Disintegration of Nigeria-State Is the Answer: A Critical Conversation & Forward-Looking Strategy [Part II]. By Carlisle U.O. Umunnah

Till date the Nation-state called Nigeria has operated its frontiers practically without elements of constitutionalism. Constitutionality of state[s] requires instruments whose intents and purposes are to facilitate order, good governance and egalitarian society. Such instruments are normally presented before the population for their validation [consent] through referendum and other ways and means of public-opinions before deployment. Details

 

$2 Billion Arms Scandal: Atikulating the Niger Delta Question. By Senior Fyneface

Though critics of Vice President Atiku may call this revelation a gimmicky, even supporters of the Obasanjo-led PDP government would admit that its policy on Niger Delta is startlingly clumsy and at best repressive. Common sense would have made right thinking Nigerians to accept that what Atiku actually meant was that there can be a different approach to the solution of the Niger Delta problem. Details

 

Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP) Trojan Horses at Work. By Dan Azumi Kofarmata

To buttress some of these assertions, one can cite the latest dramatic and shameless political rascality that took place in the country some days ago. This was the compilation and release of the so-called Nuhu Ribadu’s hit list of 130 corrupt Nigerians. These politicians are, in the eyes of Ribadu’s EFCC and his paymasters, unfit to contest for any political office during the 2007 general elections.  Details

 

Murtala’s Anniversary and 2007. By Garba A. Isa

Murtala Muhammad came to power with a clear vision: wiping out corruption and decadence and to chart an independent course for the Nation in all spheres: politically, economically, legally and diplomatically among others.  No wonder though, this “Fine soldier and a positive temperament”, was gunned down in a broad day light on the fateful Friday of February 13, 1976. Details

 

No Voters Card, No... By Ifedigbo Nze Sylva

The murmurs and silent grumbles among the congregation that followed the announcement helped to re-assure me that I was not the only one that disagreed with the new law. At that time it was only a threat which any one who knew the Bishop of the Nsukka Catholic Diocese could be sure would become law giving the mans antecedence for issuing draconian laws abi dogma’s to his flock and seeing to its full implementation. Details

 

Is President Olusegun Obasanjo a Criminal? By Dan Azumi Kofarmata

One of the major Nigerian newspapers reported that President Obasanjo while addressing elders and other stakeholders from Abeokuta North Local Government Area of Ogun State on Saturday, February 10, 2007 on preparations for the forthcoming polls, Obasanjo said that he would give it all it takes to ensure his party’s victory in the elections, adding that he was not prepared to hand over to criminals. Details

 

A Polluted Political Climate. By  Bonkoo, Tombari Tobby

As may be known to many, the state of our state (Rivers state) in the past seven years has been like a locust that turns the vast and richly blessed vegetation into a wasteland of despondency and nuisance. Violence, lax, insecurity, avarice and human adoration permeate every facets of our society to the point where the standard of living has continued to cascade with torrential rapidity, with pitiless harmful effects for the common man on the street. Details

 

Paul Adujie and the EFCC List: Making a Mockery of Justice. By Mr. Sabella Ogbobode Abidde

To compound Obasanjo’s muddy and fetid standing in the minds of most Nigerians, his deputy, Vice President Abubakar Atiku has been saying to Nigerians -- before man and God -- that his boss, his partner, the president of Nigeria has been illegally digging his hands into the nation’s coffer. Long before Atiku’s bombshell accusation, Governor Orji Uzor Kalu of Abia State has been pointing accusatory fingers at the president. Details

 

2007 Not Primed to Fail. By Ibrahim M. Attahir Esq.

I quite agree that there was massive rigging in the 2003 elections but democracy did not fail. It has therefore defied the 1983 experience. The allegation of rigging was resolved in the most democratic way possible anywhere in the world. Those that lost elections headed for tribunals and abided by the verdicts in the larger national interests. The US also has had its own experience of election rigging and what those who alleged rigging did was they headed for the courts. Details

