The Nation Newspaper

Category: Tony Marinho

  • ‘Our Girls’; Victims and poor access to Victims Fund; More sports opportunities; INEC/ PVC

    ‘Our Girls’; Victims and poor access to Victims Fund; More sports opportunities; INEC/ PVC

    Our Girls’ are still missing since April 15. Words fail to describe the emotional upheaval of both the girls and the families they were forced to leave behind. It defies explanation that they have not been rescued. Even slaves get rescued. For some reason the purported ceasefire and impending release of the precious girls has turned into a somewhat mysterious tale of mistaken ‘discussions and conclusions’ just as, back in the day, 1967, ‘On Aburi We Stand’ was subject to similar misinterpretation and innuendo which eventually led to our Civil War costing over one million lives. The Boko Haram menace casts a dark shadow over the joy of every Nigerian, especially the refugees and their families and the families of victims.

    The press is reporting that most of the victims of previous bombings are neglected for non-payment of bills for extensive surgery by the authorities who had promised to do just that and this is in spite of the huge sums of money, N58 billion, collected recently. It is very important to treat this matter urgently, perhaps give hospitals a start-up fund as credit against the names of registered refugees and victims of such attacks. This fund can be topped up as it is depleted by payment of bills for investigation, surgery and equipment for hospital and home care. The fund should be retired under medical accountancy guidelines. A country which looks after its bomb victims on the pages of newspapers and not with drugs, tests and necessary investigation is not a country worth dying or dying in.

    Nigeria is notorious for its poor heath care of those who seek its services. However on behalf of victims of war violence we deserve and demand more, better and comprehensive medical care and urgent attention to their needs. They are targeted war victims, not accidental or collateral damage.  They expect and deserve expert modern medical support by medical professionals trained in both the physical and psychological aspects of war wounds. There will obviously be many more victims of violence and war as the elections approach and Boko Haram demands wider ownership of territory in Nigeria –something that must be resisted with every bone in our body. The president has rightly pointed out that ‘not a drop of blood should be spilt, not a life lost for him or anyone to get ‘elected’.  But Southern Kaduna is in particular turmoil following the activities of rampaging Fulani herdsmen.

    My country, na wa O. My friend, returning from Kenya says we should bury our heads in shame, like ostriches, as we have nothing to boast about in Nigeria. As the Non Sovereign National Conference ended recently there is no answer or solution to the onslaught of ‘Suspected Fulani Herdsmen’, SFH, onslaughts against thousands of farmers in five states including Benue and which claimed many lives and displaced thousands. Is it just a bloody and murderous tiff between kissing turned killing cousins? Is it solely economics of demands for commandeered and unpaid for cow feed and destroyed farm produce? In that very secret war, thousands have been killed and millions displaced, more than in the Boko Haram War (BHW) which has for political reasons seized the headlines. It seems it is more convenient to accuse nonspecific foreign agents than solve the problem of Nigerians we can see. If the BHW is both external and internal, the Fulani Herdsmen War is strictly an internal Nigerian affair? You cannot ignore the killing 20-100 people a day in a cow grazing-rights conflict and then raise $200m from the USA to fight a virus which has killed less than 10 people. In the Niger Delta the target was not the people.

    In the Fulani Plateau/Benue/Kaduna/Nassarawa War and the Boko Haram War, the target is always the people and their land. And be assured that the executions are equally vicious in both wars. There is no easy way to die and death in Nigeria’s current wars is particularly gruesome. It is strange that only the outcry is that there may be a famine from unplanted fields and no outcry about the dead.

    The happy pictures of Nigerian girls and boys competing in many other sports across the world are heartening and a credit to coaches and handlers who often use personal funds. Come on youths. Companies, donate your CSR products to children to make them the Olympians and para-Olympians of tomorrow. Time to choose the next generation and support them by scholarships, grants and sponsorships in academic and athletic pursuits like wrestling, shooting, swimming, cycling, archery etc.  Any single ‘bonanza’ or reality show or mega billboard featuring a ’sporting hero’ would have paid for many games and Sports Camps.

    INEC’s distribution of Permanent Voters Cards, (PVC) was inadequately prepared for and left much to be desired.  It was poorly planned and with a grossly inadequate time frame. It was pathetic to see the INEC official sifting through 600+ cards one by one each time a person appeared. I had to give up my wait in the queue to give a public lecture and  I could not return the following day. Now I have to go to the local government secretariat to try the get the card. This is unfortunate. For time saving and easy retrieval the cards could easily have been placed in a box divided into 10-20 sections covering A-Z and given more days at the booth.

