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CLOVIS, the Nigerian-born fashion house founded by designer Louis Akorede Awode, is relaunching operations out of Atlanta following a five-year hiatus, debuting a refined brand identity and a new line aimed at international markets.

The company, previously known as ClovisCasuals, unveiled The Renaissance Collection on Sunday as its Season One comeback capsule.

The moves mark the label’s transition from a regional West African streetwear brand into a global direct-to-consumer house positioned around high-end, heritage-inspired apparel.

Founded in Ibadan, Nigeria, in 2014 with 15,000 naira ($10 at current exchange rates) and a single sewing machine, CLOVIS built a cult following across West Africa.

The label moved its footprint to Lagos, eventually selling more than 20,000 garments and dressing prominent Nigerian musicians and media figures, including Asake and Olamide.

Awode paused operations in 2019 to relocate overseas and expand his management credentials, completing a Master’s degree in International Business and Marketing in Scotland before enrolling in a STEM-designated MBA program in the U.S.

?’This is not a debut; this is a return,’ Awode said in an interview. ‘We paused to grow, and we are back to build something permanent.’

The rebrand to CLOVIS reflects a shift toward what the company calls ‘Tradurban’-a positioning strategy that blends traditional West African textiles like Aso-Oke with minimalist, contemporary tailoring.

The updated aesthetic features a restrained color palette of black, white, and sand, alongside bespoke detailing aimed at the upscale ‘quiet luxury’ segment.

The Renaissance Collection introduces three core product families: Lagos Loom, featuring woven denim and fringe outerwear; Afroform, centered on geometric print sets; and a City Graphics line commemorating the brand’s expansion from Ibadan to Atlanta.

The growing presence of global financial institution J.P. Morgan in Nigeria signals renewed international investor confidence in the country’s economic reforms, the Nigeria Revenue Service (NRS) has said, as the Federal Government seeks to strengthen fiscal stability and attract long-term foreign capital.

Zacch Adedeji, executive chairman of the NRS, stated this on Monday when he received Adedapo Olagunju, the newly appointed managing director of J.P. Morgan Nigeria, during a courtesy visit to the service’s headquarters in Abuja.

Adedeji said the confidence of international financial institutions reflected the credibility, stability and predictability that President Bola Tinubu’s economic reforms and fiscal policies were seeking to establish.

He noted that a transparent, efficient and predictable fiscal environment remained critical to attracting global capital, strengthening institutional partnerships and positioning Nigeria as a competitive investment destination.

According to him, the growing interest of major international financial institutions reinforces the importance of sustaining reforms that improve the business environment and provide investors with greater certainty in making long-term investment decisions.

Adedeji added that as the reforms continue to take shape, the confidence shown by institutions such as J.P. Morgan sends a signal that Nigeria is working to establish stronger foundations for sustainable economic growth and investment.

The meeting comes against the backdrop of far-reaching economic changes introduced by the Tinubu administration since May 2023, including the removal of the petrol subsidy and the unification of the foreign exchange market.

The reforms were designed to reduce pressure on public finances, improve the functioning of the foreign exchange market and address longstanding distortions in the economy. However, they have also contributed to higher living costs and increased operating expenses for businesses, placing pressure on households and the private sector.

For investors, the effectiveness of these policy changes will depend not only on the reforms themselves but also on their consistent implementation, macroeconomic stability, access to foreign exchange and the ability of businesses to plan with greater certainty.

Fiscal policy and revenue administration are central to this process. The Federal Government needs stronger and more predictable revenue mobilisation to finance public services, infrastructure and other development priorities while reducing excessive dependence on borrowing.

The NRS, which is responsible for administering federal taxes and driving improvements in revenue collection, occupies a strategic position in the government’s efforts to strengthen public finances. Greater efficiency, transparency and predictability in tax administration can help improve compliance, broaden the revenue base and build confidence among businesses operating in Nigeria.

