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To the Atikus Amongst Us By Usman Yerima
Atiku is a damn criminal and should be thrown in jail.
In most normal societies, he would be lucky if the
Justice department offered him a sentencing deal of 25
to life in prison given how dirty he is. Obasanjo in
my view, is just as dirty, so let's call a spade a
spade here. It is pointless to present Atiku as a
victim when indeed the crook is a humongous criminal
and part of the disaster that Nigeria has become in
recent years.
While Obasanjo may have a history of turning against
his former buddies as stated Babayola Toungo, Atiku
has a history of criminal racketeering and money
laundering. He is a disgrace for a public servant and
he lacks everything from character to decency. This
was the same man that lied about owning a property in
Potomac, Maryland a few years ago. He lied on his
asset declaration affidavit to the Nigerian people. It
later turned out that he indeed owned property in the
US even though he initially denied it when the report
was made.
He then lied again that the said property valued at
approximately $2 million was purchased prior to him
assuming office as Vice President. Again that was a
lie, because records showed that the house was
purchased in 2001, just two years after he assumed
office. Then another lie emerged. The lie was that his
African American wife purchased the house instead. Tax
records from IRS showed that his wife earned less than
$1,000 a month at the time she was said to have
purchased the house. That information makes it
impossible for her to be in any position, shape or
form, to purchase a house worth that amount regardless
of credit.
There is no way on earth she could have been approved
for a $2 million dollar home in a choice Maryland
neighborhood when her income was well below America
poverty level. But Atiku being the criminal element
that he is, did put her name on the property deed, so
that if it ever came to public knowledge that he was
buying property in America, which is against Nigerian
laws for serving public officials to own property
abroad, he could then pass it off as belonging to his
akata wife.
These scums think they are so smart, and that the
Nigerian people are so stupid. They sit in their
extravagant offices in Abuja and do no single work.
They do not go out and work hard to make the lives of
Nigerians more comfortable, or create opportunities
for people to realize their optimal potential and
chase their dreams to the max. No, the atikus do no
such thing. Atiku does not work for the masses that he
claims elected his sorry self into office, instead he
occupies himself in amasing ridiculous wealth from
several illegitimate means all at the expense of the
Nigerian people.
Judging by Atiku's financial connections and
controversial links sorrounding huge sums of money
everywhere from oil money to campaing money, to
allocated funds, both known/unknown and even the ones
he is forced to reveal in the current shameful public
battle with President Obasanjo, it is obvious that
this scum had no other objective in office and did
nothing to benefit the Nigerian masses but to service
his own pocket.
The house and Senate should impeach Atiku and then
Obasanjo, so that Nigeria may be rid of such criminal
elements that from the beginning had no initiative
whatsoever in moving our nation forward from the
political and economic quagmire that she has been in
for decades.
More saddening is the lukewarm attitude of the
Nigerian public in the face of this crazy drama
between Obasanjo and Atiku. They simply sit by like
collective dummies and watch all kinds of spectacle
unfold before their eyes. When the drama ends, if it
ends, they just go on about their normal business even
though their lives have been impacted by the recent
events caused by the irresponsible leadership whom
they elected into office.
It is absolutely distressing to imagine that 140
million people cannot demand for better or simply oust
the minority crooks that constantly put their lives
and the lives of their children in disarray.
Less than a week ago, a Military aircraft crashed and
killed all but four people. Several Army generals
died, and President Obasanjo chided Nigerians not to
mourn like 'unbelievers'. He reminded the mourners
that it was God's will, and that God makes no
mistakes. Ok, we agree God makes no mistakes, but how
the hell is a plane crash that claims several lives,
part of God's will? So what Obasanjo is saying is that
God had nothing else to do, but just casually decided
that that plane had to crash and the passengers die in
that manner. And what would be the purpose of that to
God?
The sad thing is, many Nigerians, Christians and
Muslims alike, actually buy into such stupidity. For
the most part, they accept it as God's will. This is
where I am confused. The same Obasanjo government that
declared to mourners that it is God's will has ordered
an investigation into the crash. Is he crazy? How does
one investigate "God's will"?
The fact of the matter is that, God had nothing to do
with the damn crash. Prior to this crash, there had
been a previous plane crash not too long ago where all
but two passengers perished. Was that also God's will?
Is it God's will for these already impoverished
Nigerians to keep dying in plane crashes and auto
accidents?
