Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola (August 24, 1937 – July 7, 1998), often referred to as M. K. O. Abiola, was a popular Nigerian Yoruba businessman, publisher, politician and aristocrat of the Egba clan born in Abeokuta, Ogun State, Moshood was his father’s twenty-third child but the first of his father’s children to survive infancy.
MKO showed entrepreneurial talents at a very young age, at the tender age of nine he started his first business selling firewood. He would wake up at dawn to go to the forest and gather firewood, which he would then cart back to town and sell before going to school, in order to support his old father and his siblings
He later established a band at age fifteen where he performed at different functions in return of food. He in the end came to be acclaimed enough to begin requesting money for his exhibitions and utilized the cash to uphold his family and his optional instruction at the Baptist Boys High School Abeokuta, where he outperformed. He was the editor of the school magazine The Trumpeter, Olusegun Obasanjo was deputy editor. At the age of 19 he joined the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons apparently as a result of its container Africanist office, inclining toward it to the Obafemi Awolowo-led Action Group’s keep focus on investment and educational advancement for the Western Region of Nigeria, where the Yoruba were in the majority.
In 1956 Moshood Abiola started his professional life as bank clerk with Barclays Bank plc in Ibadan, South-West Nigeria. After two years he joined the Western Region Finance Corporation as an executive accounts officer before leaving for Glasgow, Scotland to pursue his higher education. In Glasgow he received 1st class in political economy, commercial law and management accountancy. He also received a distinction from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland. On his return to Nigeria, he worked as a senior accountant at the University of Lagos Teaching Hospital, then went onto Pfizer, before joining the ITT Corporation, where he later rose to the position of Vice President, Africa and Middle-East of the whole partnership, which was head-quartered in the United States. Therefore Moshood Abiola invested a considerable measure of his time and money in the United States, whilst holding the post of executive of the corporation’s Nigerian subsidiary.
Abiola invested heavily in Nigeria and West AfricaHe set up Abiola Farms, Abiola bookshops, Radio Communications Nigeria, Wonder bakeries, Concord Press, Concord Airlines, Summit oil international ltd, Africa Ocean lines, Habib Bank, Decca W.A. ltd, and Abiola football club. In addition to these, he also managed to perform his duties as Chairman of the G15 business council, President of the Nigerian Stock Exchange, Patron of the Kwame Nkrumah Foundation.
Moshood Abiola sprang to national and global prominence as a consequence of his humanitarian exercises. The Congressional Black Caucus of the United States of America issued the following tribute to Moshood Abiola
“Because of this man, there is both cause for hope and certainty that the agony and protests of those who suffer injustice shall give way to peace and human dignity. The children of the world shall know the great work of this extraordinary leader and his fervent mission to right wrong, to do justice, and to serve mankind. The enemies which imperil the future of generations to come: poverty, ignorance, disease, hunger, and racism have each seen effects of the valiant work of Chief Abiola. Through him and others like him, never again will freedom rest in the domain of the few. We, the members of the Congressional Black Caucus salute him this day as a hero in the global pursuit to preserve the history and the legacy of the African diaspora”
From 1972 until his death Moshood Abiola had been conferred with 197 traditional titles by 68 different communities in Nigeria, in response to the fact that his financial assistance resulted in the construction of 63 secondary schools, 121 mosques and churches, 41 libraries, 21 water projects in 24 states of Nigeria, and was grand patron to 149 societies or associations in Nigeria.
Moshood Abiola was twice voted worldwide businessman of the year, and gained various honorary doctorates from universities all over the world. In 1987 he was given the golden key to the city of Washington D.c., and he was bestowed with an award from the NAACP and the King center in the USA, and also the International Committee on Education for Teaching in Paris, around numerous others. In Nigeria, the Oloye Abiola was made the Aare Ona Kakanfo of Yorubaland. It is the most noteworthy chieftancy title accessible to everyday citizens around the Yoruba, and has just been given by the tribe 14 times in its history. This basically rendered Abiola the ceremonial Viceroy of the greater part of his tribespeople. According to the folklore of the tribe as recounted by the Yoruba elders, the Aare Ona Kakanfo is expected to die a warrior in the defense of his nation inorder to prove himself in the eyes of both the divine and the mortal as having been worthy of his title.
Nigeria will never forget this grate iconic......

Ade Omisakin added to the above story that: ‘Abiola was not just a business-savvy , self-reliant individual who rose from grass to grace, just by dint of hardwork. FYI, MKO Abiola was a beneficiary of Awo-led Western Region scholarship in 1958, thru which he paid for his university education in the U.K “.



