News
Nigerian Leaders Must Communicate Directly with the People They Serve – Here is Why
By Joel Popoola
President Muhammadu Buhari must feel pretty awkward.
This week he travelled all the way to Paris to attend a conference which had already been cancelled.
Except, of course, he didn’t.
President Buhari actually travelled to France for a conference which went ahead as planned.
Not such a good story, right? Not one you would have shared online.
There is another African conference in Montpellier – 300km from Paris – which has been moved from July to October as a result of COVID-19 travel restrictions.
But conflating the two conferences is only relevant to the people who want to use online misinformation to mislead and inflame the Nigerian people, leading them to share false information amongst their friends and families.
Which they have done in their thousands.
But this is no surprise when people are trying to mislead them on an industrial scale.
Minister of Information and Culture Alhaji Lai Mohammed this week revealed that there are no less than 478 websites dedicated to pumping out propaganda designed to undermine faith in our political system, in his words “threatening the existence of the country”.
Nigeria’s digital infrastructure is improving all the time. We have seen plenty of evidence of that this week alone.
The Nigerian Communications agency has announced plans to accelerate the rollout of 5G – aiming to deploy the first network by the end of the year, placing us at the forefront of African technological progress. The NCC says this infrastructural investment will “improve the way Nigerians live and work” by advancing smart transportation, medicine, manufacturing and more.
Several states have also announced plans to use drone technology to delivery COVID-19 vaccines to rural communities in Kaduna and Cross River allowing people in 423 hard-to-reach areas to receive lifesaving vaccines in 30 minutes, when it would have taken 2 or 3 days to reach them by car.
Social media giant Twitter this week even announced that Nigeria will be one of the first nations on Earth to pioneer its proposed new voice messaging service.
And our start-up scene is getting so much international attention that even the global style magazine Vogue this week ran a feature on the “West African Tech boom”.
But whilst a recent Financial Times report highlighted our nation as the best in Africa to start a digital business, it also noted “Although Lagos is renowned for its start-up ecosystem, there is a significant disconnect between the city’s tech ecosystem, its surroundings and the wider country, which suffers from chronically poor infrastructure and education, and recurring political instability and security issues.”
But our digital intelligence has to evolve at the same rate as our digital infrastructure. And politicians must take responsibility for that.
At the digital democracy campaign I lead, our aim is to give politicians to keep in touch with their communities and converse directly with the people they serve.
We have created a free smartphone app called Rate Your Leader which puts verified voters in direct contact with the individual elected officials who represent them, creating a two-way communication channel in which voters can have their say on the things that matter most to them directly to the people who have the power to do something about them, and politicians can get important – and most importantly, accurate and honest – messages direct to their communities.
Not only does Rate Your Leader’s abuse-proof technology mean that all communication must be civil and courteous, the app also lets users rate the responsiveness and quality of the information they receive from local leaders, letting their friends, family and peers know that this is an information source they can trust – not to mention a politician worth voting for.
Let me be very clear. The Nigerian government – and politicians of all levels, political beliefs and ethnicities – make plenty of mistakes. Some of them even behave immorally, inappropriately and illegally.
But you will read about these wrongdoings in publications such as this one – often in columns written by me!
As our access to technology and information improves, we must ensure that our ability to tell fact from fiction keeps pace.
Politicians have a critical role to play in that taking advantage of the possibilities of the digital age to communicate directly with the people they serve, providing ready access to authoritative and credible information their residents may otherwise go without.
Joel Popoola is a Nigerian tech entrepreneur and digital democracy campaigner, and is creator of the Rate Your Leader app. He can be reached via @JOPoopola
By Henry Ukazu
Dear Destiny Friends,
The importance of timing cannot be overemphasized. Timing is everything in life. It is critical to one’s success. You can lose your money and get it back in many folds. You can even lose your health and get it back all things being equal, but when you lose time, you can hardly get it back again.
The importance of timing can be seen in crops. Every crop has a season, a good farmer won’t plant maize when it’s time for oranges, nor will he plant pears when it’s the season for mangoes.
Time is very instrumental to the success and failure of anyone. Imagine having a meeting or interview at 9:00am and you arrive at 10:10am, it will take the grace of God to be interviewed. As an employee, apart from one not being able to diligently do his job, one of the fastest ways for an employee to lose his job is by being late to work.
When I was in New York Law School studying Taxation law, I did a course titled, the Problem of Timing. During the semester, I learnt about cash and accrued income. Let me do some academic exercise here. In cash income, just like the name entails, one is paid in cash as soon as the work is completed. It’s just like going to the market to make a purchase. One can either pay directly with cash or with debit or credit card. But Accrued income refers to revenue a company has earned by providing goods or services, but for which payment has not yet been received, one will have to do the work first before getting paid. This is applicable when one works in either a public or private organization where one is paid either weekly, bi-weekly or at the end of the month depending on the stipulated mode of payment.
It’s important to note that before the money is paid either in cash or accrued, one would have earned it. It’s just like one learning g before earning, and one will have to update to upgrade. These are just the practical principles that will work with life.