  • ‘Our Girls’; Mubi; EU ‘Goes Sahara solar’, AU:‘ Take Africa Solar’; ‘Part Time Politics’

    ‘Our Girls’; Mubi; EU ‘Goes Sahara solar’, AU:‘ Take Africa Solar’; ‘Part Time Politics’

    Our Girls’ are missing since April 15. They are the main symbol, no longer of themselves alone, but of the wider murderous Boko Haram terrorist tragedy with its thousands of executed victims and millions of refugees. Last week’s daylight sack of 700,000 population Mubi with huge casualties and the expulsion of the Armed Forces and the bomb in Gombe State motor park killing and injuring long-suffering Fellow Nigerians exemplify the will and power of Boko Haram. Where next? Abuja? The Armed Forces needs new strategic victories, intelligence and defence strategies.

    Nigeria is groping with a pitiful 3-5,000Mw in spite of uninterrupted government boastful continuous political or military power since independence confirming a mass failure of understanding of the value of electric power. It is repugnant that a civilian government is only planning 10,000Mw by 2015 and 20,000Mw by 2020 of power when our population would have grown by 18 percent. Do you understand the ridiculousness of explaining to a Nigerian child that Nigeria after 50 years of lucrative oil trade still shamelessly has ONE TENTH OF THE ELECTRIC POWER of the evil anti-Black Apartheid South Africa which has 45,000Mw, WITH A QUARTER OF OUR POPULATION? Apartheid ‘kindly’ provided uninterrupted power supply. Why do Nigerians hate each other so much- ‘Nigerian Electricity Apartheid’?

    Incomprehensibly, corrupt and incompetent Nigeria exports crude oil abroad only to re-import refined products due to ‘Serial Killers Of Nigeria’s Refineries’. Do not expect an electric power miracle to silence the deafening cacophony of Nigeria’s new ‘Talking Drum’ the generator. No other African country is as poor power-wise as Nigeria. Nigerians require 150,000Mw recommended by the World Bank and the United Nations as our right.

    Indeed if all the money that the political and military class stole and steal were used for annual incremental electricity capacity building, we would not have ‘No Electric Power Always’ today and even Boko Haram may have never taken such hold. Instead of power plants which the Minister of Power happily boasts will take three years to plan, fabricate and build, why does Nigeria not provide ‘Emergency Power’ or do what it did with the cellphone – jump landline wahala and go into the future by making everywhere ‘power’-ful by going solar everywhere at once with a $5 billion Solar CBN Fund with low interest loans? Use what God has given us- the sun. There are solar efforts, recently a planned 3,000Mw plant in the South-east and solar-lit major roads. But we need a quantum leap in solar strategies.

    If you do not believe that God has given us enough power from the sun and if you do not believe the power of Nigeria’s politicians to willingly and wickedly deprive you even of God’s gift, solar power, then please read these internet quotes found by ‘yahoooing’ or  Google-ing ‘France solar power Sahara farms. ‘Instead of looking at the Sahara desert as unusable wasteland, look at it as good as gold! Think… If 0.3% of this desert were covered in solar panels, African solar farms will power all of Europe by 2050.’  ‘One percent of the Sahara Desert covered in solar panels would power the entire world . . . The EU seeks to take 20% of their energy from renewable resources by 2020. The EU will lay cables across the Mediterranean, build solar power plants in the Sahara, and import energy from across the sea – financed by European companies…supported by the EU. The plan is to cover 6,500 square miles of the desert in photovoltaic systems and wind parks’.

    And what will be the benefit to Africa of this EU ‘Sun for Europe’ initiative? Beyond the politics of Burkina Faso and the overdue exit of Blaise Campaore who killed Thomas Sankara 27 years ago, what strategies do the AU’s Energy Commission and the African Development Bank have to solarise Africa for Africans? Are they discussing with billionaires like Gates, Mo Ibrahim, Tata and Dangote? Are 100 African universities and businesses being funded for ‘Africa Goes Solar’ mega projects? Let it not be that ‘EU goes solar, Africa remains mumu inside darkness, O!’ Africa was never the Dark Continent. Africa always had the sun. All we need is a sun-someone with a ‘Presidential Solar Vision’ to light up the day and night with that sun.

    Nigeria must go solar in all homes and businesses.  The federal government is training 700 solar engineers. Unhappily the training of 400 engineers under FERMA had little effect on potholes, so do not expect much solar power.

