Makinde: Oyo State is primed to become West Africa’s tourism hub - ITREALMS

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Governor ‘Seyi Makinde has declared that Oyo State is on a definitive path to becoming the tourism capital of South-West Nigeria, citing a strategic shift from "personality-driven" projects to "system-driven" governance, reports ITREALMS.

Speaking on Wednesday at the International Tourism Summit Oyo State 2026, held at the University of Ibadan, Makinde emphasized that his administration has spent years laying the groundwork through infrastructure, security, and policy institutionalization to ensure the sector outlives his tenure.

When loans become surveillance & Nigeria’s regulatory triangle by Remmy Nweke -WeekendDigits@ITREALMS

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Nigeria’s regulators, FCCPC, NCC, and NDPC, unite to curb data abuse by digital lending apps. WeekendDigits@ITREALMS with REMMY NWEKE explores how everyday loans turned into surveillance, and how the regulatory triangle fights back.

Preamble:
Madam Lizzy only wanted a quick loan.
The advert promised “instant approval, no paperwork.” Out of curiosity, she downloaded the app, requested ₦1 million, and within hours, the funds appeared. She repaid before the due date—relieved and impressed.

Then the calls began:
Every morning, a strange number flashed on her screen: “Madam, you are yet to pay your loan.” She explained repeatedly that the debt was settled, yet the messages multiplied short messaging service (SMS) reminders, WhatsApp texts, even phone calls from aggressive “customer agents” threatening to contact her friends and family.

EDITORIAL: When hospitals become graveyards: The shame of UNTH, Enugu - ITREALMS

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The death of Mrs. Charity Unachukwu at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH), Enugu, after what her family describes as 12 hours of bureaucratic delay and neglect, is more than a personal tragedy. It is a mirror held up to Nigeria, reflecting the decay of our health system and the betrayal of citizens by institutions meant to preserve life.

Hospitals are supposed to be sanctuaries of healing. Instead, stories like Charity’s turn them into graveyards where negligence, incompetence, and indifference claim more lives than the ailments patients bring. It is telling and damning, that testimonies of other families quickly followed, each recounting a similar experience of abandonment at UNTH. This is no coincidence. It is a pattern.

Dangote: Nigeria can become a refining hub - ITREALMS

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Nigeria must enhance its crude oil production capacity and effectively manage its crude supply to ensure adequate feedstock for domestic refineries, in order to transit from a net importer to a net exporter of petroleum products.

Chairman of Dangote Refinery and Petrochemicals Company Limited, Aliko Dangote, made this assertion during his keynote address at a summit held in Lagos by the Crude Oil Refinery Owners Association of Nigeria (CORAN). The event attracted top government officials and key stakeholders from the midstream and downstream sectors.

Adeleke narrates ordeal to become governor - ITREALMS

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The Executive Governor of Osun State, Senator Ademola Adeleke has urged young people to be focus on their goals in life, noting that the deciding factor in achieving one's dream is being determined.

Governor Adeleke gave the charge on Sunday in his remark at the Adeleke university convocation in Ede, Osun state, narrating the journey he endured to reach his current status as a governor in Nigeria.

Nigeria: May our renewed hope not become renewed captivity - ITREALMS

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Forces that have kept Nigeria in chains are stronger than the Prince of Persia that withheld Daniel's answers for 21 days.

Tell me how else to describe the frustration faced by candidates who seek redress in court after INEC had declared winners in an election fraught with bare-faced irregularities and deliberate manipulations?

28 Nigerian scientists become fellows of ASI – ITREALMS

ITREALMS:

Twenty-Eight Nigerian scientists and technologists have become fellows of the African Scientific Institute (ASI), reports ITREALMS.

ASI, ITREALMS gathered is made up of scientists and technologists of African descent in the diaspora who have distinguished themselves and recently become Fellows of the institute.

President and CEO, African Scientific Institute, Lee O. Cherry made this disclosure to ITREALMS, saying the membership is now 1,053 with the latest ASI fellows from 56 countries globally.

“We now have 1,053 ASI Fellows from 56 countries, namely (Algeria, Angola, Barbados, Benin, Botswana, Brazil, Burkina-Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Colombia, Congo-Brazzaville, Congo-Kinshasa, Cote d'Ivoire, Cuba, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, England, Eritrea, Ethiopia, France, Gambia, Germany, Ghana, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Kenya, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Reunion, Rwanda, Sao Tome, Sierra Leone, Senegal,Seychelles, South Africa, Sudan, Suriname, Swaziland, Tanzania, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Uganda, United States, Zambia, Zimbabwe).,” he said.