 

Jigawa Is Grinding To A Halt. By  Lawan A. Kazaure

Precisely in the fourth week of January, 2007, the Government of Jigawa State has openly denied a report carried out by some of the national dailies which reported that the residing Banks in Dutse, the Jigawa state capital, could only transact with the State Government have if fully convinced of the value for the conduct of the business. Details

 

Kano Leadership Style- A Typical Case Of ‘Kashin Dankali’ By Shazali Abdulkadir

Kano leaders refuse to accept that they are leaders by the trust of their people. They are to serve the people and not to rule them. No aspect of the leadership of Kano, especially the traditional, show interest in championing the cause of the people of Kano. Details

 

The Measure of an Administration. By Ibrahim I. Bello

No doubt, the benefit, the people of the state derives from this initiative of public transportation are numerous. One, it instantly provided jobs for 500 youths. And 1000 more tricycles are to follow shortly. Secondly, it has lessened the suffering female commuters in the state experienced in moving from one place to another. Thirdly, it advanced the course of Shariah, in the name of which the government was voted into power in the first place. Details

 

Problem Has Changed Name (PHCN). By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

What a disastrous coincidence that the very period the Chairman of the Independent Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof Maurice Iwu, had chosen to examine the credentials of aspirants to various elective offices in the country was also the time his own academic qualifications came under intense media scrutiny... that Iwu had obtained both his Undergraduate and Postgraduate degrees at the University of Bradford, the University declared that Iwu was never an Undergraduate at Bradford, and that he had presented a first degree certificate from a “University in Cameroon” to gain admission into its Graduate School. Details

 

President Obasanjo: I Feel His Pain and Frustration. By Mr. Sabella Ogbobode Abidde

I sometimes feel the pain and suffering of President Obasanjo. I also feel his frustrations; I feel the needle points and the sore in his soul. To be sure, he is the cause of most of his headaches. He is qualified for the job, but he came unprepared; he knows Nigerians, but he came, thinking he could run circles around them. And for whatever reason, he forgot that 1999 is not 1976. Details

 

Recruiting the Nation's President. By Anthony A. Akinola

It would appear from all indications that the next President of Nigeria would be coming from one of the northern states.  The basis of this assumption rests with the fact that political parties that could realistically be said to be on the ground have adopted Nigerians of northern origin as their presidential flag bearers.  With the South-West geo-political zone not fielding a member of its own in the presidential contest, not least because the outgoing President is a member of the zone, the optimism may not be unfounded that a system of rotational presidency is gradually creeping in. Details

 

The Heart of Africa: The Brand Concept. By Marshall Ifeanyi

I believe that in a few years to come, the pessimism about Nigeria will give way to optimism as Nigeria is joining the league of emerging and industrial countries especially as we witness the diversification of the economy through privatization, industrialization, and general boom in economic activities outside the oil. Details

 

Twists And Turns In Nigeria’s Democracy. By Jide Ayobolu

Today, we have political parties that are more or less government parastatals, where individuals are stronger and are more powerful than the party is. There is no party discipline. The political parties have no focus, no vision, no mission; they do not have a realistic constitution and people-oriented manifesto. Details

 

Rig Activity In West African Coast: Why Celebrate Failure And Fraud? By Ifeanyi Izeze

As a Nigerian, I feel very bad that my country being the biggest player in the arena is being ripped to its under-wears by a well packaged multinational conspiracy. This situation is even more pathetic against the background that the foreign operators are collaborating with corrupt and fraudulent-minded administrators of the nation’s oil industry especially administrators of the upstream sub-sector. Details

 

Nigeria's 2007 Presidency: Let the One-Eyed Man Become King. By  Ayo Fawibe

The highly respected Professor Wole Soyinka recently gave his ‘wise’ counsel by declaring both Buhari and Yar’Adua unfit to be Nigeria’s president. So where do we go from here? Should we now endorse OBJ for a third term or allow for a vacuum in governance? Another unpalatable option is to declare these set of politicians unfit and abdicate the situation to the military and we all know that this is not plausible. Details