The truth of the matter is that the government is so
damn irresponsible, and never does things right. If we
look closely, all these aircrafts that crash, are
really not air worthy. Most of them are over 20 years
old and should not be in service in the first place,
but they are still in use despite these known safety
factors. These planes have extremely haphard
maintenance records. There are no standards, no safety
guidelines, no aircraft operational age limit, no
enforced Federal service and maintenance process to
make sure that airline operators are in compliance.
Money changes hands and the planes are given clearance
to fly regardless of condition and as such people's
lives are put at risk each time they fly.
So far, this is just an argument sorrounding the
condition of the planes operating in our airports, and
the government has clearly dropped the ball on that.
We have not even ventured into the realm of airport
security which is another serious issue. That aspect
of the equation has been ignored completely and will
only be noticed when acts of terror occurs at our
airports. The bottomline is, there is no sense of
proactive approach to anything in Nigeria. This is why
intelligent people of intergrity are required to be
the decision makers for a society if that society
wishes to proper
In Nigeria, when you fly a locally operated airline,
there is a 70% chance that it may be your last flight.
Imagine that kind of odds. So the planes are bad, and
airport security is horrible. I dare say a major
disaster is about to occur in our airport because
there is nothing in place to prevent such an occurence
and safeguard people. Imagine arriving in Nigeria as a
first time visitor or even as a repeat guest. One has
to go endure the extortion harrassment from members of
the Nigerian customs. They openly demand for bribes
and would verbally engage passengers that express
alarm at such blatant corruption. The entire customs
organization is completely out of touch with what its
purpose is. Then if you make it past the extortionist
customs outfit, you then confront a scary looking
crowd/mob just outside the doors of the arrival
section screaming and yelling at passengers from all
directions. In all the countries I have been to, I
have never seen such madness.
Nobody has the common sense to see the danger that
such lunacy posses. Things will remain that way until
it all goes terribly wrong, and then we begin to
react. That's what Nigerians do. They always react to
things, but never take a proactive approach to fix
problems before they become irrepairable.
So think about this for a minute. Nigerian airways is
grounded and quite frankly dead at this point. They
have zero airlines in their fleet. In recent years and
months, they've been trying to partner with Virgin
Airlines and South African Airways. These attempts
have yielded no sensible outcome, and usually, that
type of arrangement is never beneficial to the party
without planes. Just weeks ago, VP atiku publicly
accused the government of squandering or siphoning
some $500 million dollar Federal money. Then counter
accusations flew from both sides involving very
ridiculous sums of money.
I have just looked at Boeing's official site and dug
up some information concerning their best selling
Boeing 737 model. The Unit cost of a brand new 737 is
roughly $45 million. Now, with that $500 million that
both Atiku and Obasanjo accuse each other of
embezzling, 10 or 11 brand new Boeing 737s could be
purchased to jump start Nigerian Airways fleet again.
This way the government and public can have a degree
of confidence that the planes flying in our skies are
new and safer. This way also, more jobs can be created
as the new fleet will require a cross section of
workers for its operation.
$100 million dollars will buy a brand new fleet of 20
or more planes, and that would jumpstart the aviation
industry in Nigeria. So why do they not reason along
these lines? It has taken me less than 5 minutes to
figure this out. It is not like we do not have these
funds. So why do the Atikus and Obasanjos not embark
on common sense ventures like these that directly and
positively impact the people? Is that asking too much?
I cannot grade Obasanjo and atiku worse than an F. If
there was a grade worse than F, they obviously have
earned it already. I have watched these two confused
men since they assumed office, and each passing day,
the become worse. Neither of them have solved any
common problem in Nigeria in over 7 years of their
disservice to the nation. The most common challenges
that a high school graduate would readily fix,
Obasanjo and Atiku would failed woefully in tackling.
In all honesty let us review their performance in some
specific areas.
1. Internal security: Obj/Atiku are disasters in this
area. They had no security initiative coming into
office, and have none leaving. If we kept good
statistics in the country, we could have recorded
crime increase of over 300% in the last year alone.
Violent crime has been on a steady increase. Political
assasinations has increased at an alarming rate. Armed
robbery cannot be contained by law enforcement. As a
matter of fact, the Police IG openly admited that his
force is powerless against crime. Since that is the
case, the government has failed miserably in this very
basic responsibility.
