donne4real | February 6, 2008
The Nigerian Tribune reports that the elections tribunal are set to deliver judgment on the Presidential Elections held in 2007.
We pray for the best. The judges have been bold and assertive in their judgments so far. So I hope for the same.
Tags: elections, Government, judgment, tribunal
donne4real | November 2, 2007
At long last, the shameless speaker, Patricia Etteh has stepped down and has been replaced by Hon. Dimeji Bankole of Ogun State. As usual, he has promised vigorous debate and to act properly. But will this be the case?
Here is Reuben Abati’s opinion piece in Guardiand Newspapers of Friday, November 2nd.
Etteh-tainment
By Reuben Abati
“SOMEBODY should do a home video on Patricia Olubunmi Etteh’s story” “Or a stage play” “Absolutely. It is perfect material for a dramatist.”“Such a pity I can’t find the time to do fiction. I would have loved to do a special copy for posterity. Hopefully, some day, someone will find the Etteh material useful for a play script or a movie.”
“I have a ready title: Woman of Ikire”
“Why Ikire? I believe even the people of Ikire are embarrassed that their daughter has brought them so much disgrace”
“Okay: How about The fall of a Speaker?”
“My friend, can you be a bit more imaginative?”
” Okay. Etekete will be a good title then. Perfect in fact”
“Except that there is a copyright on that. It has already been used by Segun Gbadegesin in The Nation.”
“Yeah. I read him. He said Etteh yi a lo lau/Bo gbe ina kari, lau/Bo wo ewu eje, lau/Etteh yi a lo”
“And the woman is gone, She is gone. It is a triumph for civil society.”
“The Presidency says it is a triumph for the rule of law”“Except that most of the people using that term don’t really know what it means. The way they are mouthing rule of law, rule of law, these days, you would think it is some strange formula or a branch of rocket science. And if you ask me, I would say the rule of law ought to be given. Nobody should contemplate the misrule of law. I am in fact amused when people say that President Yar’Adua ’s main achievement is the rule of law. When I was much younger and we learning how to dance, we were taught to move quick, quick, quick, slow, slow, quick, quick. But Yar’Adua is just doing slow, slow, slow, slow slow, slow, slow.”
“Let us give the man his due credit. If the Etteh saga had occurred under Baba, I can bet that Etteh will still be in office today.
“No. She was bound to go. The opposition was too strong. But I just hope that she and her sponsors would have learnt the right lessons. Because if they do not, then we are in very serious trouble.”
“We must thank members of the Integrity Group for their resilience, for their vigilance.”
“Civil society too. All the forces in civil society who stood up to say that Nigerians expect a certain minimum standard of conduct from their leaders: probity, integrity and accountability.”
“And decency, please. We have to keep insisting that our leaders should act decently. Look there are too may people in high places in this country who do not know that there is something called shame in the dictionary.”“That woman broke all the codes”
“That is the problem with the reign of Peter’s principle in Nigerian politics”
“Peter’s principle?”
“Yes, Peter’s principle. When people are promoted beyond their level of competence.”
“No be Baba cause am?”
“I hear Baba was not alone in the management of that matter”
“Which matter?”
“The same matter that we are discussing”
“I think Peter’s principle should become Patricia’s principle. Beats me how a hair dresser made it to one of the topmost positions in the country.”
“This is Nigeria my brother. There are so many square pegs in round holes. Have you not seen graduates of chemistry prescribing drugs in hospitals; and graduates of religion running oil companies?”“Etteh’s exit is worth celebrating. One lesson that has been passed across is that persons in leadership positions cannot just behave as they wish. They have to conform with basic rules of morality. They must act right, do things properly and have the fear of God.”
“You know that woman lied till the very end.”
“Her Deputy played smart. Babangida Nguroje. It was Etteh that took all the flak. He simply stayed in the shadows.”
“You no hear im name? Maradona. But in any case, a Deputy is a spare tyre.”
“Another lesson in the whole saga is that the people should never be taken for granted. Etteh and her Deputy did not want to leave. But the Nigerian people stood their ground. They spoke with one voice that it is indecent for a public official to try to renovate a building with over N200 million, buy cars, furnish an official residence and ask for a body massager in addition”“You know when I heard that bit about body massager, I was angry. Body massager for N90 plus million. I could provide the same services free of charge and I will do a better job than a machine!”
“Craze dey worry you”
“Person wey craze dey for Aro”
“There are more mad people on the streets and in government than there are in psychiatric hospitals. That is what you don’t know Look psychiatrists talk about bipolar disorders, schizophrenia, depression, anxiety neurosis, sometimes you don’t know what is worrying some people.”
“I don’t get your drift”
“I hear the woman wept”
“Even our Lord wept”
“And Jesus wept”
“And Patricia wept”
“Etekete”
“Etteh-tainment”
“Candidly I think the people at Ebinpejo lane should do a movie on this”
“If the marketer at Ebinpejo lane won’t act, then may be whoever is at Iweka street, Onitsha”
“You sef. You don kolo.”
“I like the kind of messages that are showing up in the public domain these days. At least, politicians now know that they can’t just get rid of their opponents by hook or crook and expect to get away with such impunity. A tribunal or a court of law can reverse the decision and do justice”“But now that Etteh is gone, I hope the lawmakers will settle down and do some work for the Nigerian people. Each one of them has collected over N60 million in the past three months, all for doing nothing.”