 

The President And His Leadership Style. By Jide Ayobolu

The way and manner the president comports himself since he assumed the mantle leadership to say the very least is very undemocratic. This is because, he was a former army general and does not seem to have imbibed democratic ethos in anyway. He is used to the military high command structure, he is at home with “obey before complain” that is why he conducts the affairs of the country in a Zombie-like fashion. Details

 

Bello Damagum, the Press,  and the SSS. By Ahmed Yahaya Joe

Nigerian taxpayers have consistently been fed the crap of the detailed satellite imagery security and emergency response advantages of Nigsat 1 and  Nigsat 2 yet the Bellview and Dornier 228 crash sites were all located by peasant farmers and if it is only now that the Minister of Aviation is celebrating a partial nationwide Radar coverage the  Apartheid Air Force would have decimated the Lagos Lagoon to a Pearl Harbor destruction of course the prattler would not have known he was then reportedly marooned in rehab. But come to think of it, the Nigerian radar could not even guard itself. Only recently we heard in the news that at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, all the radar cables and other security gadgets were "safely" cut-off by persons undetected by the radar. Details

 

Not Yet Morning On Creation Day.  By Jide Ayobolu

Politics in Nigeria since the attainment of political independence has been characterized by petty issues and selfish preoccupations by variegated political characters or ruling oligarchy that have presided over the affairs of the Nigeria state over the years at different levels of government. That is why real development has eluded the country for the past 47 years. Details

 

Presidency In 2007 For ExtraStates? By Ben Okereke

The existent realities on Nigeria's political turf now begs the question: Must the Southeast trade the presidency in 2007 for extra states for the zone? The answer to this question must come from its leaders. But we must not forget the reality that devoid of any  reforms of the political status quo, the miserly five-states structure available to the Southeast's teeming population, sure, must always play against its people on every level of Nigeria's politics. Details

 

Obasanjo's Hypocrisy, A Cover-Up For Pen Robbers In Our Country. By Dr. Wunmi Akintide

The chicken is now coming home to roost. Nemesis has now caught up with Agagu at long last. If he had stolen money from the Nigerian Airways, you can multiply by 100 times the amount he has already stolen as Executive Governor. And yet Emperor Obasanjo wants him re-elected to a second term while some of the best of all the candidates in Ondo State, like Mimiko,  Architect Olu Agbesua and Dr, Bada and my good friend Solomon Oladunni, are being sidelined or written off as no good by a naked Emperor. Details

 

How Not To Resolve The Niger Delta Crises. By Uche Nworah

The recent comment credited to Nigeria’s Vice President Atiku Abubakar is worrisome, he alleged that the Nigerian government has placed orders for weapons and ammunitions worth over $2 billion which it plans to use to quell the Niger Delta insurgency. While accepting that the statement should be cautiously received considering the raging feud between President Obasanjo and the vice president, it has to be said still that should this be true, then it must be worrying news to all those who have been following the Niger Delta crises. Details

 

Teaching Strategies and Reforms in Higher Education. By  Victor E. Dike

For fear of any contradiction, some of the teachers in the system are part of the problem. They should break away from the dominant traditional theoretical method of teaching and adopt a more practical, hands-on and progressive methods of teaching and learning, where self-expression is encouraged as students learn better by performing task/activities related to the real business world in the classroom. Details

 

President Obasanjo’s Political Muddling and Irrational Actions. By Dan Azumi Kofarmata

With barely 109 days from today (i.e., Thursday, 01 February 2007) to the terminal end of President Olusegun Obasanjo’s eight years of nightmares (if elections holds as scheduled in April 2007), his recent actions (and inactions) do not indicate he is preparing his hand-over notes to a new occupant of the office. Details

 