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IGP explains why husand of late gospel singer, Osinachi Nwachukwu's is yet to be arraigned in court

The Inspector-General of Police, IGP Usman Alkali Baba, on Wednesday, April 20th, received the Minister of Women Affairs, Dame Pauline Kedem Tallen, OFR, who paid a courtesy visit on the IGP in his office at the Louis Edet House, Force Headquarters, Abuja.

The Minister discussed amongst other things, the plight of women in Nigeria, particularly in relation to gender and domestic-based violence. She pointed out the recent case of the famous gospel musician, Osinachi Nwachukwu, whose untimely death on 8th April, 2022 has caused a public outcry. The Minister who was accompanied by some members of the late singer’s family was equally interested to know what efforts the police have put in place to ensure swift justice is dispensed.

The Inspector-General of Police, while reacting, noted that the untimely death is heart-breaking particularly as information from sources close to the family and independent witnesses fingered her husband, Peter Nwachukwu, as being responsible for her death. He stated that the FCT Command of the Nigeria Police Force, in whose jurisdiction the incident occurred, arrested the deceased’s husband at about 5pm on Sunday 10th April 2022 at their residence in Lugbe, Abuja. The suspect is currently in detention at the FCT Police Command even as investigations are still ongoing.

The IGP further emphasized that considering the sensitive nature of the case, and the need to get justice, and swiftly, the command has approached the National Hospital, Abuja, for post-mortem examinations on the deceased to ascertain the cause of death and her husband will be charged to court if it is established that he was responsible for her death.

The Inspector-General of Police reiterated the commitment of the Force under his leadership to ensuring that cases of domestic violence, sexual and gender-based violence, rape, and other social vices are accorded utmost attention with a view to bringing their perpetrators to justice according to the
provisions of extant laws.

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The ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has fixed its presidential nomination and expression of interest form at N100 million; while the governorship form will go for N50 million.

The fees were announced by the party’s national publicity secretary Felix Morka at the party’s ongoing extraordinary emergency meeting of its National Executive Committee.

INTRODUCTION[i]

The media in Africa with its long history has transformed greatly. This can be attributed to a number of factors, including breath-taking communication technology breakthroughs, independence of African states, capitalism, media democratisation and the right to own media houses and the internet. These factors have contributed immensely to the growth and transformation of media in Africa, and indeed would continue to contribute.

To get better understanding, it may be helpful to do a quick review of the history of media in Africa. Pre-colonial era media in Africa in the general sense existed before they were termed as media. With folklore, oral traditions and poetry among other traditional media forms, Africans have functional media forms used to express views, share information, and instil values to a wide audience. African traditional media were also used to organise and galvanise community action. Man as a creature of communication has his very existence dependent on his ability to communicate within and without his being and share appropriate media products.

Different schools of thought have varying positions on the advent of colonial media. Some say that modern media forms like newspapers and radio were introduced to Africa by “European missionaries and colonialists some 200 years ago. The overall development of media (esp.) newspapers in the continent is linked to the long-running process of political change across the continent.” In Nigeria, the first ever mass media platform was Iwe Iroyin. The publication was in Yoruba language, and started around 1885. Iwe Iroyin’s focus was to educate and enlighten, even as it shared the religious inclination of its champion, Reverend Henry Townsend, a British Missionary.

The Colonialists used modern mass media to control African populations. Colonial media products were therefore a form of cultural invasion and disorientation. Colonial media were used to help colonialists control wealth, natural resources, and cultural products of the African continent. To a large extent, the colonialists succeeded in the use of mass media to their advantage. Africans were intrigued by mass media channels especially radio and television. As a child growing up in the city of Lagos in the late 1970s and early 80s, not many people owned the television box especially. TV stations and programmes usually started by 4pm and closed after the 9pm network news. TV viewing was a community activity, and indeed it was a privilege to watch TV. Unless your family owned the TV set, children were almost always guaranteed to watch from outside, peeping through windows and open doors. Everyone scrambled for any available space.

As the movement and interaction of citizens from across Africa to Europe and America continued, and the enlisting of Africans in Western militaries to execute the world wars, a new set of Africans emerged, “foreign” Africans. This new class of African citizens learned “the ways of the world”, bringing back to the continent and their home countries new systems, cultures and inventions to Africa. Importantly, these Africans owned the “imports” or at least owned the “imports” in collaboration with their Western partners. Organised media was one of the imports. Following disruptive developments across the world, with outlawing of slave trade, and growing discontent against colonialism and colonialists, organised media were deployed by African elites to seek independence and freedom from colonial rule.

In Nigeria, the new crop of African migrants, many of whom lived in Lagos, the former capital started mass media companies including Lagos Daily News. The newspaper started by Herbert Macaulay and John Akilade Caulcrick in 1927 was reputed to be the first daily newspaper in British West Africa. The newspaper was instrumental in fuelling the growing anti-colonialism emotions among the elites. To expand its scope and gain more followership, the newspaper rechristened to Nigeria Daily News. Other media organisations were also players in the media space and contributed to the growing discontent against colonialism. Daily Times was one of them. Ernest Ikoli, a political and anti-colonial activist was the first Editor of Daily Times. There was also the West African Pilot founded in 1937 by Nnamdi Azikiwe.

