FEATURES
IBB at 82: What Would IBB Have Done?
By Chidi Amuta
Today, former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida, turns 82. It has become my annual personal tradition to use the opportunity of his birthday each year to highlight the perennial relevance of the policies, ideas and practices that he emplaced over three decades ago to our preset circumstances.
Each time we are confronted with a major national challenge, the question that has come to my mind has always been: What would IBB have done? I raise the same rhetorical question today in the light of the issues that confront our new administration.The Niger Coup and ECOWAS
Perhaps the most burning issue today the coup in Niger Republic and the spotlight on Nigeria’s leadership responsibility as a force of stabilization in the West African sub region. As IBB observes his birthday today, it might be helpful for our younger generation and the political leadership of today to have an insight into how IBB used the projection of Nigeria’s power to stabilize war torn Liberia and later Sierra Leone.
Of course the circumstances were somewhat different. Nigeria was under military rule transiting to democracy. But our leadership place in West Africa and indeed the entire continent was not in question. The strength of our military was in tact just a sour commitment to political stability and democratization were all values deserving external projection.
Babangida’s grand vision of Nigeria saw a bolder more assertive and even regionally powerful Nigeria. With Prof. Bolaji Akinyemi as Foreign Minister, Babangida pursued the kind of bold and activist foreign policy that only befits an ambitious regional power. He was not shy to project Nigeria’s power in the West African sub region hence his direct military intervention in the civil wars in both Liberia and Sierra Leone. He saw the civil wars in both countries as direct threats to the security of West Africa. His friend, Ghanaian head of state, Jerry Rawlings. shared his commitment. They did not wait for endless summits or convoluted resolutions. They led the charge. Others followed. ECOMOG was born.
In August 1990, a contingent of the Nigerian military landed at the port of Monrovia to commence what became the ECOMOG operation. As the vessels approached Monrovia, the transmission station of “Radio Freedom” which was onboard came alive with messages of hope beamed to the Liberian people. The Nigerian force was supported by a small Ghanaian contingent, which was allowed to provide the founding force Commander of ECOMOG ,General Arnold Quainoo.
ECOMOG succeeded in separating the warring factions. It later graduated into an ECOWAS wide intervention initiative which stabilized the situation in Liberia. In subsequent years, ECOMOG expanded into troubled Sierra Leone with the stationing of an air base with a squadron of Nigerian Alpha jets. That neutralized the rebels in rural Sierra Leone. Through Nigeria’s leadership, ECOMOG became an African model in the use of national power to stabilize a region. The OAU and the UN later supported the initiative into a multilateral initiative.
Choosing a Cabinet
As the nation awaits the swearing in of President Bola Tinubu’s cabinet, national discourse has concentrated on the quality of most of the nominees. In a nation that boasts of some of the most outstanding technocrats and intellectuals in diverse fields, the mediocrity of the Tinubu selection has embarrassed many. There may be no basis for measuring Tinubu’s choices against those of Babangida over thirty years ago.
Tinubu is a partisan politician. He has political debts to pay. He has to contend with a constitution that requires that each state be represented by one minister at least. He also has to rule over a nation that has literally been overrun by a degraded value system. On the contrary, IBB headed a military regime with no parliament to please. Meritocracy and the national interest were the abiding considerations. Political charlatanry was not in the picture.
IBB was an enlightened and ideas-driven president. His constant companions were mostly from among the nation’s outstanding men and women of ideas. He constantly sought the diverse views and perspectives of intellectuals. He recruited them to work with him as ministers, advisers, heads of specialized agencies and friends. To date, the Babangida administration featured the largest collection of people of ideas in government. Just a sampling:
- Olikoye Ransome Kuti- Health
- Bolaji Akinyemi – External Affairs
- Babs Fafunwa – Education
- Jibril Aminu – Petroleum Resources/Education
- Tam David West – Petroleum Resources
- Kalu Idika Kalu – Finance
- Chu S. P Okongwu- National Planning/Finance
- Gordian Ezekwe – Science and Technology
- Emmanuel Emovon – Science and Technology
- Sam Oyovbaire – Information
- Wole Soyinka – Federal Road Safety Corps
- Eme Awa/Prof. Humphrey Nwosu – National Electoral Commission
- Ojetunji Aboyade- Economic Reform Adviser
- Tunji Olagunju – Political Adviser
- Ikenna Nzimiro- Adviser
- Akin Mabogunje – Adviser
- Isawa Elaigwu – Adviser
- Chief Michael Omolayole –Adviser
Fighting Inequality
Another matter of present national interest is the viral spread of multi dimensional poverty. Nigeria has in the last decade become the world’s poverty capital with an estimated population of 130 million poor people.
