In the second volume of our 'scam hall of fame' mini-series, we explore a classic Nigerian haux that might not have been the most daring or expensive, but was certainly the weirdest: the time Kwara State came up with the ingenious idea of importing white Zimbabwean farmers (along with tons of cows and machinery) ostensibly to set up commercial farms in the state. Now a decade after the farms were inaugurated -- with the forced displacement of thousands of indigenous Kwaran farmers -- and after millions of dollars of state investment, the majority of farms established by the white Zimbos have ..read more

We are joined once again by Ayo Ademiluyi (@ComAdemiluyi), the disputed Labour Party House of Reps candidate for Eti-Osa, Lagos, to discuss the LPs victory in his constituency. Having won the LP primaries for the position ahead of party's election victory in Eti-Osa, Ayo is now engaged in a legal battle against the 'substitution candidate' (@_JtAttah) imposed after the primaries. What is the status of Ayo's efforts to reclaim his mandate? What are the chances that Ayo will be sworn in as the National Representative for Eti-Osa come June? What, more generally, is the state of left entryism in t ..read more

In which we attempt to assess last weekend's governorship elections from the point of view of our regular thematic pre-occupations ..read more

In which we discuss the (s)election of a new president - not of the NLC, that's for later  - but of our glorious federal republic. In addition to offering various takes on the titular question, we also attempt to assess the reasons behind the historically low turnout of voters as well as how the Nigerian left should respond to plans by the main opposition parties to challenge the result in court ..read more

Coming back from our harmattan hiatus, we round out the presidential campaign  banter with a discussion about the naira scarcity: whether it really is engineered by 'the cabal' (per El Rufai's claim); how it might affect the election; and how an organized left would have responded to this moment.  ..read more

@dvmilola joined us for our second film review, this time about an authorized biopic centered on Nigeria's wannabe Pinochet and so called "evil genius", Ibrahim Badamisi Babangida. We disagree about whether the emerging sub-genre of historically-based Nollywood films should strive to be objective, but ultimately agree that IBB is one of the greatest scam artists in Nigerian history. We watched it so that you don't have to (spoilers herein contained, obviously). So enjoy.  And happy new year.  And and check out our Patreon for past and future exclusives ..read more

In this episode, we revisit the Cement Armada Scandal, which we consider one of the foundational scams of the Nigerian political economy. The scandal saw the newly oil-rich post-civil war Nigerian government bumble into ordering half of the world's concrete supply, by some estimates. The arrival of hundred of cement laden ships effectively shut down the ports in Lagos for over a year,  forcing the Nigerian government to pay huge fines to real and fictitious shipping companies as a result of the delays. Involving corrupt Nigerian officials, wily shipping companies, devious British MPs, a B ..read more

This episode draws out the key debates that came out of James Barnett's (@jh_barnett) reflections in our previous episode, centered on the findings of his in-person interviews with bandits in Zamfara. The full episode containing our earlier interview with James,  which was free-to-listen for a limited time , is now accessible via our Patreon — which you should check out. As usual, praise, reviews, feedback and (particularly) criticisms welcomed. Recent in-depth reporting on Banditry: Merchants Of Terror (2): Inside multi-million naira farming sustaining Nigeria’s terrorists ..read more

This week, we spoke with Kunle Wizeman Ajayi (@AjayiWizeman), former Lagos chair of the African Action Congress (AAC), about the AAC's ideology, 'structures', and electoral prospects.  We also talked through some of the possible limitations of the AAC's strategy as well as the party's plans to respond not only to the 'obidient wave', but also to the more established obstacles: APC and PDP.  One annoying issue with the recording (at least the first 10 minutes or so) is that the the mic kept picking up the vibration from Kunle's phone, as messages from AAC activists rolled in -- our si ..read more

In this episode, we spoke to radical ASUU member Temitope 'Maberu' Fagunwa (@RealMaberu), who is also an afrobeat musician, a pan-africanist and a history Lecturer at the University of Osun State, UNIOSUN.  We discussed the NLC solidarity protest and student support for the ASUU strike, the conditions of life for lectureres amidst such strikes, the possible elitism of ASUU's demands, and whether or not ASUU can play a wider vanguard role for Nigeria's working class movement. We also asked  Maberu about his 'Aluta' band and where his politics and music intersect.  One for the bo ..read more