2. Electricity: Obasanjo/Atiku have to earn a zero in
this area as well. Part of what this pitiful
administration promised prior to being elected into
office was the provision of excellent power supply
nationwide within 8 months. His government has not
even been able to provide poor power supply. What
Nigeria has is atrocious power supply, yet the power
agency keeps increasing rates, and people actually
pay. As an alternative, majority of Nigerians now use
generators as the primary energy source. The purpose
of generators are for emergency and special use.
The manufacturers never intended for generators to
become the primary source of power. They are loud,
they emit fumes, create atmospheric pollution, and are
not for long term use. So imagine an entire
neighborhood or community of about 30,000 people with
80% of them owning and actively using generators.
Imagine the polluttion and the potential health hazard
that begins to develop with far reaching long term
consequencies.
3. Road Network: Here again, they earn a zero. It is
common to read in the papers of how x amount of money
has been allocated for x and y federal road project.
You hear it all, but never see a darn road that meets
international standards. Almost daily, we read report
of terrible road accidents where scores of people are
killed. The roads are full of pot holes, sharp bends
without road warning signals, no trained highway
patrol officers keeping watch, no speed signs and
speed tracking devices, etc. Traffic laws are not
enforceable, and the general road conditions are just
horrible. So each year, thousands of Nigerians meet
their deaths on our highways due to dangerous
conditions, human error, unsafe vehicles, or in the
hands of armed robbers that now have complete control
of the roads.
4. Leadership/diplomacy/problem resolution:
It is pointless to grade Obj/atiku in any other
category, but let me sum up their performance in the
area of general leadership. When Federal schools
deteriorated and were in urgent need of funding so
they could serve the need of students (leaders of
tomorrow) the schools received no funding, ans as a
result, they feel into further decay. Atiku's respose
to that was to establish his own University while
still serving as a vice President. He made sure his
own personal institution got equipped with all the
necessities that makes education thrive, yet the
Federal and public schools which he was co elected to
help fix continued on a downward collapse. An
intelligent or a smart individual would have
recognized that establishing a private college while
the nation's public intititions were starving for
funds desperately would amount to a serious conflict
of interest and even misconduct. However, being the
ignoramus that he is, he couldn't see the problem
here.
Part of their internal diplomatic failure can be seen
in their dismal handling of the Niger-Delta crisis.
Rather than put measures in place to resolve the
dissatisfaction issues that exist, Obj government
aggravated it. The residents of the region have
suffere abandonment, abuse, environmental hazards,
loss of wildlife and destruction of the ecosystem in
their community due to irresponsible business
practices of oil companies, but have never been
compensated. When they got fed up and made their
voices heard, the government responded with a stiff
hand. They in turn have equipped themselves with
sophisticated weaponry and have overwhelmed the
Nigerian Armed forces. President Obasanjo is now
looking to the US to secure the area. This is another
admission of failure. So what exactly can this
government do right? NOTHING!!!!!
The clowns that they are,( Obasanjo and Atiku) they
are out there fighting tooth and nail with each other,
and embarrasing the entire country. Nigeria's image is
already in the gutters, but Obasanjo and atiku are
bent on dragging it into the sewer. Nigerians, PLEASE
wake up. PLEASE WAKE UP and kick these ignoramuses out
of office. They are totally horrible, them and their
associates.
When a nation depends on generators for its
electricity supply, that should tell Nigerians that
the leadership, the President, his deputy, their
associates, their party (PDP)and all those associated
with them are a total disaster that needs to be ousted
by any means necessary and then made to face serious
conbsequencies for their atrocities while in office.
It is never enough to simply watch them walk away.
That will solve nothing, and the mantle of official
abuse will simply be passed on to another set or
better yet, another group of recycled morons like the
IBBs and his former military colleagues like that
notorious Jerry Useni, Madaki and co. The only way
this cycle can be broken is to go after them, oust
them from office, and mete out severe penalties to
them for the violations they committed. This will
ultimatelty serve as an example to future crooks that
misconduct will not be tolerated.
Most successful nations elect their best and brightest
to positions of authority in order to make sound
decisions for the betterment of all. They hardly go
wrong using this formula. In Nigeria, the exact
opposite is the case. In Nigeria, the dumbest, most
corrupt, and most clueless govern the masses, and
guess what? The results do not lie. Look at where we
are today. It makes me boil when I see a complete
empty barrel like Atiku hunker down about wanting to
be the next President. If that happens, the country
may just as well be used as a dumpster because that's
what it will be worth under atiku's watch.
God help us
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