What else can one conclude but the above when you read the following statement by one Ebi Anthony, who wrote thus;

“I think the Igbo nation should have volunteers ‘MOSAD’ (you know what I mean), to down person’s like her where ever they may be.”

The above quoted statement was made in direct and unambiguous reference to the Chairman/CEO of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission, Mrs. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, who was the sole subject of a post by well known veteran journalist and former editor of major newspapers in Nigeria like The Guardian, Thisday, Newage as well as MD/CEO of Imo Newspapers Limited, Steve Osuji.

Steve Osuji, whose post centred mainly on calling for Abike’s apology to the Igbo nation, or alternatively to resign from her post, berated her for liking a post by an X user who allegedly used derogatory words on the Igbo ethnic nation.

“He who comes to equity must come with clean hands”

One would have expected that a Steve Osuji who wrote such a long epistle in his post to castigate and chastise Abike Dabiri-Erewa, (spitting fire and brimstone in the process), would be the last person to commit the same offence he is accusing her of, to wit, supporting and encouraging an uncouth individual to fan embers of hate and bigotry in public.

In fact, he took his own offense several despicable notches higher. Not only did Steve Osuji fail to reprimand the culprit, Ebi Anthony who, in commenting under his post, was surreptitiously and publicly calling for Abike Dabiri-Erewa’s assassination/elimination, he did not delete the offending post, something any responsible administrator of a platform would have done immediately.

Rather, Steve Osuji chose to approve of that incitement to murder by giving a “thumbs up/like” emoji sign!!!

Now, how does that make him better than Abike Dabiri-Erewa whom he accused and passed a verdict of “guilty” upon? On what higher moral pedestal can he claim to stand in judgement over her?

Read Also: Abike’s 18 laughter emojis – Re: Abike must resign, By Steve Osuji

Our law enforcement agencies must rise to the occasion and perform their duties. We cannot have citizens publicly soliciting others, whether individuals or groups, to engage in assassinations/murder of fellow citizens under whatever reasons or justifications and the law is not immediately activated to bring such culprits to book.

This man, Ebi Anthony must be immediately fished out, and prosecuted under the law. Steve Osuji, under whose post he made such a hateful and incendiary incitement must also have to explain his apparent tacit approval for the man’s incitement to murder.

The Igbo nation, whose name the man attempted to drag into infamy through his call to them to have a standby so-called ‘Mosad’ to eliminate enemies of the Igbo, must vociferously dissociate itself from this odious call and engage her sons and daughters to distance themselves from such individuals who will only succeed, if given free rein and unchecked, to further widen the gap between them and their fellow compatriots in this nation.

The unity of this country among the different ethnic nationalities at the present moment, is very fragile and being daily put to the test through unguarded statements, particularly through the social media.

We must not allow this situation to degenerate further by allowing extremists who brazenly and publicly solicit and call for the elimination of their fellow citizens. Allowing that to happen is calling for total anarchy.

It is time for our leaders, irrespective of party politics, religion, and ethnicity, to summon the courage and call for dialogue to end this seemingly unending tribal baiting of one another, an unprofitable past time that can lead nowhere but the road to conflagration!

The views expressed by contributors are strictly personal and not of Law & Society Magazine.

By Steve Osuji 

RAUCOUS LAUGHTER: It wasn’t one emoji. It wasn’t two; not even eight, but 18!
Abike Dabiri-Erewa tapped her screen 18 times on the famous laughter emoji. The one that signifies a happy, raucous laughter. The type of laughter that evokes tears and makes you roll over in utmost mirth.

Abike, a serving government official (Chairman, NiDCOM), tapped 18 times in a gleeful endorsement of a hate tweet on X.

NO NEED FOR LONG EXPLANATION: The facts of this matter are graphic and simple. They need little explanation or adumbration: A friend of Abike’s on X shared a post with her calling Igbos monkeys and gorillas and she found it extremely funny, so raucously funny🤣 that she encouraged it by endorsing it 18 times with images of joy and excitement. (See screenshot).

