Nigeria at 66: Looking Back, Looking Forward Fellow Nigerians, Today we mark the sixty-sixth anniversary of our independence. It ought to be a day of celebration and thanksgiving to God Almighty for the gift of life and for the immense blessings He has bestowed on our nation—our diversity, our abundant human and natural resources, our vast agricultural potential, and the relative absence of devastating natural disasters. It should also be a day of appreciation and patriotism: a day to remember our founding fathers and all those who made selfless, and in many cases supreme, sacrifices for the birth, survival and growth of our dear nation. We must acknowledge the efforts of past and present leaders who have laboured, however imperfectly, to build a better Nigeria. Yet independence anniversaries must never be reduced to mere celebration. They are moments for honest national reflection. We must look back, examine where we stand today, and ask ourselves whether we are moving in the direction our founding fathers envisioned. In national planning and strategy, every serious nation must continually ask three fundamental questions: Where are we today? Where do we want to be? How do we get from where we are to where we want to be? These questions are especially urgent now. Despite the enormous promises made by the APC-led government in 2023, our nation continues to face deepening challenges across virtually every critical sector of national life. Today we stand before the world as a nation: With an extraordinarily large population living in poverty and severe hardship; over 140M With one of the largest populations of out-of-school children in the world; over 18M Where insecurity, terrorism, banditry and kidnapping continue to threaten lives and livelihoods, just recently 37 young Nigerians in their productive age lost their lives Where millions of Nigerians struggle with hunger and food insecurity; over 40M Nigerians will be in extreme hunger by the end of 2026. With unacceptably high rates of infant and maternal mortality; Nigeria today is the worst place to be born. Where youth unemployment and underemployment remain alarmingly high; over 35M Where drug abuse and substance misuse increasingly threaten our young population; today 14% as against global average of 6% Where life expectancy remains among the lowest globally, today 54 years against global average of 74 years And the list goes on. This reality demands serious, sober and honest reflection. Socrates taught that “the unexamined life is not worth living.” By the same principle, an unexamined nation cannot successfully chart its future. We must therefore ask ourselves: Are we cursed, or have we become the curse through the choices we have made and the failures we have tolerated? The answer cannot be that Nigeria is cursed. We are a nation immensely endowed and blessed. Our greatest problem is not a lack of resources; it is the failure to convert our enormous resources into human development, productivity, security and shared prosperity. Only yesterday, Senator Rabiu Kwankwaso and I returned from a two-day visit to Sokoto State. We held extensive consultations with people from different parts of the state on insecurity, out-of-school children, poverty, youth unemployment, drug abuse and other challenges confronting our people. In concluding the visit, we went to the Internally Displaced Persons camp at Ramin Kura within Sokoto metropolis. What we saw was deeply troubling. Thousands of women and children live in deplorable conditions, displaced from their homes and deprived of the basic necessities of life. Many of the children have no access to education. Mothers and children have limited access to basic healthcare. These are Nigerians who should be living in their communities, going to school, farming their land, conducting their businesses and contributing to the economy. Instead, they live as displaced persons in their own country.

The Infinite Possibilities of Sport Today, accompanied by Ladipo Johnson, the NDC candidate for Lagos Central Senatorial District, and Aisha Jimoh, the NDC candidate for the House of Representatives, Lagos Island Constituency II, we went to the Onikan Stadium to watch the local league match between Enugu Rangers FC and Ikorodu City FC. As the match unfolded, I thought about the enormous possibilities of sport and how countries such as Brazil and Jamaica have used it to engage young people, fight crime, and create opportunities. It pained me to see how poorly we are developing sports in Nigeria. A stadium with a capacity of about 10,000 had fewer than 2,000 spectators. Nigeria has no shortage of sporting talent. What we lack is the vision and commitment to turn that talent into opportunities for our young people. Sport is not merely entertainment; properly developed, it can be a powerful tool for youth development, employment, and social transformation. A new Nigeria is POssible. -PO