Author: Osmond Agbo
In the end, no empire reigns forever. Power is always temporary, and supremacy always expires. The ruins of Rome, the transformed halls of Hagia Sophia, and the silent courtyards of Topkapi all whisper the same warning. Authority is borrowed, never owned. A few days ago, as President Tinubu was making news for all the wrong reasons in Ankara, on the heels of his state visit to the Republic of Turkey, I found myself less than five hours away from him. But since dis-life-no-balance, there was no guard of honor mounted on my behalf, no entourage, and no official delegation. I…
In The New York Times article, Emeka Umeagbalasi, former South East Coordinator of the Civil Liberties Organization, founder of Intersociety, former volunteer and coordinator with Amnesty International, and former associate member of Human Rights Watch, was reduced to a screwdriver seller. Not because the description was false, but because it was useful. After the last United States election, I cancelled my cable news subscriptions without a second thought. I had reached a point of saturation. I no longer wished to permit Time Warner, the Murdoch family, or any other corporate media conglomerate to monetize my anxiety. I could not continue…
Be water, my friend. For many years, I have maintained a sustained and discerning interest in Nigeria’s real estate sector, gradually assembling what might fairly be described as a modest portfolio.It has not been easy though. Residing on the other side of the Atlantic and far removed from the immediacies of home, I was compelled to rely on a network of suppliers, many of whom I cultivated over time and entrusted with confidence and loyalty. Regrettably, that trust was often violated. The pattern became grimly familiar: padded invoices, quiet substitution of inferior materials, imaginative bookkeeping, and a relentless inclination…
“Personal success will not insulate you from the failures of your society”—Author Unknown For many Africans in the diaspora, there is a quiet but enduring dream that our children will not grow up as strangers to the land that shaped us. We long for them to feel a living connection to the motherland, not as tourists, but as heirs to a history, a culture, and a people. In pursuit of this, many families make deliberate sacrifices. Some send their children back home for a few formative years, enrolling them in secondary schools so they can absorb the rhythms of daily…
In a world that has long profited from Black fragmentation, unity rooted in respect for difference may be the most enduring gift we offer each other. In recent weeks, Somali Americans have been subjected to baseless insinuations in the United States. What renders this episode particularly disquieting is not merely the malevolence of the attacks, but the ambivalence of the response. Some Blacks have hesitated to offer unequivocal solidarity, emphasizing that some Somalis do not self-identify as Black. The implicit message is unmistakable: if one does not claim Blackness, one cannot reasonably expect Black protection. This situation recalls my visit…
Even karma seems confused, looking the other way as if justice, too, has been kidnapped and no one is willing to pay her ransom. They call it non-kinetic a soft whisper in a burning field, a handshake offered to hands still wet with yesterday’s blood. In secret rooms they bargain away our lives, counting ransom in bundles as if naira could purchase conscience, as if money could bribe a monster into becoming a man. Each payment buys silence, yes a brittle, borrowed peace, the peace of a graveyard at noon when even the wind holds its breath. A Pyrrhic victory…
No amount of personal success, no matter how celebrated, can shield any of us from the consequences of a society that fails. In the first installment of this series, we revisited the historical distortions that shifted Ndigbo from the center of Nigeria’s political life to the periphery of its power structure. We examined how the January 1966 coup, hastily and wrongly branded an Igbo plot, and the chain of miscalculations that followed, created a narrative of suspicion that has defined the Igbo experience for decades. These events provided the scaffolding upon which exclusion and scapegoating were built. Yet history must…
And our deepest wound is not only that Nigeria marginalizes us, but that we are yet to master the discipline of thinking strategically about power. Umunne m, I write to you today not in anger, but with a mind sharpened against self-deception. This is neither a letter of comfort nor a stage for fragile egos, but a reckoning forged through brutal reflection. If you are seeking reassurance, validation, or easy affirmation, this is not for you. You may stop here. These past few weeks no doubt, have exacted a serious emotional toll on all Nigerians. The country has mutated into…
In Eruku, prayers ascended and bullets answered first. Church doors splintered; a sanctuary of hope transfigured into an altar of smoke and screams. Three worshippers collapsed beside their Bibles, their blood seeping like unanswered supplications across the fissured concrete. The pastor was dragged into the night, his lamentations swallowed by bush paths now highways for the damned. Elsewhere, in the same beleaguered land, Musa who had dedicated his life to the green-white-green was ensnared by ISWAP’s shadowed hands. An ambush. A loyal soldier struck down, while the very soil he bled for continued offering its children as sacrifices to…
In a country where compromise often wears the face of wisdom, Dapo Olorunyomi remains proof that integrity can survive influence and that conviction, when deeply rooted, does not bow before convenience. Like John the Baptist, who confessed himself unworthy to even loosen the sandals of the one he proclaimed, I find myself hesitant to speak of the man his friends fondly call Dapsy. Though our paths have crossed and his legend had already filled the air before his presence ever did, I remain unsure that words are sufficient vessels for a soul such as his. But then, it dawned on…