When people begin to endlessly explain something they have written in the English language, it becomes obvious they are lying and being smart by half.
The tweet is written in the collective sense, it never refers to an individual.
Here’s a verbatim quote of the tweet by Wale S. Akerele: “MY SISTER YOU ARE DOING WELL ALLOW THOSE MONKEYS TO CONTINUE TO MAKE UNNECESSARY NOISES THEY ARE BORN TO BE UNGRATEFUL PEOPLE. THOSE ANIMALS TAGGING YOU THEY ARE CHILDREN OF GORILLA HISTORY TOLD US ABOUT THEM. KUDOS TO YOU MADAM @abi…”

Does anyone need a tutorial on the meaning, intent and import of this tweet which Abike honoured with 18 LAUGHTER emojis?
Abike knows for sure that her vile friend is hereto, referring to Ndigbo as “those monkeys,” as “those animals,” as “children of gorilla.” Yoruba call this “arun oju,” meaning that the evidence is plain. It requires no long explanation!

She simply has horrid Igbo hate in her DNA; she has been getting away with it all these years. Her cup is about full this time!

If Abike was not partners in hate crime with such friends on X; if she didn’t have ingrained hate for Igbo people, she could have reprimanded the fellow who tweeted such despicable hate. Rather she encouraged it with hearty laughter.

By the way, how come you have such friends who would disparage other ethnic groups in such terms?
Show me your friends, it is said, and I will tell you who you are!

DOUBLING DOWN, NOT DELETING TWEET: A multitude of X users were aghast and protested as right thinking people. But Abike doubled down on her folly. She stood her ground. She hasn’t pulled the tweet down even as you read this.

Worse, since the 1st of September, she never bothered to offer her woolly explanations until this column called on her to resign a few days ago.
Abike didn’t only commit a hate crime, she was remorseless, putting up a “go to hell” attitude.

UNLEASHING YOUR HACKS ON THIS COLUMNIST WON’T HELP: No number of number of social media goons unleashed on this columnist will help the situation. She needs to eat the humble pie and apologise.

The matter is straight forward and no spurious explanation or personal attacks on this writer will hold water.

You have a dark heart towards Ndigbo and perhaps other ethnic groups in Nigeria. But you are a public servant bound by the constitution and Service rules. You swore an oath to be fair to all and serve without bias.

Most important, you draw your huge emoluments from the taxes paid by the same people you secretly hate and say vile things about. This is unacceptable.
Your hacks, in writing their tripe, tried to dredge up the professional tiff I had with the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE). Nothing comes sillier in this conversation than this.

Well, since you don’t understand the nuances of the Guild matter, let me educate you. I had a professional disagreement in which I contended that the body of editors should never suffer any form of muzzling or blanket black out during their biennial convention. It is about practice principles and has nothing to do with professional integrity.

Only true journalists understand my stance here and they upheld it. Even the Guild, upon further review of the matter, have determined that I was acting professionally and not out of malice or defiance.

Apparently Abike didn’t understand the full import of the situation. But then the true journalists in Nigeria know themselves and they also know the jeun, jeun journalists. In this great divide, we know where Abike belongs.

ABIKE MUST APOLOGISE OR RESIGN: The call still stands: This column insists Abike would have to apologise to IGBO and to NIGERIANS generally or resign honourably.
Of course, everyone knows you’re President Bola Tinubu’s ‘daughter’ and that you are probably playing his Igbo exclusion script and following in his anti-Igbo policies but we are not deterred in seeking justice.

We shall have to escalate this matter to the UN Human Rights bodies to adjudicate if you don’t do the right thing. We shall initiate a class action against you if we must…

Pray, how do you face thousands of Igbo Diasporans who you regard as monkeys and gorillas? How do you face them in your day-to-day engagements?

Isn’t it elementary to you that your position as a paid government official has become untenable?
If you had tried this idiocy in the UK or US for instance, you would have gone before dusk of the same day! You know too well that you would have made profuse apologies too!
#ABIKEMUSTGO

>> OSUJI was editor at The Guardian, THISDAY, etc.
>> Feedback [email protected]
>> OSUJISTEVE/15.09.25

The views expressed by contributors are strictly personal and not of Law & Society Magazine.

By Lasisi Olagunju

“You may forward this to him to reflect on…if he’s redeemable!” A Tinubu minister from the South-West sent this message to a respected, elderly journalist now in his mid-70s. It was meant for me and the Oga did as instructed; he forwarded the message to me. I read what the big man wanted me to read. It was someone’s reaction to my column on the Alaafin-Ooni problem and what I had described as Yoruba’s “curse of enlightenment.”

The minister said he got it from a Yoruba WhatsApp group, author unknown, but he believed so much in what the writer wrote that he thought he should get Olagunju to read it “if he is redeemable.”