    Nigeria expects a spiralling fall in naira value and an economic disaster unless we cut the excessive self-allocated political Salaries and Perks and salaries for life for National Assembly (NASS) officials which are a manifestation of a cross-party political greed. For example, consumptive Constitutional Projects are kicking off. Do not be deceived. Every kobo of the ridiculously high political party nomination form fees was got or will be recovered by stealing from the budget. Nigeria must cut these political budgetary items. And implement strategies to keep political parties away from the LGA, state and national budgets. For self-preservation, Nigeria must urgently cut the number of Special Advisers and their salaries. Make them and NASS and all state and LGA legislatures, all politics, part time. Nigeria cannot bear the financial assault of political Salaries and Perks and corruption–SAPing our budgets nationwide.  Politics must go PART TIME.

  • Tambuwal and the integrity question

    Tambuwal and the integrity question

    Ripples’ candid view: Aminu Tambuwal, Speaker of the House of Representatives, should have resigned his speakership.

    From the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) camp, now busy shopping for sympathy, and howling “betrayal”, that view would be “balanced and objective”; or even “patriotic”.

    From the All Progressives Congress (APC), celebrating a big political catch, Ripples would be guilty of “empty idealism” and perhaps culpable ignorance of the realpolitik.

    But both views would amount to cant.  Principles are constant.  But cant is the chameleon that changes with the season, even if it has to risk high unreason, bordering on patent absurdity.

    By convention, the party with the majority provides the Speaker — democracy is, after all, majority rule.  So, Alhaji Tambuwal ought to have stepped down because it is decent, because it is honourable, because it is fair.

    But which of the opposing sides plays by decency, plays by honour, plays by fairness?  And if overwhelming bad faith is the grundnorm, why would a partisan play by good faith — to commit partisan suicide?

    To the emotive and non-introspective, therefore, the Tambuwal affair is a PDP vs. APC tango.  In a way, it is — to the extent that the one got a net-loss and the other, a net-gain.  But dig deeper, and what you see is the unconscionable face of Nigerian politics, and its rotten, smelly core!  That ought to impress the perceptive, much more than partisan gains or losses.

    Take the PDP that now screams blue murder.  What moral right has it to do so: because it boasts better morality when similar situations are to its own rogue advantage?

    Mulikat Adeolu-Akande, the House Leader, was quoted as saying that the with Ondo Governor, Olusegun Mimiko’s defection to PDP, all eight Labour Party (LP) members of the House of Representatives “automatically” (and Ripples adds, seamlessly) become PDP members — just like that?  And there was even no split in LP!

    Now, if the House Leader is so sloppy in her sense of proprietary, why should others be more scrupulous — because the majority is now the victim?  Or because PDP can ripple its majority muscles to threaten others, or corral illicit orders from the Police high command to impose its will?

    That, of course, brings the debate to the purported withdrawal of security from the office of Speaker — not because he has been deposed as Speaker, but because he has defected from the majority party.

    To start with, there is an eerie similarity between Sulaiman Abba, acting Inspector-General of Police (IGP) and his commander-in-chief, President Goodluck Jonathan, in the so-called withdrawal of the Speaker’s security details.

    The one wants to be confirmed IGP at all cost; the other wants to win in 2015 at all cost.  So, it is meet that the subversive order — subversive of the law — emanated from the Concert of the Desperate, into which the duo fits pat!  Whenever desperation is sighted, bad judgement is never far away.

    Besides, it is tribute to Jonathan’s presidential focus that even as Boko Haram swooped over Mubi in Adamawa, the commander-in-chief was swooping over a presidential nomination form for a job he has clearly proved his inability; and was also gracelessly settling partisan scores with the Speaker.

    On what basis was the IGP giving that illegal order?  That Alhaji Tambuwal is no longer Speaker?  That definitely is not true, for no parliamentary session has deposed him.  And if he is still Speaker, does the IGP, even if the president gives him an illegal order, have the right to summarily strip the No. 4 citizen of his security, his right by law?

    If that were so, then it would be dangerous indeed: for maybe some day, someone, somewhere could “order” the IGP to summarily withdraw the president’s security details too!  And by pure logic, why not?  If a mere policeman can deny the No. 4 citizen his legally guaranteed security, on some phantom law he lacks the capacity to correctly interpret, he could also as well deny the No. 1, citizen, the president, of his too!

    Outrageous?  That is the risk you take when, by reflex but unreflective actions, you try to undermine the institutions of state.

    But back to the basic argument: ought Speaker Tambuwal have remained Speaker, after defecting from his majority party?  On moral grounds, Ripples thinks not.  But the legality or otherwise of it is much more complex, all the more complicated by the mala fide all round.

