The Nation Newspaper

Category: Lekan Otufodunrin

  • Catering for displaced persons

    But for natural disaster and war, there should be no reason why any citizen of a country should be displaced from his or her home. Even when the displacement is caused by natural disaster, it is the responsibility of the government at whatever level to make necessary provisions to cater for their temporary needs until they are fully rehabilitated.

    Unfortunately, while we have not had much cases of displacement due to natural disasters, like in other parts of the world, Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps have sprung up in many parts of the country more than ever before because of terrorists’ attacks and unnecessary community disputes.

    Instead of being temporary abodes for displaced persons, the camps have remained permanent shelters with no hope of when many of the affected persons will return to their homes. Even when governments close some camps on the excuse that situations have normalised where the people were earlier displaced, some find it difficult to go back to their former homes for various reasons.

    A picture by the News Agency of Nigeria of children in an IDP camp in Jos, Plateau State, published on the front pages of most national newspapers on Wednesday captures the plight of Nigerians in the various camps across the country.

    It is sad that even the children have to queue to get whatever ration of food is available, not to talk of the men and women who have to cope with all manners of deprivations for no fault of theirs.

    Life in the camps is indeed harrowing, with governments and agencies unable to meet the various needs of the displaced persons despite the huge amount of money governments and agencies claim to be spending.

    Not minding the unfortunate situation the displaced persons have found themselves, some callous officials have been known to be diverting relief materials and embezzling funds meant to cater for the victims.

    There are also cases of security men taking advantage of girls and women who they rape in exchange for foods they are entitled to. A report by Amnesty International which the Nigerian Army disputed exposed the sexual escapades of security men who are supposed to be guiding the camps.

    The displaced persons are also exposed to various health risks with cases of epidemic proportion that are not usually given prompt attention.

    More than ever before, governments and agencies responsible for taking care of the camps have to ensure that the displaced persons are not subjected to another round of hardship having been forced out of their homes due to circumstances beyond their control.

    In accordance with the International Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, displaced persons “retain a broad range of economic, social, cultural, civil and political rights, including the right to basic humanitarian assistance (such as food, medicine, shelter), the right to be protected from physical violence, the right to education, freedom of movement and residence, political rights such as the right to participate in public affairs and the right to participate in economic activities.”

    Displaced persons also have the “right to assistance from competent authorities in voluntary, dignified and safe return, resettlement or local integration, including help in recovering lost property and possessions.”

    Unless the government abides with the above provisions, it cannot claim to be taking care of displaced persons as required.

  • Internet: What you want is what you get

    In 1998 while in Cardiff, UK for an Advanced Journalism course at Thomson Foundation, a colleague taught me how to use search engines on the Internet.

    One of the first things I did with the knowledge was to search for Christian media groups worldwide to network with them on our then new Journalists for Christ group.

    One of the search results was Writers Information Network (WIN) headed by Elaine Wright Colvin who introduced me to three organisations. One of the organisations was Media Associates International (MAI), a global publishing ministry.

    I linked up with Media Associates International (MAI) and I have benefited immensely from local and global resources, networks and opportunities the organisation has offered me.

    From Monday to Friday, I was on full scholarship attending the LITTWORLD 2018 conference organised by MAI in Singapore with over 250 participants from 52 countries.

    Apart from attending various sessions led by accomplished international speakers, I was privileged to be a speaker at two workshops, be on a panel discussion and coordinate an African Group meeting.

    My workshops were: Writing for the Web and Mentoring and Coaching Young Writers.

    The panel discussion was on Thriving in an Age of Digital Disruption, while I coordinated the Africa meeting as a member of the MAI Africa Trustees.

    I was humbled to find my contribution to a forthcoming book, African Writer Journeys, titled, Journalism for Christ in the conference’s programme booklet.

    Five other Nigerians were also at the conference and one of them, Pusonnam Yiri, Jos-based author and trainer, spoke on Thinking Locally, Writing Globally at the opening general session with profound insights.

    I was glad to meet Peky Samal, a fellow journalist from Bruthan who was a co-fellow some years ago at Poynter Institute for Media Studies in Florida, USA.

    The World Wide Web is indeed a gold mine, but what you get from it is what you want and what you do with it.

    With search engines, any interested person can search for as much information and resources he or she requires and maximise them.