For international financial institutions, a more predictable fiscal environment can also support assessments of investment risks, financing opportunities and the broader outlook for the Nigerian economy.

J.P. Morgan is a major international financial services institution with operations spanning investment banking, markets, payments and asset management. Its engagement with Nigerian authorities is therefore significant in the context of the country’s efforts to maintain links with global financial markets and attract international capital.

However, the presence or engagement of a global financial institution does not, on its own, establish the scale of new investment commitments or guarantee improved economic outcomes. The broader significance will depend on whether confidence translates into increased capital flows, expanded business activity and improved access to financing for the Nigerian economy.

Adedeji said the confidence of leading global financial institutions reinforced the importance of continuing reforms aimed at creating a stable and transparent economic environment.

He maintained that Nigeria was building the foundations for sustainable growth and long-term investment as the reforms progressed.

The NRS did not disclose specific investment commitments arising from the meeting or indicate whether the engagement would lead to new financing arrangements between J.P. Morgan and the Nigerian government.

Nevertheless, the engagement highlights the importance of credible fiscal institutions and consistent economic policies in Nigeria’s efforts to strengthen investor confidence, improve revenue performance and secure a more sustainable path to economic growth.

The People’s Democratic Party (PDP), led by Nyesom Wike, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), has disagreed with President Bola Tinubu on who is responsible for the current economic hardship and hunger in Nigeria.

The President, while flagging off his presidential campaign in Kaduna on Saturday, blamed the opposition politicians for the current hunger and economic hardship in the country.

The statement was re-echoed by Felix Maoka, National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), during his appearance on News Central’s Breakfast Show on Monday.

Maoka also put the blame for the current economic challenges on the PDP

But, in a swift reaction, Jungudo Mohammed, the National Publicity Secretary of the PDP, said the party considered ‘these statements as attempts to evade responsibility and divert public attention from the pressing challenges facing the country under the APC-led administration’.

The PDP emphatically claims the ruling APC, adding that ‘PDP is not responsible for the hunger Nigerians are experiencing today.

‘The APC must own its record, address the nation’s challenges, and deliver on its promises to Nigerians. The government in power must answer for its stewardship and present a credible path towards economic recovery, food security, and a better standard of living for all Nigerians.’

The party stressed that rather than engaging in political blame games, the APC should explain what it intends to do to make food affordable, support farmers, strengthen local food production, create jobs, improve security, fight corruption, improve electricity supply, reduce transportation costs, and restore the purchasing power of ordinary Nigerians, among other pressing concerns.

‘While the PDP acknowledges some of the achievements recorded by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration, where applicable, we firmly reject any attempt to use the PDP’s sixteen years in government as a blanket justification for the shortcomings of the present administration,’ he said.

It, however, said, ‘Acknowledging any genuine achievements must not be misconstrued as an endorsement of all government policies or an acceptance of attempts to shift responsibility for current economic difficulties to previous PDP-led administrations.’

Pink Africa Foundation has raised an alarm over rising cases of breast cancer in Nigeria, revealing that one out of eleven women is at risk, saying 70% to 80% of cases discovered are always presented late.

BusinessDay reports that the Foundation offered free screening for breast, cervical and prostate cancers; and eye care to hundreds of people in Calabar Metropolis and its environs.

The free screening exercise, which also featured blood drive and first aid services, was part of the Go Pink Day 2026 global awareness event themed, ‘Turn Up the Fight in Breast Cancer Care.’

Glory Enoh Egria, Executive Director, Pink Africa Foundation, said the theme was targeted at closing critical care gaps affecting women, especially in underserved communities.

‘We are not just creating awareness. We are backing it up with action,’ she said.

Egria flagged late presentation and poor awareness as major drivers of deaths, stressing monthly self-breast examination and immediate hospital visit for any lump, noting that not all lumps are cancerous.

She disclosed that the Foundation had sponsored several mastectomies and chemotherapy treatments, with many survivors recorded due to early detection.

