Nigerian News Leader
First with details then facts 
By Dimeji Shobowale (Agric & Food Security Correspondent)
Perhaps nowhere is Nigeria's missed opportunity clearer than agriculture. At independence in 1960, agriculture was the backbone of the economy and the principal source of exports.
By JVINN Okafor (Managing Editor/ Head, Business & Economic Desk)
Nigeria's economic history can almost be divided into five chapters: agriculture before oil; oil boom; oil dependence; structural adjustment; and the present search for diversification.
By Desmond Ukandu (Editorial Director/Head, Politics Desk)
Nigeria's political journey has probably been the country's most disruptive story. The First Republic inherited a federal parliamentary system. Regional political parties were powerful, and political competition was closely associated with regional identities.
The crisis of the First Republic culminated in the January 1966 military coup. The counter-coup of July 1966, the civil war from 1967 to 1970 and the subsequent centralisation of political power, fundamentally altered the federation. Military rule brought some important administrative changes, including the creation of states and stronger central institutions. But it also weakened democratic culture and normalised government by decree.
Preamble
A sector-by-sector audit of 66 years of independence — the dreams, the development plans, the oil boom, military interventions, democratic experiments, wasted opportunities and the difficult search for a new national direction
By Celestine Okafor (Editor-in-chief)
On October 1, 1960, Nigeria stepped into independence carrying an enormous burden of expectation. The country was not without problems. It inherited weak industrialization, limited infrastructure, regional inequalities, a largely agrarian economy and a political system whose foundations had been laid by the departing colonial power. But there was also extraordinary optimism.
Sixty-six years after independence, Africa’s most populous nation has produced remarkable achievements in some fields, but poverty, insecurity, weak institutions, poor infrastructure, unemployment and a widening gap between promise and reality continue to test the Nigerian dream.
By Celestine Okafor (Editor-in-chief)
Today, Thursday, October 1, 2026, Nigeria will, once again, roll out the national colours of green and white to commemorate her 66 years of independence from British rule on October 1, 1960.
By Our Reporter
The Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Sen. George Akume, has explained that the bold reforms undertaken by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration since 2023 were necessary to save Nigeria from imminent collapse.