    The Internet makes the concept of the world being a global village a reality with no territorial limits to how much one can accomplish, no matter where he or she is located. There is little or no restriction to the contribution anyone can make to the conversation online or take from it.

    More than being social media tools, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and others have become professional platforms for networking beyond social issues.

    Instead of indulging in unnecessary ranting online, there is the need to be involved quality engagements with boundless opportunities.

  • Death of professions

    Last week, this column was about saving journalism as a profession based on the threat of technology and corruption highlighted by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo in his speech at the annual conference of the Nigeria Guild of Editors in Asaba, Delta State.

    His message for journalists was clear: wake up to the reality of new media and get rid of the bad eggs giving the profession a bad name or get swept aside by non-professionals.

    “When a threat is existential, the response must be radical, otherwise we really may not have a profession, we may just be presiding over what we think exists when it has simply disappeared,” Osinbajo stated.

    However, the VP’s admonition was not only for journalists, but other professionals like lawyers, accountants and others whose jobs are being redefined by technology.

    He quoted a friend who teaches law and technology at a British university. Osinbajo noted that there are now applications and more sophisticated ones being made that would offer legal advice accurately, comprehensively, and objectively, and with Artificial Intelligence, they can even analyse data and make predictions about the outcomes of legal proceedings perhaps more accurately and definitely more objectively than humans.

    Just like law, the friend added that the job of financial advisors would be done electronically, as financial models could be developed digitally; the best advice could be given with the benefit of artificial intelligence. Even for complicated health issues, there are new devices for automated diagnosis.

    While the technological developments in various professions may not necessarily mean that professionals will not be needed to do what they have been doing for ages, the message is that every professional must be alive to the changes and acquire the needed knowledge to remain relevant.

    I am compelled to stress this issue about being technologically knowledgeable due to the dismissive attitude of many to the changes technology has brought to how many things are now supposed to be done to maximum impact and efficiency.

    Those who claim to be too old to learn about technological changes need to know that their days are limited in whatever profession or trade they are engaged in now. Not only have professional practices changed, the way to get customers for any endeavour is now much more than using personal and traditional channels.

    A tailor who used to sow clothe for a young boy is trying hard to understand how the boy, now a fashion designer,  have more customers than him, far beyond the shores of the country from a room in the outskirt of Lagos. The answer is the ability of the young man to utilise new sewing equipment and access global platforms to get customers. In a technology-driven world, it is no longer enough to hire a shop for any business; one can now sell worldwide, thanks to the Internet.

    In view of these developments, there is need for computer literacy awareness and education for all. Curriculums in educational institutions need to be updated in line with new technology.

    The kinds of graduates needed now are not those who know how things used to be done, but those who can improve on them and utilise new tools.

  • How to save journalism

    Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo on Thursday, urged the Nigerian Guild of Editors (NGE) to save journalism from total collapse by enforcing the rules and values of the profession in a goodwill message at the opening of the 14th All Nigeria Editors’ Conference (ANEC) in Asaba, the Delta State capital.

    According to him, most professions, particularly journalism, had been threatened by artificial technologies, adding that social media had virtually taken over the conventional media in terms of readership and followership.

    He noted that apart from the challenges of technology, the professionals remain a challenge to themselves, such that people had lost confidence because most information lacked objectivity and accuracy.

    Journalism is indeed challenged not only in Nigeria but globally as rightly noted by Osinbajo. While journalists used to pride themselves as gatekeepers of information, new media has made it possible for virtually anyone to be involved in information dissemination on various platforms.

    With the least regards for ethics of journalism and professional guidelines for information dissemination, by those Professor Abigail Ogwezzy Ndisikak of Department of Mass Communication, University of Lagos, calls information traffickers and even some supposed professional journalists, there has been a lot of concern about the future of journalism which was echoed by Osinbajo in Asaba.

    Instead of dismissing Osinbajo’s call as one of the doomsday prophesy about journalism, his advice should be taken seriously, not only by the NGE, but by all stakeholders in the media. The state of the profession is so alarming that we cannot continue to pretend that the situation is not as bad as Osinbajo and others have painted it.

    Not only is the integrity of journalists in the country at stake considering that some professionals are as guilty as the non-professionals engaged in information dissemination, but the future of the business is bleak.