‘Early detection saves lives. Over 50 cases have been reported at our center since January, but many patients cannot afford even transport or basic investigations,’ she said.

She lamented that treatment remains expensive and inaccessible in Cross River State, with few centers like the University of Calabar Teaching Hospital unable to meet demand, calling on government to subsidise care, provide more radiotherapy machines and deploy more oncologists.

‘We need government to come in and support us. A woman is caught between buying food for her children and paying for treatment. Women in rural areas like Ikom don’t have access,’ she appealed.

Corroborating, Executive Director, Yegwa Ukpo of Asi Ukpo Hospitals and Asi Ukpo Comprehensive Cancer Centre, Calabar, said Nigeria records about 144,000 new cancer cases yearly, with breast cancer as number one globally and in Nigeria, followed by cervical cancer in women and prostate cancer in men.

‘The burden is quite heavy. About 60 percent of patients that come to our hospital are breast cancer patients. 70 to 80 percent present late,’ Ukpo said.

He noted that breast cancer also affects men, hence the need for regular screening for both sexes, listing alcohol, smoking, processed foods, canned sausages and smoke-heavy foods like suya as carcinogenic, though cancer can still occur as a malfunction in body function.

‘The best thing is regular checkup. There are cancers with no symptoms until it is too late. Testing does not invite cancer,’ he warned.

On affordability, Ukpo disclosed that the hospital is in talks with the National Health Insurance Authority to include cancer care in health insurance to make it affordable.

Vivian Mesembe Otu, Director General of Cross River State Primary Health Care Development Agency, described breast cancer as the commonest cancer killing among females in Nigeria and Africa, warning women against dying in silence.

‘Many women present very late due to ignorance, poor awareness and beliefs, when it is already too late,’ she said.

She said breast cancer is predominantly hereditary but other factors include obesity, sedentary lifestyle and smoking. She stressed monthly self-examination by dividing the breast into four quadrants and using the pad of fingers to feel for lumps.

‘If we pick this lump early at fibroadenoma stage and remove it, the woman is free,’ she said, lamenting limited resources and fake drugs.

She announced that Medical Women Association of Nigeria, Cross River Chapter, offers free breast and cervical screening every second Wednesday of the month at Barracks Road, Calabar, and that government is pushing mass enrollment into National and State Health Insurance Schemes while Pink Africa offers free mastectomy for confirmed cases at UCTH.

The Ebonyi State Government has committed over N100 million to train 100 youths from the state’s 13 local government areas in articulated truck driving and heavy-duty equipment operation as part of efforts to create jobs and develop local manpower for emerging industries.

Ajuka Obasi Nwogo, the Commissioner for Skills Development and Job Creation, stated this on Monday in Abakaliki, saying the initiative was designed to equip youths with specialised technical skills, promote self-reliance and reduce dependence on workers from outside the state.

Nwogo said the beneficiaries would undergo an intensive four-week training programme at the Nigerian Institute of Transport Technology (NITT), Zaria, Kaduna State, with the government bearing the costs of registration, tuition, accommodation, feeding and transportation, in addition to providing stipends. Nigerian Banking Launch

He explained that the programme was partly motivated by the need to prepare indigenous workers for the proposed cement industry in the state and other ongoing industrial and infrastructure projects requiring skilled equipment operators.

‘The State Government, in its quest to empower the youths and make them independent and self-reliant, has decided to embark on training Ebonyi indigenes in truck driving and heavy-duty equipment operation and safety,’ he said.

According to the commissioner, the training will cover the operation of articulated vehicles, including large trucks, as well as bulldozers, forklifts, tractors and other agricultural machinery.

He added that participants who successfully complete the programme would receive two certificates, including an internationally recognised professional certificate and another to support the acquisition of the appropriate class of driving licence.

Nwogo said the initiative was open to both male and female youths, noting that the skills acquired would improve their employment prospects in the public and private sectors, including opportunities outside Ebonyi State.