And what is in that message of redemption? I read it slowly and carefully because it came from a big man, a minister who had been where I am today: “Undoubtedly a researched article…but this writer is the archetypal Yoruba! He’s the most guilty of all the Yoruba negative attributes he so comprehensively enumerated. A content analysis of his writings shows a consistent, persistent and relentless attack on fellow Yoruba Tinubu under the same ‘curse of enlightenment’! If truly he’s disconcerted about the Yoruba ‘curse’, then he should engage himself in deep introspection – as all the Yoruba abhorrent attitudes he lampoons, he manifests with glee in his vituperations against Tinubu!”

The above is the core content of what the minister said I should read for my redemption. The man described Tinubu as “the first real Yoruba man to attain Nigeria’s presidency.” I read that part and understood the man’s problem.

The minister was not the writer, but he was the Postmaster-General who dispatched the ‘letter’ for delivery to me. I have the minister’s telephone number but I replied him through the same Oga and pleaded that it should be forwarded to him. While I do not owe the complainant any explanation for what I do, I thought the minister had obviously not been reading what he should be reading; or he had been reading the wrong thing. Because no one is completely bad, and no one is comprehensively good, I had written columns that were positive about some positive steps taken by the Tinubu government. I sent the link of one of such columns to the minister through Oga: “I wrote this last year in defence of Tinubu. Did they beg me or pay me before I wrote it? They probably want a slave (a phlegm eater. There was one like that in Old Oyo, serving His Imperial Majesty. His title was Ajitó oba má p’òfóló. That position no longer exists).”

The minister got the message and replied: “Very predictable! I expected that reaction. It’s still along the same line of ‘curse of enlightenment’. Point is – there’s a preponderance of Tinubu bashing that far outstrips any isolated pro -write up.” The minister then drifted into some Hubert Ogunde ‘Yoruba Ronu’ song.

Saul going to Damascus was on a mission to persecute Christians before a heavenly light turned him to Paul. I was happy that, like Ananias, I laid my hand on the minister and got him ‘redeemed’ from seeing the columnist as an inveterate enemy who sees absolutely no good in the king and his gilded palace. His reaction shows an admission that, at least there is now an “isolated pro-writeup” from a Yoruba man who is an ‘enemy’ of his brother, the president. If the minister had been a Muslim, I would have exclaimed Allahu Akbar (God is Great) at his redemption.

What I canvassed in my article on peace among Yoruba oba was unity of the race. What the minister and his writer demanded was conspiracy of silence by an entire race. Unity means togetherness, it means oneness of purpose; it does not mean sheepish following. I consulted a text here and it told me that true unity does not require uniformity of thought; it means standing together on some issues and respecting differences in others, even allowing for reasonable discourse. I agree with that reasoning. A people sworn to a conspiracy of silence are a people heading towards perdition. Their motive is to protect selfish interests and avoid difficult truths. Their spring water, in the words of the Ghanaian writer, Ayi Kwei Armah, is flowing towards the desert. Its end is extinction.

The minister and the anonymous critic of the columnist want all Yoruba to sleep and put all their heads on the same pillow. They thought every Yoruba comment and commentary about Tinubu and his government must be positive. They say it has to be because the president is Yoruba. When you hear or read stuff like this, you question their claim to Awolowo’s ideology of public service. Since they claim to be progressives of the Awolowo school, the best an ‘enemy’ like me can do is to invite their attention to Awoism and its literature. There is this quote from Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s autobiography: “The Yoruba are a fastidious, critical and discerning people. They will not do anything in politics merely to oblige a fellow Yoruba. If the Yorubaman is satisfied that your policy is good and will serve his self-interest, he will support you no matter from which ethnic group you hail.” Before I am accused of manufacturing this quote, I quickly say that it is on page 261 of the 1997 edition of the book, ‘Awo’.

Column writing is a self-inflicted draining enterprise. And, in taking up that beat, the columnist has behind his mind journalism’s famous interrogative sextet: who, what, where, when, how, and why. He may satisfy all or may not. That is where what he writes is different from what the everyday beat reporter does. This columnist has no enemy. The decision as to what to fix his eyes on, and how to plot his way through the labyrinth of interrogation of the issues is entirely his. Picking his words on the keyboard with one finger as I do, the columnist’s journalism sees ghastly scenes with humane and critical eyes. It is futile (and too late) to seek to goad him into the tribal cave of the heathen. What he does weekly are monologues of suppressed anger at the subversion of the noble in his heritage as a (Yoruba) Nigerian.