    For too long, the traditional media in Nigeria lived in denial of the threat of the new media until they started playing catch-up to master the technology and become active on the platforms. Having gotten used to all manner of questionable information, it has become hard for the public to separate facts from fiction, partisan views and falsehood.

    In the quest of saving journalism in the country, the real challenge is for editors to lead by example by abiding and enforcing the ethics of the profession which has enough guidelines for journalists to earn necessary public trust.

    To earn and maintain this trust according to the Code of Ethics for Nigerian journalists, it is morally imperative for every journalist and every news medium to observe the highest professional and ethical standards by having a healthy regard for the public interest.

    Unfortunately, the Code is not available to many practising journalists in the country and there are no conscious efforts to enforce it. Every journalist should be given the Code at the point of resuming work and made to undertake to abide by it like in other professions.  Where there is no clearly stated law or ethics, violation cannot be established.

    There is a minimum requirement for anyone to claim to be a journalist in the country, but as it is, too many people with personal agenda are masquerading as one.

    The ball is mainly in the court of NGE and the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) to save the profession.

  • The fear of Maiduguri

    As you read this column, I am rounding off my five-day visit to Maiduguri, capital of Borno State, for a training programme.

    Deciding to go on this trip was not easy for obvious reasons considering the high level of insurgency associated with the state, no thanks to the Boko Haram group that has almost taken over the state but for our gallant military men that have largely restored peace in most parts despite the casualties they have recorded.

    Two days ahead of my trip, there were reported attacks by the insurgents who seem determined for a showdown with the soldiers in a local government area and I did my best not to be discouraged from flying into what is considered a ‘danger’ zone. I secretly wished the programme was for another state capital, but Maiduguri was the choice of the organisers and I had a major role to play.

    Some people I mentioned the trip to couldn’t hide their worry about my decision and if they had their way, they would have advised against it. My wife did her best to mask her concern but she must have opted for praying for journey mercies.

    If Maiduguri is not really safe as many believe, I’m sure the programme organisers would not have risked endangering the lives of participants and facilitators, some of whom, including myself, are not resident in the state.

    Despite all the indications that Maiduguri is largely safe to visit, I flew in the Aziman Airline from Lagos through Abuja, trying to be brave about the journey.

    The Maiduguri International Airport was anything but international, with the temporary shed for arriving and departing passengers. But it was assuring that insurgents who once attacked the location are nowhere in sight.

    The taxi driver who took me to the Command Guest House where the programme was held assured me that there was no cause to be worried during my stay and driving through the town confirmed his claim as residents seemed to move around like in any other city.

    “Most of the scary reports about Maiduguri are written by journalists who have not been here. Some of the attacks happen far away from the capital and the military men are doing their best to control the situation,” he said.

    As I later confirmed, I was not the only one who thought twice about the trip for safety reasons. Apart from journalists resident in the state and a few others from neighbouring states who are used to the situation, many came trusting God for divine protection and stayed within the confines of the guest house until it was time to head back to the airport. Some, I learnt, declined to attend the programme because of the choice of Maiduguri as venue.

    The first time I heard the noise of a plane taking off over our guest house, I froze for fear of an air raid, but quickly got over it when I noticed that others around were not bothered. I’m glad I made the trip and got over the fear of travelling to Maiduguri.

    The combined armed forces deserve commendation for the relative peace and security in Maiduguri, Borno as a whole and other states affected by the insurgency.

    Local media houses and journalists have also sacrificed a lot to keep reporting situation in the state.

    The labour and sacrifice of dead and living military, police men and women and journalists will not be in vain.

  • Do we really want women in politics?

    President Muhammadu Buhari on Thursday charged Nigerian women to contest for political positions in order to help effect the needed changes in the country at a women political aspirants’ summit in Abuja.

    While stating that he was in support of the Gender and Equal Opportunity Bill now before the National Assembly and the implementation of 35 percent affirmative action, among others, the president said he is confident that women can make great leaders and move the nation forward.

    He also urged all political parties to create the enabling environment for free and fair playing field where women can contest elective positions and participate in our political process.

    I was particularly interested in the call on women not because what the president said was new, but because of a programme I participated in a day before the Abuja summit. Women have always been encouraged to take the bold step of vying for political positions at all levels and they have always done, but they don’t usually get the desired support they need when it matters most.