He disclosed that the State Government had already paid N100 million to the institute for the programme, describing the exercise as the first phase of a broader skills-development initiative.

Nigeria’s 2027 general election could face postponement if the Ebola outbreak spreads widely enough to pose a significant public health risk, Jide Idris, director-general of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC), has said. Nigerian Banking Launch

Nigeria’s 2027 general election could face postponement if the Ebola outbreak spreads widely enough to pose a significant public health risk, Jide Idris, director-general of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC), has said. Nigerian Banking Launch

Nigeria’s electoral timetable is already in preparation, with the Independent National Electoral Commission having scheduled the presidential and National Assembly elections for January 16, 2027.

For now, the NCDC says there is no justification for shifting the election. Any change would depend on further developments in the outbreak and the public health assessment of the risks involved.

Abubakar argued that Buhari might not have won the election without Tinubu’s backing, insisting that northern political leaders should reciprocate the support by mobilising votes for the incumbent president in the 2027 general elections.

The lawmaker consequently declared that political stakeholders in Kano North Senatorial District had set a target of delivering at least one million votes for the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate in 2027.

He spoke on Monday at a stakeholders’ meeting and inauguration of the APC campaign council for Bichi Federal Constituency in Bichi Local Government Area of Kano State.

‘Tinubu made the late President Muhammadu Buhari after several unsuccessful attempts to become president. It is now time for us to compensate Tinubu for what he did for the North,’ Abubakar said.

He dismissed allegations that Tinubu was pursuing policies deliberately targeted against northern Nigeria, describing such claims as politically motivated. Nigerian Banking Launch

The lawmaker said federal government approvals for road construction and other infrastructure projects in Kano demonstrated Tinubu’s commitment to the development of the region.

‘Those saying President Tinubu does not like the North are not sincere. We have decided to vote massively for the president because of his developmental support for Kano,’ he said.

Abubakar maintained that several development projects being executed in Kano had benefited from federal government support, adding that the interventions had strengthened the case for the APC’s re-election campaign.

He said the party’s mobilisation drive would extend beyond Bichi and Kano North to all 44 local government areas of the state.

‘We are not just talking about Bichi or Kano North; we are talking about the whole 44 local government areas. We are talking about the whole of Kano, and we will get what we want,’ he said.

The lawmaker put the number of registered voters in Kano North at approximately 1.3 million, saying APC stakeholders were working towards mobilising at least one million votes for the party in the 2027 elections.

Murtala Sule Garo, Kano State deputy governor, who represented Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf at the event, urged members of the campaign council to intensify efforts to secure victory for APC candidates.

Garo cautioned the campaign team against activities capable of threatening peace and stability in Kano North, urging supporters to adopt issue-based campaigns to persuade voters.

Abdullahi Tijjani Gwarzo, director-general of the APC presidential and governorship campaign council in Kano, urged the Bichi campaign team to engage grassroots mobilisers and youth support groups to strengthen the party’s support base.

Gwarzo expressed optimism about the APC’s performance in the 2027 presidential and governorship elections in Kano, while calling on campaign officials to shun violence and other actions capable of undermining peace in the state.

Oluwatobi Oyewole studied petroleum engineering before moving into software. He began with enterprise systems, then moved into product engineering. Through Andela, he worked with international teams on products for organisations including Science Corporation and Kinship, part of Mars Petcare.

His more recent work centres on a practical question about AI assistants. Once an assistant has access to a tool, how does it learn the instructions needed to use it well?

That question drew him into the Model Context Protocol (MCP) community, where he tested ways of making reusable instructions, known as skills, available to AI applications.

His experiments led to three accepted contributions to the MCP Skills extension repository and initial work incorporated into the official MCP TypeScript software development kit (SDK).