The President also said that the “Black Achievers in Science and Technology", an ASI Fellows Directory is now available,”

Below is the list of the latest members of ASI as obtained by ITREALMS

New ASI Fellows in September 2018 include:

* Petrina Johannes, Ph.D. (Namibia): Civil and Environmental Engineering
* Aggrey B. Nyende, Ph.D. (Kenya): Agricultural Science (Plant breeding and Genetics)
* Abdulahi Bala, Ph.D. (Nigeria): Vice Chancellor, Federal University of Technology: Agricultral Sciences
* Chinedum Nwajiuba, Ph.D. (Nigeria): Vice Chancellor, Federal University; Agricultral Science
* Zerihun Assefa, Ph.D. (Ethiopia/USA): Chair, University Dept. of Chemistry
* Sodienye Augustine Abere, Ph.D. (Nigeria): Head, University Department of Forestry and Environment; Forestry and Wildlife
* Saidel Laine, Ph.D. (Haiti/USA): Anesthesiologist
* Vincent G. J. Rodgers, Ph.D. (USA): Theoretical Particle Physics; String Theory
* James Musa Adejo, Ph.D. (Nigeria): Head, University Department of Science Education
* Justin Ballenger, Ph.D. (USA): STEM Education; Mathematics
* Benjamin Oyelami, Ph.D. (Nigeria): Mathematics
* Tony Mitchell, Ph.D. (USA): Electrical and Computer Engineering
* Elayne Arrington, Ph.D. (USA): Mathematics
* Valerie Bennett, Ph.D. (USA): Robotics
* Solomon Nwaka, Ph.D. (Nigeria/Ethiopia): Executive Director, African Network for Drugs and Diagnostics Innovation (ANDI) in United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS)
* John Gyapong, Ph.D. (Ghana): Epidemiology
* Lonnie G. Johnson (USA): Engineering
* Thomas O. Mensah (USA): Chemical Engineering
* Philip W. Phillips, Ph.D. (USA): Physics
* Cheryl L. Shavers (USA): Chemistry
* Stacey Simon-Slijepcevic, Ph.D. (USA): Plant Pathology

New ASI Fellows in August 2018 include:

* Berhanu M. Abegaz, Ph.D. (Ethiopia/Botswana/Kenya): Executive Director of the African Academy of Sciences (AAS); Chemistry
* Anthony Adade, Ph.D. (USA): University CIO: IT Management
* Perkins Muredzi, Ph.D. (Zimbabwe): Food Science and Technology
* Helen Jackson, Ph.D. (USA): Research Physics; Data Science
* Joslin A. Dogbe, M.D. (Ghana): Paediatric Neurologist; Public Health
* Wilhelm Sterlin (Haiti/USA): Mechanical Engineering; Technology Management
* Festus E. Ogbeide (Nigeria/USA): Civil Engineering
* Jamie Bracey, Ph.D. (USA): University Director of STEM Education, Outreach & Research
* Donna Stokes, Ph.D. (USA): Physics (Magnetism)
* Zipporah Ali, M.D. (Kenya): Palliative Care Doctor; Executive Director of Kenya Hospices and Palliative Care Association (KEHPCA).
* Carla J. Bell, Ph.D. (USA): University Dean and professor of architecture
* Treena L. Arinzeh, Ph.D. (USA): Biomedical Engineering
* Kokou Yano L. D. Abalo, Ph.D. (Sao Tome/USA): Mathematics
* Michael Smith, Ph.D. (USA) Deputy Executive Director, Internal Operations at the National Consortium for Graduate Degrees for Minorities in Engineering and Science (GEM); Chemical Engineering
* Samuel Achilefu, Ph.D. (USA): Radiology, Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics, & Biomedical Engineering
* Viola L. Acoff, Ph.D. (USA): Materials Engineering
* Caesar R. Jackson, Ph.D. (USA): Physics
* Stephanie G. Adams, Ph.D. (USA): Dean of Old Dominion University's Frank Batten College of Engineering and Technology; Interdisciplinary Engineering
* Frederick Addai, Ph.D. (Ghana): Cell Biology and Anatomy
* Kendall Harris, Ph.D., P.E. (USA): Mechanical Engineering
* Patrick Adjei, Ph.D. (Ghana): Neuroscience
* Daniel L. Akins, Ph.D. (USA): Chemistry
* Allison A. Aldridge, Ph.D. (USA): Chemistry
* Maydianne Andrade, Ph.D. (Jamaica/Canada): Biology
* Bill Smoot (USA): Company Vice President Engineering & Technology
* Kevin D. Apperson (USA): Chief Information Officer at Corp. Healthcare Services; IT and Electrical Engineering
* Avery August, Ph.D. (USA): Microbiology and Immunology
* Jill Bargonetti-Chavarria, Ph.D. (USA): Biology; Cancer Research
* Anthony Belvin, Ph.D. (USA): Mechanical Engineering
* Karen King, Ph.D. (USA): Director of Research for the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics
* Wayne L. Bethea, Ph.D. (USA); Computer Science
* Billyde Brown, Ph.D. (USA): Nanomaterials and Nanotechnology
* Paulette Kumi, M.D. (Ghana): Physician
* Edward Layne, M.D. (USA): Gastroenterologist
* Evan Thomas, Ph.D. (USA): Solid State Inorganic Chemistry
* Gregory Yawson, Ph.D. (USA): Industrial Analytical Chemistry/Chemical Metrology