“One of them actually said so”
“Etteh’s disgrace is not just about Patricia Etteh, it is a comment on the political leadership elite and in particular the Peoples Democratic Party, and the quality of representation in the present National Assembly”“Every National Assembly that we have had since 1999 looks like a bad copy of a familiar one”
“We may still witness more interesting episodes. Something tells me that the Etteh syndrome is not yet over.”
“But one point has been made and that should serve as a lesson again to other public officials that public appointment should be about service not self enrichment. Etteh was so much into herself, her selfishness infuriated me”
“That is why she is a hair dresser”
“In her resignation letter, she even lied to Nigerians. She said she was resigning in the interest of democracy and Nigeria. When did democracy and Nigeria become so important to her?”
“Nguroje said he had to resign in order to move Nigeria forward.”
“I agree. Nigeria is better off without those two. The Etteh saga brought Nigeria to a standstill. Even the 2008 Budget could not be presented to the House. It had to wait. Hopefully, the country can now move forward”“You know the way my mind is working?”
“How is it working?”
“The way my mind is working…”
“Be careful. Too many people have heart attack these days, and I hear when you overwork your heart, something could just snap and you are a dead man.”“I think Patricia Etteh owes Nigerians an apology.”
“Absolutely”
“She needs to show that she is contrite. She needs to admit that she conducted herself in a manner that was less than honourable. I get the impression that she still doesn’t get the point. She is adamant. She is still behaving like a victim whereas she should be very sorry indeed.”“She says the media has never said anything nice about her.”
“The media is not a propaganda arm of the National Assembly, please”
“But she says she loves all journalists”
“She doesn’t need to love us. Let her read newspapers”
“You think she doesn’t read newspapers?”“She behaves like someone who does not read newspapers. Because if she does, she would have offered to step aside immediately the Idoko report was submitted. And if she did, she may have attracted some sympathy which could have worked in her favour.”
“But all the papers were abusing her.”
“It is the duty of the media to stand by the truth and to set agenda and act as the conscience of society”
“I think Etteh is a disgrace to her gender. The first woman to serve as Speaker of the House of Reps and in less than three months she blew the chance of the womenfolk.”
“Gender is too strong a word in this matter. This is not about gender. It is all about Patricia Etteh and her own choices. Whatever has happened to her or whatever she has done has nothing to do with Nigerian women. Don’t forget that a lot of women criticised her conduct. Even the National Association of Beauticians joined the Labour Congress to protest at the doorsteps of the National Assembly. Before she finally agreed to resign, some women knelt down before her and begged her to throw in the towel”“But what kind of system produces her type? She is out of office but we have to worry about the system that throws up her type and empowers them beyond their level of competence”
“It is the Nigerian system, what other system are you looking for? The truth is that many competent people do not want to go into politics. It is too risky.”
“Because really, on second thoughts, I pity the woman. To rise so far and to fall so heavily.”
“I don’t think she is feeling that hurt. She is a hair dresser. Hair dressers are used to getting into fights and moving on. They will fight and utter threats but when the next customer ambles along, they will put a smile on their faces and go for their articles of trade.”“We are talking about governance, about the big stage, not some funny beauty parlour. The personal lesson for Etteh is that Nigeria is not a beauty parlour. It is serious business.”
“May be now that the woman is no longer the Speaker, she can set up a hair dressing salon close to the National Assembly.”
“She may get something better than that. Don’t be surprised if she shows up later as the Chairperson of a House Committee.”
“The committees have been constituted”
“They could be re-constituted now that a new Speaker is in the chair.”
“Dimeji Bankole”
“I only hope he too has learnt the lessons of Etteh’s fall”
“He is another Egba man”
“Meaning what?”
“Well, I hear is not from Owu”.
Tags: Corruption, Government, nigeria, parliament, Patricia Etteh
donne4real | September 20, 2007
There has been this back and forth accusations and counter-accusations between the EFCC and the Attorney General for a while now.
EFCC were set to charge former Abia State Governor, Kalu for corruption. The Ministry of Justice (MOJ) tried to takeover the case from the EFCC and the EFCC pointedly refused to hand over the case to the MOJ. The Minister of Justice then demanded an apology from EFCC Chairman, Mr Ribadu, who refused to tender any apology for embarassing the Attorney Genera.
Earlier this week, Gani Fawenhimi demanded that the AG resign. Very few people have come out to back the Attorney General. To make matters worse, The Senate has stated that they fully back the EFCC in this matter.
So the story continues…
Tags: EFCC, Government, Justice, Kalu
donne4real | September 11, 2007
I wonder how many times we have heard these stories before - that the refineries will be revived and they will be fully operational by a certain date. Now, they are again claiming that the Warri and Kaduna refineries will be fully operational by the end of the year.
These guys should just SHUT UP and do something. Do it fast and do it well and get these refineries working. Abeg, aleviate the suffering of the people. Stop talking and get to work!
Since the Guardian Newspapers’ articles are refreshed on a daily basis, here are excerpts of the article:
NNPC sets December deadline to revive Warri, Kaduna refineries
NIGERIANS should expect functional Kaduna and Warri refineries by the end of December this year, the acting Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Alhaji Lawal Yar’Adua, has pledged.
To meet the target, the NNPC has awarded a N6.5 billion ($52 million) contract to a local firm for the repair of the Chanomic creek channel pipeline, which supplies crude oil to the two refineries.
Although the Federal Government has unbundled the NNPC and renamed it National Oil Company (NOC), the corporation will continue to operate in its present status until the National Assembly passes the law on the recent restructuring in the oil and gas industry.