For Babangida, the main thrust of economic reform was the migration of Nigeria from a mixed economy to a free market format. He recognized that poverty and inequality would increase. His quest for a new social order involved a deliberate policy of poverty mitigation.
General Babangida believed that it was the responsibility of a compassionate government to give capitalism a human face by mitigating the alienating effects of market competition hence the efforts to ameliorate the harsh effects of the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP). The result was easily our most systematic and well thought out poverty alleviation programme to date containing:
- The Directorate for Food, Roads and Rural Infrastructure (DFRRI)
- The Peoples Bank
- Community Banks
- National Directorate of Employment
- The National Economic Recovery Fund (NERFUND)
- The Mass Transit Programme
Institution Building
It has been said in recent times that a major part of Africa’s development has been the preponderance of strong man and a lack of strong institutions. Central to Babangida’s grand vision and its enabling strategy was the creation of strong national institutions. In the domestic sphere, Babangida was obsessed with the establishment of a robust institutional framework for nation building. In the entire history of post -colonial Nigeria, the Babangida administration is on record for establishing the highest number of national institutions in major areas of national life. Most of these institutions have endured to the present including:
- Corporate Affairs Commission -CAC(1990),
- National Communications Commission-NCC(1992),
- National Deposit Insurance Corporation-NDIC(1988),
- National Broadcasting Commission-NBC(1992),
- National Electoral Commission
- Technical Committee on Privatization and Commercialization(TCPC) which became the BPE-(1988).
- The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (1989)
- The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) –(1988).
- Technical Aid Corps (1987)
- National Agency For Food and Drug Administration NAFDAC (1993)
- National Women’s Commission (1992)
Accordingly, Babangida reorganized the Nigeria Police into the present zonal command structure. Similarly, the architecture of national intelligence and security was reorganized from the former monolithic National Security Organization(NSO) to the present three branch structure of:
- The State Security Service(SSS), now DSS
- National Intelligence Agency(NIA) and
- Defense Intelligence Agency(DIA).
Insecurity and the National Guard Idea
Our insecurity remains almost intractable. Up to the time he left office, Babangida was never in any doubt about the unsettled nature of inter-ethnic relations among Nigerian groups. It was his conviction that our federation was still unsettled, with many real and potential flash points. He believed that the present and future nature of our internal security challenges would overwhelm the police and distract the professional military.
Accordingly, he believed that the police is too mild and civil to contain armed insurgency while the military is too fierce to be pressed into combatting fellow Nigerians with its doctrine of terminal precision. The solution was to establish a mid intensity intermediate force- the National Guard- based in the states and specially trained and indoctrinated to manage internal security with a mixture of resolute force and patriotic compassion. The National Guard was shot down by political hawks.
Today is a new day. IBB is 82. He left office over 30 years ago. As in previous years, it is my pleasure to join his other friends and family to celebrate a true friend and a truly outstanding nation builder and timeless patriot.
z
Today, former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida, turns 82. It has become my annual personal tradition to use the opportunity of his birthday each year to highlight the perennial relevance of the policies, ideas and practices that he emplaced over three decades ago to our preset circumstances. Each time we are confronted with a major national challenge, the question that has come to my mind has always been: What would IBB have done? I raise the same rhetorical question today in the light of the issues that confront our new administration.
The Niger Coup and ECOWAS
Perhaps the most burning issue today the coup in Niger Republic and the spotlight on Nigeria’s leadership responsibility as a force of stabilization in the West African sub region. As IBB observes his birthday today, it might be helpful for our younger generation and the political leadership of today to have an insight into how IBB used the projection of Nigeria’s power to stabilize war torn Liberia and later Sierra Leone.
