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Joel Oyeyinka Popoola: The Technological Democrat
By Eric Elezuo
“Across the world, democracy is changing forever, and Nigeria is no different. Voters expect to have more influence on politics than our traditional representative democracy can necessarily accommodate. As a result, voters are either defecting to anti- establishment parties or becoming more and more attracted by direct action.
“People’s political priorities and motivations are becoming more and more disparate and unpredictable, and politicians are clearly failing to ascertain what voters really want.”- Oyeyinka Popoola
The world of men of ideas is ruled by dedication, commitment, unwavering focus and total achievement. This is the world of Mr. Joel Oyeyinka Popoola, the founder of Rate Your Leader Ltd and Co- Founder of Aacle Ltd, who was motivated by the above to give to the world a first class app to bridge the gap between politicians and electorate.
Popoola, fondly called Joel or Yinka by well wishers, grew up in Gbongan, where he had his primary and post primary education, beginning with St Paul’s Anglican Primary School before proceeding to Gbongan Community High School.
A British Citizen of Nigerian decent, Popoola studied Accounting with background in Banking, Finance and Insurance. He is also a Masters degree holder in Managerial Psychology obtained from the University of Ibadan, Nigeria’s Premier University. Here is a man whose penchant for knowledge in an ever competitive world propelled him into the IT world where he has practiced professional software testing consultancy spanning a period of four uninterrupted and highly productive and eventful years.
Popoola, Luke Graham MP, and Alan at All Party Parliamentary China Group, House of Commons Dinner
His earliest career path saw him traversing through two superior finanacial institutions based in his home country, Nigeria; they are United Bank for Africa (UBA) and the former Intercontinental Bank, which is today a part of the ever growing Access Bank. These institutions sharpened, shaped and honed his professional skills and grounded him in distinguishing Leadership roles with excellent service delivery in Banking Operations, Customer Care Management, Branch Start-up and Management, Relationship Management, Business Development, Risk Management and Information Technology.
Passionate about delivering exceptional services and standards within the un-compromised confines of policies and procedures in the achievement of high-demanding objectives and corporate targets, Popoola who lives permanently in England, has not forgotten that charity begins at home. He brings this phenomenon to life with his constant thoughts directed at events on the home front, especially the forthcoming general elections which is just a few weeks away. His desire to see the execution of the best of elections led to the creation of the Nigeria Democracy App, Rate Your Leader. This is a technology dedicated to correcting the inability and unwillingness of social media giants to crack down on bots and trolls, which inadvertently has had an adverse effect on their users, politicians and even global democracy.
Popoola’s consistency has over the years engendered his capabilities to not only execute his deliverables, but to also exceed expectations in doing so. He is such a force to reckon with.
Probably proper to refer to him as a man who saw tomorrow, Popoola is using his technology to connect politicians with verified local electors using abuse-proof technology aims to ‘Take back democracy with technology.
Mr Popoola and wife
Hear him: “Around the world, from Trump supporters in America to Gillets Jaunes in France to Brexit supporters in the UK, people are feeling more and more out of touch with politics, and it’s only a matter of time before a similar apathy descends on Nigeria. One in three Nigerians uses Facebook; and technology offers the opportunity to connect politicians and people like never before. That dichotomy is driven by social media giants being unwilling, unable or both to effectively crack down on trolls and bots.”
Helen Goodman, MP Bishop Auckland and Mr Popoola at House of Commons All Party Parliamentary China Group Dinner
He stated further, “Democracy is now digital, which means social media companies have a responsibility to provide a safe space for both politicians and our democracy and they are evidently failing on both fronts. As a result, a troubling amount of our political debate in other parts of the world is dominated by Russian trolls and computerised bots while actual politicians are forced off social media by 21 st century pitchfork-wielding mobs. That cannot be right.”
Popoola’s ingenuity sets standard in celebrating knowledge based on proven integrity towards rekindling an abuse-proof digital platform which connects voters and politicians. He has personally urged electorate to embrace new technology to ‘take back democracy’ or risk the downside.
Mr. Popoola, wife and children
The Rate Your Leader app is a global online platform which helps politicians engage only with voters in their constituencies in an abuse-proof way and allows elected leaders to truly understand what matters most to the people who elect them while allowing local people to identify and contact their representatives at the touch of a button, direct from their phones or tablets. That is ingenuity at the highest level.
He noted: “Since Twitter, Facebook and others are not stepping up to the plate on this, we clearly need new democratic tech which allows genuine residents to interact with their elected officials in an abuse-proof way. Our Rate Your Leader technology can do it, so why can’t the tech giants? The technology allows elected leaders to truly understand what matters most to the people who elect them while allowing local people to identify and contact their representatives at the touch of a button, direct from their phones or tablets. The app, which also allows people to check if they are registered to vote and identify their elected representatives at the touch of a button, is free to download from the App store and other app marketplaces.”