The columnist asks questions even when he knows answers won’t come. Over six weeks ago, Works minister, Dave Umahi, announced the Ibadan–Ife–Ilesha road as one of the South West roads that have got 30 per cent funding “for work to start in earnest.” Has anyone seen a one per cent work done on that road since then? Where did the money go? The Yoruba columnist must not ask those questions because the president is Yoruba. Yet, those terribly bad federal roads are in Yorubaland. How did people in this government feel when they heard President John Mahama of Ghana announce the deportation of Nigerians from the US through Ghana? Mahama said at a press conference last week that “a group of 14 deportees including Nigerians and one Gambian have already arrived in Ghana, and the government facilitated their return to their home countries.” Deported from the US to Ghana; deported again from Ghana to Nigeria.

That is the dilemma of being a Nigerian today. Rejection abroad; hostility and suffering at home (Ilé ò gbàá, ònà ò gbàá). Japa is about fleeing a hostile country in search of safety, opportunities, and dignity. Arrival abroad reveals a reality that mocks expectation. Mass deportations from the US; far-right, anti immigrant rallies in the UK. Yet, the people in charge of our affairs think it is bastardy for a Yoruba to tell a Yoruba president and his government that they should work harder; that they should see ‘performance’ beyond serving themselves and their families; that the people of Nigeria deserve a cosy, comfortable country which works and functions as home to all.

In fairness to the president, one of his first charges to journalists was that they should hold his feet to the fire of vigilance. Nothing, so far, has suggested that he has changed his mind. But his (overzealous) men want the journalist to join the On-Your-Mandate-We-Stand choir or keep quiet. Collective silence is collective death. When did we collectively decide to be deaf and dumb? Where and when speech is duty, keeping quiet when you have a voice is a betrayal. And being silent in the face of wrong is akin to telling a lie. And our ancestors say a lie may glow and bloom but what it ultimately yields is bad, poisonous fruits (Bí irọ́ bá tan iná, kò lè so èso rere).

This writer promises to continue to be fair; he pledges to strive to write well, better and sweet without bile. But then, he should be allowed to tell the minister to minister well and the president to preside well. That is the road to our collective salvation. He will not abandon that road.

The views expressed by contributors are strictly personal and not of Law & Society Magazine.

By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

In January 1993, Ibrahim Babangida was Nigeria’s military ruler. He was supposedly in the last year of an interminable transition at the end of which he promised to hand over power to an elected civilian administration. Moshood Abiola was actively canvassing to inherit that mantle. As Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Mohammed Bello was in his fourth year at the apex of the system for resolving disputes between Abiola and Babangida in that process of transition from military to civil rule. He had been CJN since 1987. At the time, Abiola was also Nigeria’s most influential newspaper publisher under the Concord Group. One of the titles published by the Concord Group was a weekly magazine called African Concord. Its editor was Bayo Onanuga.

The previous month, in December 1992, Bayo Onanuga’s African Concord ran a cover under the title: ‘‘Justice Mohammed Bello: Kick him out now! Lawyers demand.” Essentially, the story alleged that military ruler, Ibrahim Babangida, had bribed the Justices of the Supreme Court led by CJN, Mohammed Bello, with gifts of exotic Mercedes Benz cars. At the time, Mercedes Benz produced the most famous luxury brand of cars in Nigeria.

This story would not have amounted to much but for what followed. Shortly after New Year in 1993, nine of the Justices of the Supreme Court instructed Frederick Rotimi Alade (FRA) Williams, the doyen of Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SAN), to file a case before the High Court of Lagos State against the Concord Group, African Concord, and its editor, Bayo Onanuga, claiming that the story had defamed them. The Concord Group instructed stormy petrel, Gani Fawehimin, to represent them. At the Ikeja Division of the High Court of Lagos where the case was tried, Samuel Omotunde Ilori, who would later rise to become the ninth Chief Judge of Lagos, presided.

This case had many sub-plots. It turned out, for instance, that Chief Williams’s youngest son, Tokunbo, who was shortly thereafter to become a SAN himself, was married to the daughter of the presiding judge, Olusola. When Gani Fawehinmi asked the judge to disqualify himself from the case, he declined, describing the request as “unprecedented” and an invitation to “an abdication of his sacred duty as a judicial officer.”

The Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) at the time, Alhaji Aliyu Mohammed, the Wazirin Jema’a, was a witness in the case. In cross examining him, Gani Fawehinmi asked for his qualifications. Reluctantly, the SGF ventured that he was the proud holder of a Teachers Grade 2 certificate, in response to which Gani spat out (to predictable courtroom mirth) “Teacher’s Grade Two certificate, and he rose through the ranks to become the SGF!”

Ultimately, the case was settled when Abiola elected to apologise to the Supreme Court Justices, who then instructed Chief Williams to withdraw it. In response, Bayo Onanuga resigned as editor of Chief Abiola’s African Concord. 

The underlying issue in that case, however, was judicial independence and integrity. 32 years ago, it was an affront to the independence and integrity of judges to suggest that they could be impressed with gifts of cars or imply that they were in the payroll of political office holders. Today, it is different. Senior judicial figures flaunt their propinquity to politicians and rely on that to subvert established rungs of authority among judges and between courts in the judicial hierarchy. It is now de rigeur for politicians to ply judges with cars.

Divining how the country got to this is not that difficult although it is not nearly as necessary as understanding when we did so.

When Mohammed Bello retired as CJN in 1995, Mohammed Lawal Uwais succeeded him. Justice Uwais was one of the justices affronted by the claims about collecting a car from the soldiers in 1992. Although Uwais well understood that “military rule had a corrosive effect” on the judiciary and had not made much of an effort to disguise their campaign to reduce the heads of the judiciary to the status of beggars before the soldiers, he was nevertheless not prepared to cede much ground to them on questions of personal and institutional integrity. Until his retirement in June 2006, the spectacle of politicians publicly gifting cars to judicial officers was not much part of Nigerian public life.

All that was the change under his successors. In effect, this business of the judges being reduced to beggars for Sub-Urban Utility Vehicles (SUVs) has all eventuated in less than two decades.  It is difficult now to trace exactly when this change began. It seem likely, however, that the index case was – as with many things in Nigeria – Lagos State. There are suggestions, at the time of writing difficult to verify, that the practice of lacing judicial office with gifts of political housing and transport was quietly in place before 2007.

However, a significant moment for policy purposes occurred in the first week of October, 2007 when freshly minted Governor of Lagos, Babatunde Raji Fashola, SAN, presented 18 cars to Magistrates in Lagos State. Daily Champion reported the presentation the day after it occurred under the caption “Lagos Government Dashes 18 Cars to Magistrates.” In presenting the cars, Governor Fashola declared: “Our commitment to continuously improve the welfare package and conditions of service of judicial officers in the state places a reciprocal demand on magistrates to display professionalism, integrity and above all a good work ethic.”

Of course, Magistrates Courts are state courts and subordinate ones at that. They are inferior to the High Court. But the significance of this moment was hardly lost on the politicians and the public. At the state level, the Judicial Service Commission oversees the work of Magistrates. The Chief Judge of the state heads the JSC. At the federal level, that role belongs to the CJN. The JSC also controls the budget of the magistracy. The issue was not that the government desired to uplift the wellbeing of magistrates. It was that it chose to do so through a public presentation of cars by the governor for their “welfare”. The same goal could have been achieved if the JSC received the budget to be administered for precisely that objective.

If the governor chose not to do so, it would have been because he desired greater say in the management of the funds or he did not trust the hierarchy of the judiciary to manage it properly if it had been given to them. It could, of course, be a matter of cause and effect between these two factors. Giving credence to this, former Justice of the Supreme Court, Ejembi Eko publicly accused heads of courts in 2024 of “vandalisation of the judiciary budget” notwithstanding the fact that they were in control of heads of courts in Nigeria controlled “enormous budgetary resources.”

There were many things about that event in Lagos in 2007 that should have warranted attention. The governor involved was a lawyer and SAN and the state involved was seen as one that set trends in Nigeria. Yet, when this occurred in 2007, most people missed both the event and its significance. The number of cars purchased by governors for the judiciary at various levels in the 18 years since then has gone off the charts. Hopefully, the judges are in a better state for it because, quite clearly, the courts are not.

It happens that the NJC Guidelines governing the appointment of judges requires as a precondition that every appointment round should be preceded by “proof of adequate Capital vote provision in the relevant approved Budget for the Superior Court of Record concerned.” In other words, before judges are appointed, the NJC requires proof from the head of the court system concerned that there are sufficient funds to take care of such things as both cars and housing for them. If politicians thereafter ply the judges with cars and other blandishments while the NJC looks away, it is not difficult to figure out what is happening.