Of course the circumstances were somewhat different. Nigeria was under military rule transiting to democracy. But our leadership place in West Africa and indeed the entire continent was not in question. The strength of our military was in tact just a sour commitment to political stability and democratization were all values deserving external projection.
Babangida’s grand vision of Nigeria saw a bolder more assertive and even regionally powerful Nigeria. With Prof. Bolaji Akinyemi as Foreign Minister, Babangida pursued the kind of bold and activist foreign policy that only befits an ambitious regional power. He was not shy to project Nigeria’s power in the West African sub region hence his direct military intervention in the civil wars in both Liberia and Sierra Leone. He saw the civil wars in both countries as direct threats to the security of West Africa. His friend, Ghanaian head of state, Jerry Rawlings. shared his commitment. They did not wait for endless summits or convoluted resolutions. They led the charge. Others followed. ECOMOG was born.
In August 1990, a contingent of the Nigerian military landed at the port of Monrovia to commence what became the ECOMOG operation. As the vessels approached Monrovia, the transmission station of “Radio Freedom” which was onboard came alive with messages of hope beamed to the Liberian people. The Nigerian force was supported by a small Ghanaian contingent, which was allowed to provide the founding force Commander of ECOMOG ,General Arnold Quainoo.
ECOMOG succeeded in separating the warring factions. It later graduated into an ECOWAS wide intervention initiative which stabilized the situation in Liberia. In subsequent years, ECOMOG expanded into troubled Sierra Leone with the stationing of an air base with a squadron of Nigerian Alpha jets. That neutralized the rebels in rural Sierra Leone. Through Nigeria’s leadership, ECOMOG became an African model in the use of national power to stabilize a region. The OAU and the UN later supported the initiative into a multilateral initiative.
Choosing a Cabinet
As the nation awaits the swearing in of President Bola Tinubu’s cabinet, national discourse has concentrated on the quality of most of the nominees. In a nation that boasts of some of the most outstanding technocrats and intellectuals in diverse fields, the mediocrity of the Tinubu selection has embarrassed many. There may be no basis for measuring Tinubu’s choices against those of Babangida over thirty years ago.
Tinubu is a partisan politician. He has political debts to pay. He has to contend with a constitution that requires that each state be represented by one minister at least. He also has to rule over a nation that has literally been overrun by a degraded value system. On the contrary, IBB headed a military regime with no parliament to please. Meritocracy and the national interest were the abiding considerations. Political charlatanry was not in the picture.
IBB was an enlightened and ideas-driven president. His constant companions were mostly from among the nation’s outstanding men and women of ideas. He constantly sought the diverse views and perspectives of intellectuals. He recruited them to work with him as ministers, advisers, heads of specialized agencies and friends. To date, the Babangida administration featured the largest collection of people of ideas in government. Just a sampling:
- Olikoye Ransome Kuti- Health
- Bolaji Akinyemi – External Affairs
- Babs Fafunwa – Education
- Jibril Aminu – Petroleum Resources/Education
- Tam David West – Petroleum Resources
- Kalu Idika Kalu – Finance
- Chu S. P Okongwu- National Planning/Finance
- Gordian Ezekwe – Science and Technology
- Emmanuel Emovon – Science and Technology
- Sam Oyovbaire – Information
- Wole Soyinka – Federal Road Safety Corps
- Eme Awa/Prof. Humphrey Nwosu – National Electoral Commission
- Ojetunji Aboyade- Economic Reform Adviser
- Tunji Olagunju – Political Adviser
- Ikenna Nzimiro- Adviser
- Akin Mabogunje – Adviser
- Isawa Elaigwu – Adviser
- Chief Michael Omolayole –Adviser
Fighting Inequality
Another matter of present national interest is the viral spread of multi dimensional poverty. Nigeria has in the last decade become the world’s poverty capital with an estimated population of 130 million poor people.
For Babangida, the main thrust of economic reform was the migration of Nigeria from a mixed economy to a free market format. He recognized that poverty and inequality would increase. His quest for a new social order involved a deliberate policy of poverty mitigation.