Others can be find here:

Nenye Dom/GEE

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MDAs: ATM machines for political elites - Bishop Kukah

EpiscopalSermon@ITREALMS:

The Easter message to Mr. President, and Nigerians et al by Bishop Matthew Hassan KUKAH, Sokoto Diocese. 

Excerpts

"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity…" WB Yeats(1865-1939)

This is no ordinary Easter, Mr. President because these are no ordinary times for our country, Nigeria, over which you preside.

I know that in your Easter Messages, you, the Senate President, the Speaker and our Governors, will all exhort Nigerians with the usual moral platitudes encouraging us to live by the teachings of Jesus Christ, to love one another, to embrace peace and live in unity. Good talk, but, as you must know very well, most ordinary citizens will say that love, tolerance and a sense of community seem to be in exile or in suspended animation in Nigeria.

Mr. President, I have decided to speak to a cross section of Nigerians, beginning with you and going right down to the many nameless men and women who do not even qualify to be classified as the ordinary man in the street because they live on water and have no streets on which to walk. I believe that this country is so split both vertically and horizontally today that all of us must honestly identify our many sins of omission and commission so that we can honestly seek a solution. This is a time for us to genuinely face what looks to me like an impending calamity. The gathering clouds are clear for us to see and even those who cannot see can hear the rumbling and rolling sound of thunder. We ignore them at our own risk. I therefore state as follows:

1. To President Muhammadu Buhari:
You know Sir, that you rode into town like a knight in shining armour, carrying the joys, pains, anxieties and fears of a people whose broken dreams had littered and turned the landscape into a kaleidoscopic scenery of desolation and despair. In your campaigns, you had promised to restore a sense of national pride in us by slaying the dragon of corruption, banishing the retrogressive scourge of Boko Haram, bringing back our daughters from Chibok and making our country and citizens truly safe.

We waited in hope right to the end of the first year, but somehow, amidst some hazy weather, all we heard was the sound of screeching tyres with the plane carrying our hopes seemingly unable to take off. It finally did but we had barely gained altitude when sickness struck and you spent the better part of a year seeking healing. The nation prayed for you and miraculously, you recovered. Evidently, you had been saved for a purpose. Our prayer is that this realization will help you understand that you have a date with history and divine judgment.

For now, before your eyes and in your hands, our country, our communities, our people are all in a state of stupor. We have never felt so alienated from one another. The bogeyman of religion, region and ethnicity, which we thought we had overcome by the sheer nature of your support base, have come back with a vengeance to haunt and threaten the very foundation of our existence. Mr. President, you are too distant from your people. There is a sad feeling that you do not share in the pain and suffering of your people. You must very quickly find a way of connecting with your people before the devil takes over the space. For taking on this challenge and connecting with Nigerians, happy Easter.

2. To the Political Class:
To Governors, Legislators, Senators, and all who are actively engaged in Politics: Please recall that Nigerians have over the years struggled for the building of a democratic, free and egalitarian society. You who are in politics today are beneficiaries of the sacrifices of those who have gone before you.
The nation has not been able to develop a political culture due to the disruptive nature of the political process marred by corruption and violence. Years of military rule have diminished our appreciation of Democracy.

