The message tagged ‘Time to Reclaim Nigeria’s Greatness,’ touched on unity, nation-building, insecurity, politics, among others.
He urged President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to use his wealth of experience to end the ugly “instrumentalisation of religious, ethnic or regional identities”.
He also appealed to Nigerians to continue to have faith in the country and be hopeful.
Kukah said: “Now, the government must devise strategies for achieving reconciliation, which has eluded us. Our injuries are not invisible. Many national conferences have been held to chart a way forward. The trove of grievances and hopes is there, and all the government needs to do is to dust them up. No need to reinvent the wheel or attempt some new diagnosis.
“Mr. President, Sir, congratulations and a happy Christmas. Now, you have what you prayed for, what you dreamt of, what you longed for. For the better part of over 20 years, you have plotted to be our President. For years, you campaigned for a new Nigeria through restructuring or overhauling the defective machinery of the Nigerian state.
“For years, you fought the military and other forms of dictatorships. For years, you fought for the victims of a deep state. For years, you sought to create an egalitarian society. For years, you sought a just society. For years, you have built networks with individuals, communities, and institutions. Now is harvest time.
“You are in the driving seat now. Under your watch, Nigeria must turn the corner. Under your watch, we must end the ugly instrumentalisation of religious, ethnic, or regional identities. You have had enough time to think of the answers to many questions that are crying for answers. Your future and that of our country is in your hands.
“Mr President, you have no excuses before God or the people of Nigeria. Neither God nor history will forgive you if you fail. This is our moment, our date with history. Now, all eyes and ears are on you. Our prayers for a united country are with you.
“We have seen the first faltering steps of policy decisions, which have elicited a mixture of controversy, anxiety, and praise. This is to be expected. You have promised us a Renewed Hope Agenda, but know that hope has worn thin in our dear nation.
“Nigerians have almost lost hope in the fact that a government can really and truly care for them. Nigerians have lost hope in the fact that our politicians will put our interests first and find a way to deal with the cancer of corruption. We had lost hope in being united again, given the seeds of division that had been sown. Ignite our hope again, Sir.
“We now have seen some renewed hope in your effort to run an inclusive government. We want an end to partisanship. The problems of Nigeria are deep-seated, and they are based on a culture of corruption that has become the foundation stone of governance. This evil structure has to be dismantled.
“Palliatives will not resolve Nigeria’s problems. The problems are deep and structural. Please do not be afraid to reset the template of power, regardless of the cultural or historical myths. We are tired of promises and stories. We want evidence we can see and touch.
“Mr. President, the killings of Nigerians by whatever name must end and end now. These senseless killings, abductions, extortions, and kidnappings have to end, and the sacredness and sanctity of human life must be restored. Blasphemy laws have no place in a democracy. We are not in a theocracy.
“Those who take life by whatever means must be fished out and punished. A culture of compensation to victims must be institutionalised and states must take full responsibility while criminals or those who hide them are fished out. We cannot go on this way. The seeds of hatred that have sprouted in Gaza show us the consequences of allowing a culture of distorted narratives to grow among us.”
He noted: “You must rid the public service of criminals who have turned the opportunity to serve into an ignoble enterprise. We concede that there are millions of decent men and women who genuinely wish to serve but are crushed by the deadweight of corrupt ogas at the top who use corruption as their oxygen! This surgery must happen if you are to succeed in any of your dreams of delivering much-needed services to our people.
“To be able to have credibility, your Renewed Hope agenda must be based on a solid foundation of faith and hope for the restoration of glory for our country. So far, a few of your key policies have unleashed a raft of suffering on the masses of our people. There must be a deliberate effort to restore hope to the faces of the poor and vulnerable in our society.
“We have heard the familiar stories of empty treasuries and the efforts at investigations. We wait to see if anything will be different. Lay the foundation for ending the unnecessary sufferings of our people.”
“Good politics and good politicians can bring about change, but all of these require the commitment and honesty of citizens to be honest at all levels. I therefore call on Christians, in particular, in this season to become real models of our faith.
“The call to be a Christian is not a call to join an Association or a Club. The fourteenth-century English poet Alexander Pope said, “Christ may be born a thousand times in Bethlehem, but if he is not born in your heart, his birth has no meaning for you.”
Enugu State has shone brilliantly at the BusinessDay States Competitiveness and Investment Readiness Awards (SCIRA) 2025, carting home the Infrastructure Development Competitiveness Award and Outstanding Performance in Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) Award.
Governor Peter Mbah, represented by the Commissioner for Works and Infrastructure, Engr. Ben Okoh and the Executive Chairman, Enugu State Internal Revenue Service (ESIRS), Mr. Emmanuel Nnamani, received the awards on behalf of the state government in Abuja, Thursday night.
Presenting the awards, the Publisher/CEO of BusinessDay Media Limited, said Governor Mbah had impacted public infrastructure in a way that goes beyond just playing politics.
“In the last six months, I have had the opportunity of travelling to Enugu three times. The first time I visited in January, my taxi driver was eager to take me around. That caught my imagination. I began to ask questions and I began to look around.
“One thing I found especially quite interesting was that Governor Mbah did not set aside everything that he met, which could have been a waste of public resources. He looked at what is good and he rebuilt them; the ones that were not completed, he completed them.
“Two things that struck me because I had to ask a question, where does he get the money? I saw good roads, and I don’t mean good roads in the major highways, I mean good roads even in the communities that are far away from the prime areas of the state capital, Enugu.
“I thought that that is a very good example of a private sector person, who knows what to do with resources, because if you use resources well, you get more from little and that is what the governor has done. And for that, Governor Mbah is receiving this award. He has impacted public infrastructure in a way that goes beyond just playing politics,” he stated.