General Babangida believed that it was the responsibility of a compassionate government to give capitalism a human face by mitigating the alienating effects of market competition hence the efforts to ameliorate the harsh effects of the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP). The result was easily our most systematic and well thought out poverty alleviation programme to date containing:
- The Directorate for Food, Roads and Rural Infrastructure (DFRRI)
- The Peoples Bank
- Community Banks
- National Directorate of Employment
- The National Economic Recovery Fund (NERFUND)
- The Mass Transit Programme
Institution Building
It has been said in recent times that a major part of Africa’s development has been the preponderance of strong man and a lack of strong institutions. Central to Babangida’s grand vision and its enabling strategy was the creation of strong national institutions. In the domestic sphere, Babangida was obsessed with the establishment of a robust institutional framework for nation building. In the entire history of post -colonial Nigeria, the Babangida administration is on record for establishing the highest number of national institutions in major areas of national life. Most of these institutions have endured to the present including:
- Corporate Affairs Commission -CAC(1990),
- National Communications Commission-NCC(1992),
- National Deposit Insurance Corporation-NDIC(1988),
- National Broadcasting Commission-NBC(1992),
- National Electoral Commission
- Technical Committee on Privatization and Commercialization(TCPC) which became the BPE-(1988).
- The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (1989)
- The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) –(1988).
- Technical Aid Corps (1987)
- National Agency For Food and Drug Administration NAFDAC (1993)
- National Women’s Commission (1992)
Accordingly, Babangida reorganized the Nigeria Police into the present zonal command structure. Similarly, the architecture of national intelligence and security was reorganized from the former monolithic National Security Organization(NSO) to the present three branch structure of:
- The State Security Service(SSS), now DSS
- National Intelligence Agency(NIA) and
- Defense Intelligence Agency(DIA).
Insecurity and the National Guard Idea
Our insecurity remains almost intractable. Up to the time he left office, Babangida was never in any doubt about the unsettled nature of inter-ethnic relations among Nigerian groups. It was his conviction that our federation was still unsettled, with many real and potential flash points. He believed that the present and future nature of our internal security challenges would overwhelm the police and distract the professional military.
Accordingly, he believed that the police is too mild and civil to contain armed insurgency while the military is too fierce to be pressed into combatting fellow Nigerians with its doctrine of terminal precision. The solution was to establish a mid intensity intermediate force- the National Guard- based in the states and specially trained and indoctrinated to manage internal security with a mixture of resolute force and patriotic compassion. The National Guard was shot down by political hawks.
Today is a new day. IBB is 82. He left office over 30 years ago. As in previous years, it is my pleasure to join his other friends and family to celebrate a true friend and a truly outstanding nation builder and timeless patriot.
By Joan Odafe
In the quiet farmlands of Chibok in northeastern Nigeria, the steady rhythm of women cracking groundnuts and sorting harvests now carries a meaning deeper than livelihood.
For the mothers whose daughters were abducted during the 2014 school attack by terrorists, the work has become both survival and healing.
What began as a response to grief has gradually grown into a small but meaningful enterprise, one rooted in farming, peanut processing and the determination of mothers to rebuild their lives and secure a future for their children.
Their story is documented in the film, ‘Mothers of Chibok’, by Nigerian filmmaker, Joel Kachi Benson, which moves beyond the moment of the abduction to focus on the everyday lives of the women who continue to live with its consequences.
In the film, the camera lingers on the rhythm of daily labour: women tending farms, negotiating land prices, planting corn and groundnuts, and later selling the groundnuts that have become central to their community enterprise.
One scene captures a mother negotiating to rent farmland. The landowner initially demands N100,000 but after persistent bargaining the woman brings the price down to N35,000, a small victory that reflects her determination to keep farming in spite of financial hardship.
Groundnuts have become the backbone of their livelihood. After harvest, the women sort, roast and process the peanuts, adding value before they are sold.
The enterprise not only sustains their farming activities but also provides income to support their families and pay school fees for their children.
Scenes in the documentary show women sitting together in courtyards and fields, cracking shells and drying harvests under the sun.
The work is demanding but it carries a quiet sense of solidarity among the mothers.
For many of them, motherhood remains the strongest source of motivation.
In one scene, a mother sits with her children during a home lesson, gently encouraging them through their reading.
