Nigeria is an energy starved nation. Imagine a country in the 21st century with over 200 million people and an unstable power supply. It's a recipe for backwardness. It is also a sad commentary on the failure of successive governments over a hundred years. No wonder the hum of progress is too often drowned out by the silence of power outages.
Today, homes flicker into darkness, businesses grind to a halt, and dreams of economic growth stall in the face of an unreliable electricity grid. The numbers paint a grim picture. Nigeria generates a mere 6,000 megawatts (MW) of electricity against an estimated demand of 40,000 MW needed for a stable, nationwide supply.
Whistleblowing is steadily growing to become the dominant theme in ethics literature. It has earned a prime position as a forceful vehicle not only for delivering clarity and openness in workplace culture, but also for defining responsible behaviour expected of an individual.
On a wider scale, whistleblowing has shaped up to become a democratic accountability tool, and a check on secrecy and abuse of power in many different contexts.
Will it be eureka for Nigerians the day after, or will the hopes, expectations and aspirations of February 25th turn to frustrations, disappointment and disillusionment in the weeks ahead?
First, will the election be free, fair and credible? Will the results stand or will we have another June 12 fiasco on the horizon? Who will win between Nigeria and the politicians? Will the outcome beget peace, unity in diversity and wholesale transformation? Highly unlikely.
The amount of queueing Nigerians have been subjected to in the last couple of weeks is unprecedented. It is equally unbecoming. It's almost like the country had gone back four decades.
Fights have broken out in queues at bank facilities, filling stations and INEC and LGAs offices across the country. There are trending videos of people stripping naked in protest inside banking halls, others hitting each other with queue dividers and one person has been confirmed dead inside a banking hall, somewhere in Asaba. Nigerians born in the 2000s, GenZs, should be forgiven for thinking the end of the world is here.
The minister of communications is out to strip the NCC of its powers, reckons Sonny Aragba-Akpore.
After reading and re-reading Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, searching for the fate that awaits telecommunications regulator, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) is not difficult to decipher.