Yar’Adua and the Haunting Ghost of PDP. By  Jaafar Jaafar

No doubt, the responses you always would get from many respondents when one asks people why they don’t want Umaru Musa Yar’Adua as the president of Nigeria come May 29, 2007 would have invariably borne a peculiar theme. “He will be Obasanjo’s clone,” scores of commentators have declared. Details

 

The Sorry Story Of The Nigerian State. By Jide Ayobolu

Albeit, Nigeria claims to operate a federal system of government, it is purely a unitary system of government disguised as federal structure, and that is what is basically responsible for Nigeria’s many woes. Details

 

Making A Date With April 2007. By A. Mohammed Bashir Shuwa

This is the opportunity that all Nigerians are expected to make a date with history by becoming a part of a peaceful revolution that is about to take place in April when the people are presented with a choice between those who represent evil and those that are good.  Details

 

Education And Democracy In Nigeria: Looking At Obasanjo’s Legacy. By Sadiq A. Abdullahi, Ed. D.

It is good news that the newly created Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) by President Obasanjo will prosecute politicians and others for misappropriations and embezzlement of national and state funds. Government corruption continues undermine national development. We must work together, at home and in the Diaspora, to model accountability and transparency. Details

 

Wait-and-See Permutations on 2007 Elections. By Abdullahi Lamido Mohammed

As the 2007 elections approaches a lot of Nigerians are uncertain as to what the shape of events will be.  This uncertainty has elicited permutations on its possibility, impossibility and the envisioned difficulties to be encountered during the 2007 elections.  Details

 

No Sharia in Buhari/Babangida v. Yar'Adua/Obasanjo Permutations. By Farouk Martins

Keep your eyes on characters not on religious fundamentalists without political ideas. It seems that the lesser “saint” in this permutation is Umaru Yar’Dua. We are not so naïve, no matter what is said, not to know that anyone squeezed between Obasanjo, Babangida and Buhari Trio, has a long spoon. Details

 

Mujahid Dokubo-Asari: Where is Justice and Fairness? By Mr. Sabella Ogbobode Abidde

The Ijaw nationalist and Nigerian patriot Asari Dokubo was arrested and detained under the trumped up charge of “endangering state security.” For well over a year now, he has been held mostly incommunicado, maltreated in detention, frequently moved around from one detention center to another Details

 

Nigeria’s Trajectory In Democratic Governance. By Jide Ayobolu

 Nigerians have for too long listened patiently to the self-admittance of failure and the now worn-out sing-song that, the problem with the Nigerian economy is legion, and that, it has been badly battered by the military for several years, therefore, the economy will need time to pick-up. Details

 

Population: Lagos Versus Kano. By  Yushau A. Shuaib

While Lagos before the exercise engaged in extensive media campaigns with intimidating messages as if it would turn to a ghost town, Kano officials were involved in grassroots sensitization campaign to the nook and crannies of the state on the census exercise; while Lagosians are mostly monogamous with single wife and few children, the majority of Kanonians are polygamous with many wives and large number of children Details

 

2007 Presidential Campaign and National Politics: Leave Religion Out Of It ! By Chudi Ikwueze, PhD

The problem, it seems, is that many non-Moslems seem to be flatly against the introduction of Sharia law, just for the sake of it. Those against Sharia law often claim that although the architects of Sharia law and state governments always promise that non-Moslems would not be adversely affected or forced to live by the law, that in practice, ample evidence point to the fact that the implementation of the law usually would inevitably, adversely affect non-Moslems. Details

 

Who Killed These Men and Women? By Mr. Sabella Ogbobode Abidde

I have wondered in the past: how many Nigerians have to lose their lives before this government comes to the realization that something is terribly wrong with our security and legal system? Why do we have a government -- when government can not assure us of our safety? Details

 

 

