Good morning,
Atiku Abubakar held a rally in Sokoto and the DSS was accused of recruiting protesters to disrupt it. The agency denies it, says two of its operatives were injured, and has ordered an investigation into its own conduct. A day later, a Federal High Court in Abuja sacked the David Mark-led ADC leadership and voided the primary that produced Atiku as the party’s candidate. The ADC says a court of coordinate jurisdiction had already affirmed the same leadership in July. It calls the ruling a “panic sign,” petitions the NJC, and vows to appeal. You do not need to be a lawyer to see the shape of this: a rally disrupted, a candidacy voided within 24 hours, and a ruling party that has consistently denied orchestrating judicial action but has never explained the timing. Atiku deserves sympathy. He has been in this film before, and the pattern is beginning to look less like coincidence and more like a strategy.
The rest of the week was the usual inventory of gaps the state has not closed. A Nigerian who has lived in the United States for 23 years returned home, asked to see the house he had been funding, and was taken to a prayer centre instead. Bayo Salami was held for 17 days because he smokes cigarettes. The Alfa pushed him into a room where people had been kept for months. The police have announced no investigation. In Lagos, NAFDAC raided Oke-Arin Market and found banned sachet alcoholic drinks hidden in shops, along with unregistered and suspected fake food products. The ban has existed since 2018. The trade adapts. Enforcement is the only thing that has not.
Some stories restore a little faith and some test it. A foreigner near Eko Hotel saw a young vendor hawking a live sea turtle, argued that the trade is illegal, and when the crowd and the police did nothing, he paid for the animal so it could be returned to the sea. The police facilitated the release. The vendor was detained. The state should not need a stranger to enforce its own conservation laws, but credit where it is due. In the courts, a woman is preparing to sue MTN after her hypertensive father was arrested twice by the DSS over a recycled SIM linked to a previous user’s crimes. She bought the line in good faith. The law protects data. It does not yet protect the wrong buyer.
The grid has gone dark again, and the explanations are familiar. The system operator blames gas supply constraints and low water inflows. Thermal plants cannot run at capacity. Hydro output is down. DisCos are getting smaller allocations, and load shedding is heavier nationwide. The Minister of Power has ordered TCN, NISO and the DisCos to fix the constraints in Lagos, Abuja, Ogun, Kwara and Oyo. The directive is administrative. It cannot create gas or rain. In a hospital somewhere, a 17-year-old mother and her newborn have been held for six months over a ₦650,000 bill. The baby is healthy. The mother cannot pay. The father is absent. The state has not intervened.
A candidacy voided in a day. A man held for smoking. A turtle saved by a stranger. A recycled SIM that keeps arresting the wrong man. A grid that cannot find gas. A child detained over a bill. These are not separate stories. They are the same story: a country where the systems keep failing, and the people keep filling the gaps, until they cannot.
Warmly,
Lolade