A lawyer and a teacher, Odinkalu can be reached at [email protected]

By Sonnie Ekwowusi

Most of us grew up, or were raised, under the illusion that the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) (originally named the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund) promotes the well-being of children in line with its stated objectives. However, any student of history who has consistently monitored the activities of UNICEF over the years—especially in developing countries—would readily attest that UNICEF has, in fact, been waging an insidious war against the world’s children.

UNICEF has been corrupting African children by teaching them how to perform abortions, how to masturbate, and how to have so-called “safe sex” without consequences. It indoctrinates children with the belief that religious instructions forbidding teenage sex are mere myths.

This is why the Trump administration has recently refused to endorse the 2026–2029 UNICEF Strategic Plan, which it says contains harmful LGBT ideology, sexualization of children, and the promotion of contraceptives among children. On 12 September 2025, Donald Trump stood alone at the United Nations (which has even developed an LGBT-themed postage stamp) and voted against UN Women’s three-year strategic plan to promote LGBT and gender ideology.

You will recall that Trump dismantled the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) for allegedly sponsoring Boko Haram in Nigeria and other places. Recently, Trump ordered the destruction of $10 million worth of abortifacient birth control pills, intrauterine devices (IUDs), and hormonal implants that were meant to be freely distributed among African women, including Nigerian women, by USAID as part of population reduction programmes in Africa. These birth control products were stockpiled by USAID during the administration of former Joe Biden to be given to women in African countries, including Nigeria. But today, the Trump administration, committed to protecting the lives of unborn children in Africa and all over the world, has ordered the destruction of these dangerous abortifacient products.

In contrast, the Federal Ministry of Health in Abuja is still stockpiling abortifacient birth control pills, intrauterine devices, and hormonal implants, which it freely distributes among Nigerian women to reduce the country’s population. I have repeatedly said that the Federal Ministry of Health is long overdue for a complete shake-up and reform.

I am a regular visitor to the Federal Ministry of Health office located at the Federal Secretariat in Abuja, and what constantly assaults my eyes are cartons of dangerous abortifacient birth control pills, intrauterine devices, and hormonal implants stockpiled at its offices. The Federal Ministry of Health has even printed vasectomy (sterilization of boys and men) and tubal ligation (sterilization of girls and women) booklets, which it uses to embark on campaigns across Nigeria to get men and women sterilized. The Federal Ministry of Health, Abuja, must be an evil institution.

Imagine a country such as Nigeria, where the majority of the people do not have easy access to basic primary healthcare, yet the Federal Ministry of Health in Abuja is mainly focused on getting Nigerian men and women sterilized, all in the name of population reduction. As I said earlier, the Federal Ministry of Health in Abuja is long overdue for a complete shake-up.

Back to Trump, UNICEF, and the sexualization of children: Faced with mounting criticisms—especially a recent report that exposed sexually explicit programs on UNICEF’s website targeting children—the agency has now removed sexual images and curricula from its website. Among the materials it pulled down was a Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) program directed at children in Ukraine.

The curriculum, titled “Adulthood Without Secrets,” designed for children ages 10–14, explains the supposed fluidity of one’s sexual orientation during life, including identifying as homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, or asexual. In the section on “sex and relationships,” sex is defined as “one of the ways people interact, when they express their feelings for each other through physical contact.” Sex is described as something that is an “important part of a relationship” that “helps express intimate feelings and togetherness between partners” and can “strengthen relationships.”

Children are instructed on the “criteria” for “good sex,” which is defined as “sex during which you derive pleasure from all the processes and reach orgasm,” and they are also taught about the necessity of foreplay.

In recent years, Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) has been rejected in many countries. Why? Because its content teaches school children how to indulge in masturbation, abortion, and LGBT practices. In fact, over the years, UNICEF has faced growing criticism for promoting sexualization programs for children under its euphemistic phrase “sexual and reproductive health and rights” agenda.

But this has not stopped UNICEF or other United Nations agencies from implementing it in country programs—often in partnership with groups like the International Planned Parenthood Federation or, in the case of Nigeria, with the Federal Ministry of Health in Abuja.

Now, the Trump administration has done the needful. It has refused to endorse the 2026–2029 UNICEF Strategic Plan because it contains harmful LGBT ideology, sexualization of children, and promotion of contraceptives among children.