The average age of Governors and Legislators across the country is 50. These are the years of dreams, maturity, sacrifice, patriotism and self-giving. But, sadly, you do not seem to be ready to depart from the culture of cronyism, prebendalism and primitive accumulation. The result has been ruination and decay.

I appeal to you to please abandon the spirit of selfish accumulation and embrace the principles of integrity and genuine service of our country. Do not let this country collapse in your hands. For accepting to make some sacrifice, respect and listen to our people, a happy Easter.

3. To the Political Parties:
Political parties ought to provide the vital foundation stones and building blocks for institutions through which political actors must graduate. It is here that new entrants learn the fine moral principles and ideologies that underpin the Parties. Sadly, there are no Parties in Nigeria. We have only rickety and disposable contraptions put together for state capture. No sooner does this happen that the actors go their way and the circles of frustration return. This explains the debilitating culture of political incoherence and dissonance in our country.

The Parties have become notorious conveyor belts and incubators of hatred, intolerance and corruption of the worst kind, even against their own members. For now, the political parties seem determined to rely on both Federal and State Government and Institutions to serve as their ATM machines. Tragically, this is why politics is toxic and totally unattractive to people of honour.

I want to call on Parties and their leaders to become true to their political claims as expressed in their Manifestoes, reduce the culture of godfatherism, and focus on building the foundation of a strong political culture. Political parties must reduce their adversarial proclivities and focus on patriotic bipartisan areas of co-operation so as to hold our country together. Our people are dying daily across party lines. For agreeing to make Political parties more respectable, a happy Easter.

4. To the Religious Leaders:
We are all custodians of the faith and trust of our people. Sadly, we have proved to be as divided as the people we are supposed to lead. We have been seduced by powerful politicians and have allowed politics to corrupt the sacred spaces of religion. Thus we have lost our voices and no longer seem to have the capacity to interrogate power, as we are called to do.

Religious leaders have fallen to the temptation to present their Churches and Mosques as platforms for partisanship. No divinely inspired religion can pretend that there is no distinction between religion and politics. Unless we are in a theocracy, no Church or Mosque can have its entire people with the same political affiliations.

Religious leaders must avoid the temptation of being seduced by filthy lucre and power for personal or any other gain. We must seek the collective welfare of our people and develop a culture of neutrality that can inspire the confidence in our people in the power of religion to change society so that the common good is always sought and promoted. For seriously rethinking our role in moulding our society, a happy Easter.

5. To the Ordinary people of Nigeria:
The men and women in power who pretend to represent you, call you the masses. The politicians, the business men/women, the religious leaders, all claim to act on your behalf.

But you yourself ,no matter how rich or poor, how educated or otherwise you are, have a duty to understand that God has plans for you and for every individual and you have a duty to both yourself and your neighbour. You have to defend your personal dignity and seek the enforcement of your rights to have property and to raise a family as opposed to waiting for the crumbs from our greedy leaders.

Defend your dignity as human beings and children of God. Do not allow the rich and powerful, who are rich because you are poor, to divide you. They have light and water in their high fenced houses not because they ared Muslims or Christians or that they are from this or that or the other tribe but simply because they are rich. You are poor, homeless, have no road, no water, and your children are sick and illiterate, not because you are Christian or Muslim or from this tribe or the other, but simply because you are poor. You and your children vote, but their children do not vote because they are abroad. Your children beg and die on the streets while their children are abroad fraternizing with those they call infidels. They give you a fake religion that enslaves you while they give their own children the religion of education that will liberate them and make them rule over you.

Rise and defend your right to food and shelter because poverty is not a divine inheritance. Easter teaches us the message of love and of gentleness and of true strength. It tells us that to defend oneself does not mean to turn to violence or to any other misdeed or evil. But it means to recognize one’s dignity as a child of God and remember that each one is created and called to enjoy the fullness of life. Easter means to recognise one’s right to be considered and respected, it means being determined to stand up for what is right and just, it means being strong and steadfast, full of hope and full of love, both for oneself and for others. For deciding today to shake off the shackles of bondage and free yourselves so as to secure your future and your family, a happy Easter.

6. To God the creator and maker of the world:
God our Father, creator of Heaven and earth, we thank you for our dear country Nigeria. You have given us so much, but like selfish animals in a pool of water, our leaders drink and mess up the water for those coming behind them. We thank you for the gift of Easter and other religious feasts. These feasts have been emptied of their moral content because our people only see them as dates on their social calendars. Please forgive us and let us turn to you.

