MARKETING COMMUNICATION DIGEST

The most recent in world memory and arguably the most talked about of speech gaffs in recent times was that of Melania, wife to the erudite US Republican Presidential candidate, Donald Trump, whose speech mirrored a 2008 copy of Michelle Obama’s. Fast forward two months later and half the world away in our own dear native land is our own dear President Muhammadu Buhari, entangled in a similar web of stolen speech. Stealing is not corruption, we were told by Nigeria’s immediate past president. PMB and his aides had spent some of last year and all of this year trying to convince Nigerians and the world that stealing is indeed corruption; and I agree absolutely. But of course, speeches, when stolen, must also be categorised accordingly, especially when it is by the man who heads a regime with anti-corruption crusade as the cornerstone of its rejuvenation policy. So how did this come about? Apparently the change didn’t begin with the President and the Presidency at...

By now, Nigerians should have heard quite enough about the Chibok Girls series; from demonstrations and counter-demonstrations; to their innocence and their defilement; and to the rescue and the next cue. And now, the Lai Mohammed cameo. After quite a while of being incommunicado on sundry national issues, Alhaji Mohammed has come out to try explaining away the ‘strategy’ of government towards rescuing the famed Chibok girls from the clutches of their abductors, deep in the Sambisa forest, or wherever else they might eventually be reported or discovered to have been kept. I think it is quite unfair that the Information Minister will come out and dish Intelligence of how the Federal Government had attempted, and now intends to rescue the girls, including the misdirected, and perhaps the disjointed moves at negotiating their freedom. With no prejudice to the gains of this government on the war against insurgency, I think the particular episode of the Chibok Girls’ re...

Beyond selfies And so, Mark Zuckerberg came visiting Nigeria, privately, but even had to come back at the behest of the Federal Government, which was possibly hoping to reap from the opportunities offered by the huge Publicity to be generated by the visit of the $56b man who came calling with no airs or fanfare. Back-slapping, klieg lights, dinner, photo ops and all, soon followed. But the question remains: how have we, as Nigerians, benefitted from this visit? Were there any Zuckerberg endorsements for the technological efforts of our government and people? Besides hyping our jollof rice, was there any consequential upping of the info-tech game and a concrete augmentation of the terrain? Mark our jollof Myriad questions might be essential, but they are not the essence of this piece. The contention is whether Nigeria and its managers have been successful at exploiting social media platforms in the mobilisation and positive orientation of its teeming, restive youth ...