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Badenoch’s identity blue

 Meursault in Albert Camus’ 1942 novel, ‘The Outsider’, is an anti-hero who lives in acute anomie towards his socio-cultural milieu. He is supremely detached at the death of his mother, as indicated in the famous opening lines of the novel’s first-person narration: “Mother died today. Or maybe it was yesterday, I don’t know.” He intensifies his apathy at the mother’s funeral where he sits through the vigil without showing any outward sign of distress, unlike copious expressions of grief by community members all around him. Meursault’s detachment continues through all of his relationships, both platonic and romantic, and provides a reference point for his sentencing to death by guillotine when tried for his inadvertent killing of a friend’s assailant named ‘the Arab’ in the novel. Newly-elected leader of opposition Conservative Party in the United Kingdom, Kemi Badenoch, is like Camus’ anti-hero Nigeria where she has her ancestral roots, but towards which she exhibits acute anomie. Only
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Indomitable Trump

By their vote last week, Americans may have swapped their legendarily libertarian political culture for imperialism – maybe unwittingly. They returned the 45th president, Donald J. Trump, to office as the 47th president in a sweeping victory for his Republican party that has dumped Democrats on the fringe of political power. With his reputation for pushing the limits of executive authority beyond historically familiar borders, the world might be about to witness unprecedented absolutism in the age-long bastion of democracy that is effectively now a MAGA (Make America Great Again) kingdom. Going by antecedents, which do not necessarily cast the future pathway in stone, that seems the promise of a new Trump era. The thing about presidential elections in the United States is that whereas it is only Americans who vote, the outcomes reverberate far beyond the country’s borders and impact, directly or not, on other nations across the world. That obviously is the reason global interest typica
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America, don’t vote Trump

 Voters in the United States of America head to the poll Tuesday, 5th November, to elect the 47th president in the country’s nearly 250-year nationhood. Their options are down to a straight choice between Vice-President Kamala Harris, who bids on Democratic ticket to make history as the first female commander-in-chief of the world’s most influential country, and former President Donald Trump, the 45th president who aims on Republican ticket to retake the reins he lost in the 2020 election to incumbent President Joe Biden. If he gets his way, he will be the second defeated president in all U.S. history to regain the office, following after Grover Cleveland – the first to be elected president after the 1885 American civil war. Cleveland, a Democrat, was the 22nd president and he returned for a second term as 24th president four years after he initially lost the White House. Under the U.S. electoral system, election day climaxes voters’ exercise of their franchise that has been underway f
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Grid of straws

They call it the national grid, and it ostensibly comprises a network of steel towers and high tension lines wheeling electricity from generating companies (GenCos) to distribution companies (DisCos) for onward delivery to end-users. But it could well have been a grid of straws, considering the spate of operational collapses that shut down power supply on the grid and leave swathes of this country in darkness. There were at least two collapses within a span of seven days in recent weeks that left government scrambling for explanation and remediation. Power Minister Adebayo Adelabu summoned an emergency meeting of managers of the sector – the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) and the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) – to trouble-shoot frequent disruptions of the grid. He also raised a panel to unearth the root causes. A statement by spokesperson Bolaji Tunji said the minister was worried that the disruptions could rubbish improvements made over the past year that ha
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Beyond age limit

 A policy initiative by government has never been more knee-jerk. That, perhaps, is why government has found itself stuck in equivocation in the narrative being plied to justify the policy to Nigerians. Education Minister Tahir Mamman lately restated government’s resolve to bar pupils under 18 years from sitting the secondary school leaving certificate examinations, which are a prerequisite for proceeding to the tertiary level. He said pupils would henceforth not be permitted to sit the West African Senior School Certificate Examination organised by the West African Examination Council (WAEC) and the Senior School Certificate Examination organised by the National Examination Council (NECO) unless they attain that age. And since these are primary requirements for advancing to the tertiary level of education, it follows that any candidate sitting the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination conducted by the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) cannot be below 18. Speaking at
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How Harris won the debate

 United States Vice President Kamala Harris is making a strong bid to enter into history books as her country’s first ever female commander-in-chief, and she’s having a roll. She dramatically reshaped the presidential race after she was tapped for the Democratic ticket less than five months to election day when President Joe Biden abruptly pulled his stalled re-election bid in July. Now, she’s further paved her path towards the White House with a commanding performance in her first match-up against Republican nominee and former president, Donald Trump. She’s aced her moments so far and the tides are swaying in her favour.  The presidential debate in Philadelphia last Tuesday night – exactly eight weeks before election day – was the first face-to-face encounter between Harris and Trump who are locked in a tight race. The Democratic and Republican nominees went head-to-head at the event hosted by ABC news network that was advertised to run for 90 minutes with two commercial breaks, but w
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Is Biya staying on?

Cameroonian President Paul Biya is 91 years of age and has been at the helm of his country for 42 years. He holds a dubious record as the world’s oldest head of state, the second longest-ruling president in Africa after Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo of Equatorial Guinea who has been in power for 45 years, and the longest consecutively serving current non-royal national leader in the world. And news is that he isn’t done. He is reported to have thrown his hat in the ring for re-election next year to an eighth presidential term of seven years that will last till he is 100 years old if he runs out the tenure. He will be the oldest candidate in electoral history anywhere when he stands in the poll, as he’s reported set upon. The number of years that the old man has been in commanding heights of power in a non-monarchical setting has no equal if you add to his 42 years of presidency the seven years he served as prime minister under his country’s first president, Alhaji Ahmadou Ahidjo, from
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