    To start with, by Section 50(1)(b) of the 1999 Constitution, the Speaker is the exclusive business of the House.  So, is the IGP (or even the president) a member of the House?  So, how come both have convinced (more of colluded with) themselves the Speaker has been removed, and so should forfeit his right to official security by law, if both don’t suffer from grand executive delusion?

    Then even the law the IGP glibly quoted: Section 68(1)(g), which says a House member loses his seat if he left his party for another, provided there was no division in the party or merger with another party.

    Now, where was our IGP when Labour Party MPs defected to PDP, even with no division in their party?  The same law he brandished with a flourish at the Speaker died then, just because the president was pleased with the defection to his own party?  So, it is some Animal Farm, where some animals are more equal than others?

    Of course, partisan opinion is divided on whether a division exists in the PDP.  The ruling party hierarchs love to flaunt a court verdict that there was nothing like “New PDP”.  They follow that up to kid themselves there was no division in the party.  But if there was no division, how come five governors (Sokoto, Rivers, Kano, Kwara and Adamawa — now reclaimed by gunboat impeachment) left the party for APC?

    The opposition APC has even upped the ante, pushing forth two Federal High Court judgments:  Justice Faji, in Ilorin, that held there were indeed factions in the PDP; and Justice Aikawa, in Sokoto, which not only affirmed that there was a division but also held that the resulting faction merged with APC.

    So, if these judgments are real, where stands the PDP position that factions never existed simply because of the legal sophistry that no “New PDP existed”?  And where stands the IGP precipitate order to strip the Speaker of his security, simply because Mr. President is boiling?

    Let President Jonathan and fellow PDP hierarchs boil all they want.  They are only a victim of their own impunity.  The rich also cry!

    But let them be wary of, as Jonathan always does when he appears trapped, rushing to wield power, without recourse to the law that created that power.  That would reinforce the ultimate futility of impunity and doom them to crises like the Tambuwal affair, if not the eventual collapse of the democratic project.

    As for APC, let them too be wary of playing the politics of cant, and play more of the politics of principle.  It is such penchant to play in the PDP sewers that fuels the rising opinion that APC differs from PDP as six differs from half-a-dozen.

    APC, if it really wants to deliver change, cannot afford such conceptual putdown.

  • ‘Our Girls’, The 2014 Ebola Media Campaign; ASUU etc Education Summit

    ‘Our Girls’, The 2014 Ebola Media Campaign; ASUU etc Education Summit

    Our Girls’ are sadly still missing since April in spite of the enthusiastic hype around the announced ceasefire and the subsequent capture of over 60 women and murder of over 30 Fellow Nigerians. There is rumour of factions, positions, moles and interest groups on both sides – Boko Haram and Nigeria. Not all ceasefires work completely first or even tenth time. Read about FARC, IRA, Red Brigade and ETA to learn more about the violence of international terrorist groups and failed ceasefires.

    We congratulate our Super Falcons as true champions. Nigeria football is like Nigeria’s Ebola victory. We get results often for little input -the wrong reasons. While we welcome the accolades heaped on Nigeria by the international community over the ‘containment’ of The Ebola Epidemic, a thorough Coroner’s Board of Enquiry should be instituted to identify where we went wrong and what needs to be done. We in medicine know that it was not as big a success as the world thinks. For years medicine has been in need of the mechanisms to fight such epidemics but any attempt to train anybody was pushed aside as wild dreaming and the ranting of an ant. The result was a massive level of unpreparedness with lack of all the needed protective gear. Nigeria lacked even one practice isolation facility with trained and retrained professionals. The abysmal state of the first isolation facility to be used as attested to by survivors and staff adequately demonstrated the ‘we who about to, or are left to die salute you’ mentality.  There is nothing spectacular in barrier nursing, the key to safe care of such patients. Protective equipment, hosing down and adequate disposal of all contact material are the key and training is compulsory to prevent spread of infection to staff and others in the contact chain including home, transport, arrival, stay and at disposal sites for contaminated products and, in some cases, bodies. The lone intuition, initiative and incisive decision making by Dr Ameyo Adadevoh and Dr Benjamin Ohiaeri and the team at First Consultants indeed reduced a possible long string of contacts to one stream and suffered and some paid with their irreplaceable lives for their heroism. This cost is also paid by thousands of victims of Boko Haram and Fulani Wars. We must thank God that the index case did fall ill when he did and not a few hours later.

