the most celebrated accompaniment for “smoking” garri, or cassava flakes if you will. It is also known for being so temptingly delicious that it could teach youngsters thievery, as one of those songs we sang in Yoruba as kids went.   Kulik kuli was also the Friday back page column of Mr Femi Adesina in The Sun. He has since then become a lead spokesperson for the second coming of a dictatorship under General Muhammadu Buhari. With lucid style, the column contributed to national discourse. There was an echo of truth in its lines. The past half a decade has however helped show Adesina for what he is, as he now writes and speaks for “the inside”. Does this have to do with supernatural powers, abi na demons in Aso Rock that like (to waste) our local snacks? Just a few years back Reuben Abati informed the world of these spirits and their taste for boli , the plantain snack which is supposed to help turgidity of that thin...

We appear to be witnessing a renewed turn to bloody repression by the Nigerian state, probably meant to divert attention from its glaring lack of capacity to meet the December 31 deadline it set itself, for defeating the Boko Haram insurgency. Last week, hundreds of Shi’ite Moslems were killed in Zaria, ostensibly to prevent the Army boss, General Buratai from being assassinated. Sheikh El-Zakzaky, leader of the Shi’ite Islamic Brotherhood of Nigeria was also arrested. On Saturday, 5 members of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) were also shot dead, and not less than 7 seriously wounded at Onitsha. This is coming up after an earlier killing of IPOB members last month. UAD unequivocally condemns this wave of macabre repression. It is an ill wind that blows us all, as poor working people, no good. The frequency of killings in this short period is a grave cause for concern. And the reaso...