A week ago, the world celebrated the international day of democracy as it has been doing for over a decade. Savouring the optimism this initiative portends will be incomplete without a critical reflection on the gains and pains of the journey to democratic consolidation in Nigeria and an engagement of the ongoing conversations on the need for a formidable partnership between state and non-state actors in propagating the gospel of democracy. Since the third wave of democratization in Africa, successive governments have come under intense pressures for democratic reforms, from within and without, embodied through expressions of discontent with economic hardship and political repression, as well as demands for social justice and security. The responses to these pressures signaled the rebirth of democracy in Nigeria, and indeed other parts of Africa, but this was not without throwing up some problems in its way. One such problem is the increasing difficulty to divorce coercion and auto-

Check out the Call for Applications for the following Department of State (United States) Fellowships administered by the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria: EducationUSA Advising Center OneBeat EducationUSA Student Achievers Program (EdSAP) Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) The FORTUNE/U.S. State Department Global Women’s Mentoring Partnership The Fulbright Foreign Student Program (formerly Fulbright JSD) Institutions Affiliated to PAS on the Fulbright Program The Fulbright African Research Scholar Program (ARSP) International Fulbright Science and Technology Program Foreign Language Teaching Assistant Program (FLTA) Humphrey Fellowship TechWomen Program The Youth Exchange and Study Program (YES) Study of the U.S. Institute for Student Leaders on Social Entrepreneurship Study of the United States Institute on National Security Policymaking  Study of the United States Institute (SUSI) for Faculty Study of the United States

DAY 2 TALES OF MY LEG - PART 2 (A Reason for Love) Love is a problem for most humans. I don’t just think so, I know so. Even though it’s in our nature as mortal beings to love and expect the same, it’s not always as easy as it sounds and I’ll say why. As far as human minds go, there is a deep-seated philosophy weaved into every fabric of our thinking, especially with issues of emotional intelligence, humanists often call this rationality. Every person who has reached the age of reason tries to explain the basis of their feelings and for their actions. We would often allude our thoughts and attitudes to something, everything and anything. There are hardly many who defy this norm. Even those who are unconscionable still tie their beliefs to a reason. Having no reason at all is a reason in itself. This way, it is almost impossible for anyone not to have a reason to or not to love. We always hang our emotional sentiments and affections towards others - what we call love, on

So Samuel Osho has challenged on to write non-stop for 21 Days. Here's my thought-piece for Day 1: DAY 1 TALES OF MY LEGS – PART 1 (The Unforgettable Days of My Life) I started out early in life as a budding academic but I wasn’t always so. Yes indeed, I was raised in a middle-class family around one of the quietest neighbourhoods in Abeokuta and had the grace of a modest collection of Euro-bibliographic works and thinking space to revel in my fantasies of life, especially the one about wanting to be a Deejay or an artistic personality of some sort, but though I knew the odds were that I wasn’t going to be one, I was ready to defy the strictures of the Nigerian environment for sure and carve a niche for myself in the arts. Those were my teenage years of identity search.   I remember how I used to pace the corridor of our dull-coloured single flat loudly reciting quotations I’ve just read from a book or heard from a scene in my favourite TV series, or even mixing new