“Myself well done. Try it another day. Mango and banana for Mau,” she sings as a reward for a lesson completed.
In spite of the trauma that reshaped their lives, education remains central in the community.
The mothers continue to send their children to school, determined that fear will not define the future of the next generation.
The film also captures moments that reveal the emotional weight many of the women still carry.
In one poignant sequence, a mother receives a phone call informing her that her daughter has been rescued and will soon return home.
Earlier in the film, she had been shown carefully arranging her daughter’s clothes, preserving them as if preparing for the day she will come back.
Elsewhere, another mother breaks down after learning that her daughter was not among those rescued.
Through these moments, the documentary presents the mothers not as symbols of tragedy but as women navigating grief, hope and everyday survival.
Benson said the film took about three years to complete, allowing the production team to build trust within the community and document realities that rarely make headlines.
“When you spend time, you see things,” he said.
The producer explained that the intention of the film was to shift attention toward the strength and resilience of the women rather than presenting them solely through the lens of tragedy.
“The idea was to show them as strong, resilient women who are rebuilding their lives and supporting their families,” he said.
Beyond the film, the mothers’ groundnut enterprise is gradually reaching wider markets.
Their products are now available at a few outlets, including ‘The Gather House’, a concept store that showcases women-owned African brands and products with strong community stories.
By connecting the Chibok women’s produce to urban consumers, the initiative is helping transform their small-scale processing into a sustainable livelihood.
For the mothers, every bag of processed peanuts sold represents more than income. It reflects their determination to rebuild stability for their families and create economic security for their children.
Their story carries particular resonance during moments such as International Women’s Day and Mother’s Day, occasions that celebrate women’s strength and the enduring power of motherhood.
In Chibok, those ideals are lived daily in the fields and courtyards where the women work.
Through farming, enterprise and collective resilience, the Mothers of Chibok are gradually transforming a painful chapter of history into a story of dignity, survival and hope. (NAN)
By Ebuka Ukoh
If Nigeria is serious about reform, it must study not only who the late Right Reverend
Jesse Jackson was, but also how he operated. He did not merely protest injustice; he built lasting institutions to sustain his quest for justice.
Born in 1941, Jackson emerged from the civil rights movement under the leadership of Dr Martin Luther King, Jr.
He marched in Selma. He organised in Chicago. He founded Operation PUSH and later the Rainbow Coalition. In 1984 and 1988, he ran for President of the United States, becoming the first African American to mount a serious national campaign and win millions of votes across racial lines.He did not win the presidency.
But he definitely expanded the imagination of who could lead. And sometimes that is how structural change begins.Jackson understood something that Nigeria is still struggling to internalise. Protest without structure is noisemaking. Structure without moral vision is empty. A nation requires both structure and vision.
Architecture of Moral Language
Jackson brought moral language into the centre of political discourse. He spoke of dignity, economic justice, inclusion, and accountability. He challenged corporate
America and government policy with the vocabulary of conscience.
Nigeria is deeply religious. Churches and mosques overflow. Sermons are powerful. Yet our politics often lacks moral restraint. We speak the language of faith but operate the mechanics of patronage. We invoke God but rarely demand ethical clarity from those in office.
Jackson’s example forces a question. What would Nigerian politics look like if leaders were pressed not only on strategy and tribe but on justice and responsibility? What if we evaluated leadership not just by who benefits, but by who is protected?
Coalitions Across Difference
Jackson’s Rainbow Coalition was not a slogan. It was a deliberate attempt to unite
Black Americans, Latinos, labour unions, farmers, and low-income communities under a shared platform of economic and social justice. It required negotiation. It required compromise. It required maturity.
Nigeria is a federation of identities – ethnic, religious, and regional. Yet our coalitions are often temporary arrangements built for elections, not for transformation. They dissolve after victory. They fracture under pressure. We have ethnic champions. We have party loyalists and chieftains. We have influencers…but we lack bridge builders who can gather citizens around shared interests rather than shared enemies.
Jackson’s campaigns proved that diversity is not a weakness. It becomes a weakness only when leaders exploit it instead of organising it. Jackson understood something many movements forget: protest is emotional energy, but institutions are stored power.