Lord God of Heaven and earth, so many of our children and our parents have died senseless deaths. Rather than worry that they are burying their children, our elders are busy with other ideas, denying sins that they themselves have committed against you and our dear country. We beg you to overlook their excesses and grant them forgiveness. But, please heal our country.

The forces of evil cannot have the last say. Please protect our country because no human army can do this. No power on earth can protect us except you. We are sorry for destroying our country through our collective greed. We stand before you in sorrow and ask for your mercy and forgiveness. The ship of our state is being tossed in the winds, but we know you will save us. Please save our dear country from the grip of evil forces.

Finally Lord, we commit all our children into your hands. Save them from the hands of marauders who continue to prey on them. Help, guide and protect our children, especially our daughters, who, even in their innocence carry the seeds of the promise of tomorrow. Our daughters in Chibok are still in your hands as well as our dear daughter Leah. 

Bring them back home, O God. Leah has defied the forces of evil and her innocent courage is a sure sign that our dream for a new dawn is not empty. Raise up more Leahs for us so that our future can be guaranteed. 

Thank you, Father, and please forgive us our sins. Show our leaders the way, convert them to yourself. 

For a united Nigeria, happy Easter.

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Become media entrepreneurs, alumni tell MAPOLY students

ITRealms:

The 1992 set of the Association of Mass Communication Students of the Moshood Abiola Polytechnic, Abeokuta, Ogun State have told the Mass Communication students of the institution to explore how to become media entrepreneurs instead of looking for white-collar jobs.

Officials and members of the set, known as AMACOS ’92, said this on Tuesday when they came to their alma mater, which was known as Ogun State Polytechnic during their time in the school, for a mentoring programme in the department.

The association, during the programme, taught the students practical aspects of public relations, advertising, print journalism, broadcast journalism and blogging to mark their 25 years post-graduation anniversary from the institution.

The programme, which had as theme: “Classroom Experience and Post-Classroom Reality,” was held at the auditorium of the Mass Communication Department.

It had in attendance the Rector, MAPOLY, Prof. Oludele Itiola; the Director, School of Communications and Information Technology, Dr. Goke Raufu; the Head of Department, Kolawole Amos; and the Sub-Dean, Lekan Oketokun.

An alumnus and Founder, Rave FM 93.7, Osogbo, Osun State, Femi Adefila, who spoke on: “How to become a successful media entrepreneur,” told the students that the days of white-collar jobs were gone, advising them to develop the mentality of job creators.

Adefila urged them to have the “can-do spirit” because, according to him, nothing is impossible.

"You must be pregnant with ideas and deliver it. You should dream big and always think out of the box. At times, there may not even be any box,” he stated.

Another alumnus and Editor, Nigerian Tribune, Debo Abdulai, who spoke on: “How a journalist can remain relevant in today's newspaper world,” noted that for a journalist to stand out, he or she must be creative and constantly seek knowledge by reading wide.

Abdulai also listed adaptability, carving a niche for oneself, taking initiatives, integrity and nurturing relationship as some of the ingredients that would make the students relevant in the media practice after leaving school.

He noted that the media industry, especially print journalism, in the country was striking, as circulation had dropped, identifying online media as the biggest threat.

“Your success as a journalist isn't just dependent on the right skills and experience, it is dependent on you showing initiative. How you show initiative plays an active role in your career and it determines how far you will go in your career,” he said.

The Publisher, The Eagle Online, Dotun Oladipo, who spoke on online publishing, allayed the fears that online journalism might kill newspapers, arguing that newspapers would continue to survive despite the penetration of online media.

Oladipo challenge the students to start making money from their smart phones even while in school. 

The Vice-Chairman of AMACOS ’92, Adekunle Adeshina, speaking on public relations, urged the students to dare to be different in whatever they were involved in.

“Walk with confidence and engage in self improvement,” Adeshina said.

The “hairman of the set, Adekunle Adams, said the association in the past had donated equipment worth over N2 million to the department.

The ex-students equally donated a giant generator to the department on Tuesday.

Adams expressed the support of the set for the transformation of MAPOLY to a university of technology.

Appreciating the former students, the Rector, who was represented by Raufu, said the Department of Mass Communication was the flagship of the institution.

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