In the same way, in life there’s a seed time and harvest time. It’s a universal principle of life. Whether as a parent, entrepreneur, student or employee. As a parent, if you don’t train your kids very well, they will grow up to reflect the opposite of what you desire. As an entrepreneur when you invest in your business, you will get the reward in due time. As a student, if you take your studies seriously, your grades will improve, and as an employee, you stand to get promotions and opportunities when you add value to your work. In summary, one will have to put in the work before recognition comes on.
To understand how seedtime and harvest work, imagine where parents tend to like one child more than others just because they see potential in him, or he’s smart, hardworking or even creative. They fail to understand that every child is different and as such their timing can be different. Some kinds take time to develop.
I personally believe there’s something so unique about each individual which God has deposited in everyone of us. It’s just a matter of time for it to manifest. Your timing of manifestation is different from your siblings and colleagues.
Personally, I didn’t mature fast with my contemporaries. Overtime, I have seen much improvement in my personal and professional life. Maybe because I have added value to my work with the assistance of mentors and good friends, or God had to humble my colleagues and mentors . Why do I say this? During my formative years, I had little or nothing to show for it. I was looking at my contemporaries as mentor and seeing my mentors as small gods whose feat is unattainable, but now, the reverse seems to be case as I have developed capacity some of my colleagues are yet to attain, while I have even surpassed the achievement of my some of my mentors in some quarters.
In all these, they are all surprised how it happened. Some are yet to comprehend or articulate the feat. It’s just like watching a film where everyone slept and woke up to see the game and tides have changed. The secret behind it is the seed time and harvest time. I was probably learning the trade while in the wilderness, and when the training season matured and ripe enough to be harvested, I became attractive to almost everyone who loved the seed I was producing.
There are litany of examples of people, who have been in the wilderness during the seed planting season. Let’s take a case study of Joseph in the Bible, his journey to stardom took a little twist. Despite the travails he experienced in the hands of his siblings who sold him, his experience while in the jail, and with Portiphar’s wife, who tried to seduce him; they were all set ups for success. The moral here is Joseph seed time and harvest time was quite different, it wasn’t a smooth journey. Ordinarily, one would have cursed his siblings or his friends who were with him in prison and forgot him after they were released. But at the end of time, everything worked out for his favor. Joseph’s seed days were his dark days while in the wilderness.
Another inspiring story of note was that of Pastor Ibukun Awosika, the former board Chairman of First Bank of Nigeria. She once shared a pathetic story during her formative years of being in business. According to her, she sojourned for about 15 years. She cried because lines were not adding up for her and she wouldn’t do what her contemporaries were doing to get opportunities. At a point in her business, it appeared like she was in a race of own life because everything seemed to be against her, but at the appropriate time, lines began to fall in place for her. Appointments, business opportunities, favours and goodwill began to fall in place for her. Again, she had a fair share of seed time.
An interesting question I would like to ask you is, what’s your seed time? Have you ever been in the wilderness when you appeared to be fixed? It’s unfortunate many people are not willing to pass through the storms or experience seeds and harvest time. Amidst all these, one must do some work before they get opportunities. However, before such opportunities will come up, one will have to plant the seed.
In conclusion, seed time and harvest time is critical in the journey of life. Take a seat and determine what seed you would like to sow and what you’ll like to harvest.
Henry Ukazu writes from New York. He works with the New York City Department of Correction as the Legal Coordinator. He’s the founder of Gloemi. He’s a Transformative Human Capacity and Mindset coach. He is also a public speaker, youth advocate, creative writer and author of Design Your Destiny Design Your and Unleash Your Destiny . He can be reached via info@gloemi.com
By Eric Elezuo
The Senate has suspended Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghen for six months over her sexual harassment accusation and other disputes against the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio.
The Senate also withdrew her salaries for the period of the suspension, as well as her security details.
The chamber however, soft-pedaled on the salaries and allowances of her aides, who it was argued would not have any source of livelihood within the period.
Globacom is welcoming new customers on its network with the introduction of the e-SIM. The e-SIM activated in any Gloworld shop or Dealer outlet comes with an introductory free 5GB data when the customer buys a data plan of N1,500 or more.
Customers already on other networks can now join the Glo network with e-SIM as an additional SIM. Existing Glo customers can also enjoy this “SIM-less” freedom.
With the e-SIM, customers no longer have to worry about space for a physical SIM on their phones. The e-SIM is a software-based digital chip built directly into smartphones or wearable devices, thus eliminating the need for a physical SIM card for customers.
The use of e-SIM enables customers to have seamless switching between phone numbers without a physical SIM. It is ideal for upwardly mobile people who travel frequently. The e-SIM also guarantees security, as unlike physical SIM, it is harder to remove from devices. It is also eco-friendly and reduces plastic waste.
Globacom’s launch of the e-SIM enables enables it to cater to high-net-worth individuals and enterprise customers, and it also reinforces the company’s commitment to providing seamless and future-ready services to its customers.
A customer seeking to activate the Glo e-SIM needs to check the compatibility of the mobile handset by dialling *#06# on his or her phone. If an EID number reflects on the mobile screen, the device is e-SIM compatible.
“The customer can then proceed to the nearest Gloworld shop or Glo Dealer outlet to migrate to e-SIM. The process takes only a few minutes and the customer can thereafter begin to enjoy the use of an e-SIM”, the Marketing Department disclosed.