He said the contract was awarded to an indigenous oil service firm, which had worked with the multi-national oil companies in the Niger Delta region. According to Yar’Adua, ” the community people have assured us of access to the place, we have evaluated the contract, we have signed the agreement with the community and we expect to finish this in four months. But I am putting pressure to see if we can reduce this to three months. We are looking at the possibility of bringing the refineries back on stream maybe before the end of December to see if we can give Nigerians a Christmas present.”
“It was over N12.6 billion ($100 million) but I have successfully negotiated it down, with the use of the indigenes to around $52 million (N6.5 billion),” Yar’Adua said. With the arrangement, the NNPC boss said, he had saved half of the cost of the contract for the country…
As part of the efforts to protect the pipelines from vandals, the NNPC boss said the management had signed a surveillance contract with the communities, stressing that by involving the people in the repair and surveillance it would go a long way in stemming the activities of the vandals in the region.
On the incessant vandalisation of the Escravos-Lagos pipeline, which supplies gas to Egbin Power Station and other gas users in the western part of the country, Yar’Adua said President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua had approved fund for the repair in view of the strategic nature of the pipeline to the power sector and the industrial sector.
“The line was vandalised by militants and we just repaired it and restored gas supply to Egbin. We achieved this a few days ago after spending more than N2 billion. Now we have found five new vandalised points. I then had to go back to Mr. President and he has approved that the affected areas should be repaired. So really, the gas is available but the line is being vandalised,” he said.
Yar’Adua pointed out that the refineries were technically ready and in good shape. ” Port Harcourt is operating. Today it is operating at about 60 per cent capacity, we are going back to 70 to 80 per cent. The Kaduna Refinery is operating at 85 per cent capacity. Warri was operating until the 18th February, 2006, that was when the crude oil pipeline was vandalised,” he said.
At the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) secretariat yesterday in Vienna, Minister of State for Energy (Petroleum), Mr. Odein Ajumogobia, said the National Energy Council set up recently by the government would review the issue of refineries as contained in the Oil and Gas Reform Implementation Committee(OGIC).
…
Ajumogobia explained that the problems with the refineries were systemic and bordered on spare parts, power generation and pipeline vandalisation, assuring that by the time government fixed these parts, the plant would deliver products to Nigerians.On the new refineries announced by the former Group Managing Director of NNPC Mr. Funso Kupolokun, Ajumogobia said that the modality for the exercise was sketchy. He said it was not clear under what arrangement the new refineries would be built.
“I cannot say whether government will do it alone or in partnership with private sector but what concerns me now is to fix what we have. That is what we will do for a while,” he said.
Tags: Government, NNPC, Refinery
donne4real | August 28, 2007
Here is Guardian’s editorial on the Honorable (or should I say, dishonorable) mess:
Cost of renovating the Speaker’s house
IT is the most telling sign of the times, that nothing shocks Nigerians any more. Yet, the widespread condemnation that greeted the latest scandal in the House of Representatives shows just how appalled Nigerians have become at official misdemeanour. The whistle over the scandal was blown the other day by House Deputy Chief Whip, Hon. Suleiman Kawu. He disclosed that contracts worth N628 million had been awarded for the renovation of the official residences of the Speaker, Hon. (Mrs.) Patricia Olubunmi Etteh, and her deputy, Alhaji Babangida Nguroje, and for the purchase of 12 cars, at a time when, and in a country where, poverty and disease are pandemic.
It is even more shocking that this contract award was among the first concrete actions of this session of the House of Representatives. What manner of legislators are these, who have done nothing to alleviate the condition of Nigerians, but have been busy awarding massive contracts to renovate their homes?
If, according to Hon. Eziuche Ubani, Chairman, House Committee on Media and Public Affairs, the contract for the renovation of the two houses was “only N238 million” (or N.24 billion), it means that the balance of N390 million (or N.4 billion) was spent on 12 cars, at a cost of about N32.5 million each! It should be noted that what was allegedly done with the sum of N.24 billion was the renovation of existing buildings, refurbished only in 2003, and not the building of a residential estate or even the construction of two brand new houses.
In a country where the average citizen spends less than $1.00 per day, to expend the stated sum of N.238 billion on the renovation of the residences of only two of the several elected lawmakers in just one of the two chambers of the National Assembly trenches on scandalous prodigality, if not on a crime, and it places a moral burden on the national legislature.
The 1st to 5th sessions of the National Assembly, which held in the last administration, were dominated by bickering and stormy exchanges among “honourable” and “distinguished” members over money sharing, which stood between them and the discharge of their primary responsibility, the duty to make laws for the peace, order and good governance of the country. The present scandal, the renovation of two houses and purchase of 12 cars for a colossal and dreadful sum of N628 million, raises a number of gnawing questions: First, shouldn’t the renovation of the Speaker’s and Deputy Speaker’s residences have been undertaken by the Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA) whose properties those two houses are, in the first place?
Secondly, if the House of Representatives twisted the arms of the FCDA for permission to undertake the renovation exercise and to purchase the 12 cars by itself, was the said sum of N628 million budgeted for in the Capital Vote for the House? Thirdly, if so, did the release of that prodigious amount of money pass through due process in the House? Fourthly, if the official residences of the Speaker and her deputy cost N238,852,192.00 to renovate, for how much was Aso Rock, the seat of Federal power, renovated?