In this interview with ROYAL IBEH, he discusses what those experiments revealed, what he learned from other contributors, and why he wants more Nigerian developers to get involved.Nigerian Banking Launch

For someone outside software engineering, what does MCP do, and where do skills fit in?

MCP is an open standard for connecting AI applications to tools and data. Imagine an assistant connected to a company’s inventory system or customer-support platform. Developers can use MCP to give it access to approved information and supported actions through a common interface.

The question I became interested in was what happens after that connection. An assistant might have access to a tool without knowing the workflow it belongs to. A skill provides reusable instructions that the assistant can read when it needs guidance.

One of my experiments used a dice-rolling tool and a skill that explained tabletop dice notation. I asked the assistant what an expression like 5d10dh1 meant. The tool could execute the notation, but it wasn’t designed to explain it. I observed the client retrieve the skill’s main instruction file, then a reference document about the notation. That gave me a practical example of how tools and skills could work together.

What made you want to work on this problem?

There were discussions about whether developers needed MCP if they already had skills, and whether skills were necessary if MCP already existed. I could see a use for both. MCP could provide access to a capability, and a skill could explain how to use it for a particular task.

I found the MCP Skills working group and started joining the discussions. One question was how the proposed extension would behave in development environments that already supported MCP. I volunteered to investigate Visual Studio Code. It gave me a specific problem to work on and a way to contribute something useful.

What did that first investigation involve?

I built an experimental implementation in my own fork of VS Code and tested it against a live Hugging Face MCP server. It discovered eight skills and made their descriptions available to the model.

That was encouraging, although there was a limit to what I could conclude. I hadn’t fully verified whether the model would choose to load those skills on its own, so I documented that alongside the results.

The findings were accepted into the MCP Skills extension repository. As the specification changed, I went back to test the newer discovery methods and how the client retrieved and verified skill files. The VS Code implementation remained in my experimental fork; it wasn’t merged into Microsoft’s upstream project.

What surprised you when you tested it?

How quickly a small implementation choice could create extra work for a server. In the first experiment, a naive approach to discovery generated about 20 reads of the skills index during one chat turn. That raised an immediate question about caching: how could the client avoid asking for the same information repeatedly?

Later, I saw the other side of that problem. In one experiment, the client reused a skills listing for about 27 hours across several connections. If a server changes its skill files during that time, the client could still be relying on an old listing. Caching saves requests, but you also have to decide when to refresh what you’ve stored.

I also observed a session in which the assistant preferred calling an available tool to reading the skill intended to guide its use. Having the instructions available didn’t guarantee the model would consult them.

Those findings formed part of three accepted contributions covering early discovery, client behaviour and metadata interoperability. The third explored how a metadata key using the io.modelcontextprotocol/ namespace could be preserved and recognised in skill files. Each experiment helped identify details that needed more attention.

How did the experiments lead to work on the TypeScript SDK?

At the time, the official SDK didn’t have dedicated APIs for the Skills extension. Developers could build the functionality with existing MCP capabilities, but they had to handle some of the Skills-specific work themselves. After experimenting in VS Code, I wanted to help make that easier.

I proposed the integration, then submitted an initial implementation. My contribution covered TypeScript types and validation schemas, client operations for listing and retrieving skills, server request handlers, and capability negotiation, which lets a client and server establish what each supports. I also submitted a conformance-testing fixture to check behaviour against the specification.

Konstantin Konstantinov led the final implementation, which was merged on 20 October 2026. It built on my earlier work, retained my commits and explicitly credited my contributions. It also added substantial functionality beyond my submission, including loading skills from the filesystem and verifying retrieved resources.

I’m pleased that my work became part of that implementation. The public review history shows how different contributions came together. It’s too early to say how widely developers will use it.

What did working with the maintainers teach you?

The reviews showed me how much there is to consider when a prototype becomes part of a maintained SDK. Other contributors expanded the work to address requirements I hadn’t fully covered. Following those changes helped me understand their decisions.