Hostage-Taking: What Government Must Do In 2007. By Atâyi Babs

The cumulative cost of quasi-military resistance by the Niger Delta youths has been enormous in terms of human, financial and economic sacrifices. The impact of hostage-taking, which has come to be regarded as a national malady, afflicting the soul of the nation’s economy can only be hazarded as the nation’s oil output is the worse hit with the loss of 600, 000 barrels per day (BPD) and even more as at last year.  Details

 

Too Many Happy Returns For Political Office Holders. By Tony Ishiekwene

It is an irony of circumstance that a poor and underdeveloped country like Nigeria would engage in so much waste and extravagance in the running of its bureaucracy, particularly with regard to the monetary benefits and packages accruable to political office holders in Nigeria, compared to the richer developed economies of the west. Details

 

On Wole Soyinka and Ebenzer Babatope’s Attempts to Neutralise the Opposition Against Obasanjo. By Mahamman Adarawa

The emergence of party flag bearers by anointment or consensus as well as the rallying  of opposition parties behind Buhari against the ruling PDP has threatened Obasanjo’s plans of  extension of his rule (option A) or imposition of his anointed candidate(option B) in April 2007. The anxiety and fears expressed by Obasanjo and his “loyal” PDP officials is not unexpected. However, what is surprising to Nigerians is the extent to which his intellectual and spiritual backers like Soyinka and Babatope can shamelessly go on helping him to consolidate his position when almost all Nigerians said it loud and clear that his time is up.  Details

 

Wole Soyinka’s Old Scare Stories And Lies Aren’t Frightening Anymore! By Dan Azumi Kofarmata

Every negative remark made by Soyinka against the person and past leadership of Buhari cannot major up to what the past seven years of President Obasanjo’s leadership has inflicted on Nigerians under a democratic setting. I wish to remind Soyinka that least he forgets, all the subsequent military dictators that misruled Nigeria after General Obasanjo’s military dictatorship of the late 1970s were off-shots of his misrule and abuse of human rights. Details

 

What To Know About Democracy. By Jide Ayobolu

It must be known that in the past, particularly under the various forms of military regimes that, we have had in Nigeria, governance is tantamount to the culture of corruption, mismanagement, insensitivity to the plight of the poor and needy, political elite occupation of the state and subversion of traditional values and institutions, coupled with socio-economic deprivation, marginalization of various sorts as well as the institutionalization of development of underdevelopment. That was why people fought the military to a standstill, and shed blood for democracy to blossom. Details

 

Demographics for Politics. By Umar Bello

Getting down to the nitty-gritties, If for instance Kano is more populated than Lagos , will that add more tuwo on the table of an average Kano man or will it make the amala on the table of an average Lagosian less? in simple economics shorn of all high falutin grammar and bourgeois politics this should be the real debate for the masses. Details

 

The Enveloping Ecology Of Poverty. By Jide Ayobolu

Yes, poverty in Nigeria did not start with the present government in 1999; it has been with us for quite a while now. For instance, in 1986, according to official figures, three million Nigerians were unemployed. Of these, those below 25 years accounted for 73.1 per cent, young school leavers accounted for the bulk of the employed with 60.3 per cent and 46.2 per cent in the urban and rural areas respectively. Details

 

The Cheat In All Of Us. By Uche Nworah

Please don’t tell me that you don’t know what I mean by underhand activity but if you insist, I will spell it for you. Let’s go then: Ever heard of omo kirikiri? Yes, the little missiles you carried with you into the exam hall, how could you have forgotten your dexterity in being able to compress the full contents of a full textbook into tiny scrawled coded language that only you could understand? Details

 

PDP Flag bear Yar’dua and Nigeria Census Certified, OK. By Akwaba Law Chambers

The PDP presidential flag bear as Alhaji Yar’ dua is widely accepted despite some grumbling and weak protest from South Easters and South South Politicians who failed to use a long time strategy of political planning and secret arrangement/program to organize, strategize and select one candidate with no fault and group themselves into one for the whole region of East and South South and thereby giving Fulani Hegemony the space to nail Obasanjo/PDP into a corner of submission while now crying when technically they are the real people who failed themselves as Politics is a game of strategy and planning. Details