Nigeria has seen this before. The resistance that followed the annulment of the June 12, 1993, election did not survive on outrage alone. It survived because labour unions, pro-democracy coalitions, student movements, journalists, religious leaders, and civil society groups worked in uneasy alignment. The pro-democracy movement of the 1990s was not a hashtag. It was infrastructure. It was a coalition. It was architecture.
Without that web of organised actors, military rule might have endured longer.
Even the fuel subsidy protests years later revealed the same pattern. When labour federations coordinated action, the nation listened. When the organisation fractured, momentum faded. History keeps teaching the same lesson. Energy without structure exhausts itself. That is the lesson Nigeria must not ignore.
From Protest to Policy
The civil rights movement did not end with marches. It produced legislation. The Civil
Rights Act of 1964. The Voting Rights Act of 1965. Structural outcomes followed sustained pressure.
Nigeria trends outrage quickly, hashtags rise, emotions flare. Then the moment fades.
What often does not follow is institutional design, policy literacy, electoral strategy, budget scrutiny, and local organising.
Jackson moved from the streets to the ballot. He did not see activism and governance as enemies. He saw them as stages of the same struggle. Nigeria does not need fewer passionate voices. It needs more disciplined movements. It needs citizens who understand that democracy is not event-based. It is process-based.
What made Jesse Jackson’s life particularly instructive was not merely his charisma. It was the ecosystem that produced him.
He emerged from a dense network of Black institutions in America that did not operate in isolation. The African Methodist Episcopal Church laid spiritual and organizational foundations. Prince Hall Freemasons built mutual aid networks and leadership pipelines. Historically Black Colleges and Universities trained generations of professionals. The Divine Nine fraternities and sororities cultivated bonds of service and activism. The NAACP reshaped legal strategy. The Urban League advanced economic mobility.
These were not parallel stories. They were interdependent systems. Leadership moved between them. Resources circulated among them. Victories in one strengthened the others. Remove one pillar, and the structure weakens. This is precisely the argument of our joint bookwork, Built By The Ancestors. Most historical accounts treat such institutions as separate chapters. They are not. They are ecosystems. The durability of a people rests not on one hero but on coordinated pillars of faith, education, economics, law, and civic action.
Jackson was not an accident. He was the architecture itself. Nigeria must ask itself an uncomfortable question: Where is our architecture?
Economic Justice as Stability
Jackson consistently linked race and poverty to economic exclusion. He argued that political rights without economic access produce fragile democracies.
Nigeria is learning that lesson the hard way. Youth unemployment, insecurity, inflation, and regional instability are not isolated crises. They are symptoms of exclusion. When large segments of the population feel economically locked out, frustration becomes combustible. Economic justice is not charity. It is national security.
Hope as Strategy
Perhaps Jackson’s most enduring contribution was not a policy but a posture. He believed in what he called the “architecture of hope.” Not optimism detached from reality. Not a denial of hardship. But structured belief that systems can be changed when people organise deliberately.
Nigeria often oscillates between two extremes: Cynicism and magical thinking. Either nothing will ever change, or change will come through a single election or saviour.
History suggests something different. Change requires sustained effort. It requires a coalition. It requires moral clarity paired with institutional work.
Movements, Not Moments
Jesse Jackson’s presidential campaigns did not end racism. But they shifted representation. They expanded political possibilities. They prepared the ground for future breakthroughs.
Nigeria must learn this lesson. Not every attempt at reform will succeed immediately.
Not every campaign will win. But disciplined participation builds capacity. Capacity builds influence, and Influence builds reform.
We cannot afford to be a country of moments only. Moments trend, but movements transform.
If Nigeria desires a different future, it must cultivate leaders who can speak with moral courage and organise with strategic patience. It must nurture citizens who understand that democracy demands more than applause or outrage. It demands structure.
Before we ask why the system does not work, we must ask whether we are building systems strong enough to hold our hopes.
Jackson’s life offers Nigeria a mirror. A nation does not change because it feels injustice. It changes because it organises against it. And that work begins long before the next election cycle. We have voices. We have anger. We have talent. What we have not consistently built is a system strong enough to outlive any one leader.