One issue I investigated involved a response that appeared to contain the right information but still failed validation. Tracing it through the SDK showed that a field was being removed during decoding, before the application’s schema saw it. The schema had to account for that existing behaviour. It was a useful reminder to understand the surrounding system before deciding what to change. I also learned to be patient with reviews. Maintainers have other responsibilities, and a substantial contribution takes time to assess. Ola, one of the Skills extension maintainers, later recognised my consistency and follow-through. That meant a lot because it came from someone who had reviewed the work. I would volunteered to investigate a problem, and I would stayed with it.

Before this, you worked on products for international teams. Which project stands out?

The consolidation of Kinship’s UK and US websites. The company had separate web domains for the two markets, and we needed to bring them under a unified domain structure while keeping the functionality each market required. Read Economics

I was given technical leadership responsibility for the project. It meant understanding the frontend, the Gatsby framework underneath it, routing, backend integrations and deployment. I also had to coordinate with other engineers and keep the technical decisions moving towards the deadline.

We completed the consolidation, and the experience changed how I understood technical leadership. Solving a difficult programming problem was one part of the job. I also had to help the team deliver the whole project.

How did that product work change the way you make engineering decisions?

It made me pay closer attention to what happens after a feature is built. In our experimentation work, for example, we wanted to understand how different sign-up flows affected customers. I helped introduce a more structured approach to A/B testing, including mutually exclusive experiments to reduce interference between overlapping tests. That gave the team a way to compare user behaviour and conversion data before deciding which experience to use. We could investigate a product question rather than rely on assumptions about what customers would prefer.

Working on products for UK and US customers also exposed me to consent management. I worked with OneTrust and analytics platforms to understand how a person’s consent preferences affected tracking and data collection. Those requirements had to be considered as part of how the application behaved.

You demonstrated MCP at a Cursor developer meetup at the University of Lagos. What did you want people to take away?

I wanted them to see how they could build something themselves. I’d submitted a talk proposal and was selected, so I used the session to build an MCP server and connect it to ChatGPT. Then I showed how the assistant could interact with the functionality the server exposed.

I would already been experimenting with similar technology professionally, and a live demonstration felt like a useful way to share what I’d learned. You can explain the idea with slides, but watching the connection work makes the steps easier to understand. My aim was to make MCP feel more accessible to the developers in the room.

You have also spoken to secondary-school students about technology careers. Why is that important to you?

Students use phones, websites and apps all the time, but they may not have thought much about the people who build and maintain them. I wanted to introduce them to that work and the careers around it.

Software development is one option. There is also product management, design, cybersecurity and data, among other areas. My own path began in petroleum engineering, so I know a career can change direction. I wanted the students to understand that they have room to explore.

What would you say to a Nigerian developer who wants to contribute to open source but isn’t sure where to start? Nigerian Banking Launch

Start with a project you use or care about. Read the documentation, look through the issues and spend some time understanding the code. Reproducing a bug or testing a feature can be a useful first contribution. So can improving documentation when you’ve found something unclear. You will also need to learn how the community works. Understand the direction of the project, explain what you are proposing and respond to feedback. A pull request may take time to review, so patience matters.

Open source gives engineers a way to work together across countries without having to relocate. In my case, volunteering to investigate a specific problem gave me a way in. As I understood more, I found other places where I could help.

What are you interested in working on next?

I am still interested in how AI applications discover and use external capabilities. With the Skills extension, I want to learn what happens as developers put it to use. Where do clients struggle? Which parts are difficult to implement?

The experiments have made me more curious about what sits behind the tools I use. I used to install libraries and focus mostly on what I could build with them. Now I am also looking at the decisions behind them and the problems their maintainers are trying to solve. That’s where I’d like to keep contributing.

How a warning delivered at the United Nations in 1963 found a new voice in a Jamaican recording studio thirteen years later, transforming an African statesman’s appeal for racial equality into one of reggae’s most uncompromising political anthems.