    The roundtable I spoke at on Wednesday was about curbing gender-based hate speech online organised by the International Press Centre (IPC), Lagos in partnership with West Africa Network for Peacebuilding (WANEP) and Humanity Family Foundation for Peace and Development (HUFFPED) and funded by Peace Tech Lab.

    Among others, the objectives of the project is to change public perception and stereotypes about women positioning and functioning in society and to mitigate hate speech that hinders women participation in politics.

    Gender-based hate speech is indeed one of the major factors hindering women’s participation in politics.

    The definition of hate speech by Ulrick Neisser as communication (whether verbal, written, symbolic) that insults a racial, ethnic (gender) and political group, whether by suggesting that they are inferior in some respect or by indicating that they are despised or not welcome for any other reasons captures how our calls for women participation by especially men don’t match their actions.

    Consciously and unconsciously, many indulge in hate speech which includes threats and violence, celebration of gender-based violence, sexist rhetoric based on prejudice and stereotypes, morality/hierarchy policing.

    According to a report by the National Democratic Institute, an informal survey administered to some of the Transition Monitoring Group (TMG) observers in North East and South East in the post-election period suggested that gender-based hate speech was sometimes accompanied by other acts of gender-based violence, including threats of divorce, sexual violence, blackmail or destruction of property.

    More than ever before, the various online platforms have become veritable tools for gender-hate speech against women who speak up on some major issues or offer to contest for political positions.

    Instead of sticking to issues being raised or the qualifications of women for positions they are vying for, online commentaries are often snide remarks about their looks and personal lives. They are subjected to unfair criticisms which can be very hurting and discouraging in our kind of society.

    If we really want more women in politics, there’s need to avoid gender-based hate speech online and offline. Evidence abound like President Buhari acknowledged that Nigerian women are as capable as men to hold any political position in the country and worldwide.

    All that is required as discussants at the roundtable agreed is equity and not necessarily equality for women to have the chance to prove their mettle like men.

    Perhaps one other practical way to prove our sincerity about wanting women to participate actively in politics is for men to encourage their wives, sisters and daughters to join political parties, contest for positions and serve in any other capacity open to them.

  • Still on corruption

    As I noted in my last week’s column titled Corruption in high places, there is an urgent need to tackle the malaise which is a major hindrance to the development of the country as the citizens would have wanted.

    No one can deny that the present government has shown a lot of determination to fight corruption. Not only is President Muhammadu Buhari’s credentials a major convincing factor, his repeated promises not to treat the problem with kid gloves like his predecessors gives a lot of hope.

    However beyond his utterances, he needs to match his words with deeds. A number of unresolved cases like those of the former Secretary to the Government, Babachir David Lawal, Chairman of the defunct Presidential Task Force on Pension Reforms, Abdulrasheed Maina, who was secretly recalled to the service and promoted to head a directorate in the interior ministry and even the un-golden silence of the Minister of Finance over the allegation of forging her National Youths Service Corps (NYSC) certificate leaves a big question mark on the anti-corruption crusade of the government.

    Below is a response to my last column by Venerable Tayo Adebayo from Idi-Ayunre, Ibadan on how to combat corruption  

    I read your last Sunday’s bit in THE NATION. The failure of government to make any meaningful impact in its fight against corruption is a clear result and obvious demonstration of the futility of fighting corruption in the flesh. What do I mean by this?

    The plain truth is that Nigeria is indisputably a Godless nation. Forget all the millions of religious assemblies (Christian & Moslem) all over the country. They’re no more than mere assemblies meant to deceive ourselves; but as the Holy Writ says: ‘God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.’ Only those who are led by the Spirit of God are His true followers. You cannot reap the fruit of the Spirit from the vine of sinful nature. What then is the way out?

    The federal government must pick a day or a week for all Nigerians (the leaders and the led) to go to God in a spirit of penitence, to confess our sins and ask for His forgiveness.

    I’m of the belief that a legislated weekly national BROTHERLY LOVE DEMONSTRATION as a policy matter, would after a time, ultimately become the average Nigerian’s second nature as it goes into our subconscious as  psychologists would say. Endemic corruption is a product of decades of societal decadence which has given birth to a community of people with paralysed consciences, a nation where might is right, a people that sees greed as a creed, a race where self-interest is the thrust of our catechism.

