Azu Ishiekwene

An image of senegalese president Bassirou Diomaye Faye and Emmanuel Macron

Faye and France: The Tyre Meets the Road

Africa, politics /

From Mali to Burkina Faso and from Guinea to Niger, France has become a dirty word, even though the elite in these countries are too ashamed to admit there’s nothing France has done without their helping hand. France is not just a metaphor for underdevelopment. You’ll be forgiven to think it’s probably also the reason some formerly virile folks in the former colonies have lost their libido. It’s not a laughing matter

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an image depicting okuama community burning along with the images of the deceased soldiers with a main focus on Col AH Ali

The Okuama Dead: Story Behind the Grief

Human Interest /

Oil money, mixed with militancy and violent local politics in the area, has created and nurtured private armies with money, weapons, and political clout comparable to rogue states… But politicians don’t mind. In their desperate search for solutions to the problem of oil theft and also to consolidate their political hold, they have indulged the private armies. Officers deployed in the area are left to invent their own ways of serving two masters – the state and the communities on the one hand and the powerful private armies on the other

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an image of a natural woman and the same image of her heavily photoshopped

Photoshopping Princess and The Perils of Manipulation

International Affairs /

What’s the point of it, really? Since the outbreak of the so-called Kate pic scandal, I have been brooding over images that I see very often as DPs and also on WhatsApp Status. I’m keeping myself to that microblogging site and the mainstream press. No need to bother with Insta, probably the worst photographic crime scene since Joseph Niepce invented the camera

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a group of students with bandits behind

The Famished Road to Kuriga

Human Interest /

Politicians who shed crocodile tears for a living visit crime scenes like Kuriga twice in their lifetime. They visit unfailingly during election campaigns and then grudgingly – more for the camera – at a time of grief, like this. Kaduna State Governor, Uba Sani, for example, was in Kuriga on Thursday, shortly after the students were kidnapped… It was as if was going to a war front

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An image of a man standing in a dark rrom with no electricity

Rolling Blackouts, Heatwave and Tales from Dead Bulbs

Economy /

One day in the last week of February, for example, the light went off and came back, surging each time at different frequencies, four times in less than 10 minutes. It was as if someone somewhere was testing the supply or that in my confused state, I never quite saw the light come on before it went off again. That was late evening, after work. I’m not counting how many other times this erratic supply may have occurred after I went to bed that night. But the evidence was waiting the next day

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an image of west africa map showing the three countries, burkina faso, mali, guinea and niger, along with their leaders

Will the Humble Pie Heal ECOWAS?

Africa /

If the Afrobeat icon, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, had rendered a welcome tune for the embattled regional leaders as they met in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja, it would have been his famous “Confusion Break Bone (CBB).” Misery never had a better company than the current state of affairs in the 50-year-old regional body, which apart from SADC, was perhaps Africa’s most exemplary model of regional co-operation

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Anamero Dekeri, Monday Okpebholo, dennis Idahosa, all apc edo governorship primaries winners

APC Digging Its Own Grave in Edo

politics /

The result of the party’s “inconclusive” primaries on Saturday showed that the surprise came early. From reports, Oshiomhole, APC’s certified nemesis in Edo, managed to suborn forces in the Presidency to hand over the party’s flag to Dennis Idahosa – a candidate that Oshiomhole’s government had once described as “untrustworthy,” the most flattering of the government’s description at that time.

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an image symbolically representing the rising cost of living in Nigeria

Cost of living crisis: A personal story

Economy /

Portion control was a frequent point of argument in my house. It’s a problem with men, of course, but it’s worse with African women brought up to believe that the proof of spousal care is in the size of the husband’s weight, measured by the amount of food on his plate. It’s considered taboo in many places, especially in the South of Nigeria, for example, for a man’s plate of soup to have only one piece of meat or fish. Or for his dough, famously called swallow, to appear miserly…the cost of living crisis is finally driving the point home!

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an image of a man in a suit pushing a boulder designed with a senegalese flag down a cliff

Sall Taking ECOWAS from Frying Pan to Fire

Africa /

A politically unstable Senegal is the last thing that the community needs at this time. Of course, it’s unlikely that the situation in Senegal will feature at the ECOWAS meeting, where an allegiance of hypocrisy, elegantly called the principle of “non-interference”, forbids members from telling one another the truth…Tinubu, who promised to promote a coup-free region when he assumed office as chair of ECOWAS last year, cannot afford another country added to the regional coup belt. He needs to pull Sall’s ear, behind closed doors, and ask him to stop playing games

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