There was no guitar in the room. No drumbeat, no bassline, no Jamaican rhythm section. Only an ageing African emperor, dressed in the formal dignity of his office, standing before the representatives of the world’s nations in New York.

It was October 4, 1963.

Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia had come to address the United Nations General Assembly. Twenty-seven years earlier, he had stood before another international gathering in Geneva, pleading with the League of Nations to save his country from Benito Mussolini’s invading armies. His appeal had largely fallen on deaf ears. Ethiopia was conquered, the emperor driven into exile, and the world learned, rather too late, what happens when aggression is rewarded with indifference.

Now he had returned to the international stage, carrying a different but related warning.

The subject was racial injustice. The argument was peace. The message was that humanity could never genuinely achieve the latter while continuing to practise the former.

He spoke of the absurdity of dividing human beings into superior and inferior races. He challenged the existence of first-class and second-class citizens. He condemned the racial regimes holding Africans in bondage in Angola, Mozambique and South Africa.

And he warned that until these conditions disappeared, the world’s promises of peace would remain an illusion.

It was an extraordinary speech, although few among those listening could have imagined its remarkable afterlife.

Thirteen years later, a Jamaican musician with dreadlocks, an electric guitar and an increasingly commanding international reputation would take the emperor’s words and give them something diplomacy had never quite managed to provide.

A rhythm.

His name was Bob Marley.

The song was War.

And one of the most remarkable political transformations in popular music was complete.

The Speech That Refused to Remain a Speech

To understand the force of Selassie’s 1963 address, one must travel backwards to June 1936.

Ethiopia had been invaded by Fascist Italy the previous October. Mussolini’s forces, supported by superior military equipment and chemical weapons, had overwhelmed Ethiopian resistance. Addis Ababa fell in May 1936.

Selassie went into exile, but before settling in Britain, he appeared before the League of Nations in Geneva.

There, the defeated emperor became something larger than a dispossessed monarch. He became a witness against the international order itself.

The League had been established to prevent another catastrophe like the First World War. Yet it had failed to protect an African member state from European aggression.

Selassie warned that the failure would have consequences far beyond Ethiopia.

History vindicated his fears. Within three years, Europe was again at war.

When he addressed the United Nations in 1963, the emperor could therefore speak with the authority of a man who had witnessed the distance between international morality and international behaviour.

hana had achieved independence in 1957. Nigeria followed in 1960. Across the continent, colonial flags were coming down and new nations were entering the international community. Earlier that same year, Selassie had hosted African leaders in Addis Ababa for the establishment of the Organisation of African Unity.

Yet the continent remained divided between liberation and subjugation.

South Africa was under apartheid. Angola and Mozambique remained Portuguese colonies. White minority rule continued to shape the politics of southern Africa.

Selassie’s message was that political independence in one part of the continent could not justify indifference to oppression elsewhere.

It was a Pan-African argument, but also a universal one.

The moral legitimacy of the entire international system, he suggested, depended upon how it treated the least powerful among its members.

In the United Nations chamber, these were the words of a statesman confronting the contradictions of an international order that claimed to uphold equality while tolerating racial domination.

What gave them their eventual musical force was the structure of the argument itself.

Selassie did not merely condemn injustice. He established a series of conditions that had to be fulfilled before peace could become meaningful.

Discover moreEach condition led to another. Each injustice demanded correction. Each unresolved inequality postponed the possibility of genuine peace.

It was a formulation almost waiting to be transformed into a refrain.

How Bob Marley Discovered the Music in the Message

By the middle of the 1970s, Bob Marley was no longer simply a talented Jamaican singer hoping for international recognition.

He had become the most influential global voice of reggae.

The Wailers’ recordings had brought a new intensity to Jamaican popular music, combining the rhythmic sophistication of reggae with social commentary, religious conviction and an increasingly international political consciousness.