Fifthly, are there no established rules and procedure governing the award of contracts and fixing the maximum amounts in contracts for specific projects? Sixthly, did the alleged award of over N628 million contract to three firms through the notice board of the National Assembly accord with the established House rules and procedure? Seventhly, if the houses in question belonged to Speaker Patricia Etteh and the money for their renovation was to come from her own pocket, would she have endorsed the contract for the refurbishment of two houses that were comprehensively renovated only in 2003, and a N390 million contract for the purchase of 12 cars (i.e. at N32.5 million per car)?
Finally, shall we assume that some people in the lower chamber of the National Assembly are completely bereft of conscience? Surely, such wastage, such recklessness and acts of profligacy, underlie the sub-human existence confronting millions of Nigerians today.
Not a few Nigerians are beginning to wring their hands in utter frustration at a situation in which a massively discredited set of rulers most of whom got into office through a gravely flawed process, is routinely succeeded by a worst set. Only in July, last year, a damning report on Nigeria’s economic growth was released in a collaborative effort of two U.S.-based influential organisations, The Heritage Foundation and the Wall Street Journal.
In the report, the two bodies ranked Nigeria 146th out of the 157 countries on the list. In fact, in sub-Saharan Africa, the report rated Nigeria above only one country: Zimbabwe! It can hardly be gainsaid that the bane of rancid corruption, unconscionable wastefulness and misfeasance is at the root of Nigeria’s abysmally low socio-economic growth. This explains why we had argued in previous editorials for the need to intensify the war against corruption, a morbid phenomenon, and to carry it further to the doorsteps of legislators and appointed public officials, at the Federal and state levels, including local government chairmen.
A panel must be instituted forthwith to inquire into the circumstances surrounding the alleged award of N628 million contract(s) for the renovation of two houses and for the purchase of 12 cars ostensibly for some principal officers of the House. For good measure, the probe must be done in the full glare of the public. And the ruling PDP must do nothing to sweep this scandal under the carpet. The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mrs. Patricia Etteh, has in the face of the allegations, been busy offering excuses. This is shameful. Her honour and integrity are at stake. If she understands this to be so, she should act honourably by stepping aside, to allow proper investigations to be carried out.
Tags: Government
donne4real | August 27, 2007
I weeaaaaaak when I read that N628 million was approved legally (or illegally) to renovate the official quarters of the top senate officials. In an attempt to douse this controversy, Punch reports that they are now claiming it was just N238m and not N628m. They state that:
The contracts were for the renovation of Etteh’s official residence at a whopping cost of N238m, the renovation of the home of the Deputy Speaker, Mr. Babangida Nguroje, and the purchase of 12 cars.
Dem dey mad ni? People never eat and dem dey spend dis kain money to renovate house. Na gold dem use build de house ni? Why are our leaders just crooks? Why is it that they dont have any interest for the nation at hear? All they care about is their own self interest.
This new congress has not passed any noticeable law. They have not done anything substantial in the last 3 or so months. There was first the story that the speaker used public money for a B-day bash in the US and now this? This woman should be ashamed of herself. Ms. Etteh had the honour of being the first female speaker in Nigeria and this is now what she has become known for.
Today, Vanguard reports that she is under pressure to quit. Punch reports that she had a secret meeting with the Senate President in order to come up with a strategy. This Day reports that she is moving to douse the impeachment plot.
This is a bunch of BS. She should be impeached and imprisoned for that matter!
First, it was the news that the Naira will be revalued. It was then followed by the news that the Federal Government was not informed and that they were caught off-guard by Soludo’s announcements - that he did not inform or consult the President before making the pronouncement. Then the news that the CBN did not have the authority to make such a move. Then the news that Soludo was conspicuosly left off the Economics Team for the nation. All led to the pronouncement by the Justice Minister that the Naira Revaluation Policy had been suspended indefinitely.
I wonder how the FG can justify leaving the CBN head out of the Economics team. Does that make sense to anyone? I believe that there is something fishy about this story. CBN Officials claim that the President was made aware of the move. I will be extremely surprised if he did he made such a pronouncement without the president’s approval. Maybe he stepped on some toes with such a move. If you think of it, it wont pay foreigners. So there is a high likelihood that some people making money from the foreign exchange trading are/were against the move and therefore acted to kill the policy.
If I were Soludo, the honorable thing will be to resign. He does not have anything to prove again to anyone and he is surely guaranteed of some plum job in the World Bank or at the IMF or one of these financial institutions. My fear is that some anti-progress forces will continue to act as obstacles of progress.
Tags: CBN, Government, Naira, News, Soludo
donne4real | August 9, 2007
After weeks of giving some very flimsy excuses, the V.P. has at last decided to publish his assets. I wonder why he did not want to do this. Did he have some skeleton in his wardrobe? And I also wonder why he has now decided to publish them. Was he forced by the president?
Here is the article from Guardian Newspapers:
Jonathan publishes assets, worth N295m
From Madu Onuorah, AbujaVICE President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday succumbed to public demand that he release the details of the assets he declared before the Code of Conduct Bureau. In a statement made available to journalists in Abuja, the Vice President put his total assets at N295, 304, 420.
On June 28, 2007, President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua published details of his assets, which he put at N856.64 million. Details of the assets, which Jonathan declared on May 30, 2007 before Justice Muktar N. Dodo of the Abuja High Court, show that the Vice President has no foreign account or assets.
Senior Special Assistant to the Vice President (Media and Communications), Mr. Ima Niboro, who released the details of the assets to journalists at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, said in a press statement: “This merely shows that in the affairs of man, there comes a time when even the law must take a second place, and the public mood must define our actions.”