Agreed, UNICEF promotes some laudable projects for the well-being of children. But the problem is that those good projects are so mixed up with LGBT ideology, abortion, teen masturbation, teen transgenderism, teen sexual “rights,” and teen contraceptives that UNICEF is unwilling to remove these controversial elements from its otherwise laudable programs. Instead, UNICEF imposes both the good projects and the LGBT ideology, abortion, teen masturbation, teen transgenderism, teen sexual “rights,” and contraceptives wholesale on developing countries.

“The United States strongly supports the work that UNICEF does to help children around the world, but we cannot endorse a plan that contains elements that are at odds with U.S. policy,”
said U.S. representative Jonathan Shrier.

However, the Trump administration insists that UNICEF should focus on its primary responsibility of protecting children and fostering their education, health, and well-being, and should stop giving children LGBT ideology, contraceptives, masturbation, transgenderism, abortion, and sexual “rights.”

Can you imagine UNICEF promoting teen LGBT ideology, abortion, teen masturbation, teen transgenderism, teen sexual “rights,” and teen contraceptives in poverty-stricken Thailand or war-ravaged Ukraine? What a shame. Instead of supplying Ukrainian children with food, milk, and other relief materials for their well-being, UNICEF is offering them masturbation, transgender, sexual “rights,” and teen contraceptive services.

A 2024 UNICEF brochure tells 15-year-olds that “it is normal to feel sympathy or attraction to members of your own or the opposite sex…” and that “masturbation is perfectly acceptable in relationships, both alone and with partners.” The brochure also says that masturbation may be “surrounded by myths, but it is actually a way to relieve stress, satisfy arousal, and explore your body, sexuality, and desires.” UNICEF tells children, “Only through experiments can you understand what really brings pleasure to you and your partner.”

UNICEF even lists “anal sex” as just another sex act that children should be familiar with:

“Sex happens… oral — stimulation of the genitals with the tongue or lips; vaginal — involves penetration of the vagina with a penis, fingers, or sex toys; anal — during which the penis penetrates the anus, fingers, or sex toys.”

Another UNICEF brochure tells 10-year-olds in JSS1–JSS3:

“Foreplay and caressing touch help you to relax, feel comfortable, and increase sexual arousal… In order to understand what caressing you and your partner like, you need to talk about it.”

The same brochure teaches the children that phrases like “traditional or non-traditional orientation” are incorrect, stating that “all types of sexual orientation are natural.”

Coming back home to Nigeria, UNICEF is reportedly teaching mothers and children in Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps how to perform abortions, masturbate, exercise their sexual “rights,” and take various harmful contraceptives. I recall that many years ago, UNICEF—ostensibly authorized by the Federal Government—went to the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) Orientation Camp in Lagos to distribute condoms to the hapless youth corps members.

UNICEF arrived at the camp in the morning with a big truck bearing the inscription Condom. Thereafter, all the corps members were instructed to form a single file. They did. Then the UNICEF staffers began distributing condoms to them free of charge. Paradoxically, that same evening, a male corps member and a female corps member were caught by NYSC security agents misbehaving with the condoms. The next day, the NYSC camp authorities met and expelled the two corps members from the camp.

The logical question at the time was: If UNICEF gave the corps members condoms to misbehave with, why expel the two corps members for misbehaving with them? Obviously, UNICEF cannot commit this kind of wrong in its home country. But because Nigeria is treated as a dumping ground for all kinds of toxic materials, any foreign NGO can freely come to Nigeria, commit all kinds of crimes, and get off scot-free. For example, Marie Stopes, a UK-based abortion NGO, is in Nigeria running abortion clinics in almost all the states of the federation. Marie Stopes lures underage girls into their clinics to be given abortifacient injections without the consent of their parents.

Acting on a petition written by a parent, some policemen went and sealed off one Marie Stopes abortion clinic in Lagos. The police handcuffed the abortion doctor (name withheld) on duty at that time and took him to their police station.

The most tragic part is that almost all the good English literature books—such as Macbeth, Julius Caesar, Weep Not Child, Things Fall Apart, Zambia Shall Be Free, The Man Died, African Child, Akin the Drummer Boy, Mine Boy, The Gods Are Not to Blame, Gulliver’s Travels, Around the World in Eighty Days, Allan Quatermain, King Solomon’s Mines, and Eze Goes to School—which most Nigerian adults read in public secondary schools in the 70s, 80s, and even mid-90s, have been removed from the curriculum and replaced with sex-related textbooks and English literature books.

