Reporting News and opinions
Nigeria is a federation. Federal agencies do not get to shut down state governments because they suspect something may have gone wrong with the books. Trail the money into private hands. Do not turn off the treasury. The courts, the governors’ forum and the plain language of the Constitution have already said as much. The only question left is how many more times the lesson must be repeated.
There is a clean, structural reason Nigerian election season feels less like a celebration of democracy and more like a high-stakes tactical thriller. We built an election system where the referee is hired by one of the teams, trained by one of the teams, and paid out of a purse controlled by one of the teams.
There is a specific, quiet corner in Abuja where Nigeria’s most brilliant ideas go to die. It isn’t marked by a monument, but by dust. It is the graveyard of panels, commissions, and committees a place where billions of Naira and thousands of hours of expert labor are neatly bound into volumes, submitted in front of flashing cameras, and promptly forgotten.
Nigeria's army has been described as mighty on paper many of its soldiers 'ghosts' who exist only on the payroll, much of its equipment stolen and sold to insurgents."The Economist, October 2021
FEC approvals typically involve Executive Council Memoranda (ECMs) submitted by Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs). Here’s the structured workflow:
Centre for Nigeria Progress 