Niboro added: “To the Vice President, this is such a time, hence the choice to send you a copy of his declaration for publication. There is nothing to hide, as you can very well see!” A breakdown of the assets showed that the Vice President’s private buildings are worth N67, 990,000. These include a four-bedroom duplex in Kpansia, Yenagoa, valued at N15 million, a four-flat storey extension of the family house in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital, valued at N10 million and a four-flat storey building at Otuoke, Ogbia Local Council, which was bombed days before his inauguration as Vice President, valued at N18 million. There is also a five-bedroom personal residence in Gwarinpa, Abuja, worth N24.99 million.
Under the vehicles and household items, Jonathan declared a total assets of N41.8 million. They include a BMW car in Abuja valued at N15 million, generators, electronics, air conditioners, furniture, kitchen utensils and others in Kpansia, Yenagoa, Otuoke, and Gwarimpa costed at N26 million. The BMW was declared as a gift while the other items were said to be gift or procured from savings. He also declared some vacant and undeveloped plots as worth N60.538 million. They include five undeveloped plots of land in Bayelsa State, two undeveloped plots of land in Cadastral Zone BO2 and AO6 in Abuja .
Jonathan listed N62, 072, 200 million as accruing from income yielding investments. This comprises investments in stocks managed by City-Code Trust and Investment Company Limited. He categorised them as 16 different stocks in Nigerian blue-chip companies. The Vice President said that he has four 16-seater passengers’ boats for hiring by companies and other agencies. According to him, total cash in Nigerian banks (Bank PHB, Union Bank of Nigeria Plc, UBA and others is N58.984 million. He stated that the total income includes personal savings and income from his investments, among them performing stocks and hiring of the boats.
Niboro said that the assets declared did not include those of Jonathan’s wife, because “the wife of the Vice President is a public officer, being on the staff of the Bayelsa State Ministry of Education, Yenagoa.” “She could, on her own, being in service, declare her assets through laid-down procedures,” he added.
Niboro added that Jonathan’s children, being under the mandatory age of 18, do not own assets. Noting the controversy that Jonathan’s reluctance at releasing the assets had caused, Niboro said: “There is no question that the issue of the publication of the Vice President’s assets declaration has been the source of vigorous debate in the mass media in the past week or so. There have been strong opinions on both sides of this emerging, if unnecessary, divide.”
He added: “His Excellency, the Vice President, is a firm believer in the rule of law, and this has guided his conduct in public office through the years. It is this belief that also guided his position that having fulfilled the requirements of the law by declaring his assets for a total of seven times, there was no point in going further to publish the declaration.” The Vice President’s aide regretted that “this position has generated an unfortunate storm, which is not only distractive but also quite unnecessary. We are worried that some newspapers and citizens we hold in high esteem have joined the fray. To the Vice President, this is such a time, hence the choice to send you a copy of his declaration for publication. There is nothing to hide, as you can very well see.”
Jonathan’s failure to release the details of his assets had generated a storm particularly because President Yar’Adua had set the standard by making his own public. The public, which had lauded the President’s action, had expressed concern that the moral high ground on which the government could proceed with its avowed anti-graft war would be undermined if the Vice President did not follow suit. The Code of Conduct Act, which prescribes the declaration of assets for public officers, is silent on whether the document should be made public or not, therefore leaving it at the discretion of the affected persons.
Jonathan, had in the defence of his decision not to make the assets public, cited the bombing of his country home in Yenagoa shortly before he took office as a strong disincentive. He also challenged key officials of the opposition party, the Action Congress (AC), which had been at the forefront of the campaign, to also make public their assets. Jonathan particularly threw the challenge at the current Lagos State Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola, his predecessor Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and AC’s national spokesman, Lai Mohammed.
None of them is yet to accede to the request.
Tags: Assets, Government, Jonathan Goodluck, News, nigeria
donne4real | August 3, 2007
The former Senate President, Evan Enwerem is dead.
“A close political associate of the politician, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that Enwerem was believed to have died of an ailment that had to do with the central nervous system.”
Tags: Government, nigeria
donne4real | August 1, 2007
Femi Meyungbe-Olufunmilade had a very good comment on the Yar’Auda’s minsiterial list. In my opinion, it was very unbalanced. All the top posts were awarded to northerners while the less powerful posts were awarded to the southerners.Read his comment below:
Yar’Adua’s cabinet gaffe
By ‘Femi Meyungbe-OlufunmiladeSINCE my letter “President Yar’Adua and The Ministers List” appeared in The Guardian of Sunday, July 29, 2007, my mail box has been inundated with rejoinders from diverse walks of life - both home and abroad. That has precipitated the need for me to add some footnotes to the letter. Before then, however, I wish to reproduce the entire text as I have absolutely nothing to correct from it.
Most of the letters concurred with me, one of which came from the editor of internet-based Nigeriannews.com and conscienceDaily.com. The letter goes: “Dear President, I went through your list of ministers and was alarmed about its lopsidedness in terms of ethnic\geo-political balancing. The Yoruba, for instance, have no major portfolio. Major portfolios in Nigeria’s context refer to senior ministerial posts in: Defence, Finance, Energy, Foreign Affairs, Interior and Transportation. How could you make such a great error when you’re talking of Government of National Unity (GNU) and had given the impression that the delay in constituting your cabinet is to ensure you carry all of us on board? I’m afraid what we just got is like the pregnancy of an elephant giving birth to a rat!