These media organisations in their own ways contributed to Nigeria’s independence from British colonial rule. The media organisations also helped to breed a new crop of media elites who were respected and influential. These included Lateef Jakande, Bisi Onabanjo, Ernest Ikoli, and Anthony Enahoro. Some of these media elites also featured in the political terrain, and held some political offices.

Post-independence politics witnessed the advent of coups and counter coups across Africa. These military interventions and interruptions in political governance had remarkable impact in mass media development. Not only were media houses shut down by dictatorial military governments, several military decrees were promulgated aimed at stifling press freedom. In Nigeria, one of the most popular military decrees against press freedom and free speech was the Public Officers (Protection against False Accusation) Decree No. 4 of 1984. Two prominent Nigerian journalists Tunde Thompson and Nduka Irabor, were prosecuted under the infamous decree.

The advent of and accessibility to technology has also transformed mass media in Africa. Technology has improved the speed and availability of media products presented to consumers. It has also made media outputs largely affordable. Unlike in the past, smartphone users, with a push of the button can access news stories from every part of the globe. The mobile phone has now become the new platform while internet connection is the new currency. Closely related to new technology is the advent of social media channels that have democratised the media space. Many social media channels have news components, and users also utilise the platforms as news outlets. Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are popular social media sites that are also popular as news outlets. It is instructive to note that social media have enhanced the promotion of organised falsehood, otherwise known as fake news. The lack of a universal Ombudsman has created gaps leading to the publication and broadcast of poorly edited or out rightly false and misleading stories. Infact there is an “epidemic of online fake news”.

In an article by Eileen Brown published in zdnet, “an economic study by Tel Aviv, Israel-based cybersecurity firm CHEQ and the University of Baltimore have revealed that fake news is costing the global economy $78 billion each year.”. This is huge for a world grappling with extreme poverty, natural disasters, and climate change.

Media ownership used to be the exclusive preserve of the rich and powerful in society. Media is a capital intensive project. While some aspects of the media is still owned and operated by the “high and mighty”, new technologies have also given rise to new media entrepreneurs, and what is also popularly known as Citizen Journalists. Generally defined, Citizen Journalism is the gathering, reporting and distributing of news by members of the public rather than trained journalists. Of course this new trend of citizen journalism has an impact on the increase and popularity of fake and unsubstantiated news. Citizen journalism is an important era in media transition, not only in Africa, but globally. A comparison of the benefits against the disadvantages of citizen journalism would be a matter for another day. However, the impact of citizen journalism is so evasive that many countries of the world are grappling with measures to contain its spread and impact.

*Conclusion*

In a talk with a group of postgraduate students of the Department of Mass Communication, Bingham University, Karu, Nigeria, Dr Desmond Okocha avers that, “media in Africa need to redefine itself and understand its purpose” if media in Africa would serve as dependable tool in developing and progressing Africa. This statement is instructive. When purpose is unknown, abuse is inevitable according Dr Myles Munroe in his book ‘Understanding the Purpose and Power of Woman’. To serve the teeming African population, Media in Africa need to first understand and define its roles in satisfying the yearning of a population bedevilled by long years of poverty, misrule, misrepresentation and unbridled corruption. Media in Africa must be partners in progress in developing the continent, and not a tool for divisiveness or disruptiveness. Media in Africa must transcend the low waters of being willing tools in the hands of ‘highest bidders’ to perpetrate oppression and promote immoral capitalism, they cannot be silent in the face of injustice. Media in Africa must be a critical tool in the continent’s march to self-actualisation and sustainable development premised on the collective power and strength of the people to choose and achieve their shared destiny.

To be more effective and relevant to the everyday struggles of the average African, it is important for the African media to reassess itself, clearly articulate and pursue a stated purpose. This redefinition would highlight the importance of perhaps strengthening Development Media, an aspect of media practice that is focused on empowering the populace, supporting government policies that promote citizen wellbeing and enhance wealth creation.

*References*

Abebe, M. M. (2019). The Historical Development of Media in Unconquered Africa A Historical Review of Ethiopian Media

https://quotepark.com/quotes/1518100-myles-munroe-when-purpose-is-not-known-abuse-is-inevitable/.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13688804.2019.1634528?journalCode=cmeh20#:~:text=Media%20were%20introduced%20to%20Africa,political%20change%20across%20the%20continent.

https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/media-and-preservation-culture-africa

https://guardian.ng/features/the-nigeria-media-evolution-trends-and-projections-for-2018-part-1/

https://www.zdnet.com/article/online-fake-news-costing-us-78-billion-globally-each-year/

*Stanley Chukwuemeka Okereafor is communication specialist based in Abuja. He can be reached on ambchukwuemeka@gmail.com*

Manchester United forward Cristiano Ronaldo, has announced the tragic death of his son.
In4mationplug reports that the football superstar made the announcement on his social media pages on Monday in a statement co-signed by his spouse, Georgina Rodriguez, on Monday.