Rt. Honourable John Bercow, The Speaker of House of Commons and Mr Popoola, at the Northumberland Police and Crime Commissioner’s Annual Lecture
Consequently, as many that has lost faith in their representatives has just got their faith rekindled. The tech-preneur quoted a research from YouGov, an international Internet-based market research and data analytics firm, headquartered in the UK, with operations across the world, which declared that only 18% of voters trust politicians to ‘do what is right’, with 66% believing their elected officials put personal interest before communal interest.
With the CEO of NHS at 2018 Director of the Year Award
This decline in faith in traditional politics, he said, has coincided with the election of explicitly anti-establishment leaders in the United States, Brazil, Mexico, the Philippines and India, the result of the Brexit referendum the UK and in the case of the Gillets Jaunes, Paris, direct action on the streets. The Rate Your Leader has practically eased the distrust, thanks to the foresightedness of Mr. Popoola.
Popoola has set a personal and professional value-chain of goals, and has a proven track-record of adding value and raising the bar through unfettered contribution of significant milestones to business performance.
R-L Tope, Jeff and Mr. Popoola
The achiever is a member of Tech London Advocates, and an Advance Member of The Institutes of Directors, and is totally, passionately and irrevocably committed to working with positive-minded people in creating a better world.
Stephen Hepburn MP, Jarrow Constituency and Joel Popoola at the House of Commons
Mr Popoola is married to Dr. Olusola Popoola nee Awomolo, and they are blessed with two lovely children Praise and Ife.
Sir, for your dexterity and can do attitude, you are our Boss of the Week. Congratulations!
Former Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai on Thursday noted that if he were in the President Bola Tinubu-led government, his remarks about the administration would remain unchanged.
This was in his response to the President’s Special Adviser on Policy Communications, Daniel Bwala.
El-Rufai had described the state of governance and opposition in the country as a “national emergency” at a national conference in Abuja on strengthening democracy in Nigeria on Monday.
The former governor also lamented the lack of internal democracy and active party structures within the All Progressives Congress, saying, “I no longer recognise the APC. No party organ has met in two years—no caucus, no NEC, nothing. You don’t even know if it is a one-man show; it’s a zero-man show.’
In its response, the ruling APC knocked El-Rufai, as it accused him of treachery over how he had been dragging the Federal Government and the ruling party recently.
This prompted Bwala’s question to the APC chieftain via his X handle, saying, “My Senior brother if you were to be in the government and cabinet, would you have held and expressed the same position?
On Thursday, the former governor, via his X handle, asserted his stance, as he called out “latter-day converts” to the Tinubu administration for insisting he wanted to serve as a minister in the current government.
“Good morning, #BwalaDaniel, I was cabinet minister 22 years ago and was clear to Asiwaju that I was not interested in any position in his future government. The pathetic manner all of you latter-day converts to the Tinubu government make an issue of something that I never wanted in the first place is perhaps a reflection of the level of your moral flexibility.
“If I had remained in the Tinubu government, I will say or do the same on the tragedy within a party I was a founder, and the government that emerged from it – first in private sessions with those concerned, and then go public if no remedial actions are taken. Go and check my public service record from 1998.
“I am only responding to you because I still think you are a decent person who may need a job, and not in the class of Wendell Simlin and that Kaduna pretender that our voters retired in 2019 – these clowns are political mercenaries that receive humongous monthly stipends from the security vote to be the first to jump on X and other platforms to defend everything the Asiwaju government does or fails to do, no matter how indefensible it may be.
“Enjoy your special adviser position, my brother, but remember that allegiance to God and country comes first in the human scale of accountability, before any person or authority.”
In line with Prof Afe Babalola’s promise to forgive defamation charge against Lagos-based lawyer and author, Mr. Dele Farotimi, the Federal High Court sitting in Ado Ekiti, Ekiti State, has struck out the criminal charge filed by the police against Farotimi.
Justice Babs Kuewumi struck out the charge following an application by the police prosecutor, Samson Osobu, to withdraw the case.
Osobu told the court that the prosecution had filed a notice of discontinuance.
He said: “The matter is slated for hearing today, but we have filed a notice of discontinuance dated January 29, 2025, and filed this morning”.
Predictably, Farotimi’s team of lawyers, led by Adeyinka Olumide-Fusika (SAN), raised no objection.
That paved the way for Justice Kuewumi to strike out the case, with the judge declaring: “This case is hereby struck out.”
Outside the courtroom, Olumide-Fusika told journalists that the case has been concluded in this particular court but declined to comment on related matters pending in other courts.
He also said that he advised Farotimi against granting press interviews on the matter.
Meanwhile, another criminal charge filed by the police against Farotimi is pending before the Magistrate Court also in Ado-Ekiti.