Speaking, Engr. Okoh thanked BusinessDay for recognising the Mbah Administration’s efforts at rewriting the narrative of the state, stressing that Enugu had a lot of success stories to tell in just three years.
He, however, described the awards as a motivation to do more, noting, “as the governor always says, you ain’t seen nothing yet.”
Okoh went on to reel out some of the achievements of the administration, saying that “Enugu State has witnessed an unprecedented infrastructural revolution, the type we have never seen since the advent of this present democracy in 1999.”
“Projects that were inherited even from governments that left office in 2007- for instance, the International Conference Centre, Mbah has completed it. Hotel Presidential, the flagship hotel of the old Eastern Region, and the Nigergas Company, which has remained moribund for over 30 years, have been revived.
“Being the commissioner for Works and Infrastructure in the state, I can stand here confidently to say that no government since 1999 achieved what Governor Mbah has achieved in three years.
“I can say that in terms of road construction, in just three years, we have done far more than double what any other government did in eight years. No government in Enugu since 1999 did up to 600Km of roads in eight years.
“Under Governor Mbah, we have 267 smart schools across the state and 260 Primary Healthcare Centres to our credit.
“We are developing the New Enugu City, a world-class smart city. The present Enugu City is about 14,000 hectares, while the New City is approximately 10,000 hectares. To put this in perspective, the New Enugu City is almost the same size as Paris, Milan or Barcelona, making it one of the largest planned urban developments in Africa.
The New Enugu City is also larger than Manchester or the entire Phase One of the Federal Capital City, Abuja, which comprises the districts of Asokoro, Maitama, Maitama Extension, Wuse I (Zone 1 – 7), Wuse II, Garki I (Area 1 – 11), Garki II, the Central Business District, Three Arms Zone, Guzape I, and Guzape II.
This is the first time a state in Nigeria would be undertaking an integrated infrastructure development, which is what we have in the FCT where all the facilities in the modern city are underground, and telecommunications lines- the fibre optics, the electrical cables, water pipes, everything is underground. It is not just a vision; the projects are already ongoing.
“There is no particular sector that Governor Peter Ndubuisi Mbah has not touched, be it tourism, security, agriculture, education or even transport sector where the administration floated Enugu Air, built five ultramodern transport terminals and launched over 150 CNG buses,” he said.
It is also recalled that the Mbah Administration has disrupted the state’s IGR space, where he used reforms and technology to grow the state’s IGR exponentially from N26.8bn in 2022 to N37.4bn in 2023, N180.5bn in 2024, and N406.7bn in 2025, with tax revenue accounting for just N51.5bn or 12.6 per cent of the 2025 IGR proceeds.
Meanwhile, BusinessDay is Nigeria’s leading business newspaper and the SCIA recognises and celebrates states that have demonstrated exceptional performance in governance, economic development, infrastructure delivery, investment promotion, and the creation of an enabling environment for businesses and citizens to thrive.
A legal practitioner, Barrister Chinedu Ifeanyi Iloeje, has publicly declared that a man previously believed to be his son is not biologically related to him, following the outcome of a DNA test.
In a public notice published in a newspaper, Iloeje stated that he was allegedly misled by the man’s mother into believing that the individual, identified as Chinedu Francis Iloeje, was his biological son.
According to the notice, DNA testing conducted on the matter established “beyond any doubt” that the man is not his son.
The lawyer further clarified that he never legally adopted the individual, despite the latter bearing the name Chinedu Francis Iloeje.
Barrister Iloeje explained that the man’s original name is Chinedu Francis Onwualu and stressed that he has no legal or biological relationship with him.
The notice also informed members of the public, the Greater Iloeje Family, the Umuodu Village Union, Uwani Amokwe Town Union, St. Theresa’s Catholic Church Amokwe, Udi Local Government Council, and other stakeholders of his declaration.
He stated that the disclaimer was made in good faith and while of sound mind, urging the public to take note of the clarification.
The publication has sparked discussions on paternity disputes and the increasing reliance on DNA testing to resolve questions of biological parentage.
Presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) in the forthcoming 2027 general election, Mr. Peter Obi, has donated N10 million to assist in the renovation of the burnt Mother of Christ Specialist Hospital, Enugu State.
The former Anambra State governor handed over the cheque for the donation to the hospital management team when he visited the hospital yesterday.
The hospital belongs to the Reverend Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of the Catholic Church.
Mr Peter Obi inspecting the burnt hospital
Addressing the hospital management team after inspecting parts of the burnt hospital, the NDC presidential candidate commended them for their efforts in contributing to healthcare delivery services.
Telling them that even though they might feel that they were not being appreciated for what they were doing, Obi, however, described healthcare delivery services and education as among the “most critical needs of society” and urged them not to relent in what they were doing.
Accompanied during the visit by his Chief of Staff, Commissioner for Housing, as well as Special Adviser on Media when he was Anambra State governor, Prof. Stella Okunna, Prof. Patrick Obi, and Dr. Valentine Obienyem respectively, Obi assured the hospital management team that he would continue to support them.
Part of the hospital gutted by the inferno and inspected by Obi was the Children’s Ward.
Expressing gratitude on behalf of the hospital management, the Chief Medical Director of Immaculate Heart Hospital, Nkpor, Anambra State, Rev. Sister Dr. Maria Nkiruka Okafor, eulogised Obi for his sacrifices and selfless contributions to humanity.
Disclosing that Obi had already credited the hospital’s accountant with the N10 million donation and that he was even the person who called her to inform her that he had received the sad news of the inferno and promised to donate towards the renovation, Rev. Sister Okafor described him as a rare politician.
She prayed that God would grant him his ambition to become President of the country and enable him to achieve his desire to transform it.
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