“Again, how come a northerner is still the National Security Adviser and you now appoint another northerner the Minister of Defence. Both positions were held by northerners under President Obasanjo. Like it or not people expect that what is good for the goose is also good for the gander. Now you’ve positioned another northerner, Taminu Kurfi, as Deputy Chief of Staff to take over from another northerner, Gen. Abdullahi Muhammed, who was in the saddle throughout Obasanjo’s administration as Chief of Staff. Why is the FCT minister perpetually a northerner?
Is Abuja not the home of all? Why then sustain the impression in people’s psyche that it is an exclusive northern territory - you in whom we had invested hope of change? Afterall, your dad (a northerner of northerners) of blessed memory was the Minister of Lagos Affairs at the very nerve-centre of Yorubaland. This is the kind of insensitivity or oversight that made it difficult for past northern leaders to succeed only in galvanising southern opposition instead of mobilising all for national development.
I wish we have a country where merit is the watchword and the issue of one’s place of origin is down-played. However, that will for a long time to come be a pipe-dream. Even in the U.S. people still talk of who is a Jew or Black in cabinet appointments. The issue is about giving people a sense of belonging in a government. Some northerners even complain that the key portfolios for the north are in favour of Fulanis!
Believe me, Your Excellency, I am a good friend of my country and that makes me your friend. If you do not embark on an adjustment immediately, you may end up failing to achieve your set goals but have saboteurs aplenty, who don’t see you as representing their interest but the arrow-head of Fulani oligarchs and their narrow agenda. You may have good intentions but public perception must be favourably married to such intentions. A stitch in time saves nine!”
That aphorism ends the letter. Let me now add the footnotes, which are five in number. One, as one whose ambition from secondary school has been to become the president of Nigeria, later proceeding to study political science towards that end, I realised early that in a heterogenous country like Nigeria you need to acquire the persona of a father-of-the-nation in whom each ethnic group sees its interest as represented if you want to succeed in mobilising them to achieve the as yet unattained goal of national development. In acquiring this persona Federal Character must not only be reflected in your appointments and allocation of resources, but must be seen as reflected. Otherwise, you will be running a thug-of-war kind of government where instead of pulling in one direction, you find people flexing muscles in opposite ways. That has been the curse upon Nigeria since independence. That is the error I wanted Yar’Adua to avoid. The contents of my letter only represented the feelings of many Yoruba people of my acquaintance and Southerners in general. It is only President Olusegun Obasanjo and Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar, whom I know quite well, that tried to be truly Nigerian in their public postures to an appreciable extent.
Secondly, I want a father-of-the nation persona for Yar’Adua because I wanted nothing to hinder him from succeeding as president. Despite my reservations on the flawed election that brought him to power, I am impressed by his legacies as the Governor of Katsina State. I conducted a vox populi in Katsina city en route Abuja from Niger Republic, where, through an invitation via His Excellency Elhadji Ibrahim (Niger’s Ambassador to Nigeria), I was a guest of the government of President Tanja Mamadou at Republic Day’s celebration (14-18 December, 2006), shortly after the PDP primaries that produced Yar’Adua as the party’s presidential candidate. I was impressed about the level of infrastructural development, staff welfare, agricultural progress, thrifty management of resources, etc Katsina had witnessed under Yar’Adua.
I was surprised that unlike his colleagues in other states, many of whom have turned out to be thieves of public money, he did not set much store by publicity. I was glad and told myself that, whichever way the pendulum swung in the April presidential polls, Yar’Adua’s way or Gen. Buhari’s who was my man for the job, Nigeria was going to have an upright and resourceful president. In a nutshell, I am presenting people’s view on Yar’Adua’s cabinet to him so that he would not fail. No Nigerian, be they Yoruba, Ijaw, Fulani, Hausa and what have you, stands to gain anything from his failure as president. His failure, God forbid, would be Nigeria’s failure, which we can ill afford, having failed often. Personally, Yar’Adua has made history to have attained the office of president. But we as Nigerians need him much more to make history for us by transforming our country into a developed nation. The least we can do to help ourselves in this regard is to warn him when he falters.
Thirdly, I feel constrained to state that I am not merely posturing as having goodwill towards Yar’Adua presidency. Prior to this time, I had sent him series of position papers on the dual subjects of peacemaking in our fractured polity and accelerated industrial development through his sister-in-law, Zainab Yar’Adua, and our mutual friend, Former Head of State, Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar, apart from forwarding same straight to his personal email. But I had to go public with the letter at issue, which I copied him, because it requires urgent action, and reactions have proved my judgment right.
Fourth, the arrogance of some of our northern folks in boasting of northern imminent reclamation of so-called lost grounds under President Obasanjo requires vigilance as Yar’Adua is human and not altogether immune from influences around him. These are times that reverberate the wisdom of my late mentor and boss, Chief Bola Ige (whose killers while serving as Attorney General and Minister of Justice of Nigeria under Obasanjo, are yet to be brought to justice), in warning that Nigeria may never know progress till the country is restructured into a proper federation via a Sovereign National Conference.
I know for sure that lots of ethnic pressures are piled on Yar’Adua daily from his kinsmen, but he is supposed to belong to all of us. So people like us cannot but be vigilant. Voltaire says, “The price of liberty is eternal vigilance”. A Yoruba adage also says, “If a man hears shouts that a lethal load should be dumped somewhere, and fails to join the dumping gang, the load might be dumped in his backyard”.
Finally, what is wrong in Yar’Adua appointing southerners as Senior Ministers of Defence and Federal Capital Teritory Administration (FCTA), as well as National Security Adviser? Afterall, he was prompt in appointing a northern political figure in the person of Ambassador Babagana Kingibe as the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, a position hitherto held under Obasanjo by Chief Ufot Ekaete, a Southerner from Akwa Ibom State. Is anything really bad in giving to the goose what was good for the gander?