    After all, someone says: adjustment to a deformed society creates deformed individuals. But God is love. Consequently, the assurance is there for us as a nation to gain access to His grace as we faithfully engage in this mode of fighting the monster called CORRUPTION.

    Thereafter, the government shall pick a day (midweek) like the Environment Sanitation Day as NATIONAL BROTHERLY LOVE DEMONSTRATION DAY (NBLDD) to be observed weekly by all Nigerians. What to do on that day? Every Nigerian (old and young) will be encouraged through the media to pray for someone outside his/her immediate family circle and then spend the rest of the day to offer one form of assistance or the other to someone outside his/her family circle in the course of the same day.

    You find this too simplistic, childish, puerile or naive? Yes it may appear so. But hear this: ‘…unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.’ Or as someone puts it:  ‘There is no affectation about a true follower of God; he is as a little child, amazingly simple, but unfathomably deep.’ God bless Nigeria.

     

  • Corruption in high places

    It is well known that corruption is well entrenched at all levels, be it in government or the private sector.  No section of our society, even hallowed religious sanctuaries, is spared of corrupt practices of kinds that have become so entrenched that we have remained a poor nation despite the enormous resources God has blessed us with.

    It is not often that one gets to read fine details of how corruption thrives in particularly government circles from people who should know. The book by former Finance-Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala entitled Fighting Corruption is dangerous is indeed the story behind the headlines of massive corruption in high places, which underscores the enormity of the challenges we face in our quest to ensure that our resources are not appropriated by some few persons who abuse their offices.

    Just imagine an unnamed top-ranking presidential aide who must have been benefitting from those collecting up to $6 million a year as Cargo Tracking Note which was abolished under the port reforms by the government, asking security men not to allow the minister to enter the Villa through a gate she normally passes through for morning prayers.

    Since the former minister refused to yield to his request that the fee not remitted to the nation’s treasury should be reinstated despite presidential directive for its stoppage, the power-drunk took the laws into his hands and even went to the extent of preventing the convoy of the visiting Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Madame Christine Lagarde, from entering the Villa through the gates reserved for dignitaries of her status.

    Like Okonjo-Iweala rightly stated, it’s unbelievable that people like the presidential aide were prepared to put at risk such a high-level and important visit for the country’s economy for personal pecuniary interests.

    While the former minister was able to rebuff the aide’s show of power, I’m sure there must have been many other instances where he had his way at the expense of the country with other government officials willing to meet his demands for fear of what such desperate persons could do.

    Such is the power and influence that many close aides of top government officials, like the one above, wield that they directly and indirectly aid and abet corruption, sometimes without the knowledge of their bosses.

    I recently renewed a document and the aide of the officer in charge who asked that I should be assisted devised a means of getting extra charges more than the official fee by asking a non-staff of the organisation to process it for me.

    He was not bothered that I was a journalist and flatly stated that the extra charges were the cost of processing, which was mainly taking the forms from one office to the other. His boss will definitely get to hear what transpired soon and I want to confirm why the aide has such audacity to act the way he did.

    One other thing that has struck me so far in the former minister’s book is how close scammers can get to defraud the country by meeting the president with their bogus proposal and would have succeeded but for the intervention of forthright officials like Okonjo-Iweala.

    If she was ready to cooperate like in an instance she cited, the country would have been committed to guaranteeing loans that would have ended up swelling our debt portfolio.

    We can’t give up fighting corruption because like President Mohammadu Buhari once said: if we don’t kill corruption, it will surely kill us as a country.

  • The case for Jones Abiri

    The arraignment of Jones Abiri, the publisher of Weekly Source magazine, last Thursday at the Chief Magistrate’s Court in Wuse Zone 2 in Abuja is a welcome relief after being kept incommunicado for almost two years without trial.

    But for the demand for the release of Abiri by the International Press Institute (IPI) during its recent global conference in Abuja and unrelenting follow up campaign by Committee for Protection of Journalists and other media groups, the publisher may have remained in detention for as long as the Directorate of State Security (DSS) that arrested him wants.

