Last Thursday, July 23, 2026, I granted an interview to Arise News Television on its Newsday programme. It was on the reported huge budgetary allocation of N8bn earmarked for renovation of mosques and churches in the 2026 Federal Government’s budget. The previous day, I had granted an interview to a Daily Trust correspondent on the same issue. By the time the newspaper published the report in its July 23 edition, it had expanded the scope to include over N22bn budgeted for renovation of 106 palaces in the same budget. The total sum came to N30.15bn. During the Arise News interview, I expanded the scope of discussion to include the palace renovation. I roundly condemned the misplaced priorities. The interview went viral as an excerpt from it was published by The Cable and BusinessDay newspapers. True Vision Television likewise interviewed me on it.
The question is, why does the Nigerian government keep embarrassing us by doing ludicrous things? The case of the purported fake agency named “Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council” headed by a con-man named Prince Adeyemi, Adeniyi Matthew who was a able to run a fictitious agency for over one year, secured office space, got official website, open bank account with the Central Bank of Nigeria, opened official website and even get a budgetary allocation of N1.3bn in the 2026 budget is still being investigated, now we have this humongous allocation for renovation of palaces, churches and mosques. Are we cursed? What has the government business with these issues?