Tags: Government, ministers, News, nigeria, Yar A dua
donne4real | July 27, 2007
Below is an interesting article by Reuben Abati on Yar’Adua’s style of leadership:
Yar’Adua’s emerging style
By Reuben Abati
TO say that a new leader’s style and/or persona is different from that of his predecessor may amount to a statement of the obvious. But in Nigeria, style in this context acquires a significance that is instructive beyond what may seem to be given. And in attempting a preliminary assessment of President Umaru Yar’Adua, what is emerging is the realization, now generally acknowledged that his style is so far a radical and refreshing departure from what Nigerians experienced under former President Olusegun Obasanjo. Already Nigerians are breathing a sigh of relief as Yar’Adua in the past two months has now begun gradually and certainly to show that he is his own man. The style is the man.
What defines the man conditions what he does, or says or how the public responds to him. If there is any concrete change in the Presidency that we can speak of, for now, it is the change in Presidential style.
President Olusegun Obasnajo was an authoritarian leader who left no one in doubt that he was in charge. For him, every occasion provided an opportunity to advertise the supremacy of his office. Even when this was absolutely unnecessary, he went out of his way to behave in an imperial manner. It was as if the then President needed to reassure himself of his achievement and pre-eminence at every hour, every minute and every second. Discussions with him often ended up, it was said, as a monologue in which he alone was the wise one. Any sign of independence or expression of an alternative view point was shot down from the imperial throne.
There were many demonstrations of this style in the public arena. Obasanjo once asked a Christian cleric, a high-ranking official of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) to shut up. On another occasion, he threatened top flog someone who disagreed with him publicly. At a meeting in London he also reportedly threatened to slap a fellow for asking a question that he considered rude.
Journalists who took part in “The President Speaks” media encounters suffered terribly in his hands. He bullied them, booed them or asked them to sit down, stand up or get out. This the leader-knows-it-all tendency and style soon became a key factor in that government’s policy processes. The Presidency became the nation’s centre of gravity. It overruled the courts of the land, obeying the courts only when it was convenient to do so. Special advisers were advised to keep their ideas to themselves. Political appointees were constantly reminded that they were at the mercy of the President.
One other Nigerian leader had been described severally as being Machiavellian but I suppose no other leader in Nigerian history has been more Machiavellian than Obasanjo. Between 1999 and 2007, he was in many ways, the archetypal Prince.
One major advantage of his style though is that Obasanjo provoked civil society into action and expression. By pushing his own views and choices so vigorously without any care in the world, about whose ox was gored, about the popularity or otherwise of his actions, Obasanjo energized the rest of us to challenge him, to counter him, to knock him heavily in a battle of ideas and wills. We were invariably playing his own game but the gain was the creativity that his style unleashed in the public arena, with the more progressive camp insisting on the right of the people to know, to be heard, to choose, and to live in an open and good society under the rule of law. Our protest against the Obasanjo style was tiring as the man was unyielding till the last moment.
This curious leader-people dynamic was further complicated by the emergence of mini-Obasanjos in the corridors of power. A group of Ministers and Advisers, hidden economic hit-men, self-promoting patriots, the know-it-all gang which also thought that the best way to serve the people was to bully them. Their arrogance was insufferable and infuriating. They were poor imitators; for they differed from Obasanjo in an essential respect: they lacked Obasanjo’s common touch, his wit and humour, his predictability, naturalness and native intelligence which often won him the admiration of even his most ardent critics. Obasanjo’s style may have been ambivalent, his methods may have been vague, but for the most part, the people knew where they stood with him. There wasn’t much that he did that surprised the average Nigerian.
With President Yar’Adua, there appears to be some form of clarity and simplicity and the public appears to be somewhat excited. The new President may not be a fantastic campaigner on the political platform; he may not make quotable statements that would be transported from lips to lips for weeks on end. He may not be bale to break out in an expansive dance in response to the rhythms of drum and song; he certainly may not have great stories to tell about the past and the future of Nigeria.
But we can conclude that this is not a President who will threaten to slap, flog or frog-march people. He does not look like the kind of President and he is not behaving like one, who will walk people out of his office. Or ask people to shut up, sit down, or stand up as if these were the nicest words in the English dictionary. His manners are mild. In close to 60 days in office, no one can trace any act of viciousness or word of antagonism to him. President Obasanjo had hardly settled down in office when he told everyone who supported his election campaigns not to expect any favours from him! Umaru Yar’Adua does not even hug the limelight. He is so self-effacing, so soft-spoken, you may be tempted to sympathise with him.
He had assumed office on May 29 with the promise that he will be a servant-leader. He seems to be working hard at this aspiration. His body-language is according to his early admirers, pleasant. You could miss him in a crowd of his assistants. Nobody could ever miss Obasanjo’s swagger, imposing presence and power-grunts. It is perhaps a function of Yar’Adua’s style that in two months he has been able to handle a number of controversial incidents, including the quiet dismantling of Obasanjo’s spheres of influence without attracting much attention to himself or his likely long-term motives.
After what seemed like an initial bout of stage-fright, he reversed the increases in the pump prices of petroleum products and VAT.
