Category: Opinion

COMMUNICATION AS NATIONAL BRAND STRATEGY Beyond domestic governance, communication policy also affects how nations are perceived internationally. Countries today compete not only economically but also reputationally. Scholars such as Simon Anholt have demonstrated that national reputation, often referred to as nation branding, influences foreign investment, tourism, diplomacy, and global partnerships. Countries that manage their communication…

The Loyalist: A memoir of service and sacrifice by Bolaji Abdullahi is a riveting, thought-provoking work. A narrative cobbled together in a span of 287 pages, it is a book that not only provides the missing links to tissues of recent Nigerian political history, it breaks boundaries of assumptions, and explores the delicate frontiers of…

Our power minister, Adebayo Adelabu, is now mocked as the King of Darkness—Kábíyèsi Olókùnkùn. I laugh at his traducers. They are crowning the wrong monarch. The true emperor of darkness sits higher. For more than three years, the president has wandered luxuriantly through the bush of politics while abandoning the hard road of policy that…

In the chronicles of Nigeria’s struggle for democracy and the evolution of its media, Senator Ojudu Babafemi stands as a ‘guerrilla Journalist’ turned Statesman who has never lost his appetite for truth. A co-founder of The NEWS, PM News and Tempo magazine respectively, and a former Special Adviser to the President, his life is a…

I have spent time on the Third Floor of the United Nations Headquarters in New York, where the press corps works. It is not a gentle place. The journalists there are seasoned professionals drawn from every region of the world: people who have reported wars, corruption scandals, and the fall of governments. They are interested…

“When I posted the phrase “Shame of a Nation,” many people quickly rushed to their own conclusions. Some assumed that I was referring to someone called Bwala. Frankly, I do not know who he is, nor do I care about whatever he may have said or not said. Others assumed that I was speaking about…

There is a Yoruba saying that has stayed with me for a long time: “Igi kìí gbé abẹ́ igi kó di igi.” Literally translated, it means a tree growing under another tree cannot flourish to become a big tree. For years I have pondered over this proverb, reflecting on its deeper meaning. Recently, an experience…

Patty was in pain, deep searing pain. She was not supposed to be in this place, end up at this sorry pass. She gave Alhaji her all, the relationship her everything. Relationship? Was what they had even worth calling a relationship? Looking back from her balcony of grief, all she could see now was a…

I served in the North, Kebbi State to be precise. And I can boldly say I never, I repeat never, received half the insults I got yesterday from the Northerners. In my last post, I shared how I wanted to marry a Yoruba man 5years ago, but his mother refused because I am ‘Omo Ibo’….

Recent comments purportedly by Babajide Sanwo-Olu, the governor of Lagos State, that governments often struggle to communicate policies effectively should not come as a surprise. It is, in fact, an admission of a long-standing structural weakness in Nigeria’s governance architecture. And it’s something professionals in Marketing Communication have been advocating for years. I have written…