These sex-related English literature books, containing lewd subject matter, have been introduced into the curriculum to give unsuspecting young school pupils the wrong impression that self-control is unnecessary, repressive, and impossible; that casual sex makes them feel good; that they should engage in casual sex before marriage; that “safe sex” is the goal in life provided they don’t get pregnant—and if they do, they should procure abortions as soon as possible.

For example, one of the speakers at the Regional World Congress of Families held at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, Victoria Island, Lagos, from March 27 to 29, 2017, was Ahmed Akanbi. Ahmed is a parent and a Lagos-based legal practitioner.

Midway through his presentation, Ahmed did something that shocked most of the conference participants. He carefully dipped his hand into his bag, brought out two English literature books containing some lewd subject matter, and showed them to the participants. He told them that the two books were recommended for Primary Six pupils in the school attended by his daughter.

The title of the first book, authored by Oyekunle Oyedeji, is Tears of a Bride, while the second book, written by Queen O. Okweshine, is titled Precious Child.

According to Ahmed, his 9-year-old daughter in Primary Six came back home from school one day and engaged him in a conversation about some sexual experiences. At first, Ahmed was utterly stunned. But after he regained his composure, he asked his daughter where she learned about those sexual experiences. It was then she narrated how their school teacher had been using the two books to teach them how to practice “safe sex” and how to gain sexual pleasure.

Ahmed read aloud some sexual portions of the two books to the hearing of the participants, who rose to their feet in utter shock.

A society reaps what it sows. If our school children are taught in open classrooms that self-control is unnecessary, repressive, and impossible, and that casual sex, masturbation, and LGBT practices make them feel good—all in the name of sex education—then we are ruined as a people.

Consequently, we must protect our children from the bad influence of UNICEF. Did you know that UNICEF spends hundreds of millions of dollars promoting explicit—even pornographic—sexual content for children around the world? And we are letting them operate unchecked in Nigeria.

Did you know that the National Sexuality Education Curriculum, which was developed by the National Council on Education, is modeled after the book Guidelines for Comprehensive Sexuality Education in Nigeria published by Action Health Incorporated (AHI), a Lagos-based NGO? And this AHI book is an adaptation of the 1991 Guidelines for Comprehensive Sexuality Education produced by Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) in New York. And we are still allowing this so-called National Sexuality Education Curriculum to be used in Nigeria.

Small wonder Malam Adamu Adamu, former Minister of Education, had directed the Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council (NERDC) to expunge sex education from the school curriculum in Nigeria, noting that sex education should be left in the hands of parents and religious institutions and not taught in schools in a manner that would further corrupt little children who are already exposed to all sorts of sexual perversions on their mobile phones and electronic gadgets.

The Minister stated that his action was informed by the fact that, in Nigeria’s religious and cultural setting, the morals and values imparted to children by their parents and religious institutions are the superstructure for moulding their character and building our national ethos.

Current Nigeria’s Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Muhammad Ali Pate, should follow the good example of his predecessor in office and direct that sex education or CSE should not be taught in Nigerian secondary schools because it corrupts the morals of students.

Rather than teaching unsuspecting young school kids in Nigeria sex education or CSE, they should be taught moral/religious instruction, civic education, history, basic hygiene, and basic cleanliness. Nigerian parents should be reminded—perhaps for the umpteenth time—that parents are the first and most important educators of their children and possess a fundamental competence in this area: they are educators because they are parents.

Therefore, no UN agency or NGO has a right to teach our children anything in school that goes against the faith and morals of their parents.

I know a government secondary school (name withheld) along Eric Moore Street, Surulere, Lagos, where hired teachers (paid ₦20,000 each) came to an open classroom with rubber penises and rubber vaginas and demonstrated to the school pupils how to wear condoms. Is this not criminal?

This reminds me: some Nigerian pro-abstinence NGOs took some distributors of condoms in Nigeria to court a couple of years ago on the ground that abstinence, not condoms, offers 100% protection against HIV. I remember I was the lawyer for the plaintiff pro-abstinence NGOs in that matter. Anyway, the pro-abstinence NGOs won the case. A copy of the court’s judgment is lodged in our law firm. No appeal has been filed by the defendants to date.

The views expressed by contributors are strictly personal and not of Law & Society Magazine.