Child abduction: The enabling circumstances

…also published in Daily Trust

The case of the nine children abducted in Kano; trafficked and sold off in Onitsha where they were converted to Christianity; renamed and had their ethnocultural identity and looks changed is probably just the tip of the iceberg.

Though given the prevailing security situation in Nigeria, no one is invulnerable to abduction except, of course, a few thousand among the elite who enjoy virtually invincible state-provided security protection, yet the vulnerability of children in many states in the northern part of the country is particularly alarming. 

Nigerian economy: Between economists and “laymen”

…also published in Daily Trust

Over the decades, successive Nigerian governments have always resorted to the introduction or enforcement of one set of revenue generation boosting measures, or another, to prevent further deterioration of the country’s ever-deteriorating economy. However, the poor have always ended up worse off.  

With the controversy triggered by the federal government’s current drive to boost revenue generation in the country, there are all sorts of analyses and solution proposals to the country’s persistent revenue deficit and the associated economic crisis, which further highlight the subtle but unmistakable mutually dismissive attitudes between Nigerian elite economists and experienced economic observers who aren’t formally trained economists.