Albums such as Catch a Fire, Burnin’ and Natty Dread had established Marley as an artist capable of making the experiences of Kingston’s poorer communities intelligible to audiences far beyond Jamaica.

Songs such as Get Up, Stand Up, Burnin’ and Lootin’ and Them Belly Full (But We Hungry) had already demonstrated his willingness to confront power.

Yet War was different.

It did not rely primarily on Marley’s own lyrical imagination. Its central text came from Selassie’s 1963 address.

The adaptation was associated with Marley’s close friend Allan ‘Skill’ Cole, while drummer Carlton Barrett played a significant role in developing the music. Both men received songwriting credits, although the precise contributions to the composition later became the subject of legal dispute.

For Marley, the speech offered more than useful political language.

It provided a declaration of principle that could be carried beyond the conventions of diplomacy.

Where a formal address was limited by the occasion of its delivery, a recording could circulate indefinitely. It could be played on the radio, performed before concert audiences, purchased as a record or absorbed into the soundtrack of a political movement.

The challenge was how to turn a statesman’s carefully constructed prose into compelling music without weakening its argument.

The Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), Kwara State Command, has arrested two suspects in separate cases involving alleged investment fraud and suspected cult-related activity, recovering a locally fabricated pistol and mobile phones in one of the operations.

According to a statement signed by Ayoola Michael Shola, the Command’s Public Relations Officer, the arrests were part of the command’s ongoing intelligence-led efforts to combat crime, protect lives and property, and bring suspected offenders to justice.

In the first case, the command arrested 33-year-old Onwucheku Odum Umeh over an alleged investment fraud involving the PXES investment platform, following a complaint received on September 19, 2026.

The suspect was arrested at about noon on October 15, 2026, in Ikeja, Lagos State, by operatives of the command’s Tracking Unit after investigative and intelligence-gathering efforts.

The complaint bordered on alleged cheating, fraudulent activities and obtaining money under false pretences.

Preliminary investigations indicated that six investors reportedly committed a combined sum of N78,360,709 to the platform.

The command said further investigations traced the account into which the investors paid their money to the suspect. Investigators also reportedly established a link between the PXES platform and Ragekay Global Investment Limited, with a substantial portion of the funds traced to the company’s account.

The platform subsequently became inaccessible, leaving investors unable to access their accounts or recover their investments.

The command explained that it was expanding its investigation to identify other potential victims and determine the full extent of the alleged scheme.

According to a statement signed by Ayoola Michael Shola, the Command’s Public Relations Officer, the arrests were part of the command’s ongoing intelligence-led efforts to combat crime, protect lives and property, and bring suspected offenders to justice.

In the first case, the command arrested 33-year-old Onwucheku Odum Umeh over an alleged investment fraud involving the PXES investment platform, following a complaint received on September 19, 2026.

The suspect was arrested at about noon on October 15, 2026, in Ikeja, Lagos State, by operatives of the command’s Tracking Unit after investigative and intelligence-gathering efforts.

The complaint bordered on alleged cheating, fraudulent activities and obtaining money under false pretences.

Preliminary investigations indicated that six investors reportedly committed a combined sum of N78,360,709 to the platform.

The command said further investigations traced the account into which the investors paid their money to the suspect. Investigators also reportedly established a link between the PXES platform and Ragekay Global Investment Limited, with a substantial portion of the funds traced to the company’s account.

The platform subsequently became inaccessible, leaving investors unable to access their accounts or recover their investments.

The command explained that it was expanding its investigation to identify other potential victims and determine the full extent of the alleged scheme.

Abbas Ndah Mohammed, the State Commandant of the NSCDC, reaffirmed the command’s commitment to sustaining proactive, intelligence-led operations to combat crime and safeguard residents across the state.

He urged members of the public to support security operations by providing timely, credible and actionable information, stressing that public cooperation remained essential to crime prevention and effective law enforcement.

The commandant assured residents that investigations into both cases were ongoing and that appropriate legal action would follow as the investigations progressed.