“It is with our deepest sadness we have to announce that our baby boy has passed away. It is the greatest pain that any parents can feel.

Only the birth of our baby girl gives us the strength to live this moment with some hope and happiness.

“We would like to thank the doctors and nurses for all their expert care and support. We are all devastated at this loss and we kindly ask for privacy at this very difficult time.

“Our baby boy, you are our angel. We will always love you.”

In4mationplug reports that in October, Ronaldo announced the pair were expecting twins in an Instagram post that read: “Delighted to announce we are expecting twins.

“Our hearts are full of love – we can’t wait to meet you.”

The couple later confirmed in December that they had been expecting both a boy and a girl.

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MEET FEHINTOLA ONABANJO

As the encomium and Loud Publicity of the 2023 General Election belly up,
The emancipation and libration for women involvement in politics is Growing and gladly the spirit of women arose to the call , bravery and determined without lingering or hesitation as a result of that , we present you a woman of accountability, whose Vision's to seeks a new and fresh beginning anchored on a vision of inclusiveness, empowerment, equity, equality, fairness and justice to promote economic growth, equal job opportunity and people centred development, allied with infrastructural renewal,
a woman of equal right whose agenda never negate both gender(Fairness) , a human right activist who champion matters concerning the female abuses(Justices) , Trust she's a guardian and builder who can deliver , No wonder the entire people of Ogbomoso North /South And Orire Local Govt welcome and appreciates her by trusting her into Political Office because she's a tool in the hand of God And cannot but submit herself to God and humanity because she seeks for Transparency, accountability, love, people centred development, equal job opportunity, equity, equality, fairness and justices,
She is a notable, vibrant respectful, responsible, responsive, polite, firm and friendly, jovial team player, focused, development oriented person, grassroot mobilizer and community woman, having worked several years as an accountant, and communication specialist, analyst, motivator, administrator and business owner.

As a mentor and motivator, she have helped many youth to find their direction in life through

* Mentoring, motivation and supervision to enlist for higher education, trade, vocational training and skill acquisition

Payment of school fees , sponsorship, workshop equipment.

A practising notable Christian contributing to religious , advocate of Peace and tolerance through the Christian folds organisation.

A through breed local community and grassroot personality.

THE BELOW INFORMATION SPEAKS OF MRS ONABANJO, KINDLY READ THROUGH.

Mrs Fehintola Opeyemi Onabanjo is an indefatigable and erudite accountant who is an indigene of Ogbomoso South local Government Area of Oyo state.

Fehintola Opeyemi Onabanjo spent her early childhood in Bosunla Compound Ibapon ogbomoso, she is from the family of Mr Daniel Olayoonu Adedokun(Late) and Mrs Alice Adunni Adedokun, her Elementary School Education Was at Osupa Baptist Day school 2 Ogbomoso, she attended Anglican Grammar school Ogbomoso and obtained her west African School Certificate , she thereafter proceeded to Federal Polytechnic Ede Osun state where she obtained her National Diploma Certificate (OND) In Financial Studies, followed by her Higher National Diploma (HND) Certificate In Accounting From Lagos State Polytechnic Isolo, Followed by her second degree (M.sc) Master in Business Administration (Financial management) bagged From Ladoke Akintola University of technology
Due to her love for her hometown.

*Armed with these qualifications,*
She is a member of Association of National Accountants of Nigeria (ANAN),

Associate of Institute of Chartered Economics of Nigeria (ICEN)

Associate of Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria (CITN)

Member of Institute of Public Management.

Fehintola Opeyemi Onabanjo,being the quintessential philanthropist that she is , established Fehintola Onabanjo Foundation (F.O FOUNDATION) a non-profit NGO as a vehicle for the distribution of scholarships ,assistance to the widow, medical care , empowerment at all level.


Fehintola Opeyemi Onabanjo She was a two term president of virtuous women of Christ Community Assembly Papa Ajao Mushin Lagos because of her role of played in administering women and church of God . ( Before demise of the General Overseer)

Member Of Dorcas Women Group (WMU) at Ikoyi Baptist Church Lateef Jakande Avenue Off Boudillon Ikoyi Lagos


In her leisure, she enjoys composing music simply music is part of her , travelling, and spending time with her family.

FEHINTOLA
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