The case before Magistrate Abayomi Adeosun was adjourned to February 13, 2025, and it is expected that the police will also move to discontinue proceedings in that court and withdraw the charge.
There are also civil cases against Farotimi pending before the FCT High Court, Abuja, the Ogun State High Court, Oyo State High Court, and Rivers State High Court which were filed by lawyers in the Afe Babalola Chambers in those states.
Some of the courts had granted interim orders restraining Farotimi or any person acting through him from further printing, publication and sale of his book titled: “Nigeria and its Criminal Justice System”.
It is not yet clear whether those cases will also be discontinued.
Detained leader of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, has dragged the Nigeria Police Force Public Relations Officer, ACP Olumuyiwa Adejobi, to court for accusing the group of killings in Imo State and other parts of the South-East region.
In the libel suit filed before the FCT High Court in Abuja on Tuesday by his legal team led by his Special Counsel, Aloy Ejimakor, Kanu is demanding N20 billion in damages as well as a retraction of the accusations.
The IPOB leader also warned that any security agency or individual directly or indirectly peddling propaganda against IPOB will be sued to compel such an entity or individual to come to court and present their evidence.
Ejimakor who shared details of the suit on his X account on Tuesday night, stated that the detained IPOB leader accused Adejobi of defaming him by calling him and IPOB a terrorist and a terrorist group in a media publication by Vanguard Newspaper on January 25, 2025, titled, “Imo: Police neutralise six IPOB/ESN terrorists, recover arms”.
The lawyer said it was out of place for the police spokesman to label Kanu a terrorist or IPOB a terrorist group as, according to him, a competent high court had held in October 2022 that the Federal Government breached the Constitution in labeling IPOB a terrorist group and that the group was discriminatorily targeted because its membership is populated by the Igbo.
He said, “Earlier today, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu’s legal team issued a Writ of Summons against ACP OLUMUYIWA ADEJOBI, the Police Public Relations Officer in a Suit for defamation brought on behalf of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu,” Ejimakor wrote.
“The Suit was filed at the FCT high court for ACP Adejobi’s widely published defamatory utterances, claiming that those killed by police in Owerri three days ago are IPOB members.
“In issuing instructions to file this suit, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu made it very clear that any security agency and others engaging in media trial of his person (directly or indirectly) or peddling propaganda against IPOB will be sued to enable such an entity come to court to present their evidence.
“This is especially compelling as these false narratives can turn prejudicial against Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and the IPOB which still have pertinent cases pending in court.
“To this end, media houses are hereby encouraged to verify the accuracy of these anti-IPOB, anti-Nnamdi Kanu, anti-Igbo defamatory statements issuing from security agencies that beat their chests and leave the uncanny impression that they are somehow benefiting from stoking insecurity and panic by way of needless propaganda.
“For avoidance of doubt, a competent high court had held in October 2022 that the Federal Government blatantly breached the Constitution in tagging IPOB a terrorist group and that the group was discriminatorily targeted because its membership is populated by the Igbo.
“Therefore, this tendency by security agencies to tag every criminal element encountered in Southeast as IPOB must stop forthwith. If it does not, we shall take prompt vigorous legal steps to protect the name of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and that of Ndigbo who are collectively defamed by this false and libelous narrative.
“To keep tagging every criminal encountered in Southeast as IPOB exhibits a false narrative that defames not only Nnamdi Kanu but the entire Igbo.
“The statements are false and constitute a grave libel on his person, as the words in their natural and ordinary meaning portray him as a leader of a violent and terrorist group.
“The said words in their natural and ordinary meaning were meant and were understood to mean that the Claimant is in fact a leader of a terrorist movement that is to be vicariously blamed for alleged acts of terrorism in Imo State.
“That the words were meant to call into question the Claimant’s honesty, personal integrity and reputation.
“That the Claimant states that these defamatory and libelous statements go far beyond fair comment and are malicious and are designed specifically to impugn his person and character and they were made in bad faith.
“Kanu, therefore, prayed the court for a declaration that Adejobi’s published statements or utterances are libelous and defamatory.
“He also sought an order of this Honourable Court directing the Defendant to retract the said publications through other publications through the same media by way of issuance of another press statement.
“An Order of this Honorable Court directing the Defendant to write and deliver to the Claimant, an unreserved letter of apology. The letter of apology shall be prominently and boldly published full-page in three (3) national dailies, namely: then SUN, Daily Trust and Vanguard.
“An Order of perpetual injunction restraining the Defendant from further and forever uttering the said defamatory and libelous words about or concerning the Claimant.
“An Order of this Honorable Court directing the Defendant to pay to the Claimant the sum of N20,000,000,000 being general and exemplary damages.
“An Order of this Honorable Court directing the Defendant to pay the cost of this Suit.”
Source: Ripples