    When the issue was raised at the opening ceremony of the IPI conference, President Muhammadu Buhari promised to consider the request but the outcome was that the Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, insisted that Abiri is not a journalist and he was being held for criminal charges bordering on oil sabotage and others.

    Government officials and surprisingly their co-sympathisers who are newspaper publishers who should know better have consistently maintained this same line of argument to justify Abiri’s continued detention without trial in violation of his fundamental rights.

    “As a true believer in the rule of law and the integral role of the media in a democracy, the presidency did interface with the security agency involved in the matter and our findings confirmed that the suspect is in custody because of alleged involvement in pipeline vandalism and theft.

    “Abiri is not a registered journalist with any of the media professional bodies in the country. Abiri’s stock-in-trade and notoriety in the liberalised Nigeria media industry include fronting as a spokesman for militants engaged in economic sabotage in the Niger Delta region,” Malam Garba Shehu, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, once stated.

    I have no problem if the government can prove that Abiri is not a journalist and he does not belong to any professional group when there are evidences to the contrary, but that is not a sufficient justification to detain any citizen without trial.

    No matter the offence committed by any citizen, he or she should be given fair trial in accordance with relevant laws and constitutional provisions. No agency of the government for whatever reason should have the right to do as it wishes and get the approval of those who should call it to order.

    It is the height of lawlessness that it took the N200million suit filed by Femi Falana Law Chambers against the (DSS) and the outcry of media stakeholders and human rights groups to force DSS to produce Abiri last Thursday

    As if to confirm that the DSS has no good case against Abiri, the agency failed to produce its witnesses and the matter had to be adjourned till August 16 with Abiri being ordered to be remanded in Keffi Prison based on the request by his lawyer that the terms of the bail granted him be less stringent.

    The federal government cannot continue to lay claim to be law-abiding when, like in this instance, the rights of a citizen were flagrantly violated.

    A Nigerian does not have to be a member of a professional group for his or her rights to be defended by others. Injustice to one is injustice to all.

  • Let us pray

    I’m a firm believer in prayers among other Christian tenets. Much as I believe one does not have to be religious to get things done, there are too many situations in our country that do not leave one with much option than to seek divine intervention.

    When we get to the kind of situation we are that the government of the day appears helpless in the face of endless killings of people in many communities and the security men and women who are supposed to protect lives and properties, it will really take God to take control of the situation in various ways.

    Despite the outcry in many quarters for necessary measures to be taken to halt the killings, whatever the government has done does not seem to amount to much. Terrorists, herdsmen, kidnappers and other criminals are having a field day resulting in mass burials, though we are not at war with another in the country.

    Mass killings have become so common that they no longer make headlines. The high number of persons that regularly get killed sounds so unbelievable that the media gets confused if they are indeed true that they are not reported.

    When the killings happen, like even the recent incident involving soldiers killed by Boko Haram insurgents in an ambush, they are downplayed by authorities concerned who claim the reports are false, only for families and associates of the victims to start announcing the death of their loved ones in the service of the nation and for pictures of the mass burial to emerge.

    Apart from killings, so many communities have been displaced and the indigenes are now homeless, while some are lucky to live in Internally Displaced Persons, IDPS, camps under largely inhuman conditions.

    What is particularly worrisome is that our security agents don’t seem to have the required fire power to arrest and bring to book the terrorists and criminals to the extent that some leaders of the herdsmen are bold enough to justify their actions as reprisals for the killings of their cows.

    The Boko Haram terrorists are obviously law to themselves as they decide which military base they want to attack, or troops they want to ambush and do so confidently and sometimes come online and other platforms to issue threats.

    The insurgents who continue to attack and kill our soldiers are the same groups the government wants us to believe have been decimated. Nigerians sure know better with the casualty figures of both the civilian and military sides.

    In other climes where voices of the citizens’ matter and the government at all levels can be held accountable for what they are supposed to do, recourse to prayer is limited. They don’t have to believe God for basic things they are entitled to or what the government should do when there are crises situations like we have in the country.

    As it is, Nigerians who believe in prayers and are really desirous of peace before the situation gets out of hands have to urgently engage in effectual and fervent prayers and fasting which informs the call for prayers by Christian groups, churches and other religious groups.

    Since God will not come down and do what our leaders are supposed to do, our prayers among others is that God will grant them the wisdom to handle the situation and the willingness to take necessary actions.