 

Yoruba Rooooo nu OOOOO!!! By  Babatunde Adenodi

If there is any Yoruba alive who did not know that General Obasanjo was foisted on Nigerians and Yoruba in particular, as a so-called Yoruba candidate in 1999, that Yoruba man or woman is living in a fool’s paradise. And if they did not know that the architect of “Yoruba presidency” after the disastrous Hausa/Fulani chain of administrations was the same Babangida who thought Abiola was not muslim enough and not Nigerian enough to be Nigeria’s president, they are living somewhere on planet Jupiter! Details

 

Dual Citizenship and Access To Elected Office in Nigeria. By Bello Salihu

Mixed signals are being sent to Nigerians in Diaspora by the Nigerian state. While, according Reuben Abati in an opinion expressed in the Guardian of January 26th 2007, something as enticing as a Diaspora Village in an exclusive part of the sprawling metropolis  of Abuja is being promised by the government, in the same vein Nigerians in Diaspora, over half of whom, along with their children are also citizens of their countries of residence are now told that they cannot aspire to any elective office in  the land for their sins of holding dual nationalities.  Details

 

President Muhammadu Buhari and Nigerians in Diaspora. By  Muhammad Jameel Yusha’u

f you are following events in Nigeria you must have read about Soyinka’s diatribe against Buhari few days ago, interestingly Soyinka’s attempt to establish himself as the custodian of rational thinking in Nigeria backfired into a  political diarrhoea that made the vestiges of his intellectual camouflage to stink before the Nigerian public. Details

 

Buhari’s Supporters or Spoilers? By  Hassan S. Indabawa

We now also know that although the TBO has been collapsed into the bigger ANPP family in principle; in practice, TBO is still very much around, at least in Kano, where envy, hate and treachery seem to be the guiding principle for these Buhari’s “supporters”. And because they were using it for their own personal interests, they were going on as if TBO was never proscribed. Details

 

Fuel Scarcity/Price Increase: Lawmakers Failed Nigeria. By Ifeanyi Izeze

The nation has or was supposed to have about 445, 000 barrels per stream day installed domestic refining capacity, but today we cannot process a single barrel in one year under a government that is spending huge money on very expensive foreign media to showcase the fruits of its reform agenda. Shame! Details

 

See What Nigerians Are Going Through. By Ladi Ibrahim

Apart from all this, the national economy is in tatters, the Gross Domestic Product, Gross National Product, Per Capita Income, Capacity Utilization of Industry is abysmally low, the standard of living is very high, inflation is galloping, bank interest rate is beyond the reach of many affluent people, talkless of the downtrodden, Naira has been over-devaluated, there is no accurate and reliable CENSUS figures, planning in Nigeria at all level of government is very problematic, elections are always rigged, those in government are there for personal gains, not the interest of the people or even their country. Details

 

2007 Election: The Anatomy Of Jigawa Gubernatorial Contestants. By  Abdu Isa Kofarmata

The complications and intricacies of Jigawa state from inception in 1991 and the forced composition of the state have made the political terrain one of the most difficult and un-predicting in Nigeria. It is also one of the most difficult states to govern due to conflicting interest which is more personal than collective interest. This singular feature of Jigawa state and the coming to an end of the tenancy of the incumbent governor, Alhaji Ibrahim Saminu Turaki (Turakin Hausa) in the Dutse government house have provided an opportunity for the signing of new tenancy with a new tenant.Details

 

Ethnic Minorities, Justice and Languages. By Ikechi Udegbunam Chukwunonye

There are more than six extinct languages in Nigeria ; a tireless, masculine overdrive should occupy our immediate existence not just to incorporate every  language in Nigeria but other issues that would impact positively on minorities to reflect and engender a just Nigeria . Details