The sale of the Kaduna and Port Harcourt refineries had also raised much dust. Without making the powerful owners of Bluestar Consortium lose face, Yar’Adua provided them a soft landing by allowing them to withdraw their purchase of the refineries with a threat that they were giving the NNPC one year to turn around the refineries “or else”. But or else what? Quietly also, Yar’Adua managed to put an end to the face-off between government and ASUU. When the Supreme Court gave a ruling which rendered the April 2007 Gubernatorial elections in Anambra state null and void, the Yar’Adua Presidency made no attempt to stand in the way of the apex court. Under Obasanjo, either the Presidency or the ruling party could have overruled the Supreme Court.
Yar’Adua has also ordered the release of the remaining part of the withheld funds due to local councils in Lagos state. He has also named Lagos one of the two Presidential retreats that will be used by his government. This is the same Lagos that President Obasanjo dismissed as a “jungle” and turned into a victim of partisan politics.
It should not be too difficult indeed to see why President Umaru Yar’Adua appears to be winning in the style department. But style is not enough. What matters is substance: in terms of performance and quality of service delivery. If the Obasanjo government had succeeded in delivering the much demanded “dividends of democracy”, not many people would have complained about style; they would have been satisfied with a trade-off. Mild manners and simplicity may make a leader attractive but that is no guarantee of quality performance in office. In the First Republic, Prime Minister Tafawa Balewa was a simple and modest man. But under his watch, Nigeria imploded.
In the Second Republic, President Shehu Shagari was a man of few words and excellent manners.
But his government, right before his eyes, was hijacked by a profligate and influential cabal. General Buhari as Head of State was reticent, his second-in-command Tunde Idiagbon did more of the talking, and yet the rule of law suffered under his government. When General Babangida first showed up, his toothy smile endeared him to Nigerians, but his government ended up mortgaging Nigeria’s future. General Sani Abacha was so taciturn, everyone considered him the dumb General. But he soon showed Nigerians that no one should judge a book by its cover. Human history is full of so many leaders who started their careers as men of style and decorum but who ended up as terrible rulers. Are we not trusting President Yar’Adua too early, too soon? President Obasanjo had in fact foreseen the comparison that is now being attempted when he declaimed as follows: “Umoru does not talk. His style will be different. But he will react.”
President Yar’Adua style as defined is actually a reaction to his environment, his circumstances, and the grandeur of his office.
Could he be that he is treading softly, knowing that there are cases in court which still have to be determined before he can sit confidently as Nigeria’s President? Is he so gentle and so self-effacing because he is still having stage-fright? He is carrying out the most important assignment of his life. He is now on the big stage. He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, and everything that he ever did in his life came to him on platter of gold.
He inherited houses from his father and his brother. He went to school as a privileged child; he was made a state commissioner even when he did not want it. He became Governor of Katsina state for eight years without any hassles, and his brother’s friend decided to make him President of Nigeria. Is it not possible that what is being termed style is actually the case of a man still trying to adjust to his new surroundings?
Running Nigeria is such a complex assignment that can bring forth hitherto uncharted depths of a man’s character. Yar’Adua is a leader we still need to watch closely, lest his style sways us and we abandon our role as sentinel.
Tags: Government, Leadership, nigeria, Reuben Abati, Yar A dua
donne4real | July 26, 2007
After almost three months, we now have ministers in Nigera. Here is the list of ministers:
1. Attorney-General/Minister of Justice: Mr Michael Aondoakaa (SAN)
2. Agriculture/Water Resources: Abba Sayyadi Ruma
3. Agriculture/Water Resources: Adamu Maina Waziri (State 1)
4. Commerce/Industry: Chief Charles Ugwu
5. Commerce/Industry (State): Ahmed Garba Bichi
6. Culture/Tourism: Adetokunbo Kayode
7. Culture/Tourism (State): Aliyu Idi Hong
8. Defence: Yayale Ahmed9. Defence (State): Mrs Fidelia Njeze
10. Education: Igwe Aja-Nwachukwu
11. Education (State 1): Agada Anthony Jerry
12. Education (State 2): Mrs Aishatu Jibril Dukku
13. Energy (State): Power Mrs Fatima Ibrahim
14. Energy (State) Petroleum: Henry Odein Ajumogobia
15. Energy (State) Gas: Odusina Emmanuel
16. Environment/Housing: Mrs Halima Alao
17. FCT: Dr Aliyu Modibbo Umar
18. FCT (State): Sen. John Akpanudoedehe
19. Finance: Dr Shamsuddeen Usman
20. Finance (State): Aderemi Babalola
21. Foreign Affairs: Ojo Maduekwe
22. Foreign Affairs (State 1): Tijjani yahaya Kaura
23. Foreign Affairs (State 2): Amb. Bagudu Hirse
24. Health: Prof. Adenike Grange
25. Health (State): Gabriel Aduku
26. Information/Communication: John Odey
27. Information/Communication (State): Ibrahim Nakande
28. Interior: Maj.-Gen. Godwin Abbe (Rtd)
29. Interior (State): Hassan Alhaji Haruna
30. Labour: Dr Hassan Lawal
31. Mines/Steel Development: Chief Sarafa Tunji Isola
32. Mines/Steel Development (State): Ahmed Moh’d Gusau
33. Transportation: Mrs Diezani Alison-Madueke
34. Transportation (State): John Okechukwu Emeka
35. Science/Technology: Mrs Grace Ekpiwhre
36. Youth Development: Sen. Akinlabi Olasunkanmi
37. Women Affairs: Saudatu Usman Bungudu
38. Minister/Deputy Chairman National Planning Commission: Sen. Sanusi Daggash
39. Minister/Chairman, National Sports Commission: Abdulrahman Gimba.
Tags: Government, ministers, nigeria, State