Jackson’s life reminds us that movements mature when they become institutions. And institutions endure when they are interdependent.
Before we ask whether Nigeria will produce another charismatic reformer, we must ask whether Nigeria is building the pillars that can sustain one. Nations do not rise on moments. They rise on structures. And without structure, even the loudest cry fades into silence.
Mr Ukoh, an alumnus of the American University of Nigeria, Yola, and PhD student at Columbia University, writes from New York.
By Jane Eze
Lucky Elohor was still conscious when they placed her in the ambulance.
The 29 year old founder of Digital Creator Chic had built her career connecting young Nigerians to digital opportunity. After a serious road accident in Ilorin, doctors suspected spinal cord and head injuries.
To know the full extent of the damage, they needed an MRI scan.They did not have reliable access to one.
Ilorin, a major state capital, could not provide immediate, functional and accessible MRI imaging in that critical moment. The decision was made to stabilise her and transfer her to another city. She died before reaching definitive imaging.
Her death highlights a national problem that extends far beyond one tragedy.
A National Deficit
Nigeria has about 58 MRI machines for roughly 218 million people. That equals 0.3 scanners per one million citizens.
By comparison: Ghana has about 0.48 per million, The United States has nearly 39 per million and Japan has more than 50 per million
Even more troubling is distribution. Nearly all MRI machines are located in urban centres. Rural Nigeria has virtually none.
Within cities, access is unequal. Many scanners are in private facilities where a single scan costs between fifty thousand and two hundred thousand naira. In a country where most healthcare expenses are paid out of pocket, this cost alone delays or prevents care.
In public hospitals, unstable electricity is a major obstacle. The Nigerian Association of Resident Doctors has repeatedly warned that erratic power supply leaves many public hospital MRI machines non-functional. MRI systems require constant power and cooling. Voltage fluctuations damage sensitive components.
A machine on record is not the same as a machine that works in an emergency.
Geography Determines Survival
Advanced imaging in Nigeria is concentrated in a few cities such as Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt, with smaller numbers in other major urban centres. Patients from smaller states often travel hundreds of kilometres for scans.
For conditions such as stroke, traumatic brain injury, spinal cord damage and cancer staging, delay in imaging can mean permanent disability or death.
Studies show that more than seventy percent of cancer cases in Nigeria present at late stages. Limited access to diagnostic tools contributes to that delay. Tens of thousands of cancer related deaths occur annually, many with poorer outcomes because of late detection.
For families, the economic burden is severe. When public facilities cannot provide imaging, patients are forced into private centres. A single scan can equal months of income. Some delay testing. Others never receive it.
Why the Gap Persists
MRI machines require more than purchase funds. They demand uninterrupted power supply, specialised rooms with shielding, stable cooling systems, liquid helium, trained technologists and biomedical engineers.
A new 1.5 Tesla MRI machine can cost between two and three million dollars before installation. Even refurbished machines remain expensive. Without maintenance and stable electricity, they deteriorate quickly.
Policy choices have also shaped the crisis. Investment in advanced diagnostics has not matched population growth. Public private partnership models have concentrated high end imaging in profit driven centres, reinforcing inequality. This means hose who can pay are scanned. Those who cannot travel, wait or gamble with time.
What Must Be Done
Solutions are practical and achievable: Conduct a national audit to determine which of the 58 MRI machines are functional and which can be restored.
Stabilise power supply at designated MRI centres before purchasing additional machines.
Ensure every federal teaching hospital has at least one reliably functional MRI unit.
Mandate insurance coverage for medically indicated MRI scans to improve affordability.
Invest in local training for biomedical engineers and MRI technologists to reduce downtime.
Deploy mobile MRI units to underserved state capitals while permanent infrastructure is developed.
A Question of Priorities
Lucky Elohor’s story is not only about a road accident. It is about diagnostic distance. It is about a country where access to lifesaving imaging still depends on geography and income.
The MRI crisis is not a technical mystery. The machines can be bought. The expertise can be trained. The infrastructure can be built.
What remains uncertain is whether access to advanced diagnosis will be treated as a national priority or continue as a privilege.
Jane N Eze is a Research and Data Analyst.
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