    The 2014 Nigerian Anti-Ebola Media Campaign was a credit to the media and the country. It totally eliminated the disease called ‘Ignorance of anti-Ebola Strategies’. The methodology should be taught in media schools and university faculties of Communication and Language Arts across the country. The media is too powerful an influence to neglect its duty in an ignorant country to ‘sell’ all its airtime in favour of the highest bidder!  When giant corporate bodies come to the media, the media should have its own agenda to integrate with adverts and reality programmes and incorporate some other messages. The media also has the right and responsibility to have daily life skill messaging targets to educate on every aspect from hygiene to health to road use to non-partisan voter education. One death from ignorance is a mark against all of us. The war on ignorance is squarely in the media’s court but the media in an effort to put everything under Internally Generated Revenue (IGR), sees almost everything from the selfish money-making aspect. It would rather remain silent unless paid to speak. It therefore fills gaps with music and often charges for everything including social life-skill messages on HIVAIDS, reading culture, breast examinations, the man being responsible for the sex of the baby, wearing a seat-belt and crash helmet, avoiding bullying, sex and drugs etc.

    Ebola has taught us what a 21st Century Social Message Advertising Revolution entails. It requires a truly massive educational and strategic reorganisation of all media and public service organisational communication templates. The first class lesson of the Nigerian Ebola Media Campaign must be learnt and it should start here to spread around the world for the successful combat of the top 100 conditions that the UN and WHO identify as needing an ‘Ignorance Elimination’ media strategy.

    Nigeria builds Malls not Museums and Event Centres not Exhibition Centres. Our best buildings were banks for lending money when we need book buildings –libraries for lending books.

    The ongoing ASUU/NAAT/NASU/SSANU Education Summit 27-31st October with the theme: Towards a System Of Education For The Liberation In Nigeria’ is the best thing that has come out of tertiary education unionism in years. Hopefully it will address the liberation of the over N102billion trapped in UBEC, TET Fund etcetera. For a long time I have suggested that ASUU needs a strong ‘Academic Division’ for the future guidance of education in Nigeria. It is here at last and we are hopeful of a successful, non-political, outcome led by a full scale war on our disgraceful 31% pass at WAEC, a systemic, not a student failure. With tumbling oil prices decimating education budgets nationwide, it is essential to strategise on how ‘Bring Back Our Student Refugees’ forced by crumbling standards, insecurity and lack of space to flee to pay billions annually in private educational facilities in Ghana, South Africa and the UK for a better education in a normal calendar timeframe.  There is a lot to include in an ‘Education Action Plan’ including financing.

  • ‘Our Girls’; General Gowon @80; Lagos Ibadan; BBOG; Trust Boko Haram? End Fulani War        

    ‘Our Girls’; General Gowon @80; Lagos Ibadan; BBOG; Trust Boko Haram? End Fulani War        

    Our Girls’ kidnapped from Chibok at night during exams and missing since April 15, six-plus months, are on the brink of or may even have mostly been released today.

    We celebrate humane longevity with General Yakubu Gowon @ 80, the Officer and Gentleman leader of Nigeria. His was not that of his successors like Buhari or Abacha brutality or Babangida ‘Missing oil wind fall money’ settlement corruption. His administration, unfortunately, accommodated the first generation of get-rich-quick militarism which got worse dragging Nigeria into the quagmire of corruption and 4,000Mw instead of 170,000Mw it faces now.

    The Lagos-Ibadan Expressway is still rubbishing our lives. Why so much pain for us to gain a smooth road – a human right even during reconstruction?

    This article was submitted on Monday, after the Boko Haram ceasefire but before any release. Sadly, there are new Boko Haram attacks. The release, if it comes, is, thanks to the combined worldwide pressure on both government and the Boko Haram. A major pressure came from a tenacious red ‘Bring Back Our Girls’ campaign. This was mismanaged by a government myopic policy which alienated the citizenry by demonising the BBOG as ‘opposition politics’.

    In addition, there was at last military pressure on Boko Haram from a re-equipped, motivated armed forces restricting the Boko Haram. Boko Haram was supposedly in a militarily weakened position and forced to the negotiation table by countries surrounding Boko Haram hideouts. With no trans-border retreat options and an aggressive Cameroonian campaign preventing reinforcements, negotiations were inevitable as even Boko Haram people no wan die! But feel sympathy for the honest Nigerians negotiating with such blood-thirsty cruel people. Under that same negotiating table, there is the smell of death and an ocean of blood and misery from 10,000 murdered Nigerians and millions of displaced refugees. That is 10,000 people with five litres each or 50,000 litres of blood shed for nothing- just a negotiation?

    Since the capture of ‘Our Girls’, this column began every article with ‘Our Girls’ which was the first item. Though many of ‘Out Girls’ may come home, some will not, due to death, brainwashing, stigmatisation or becoming untraceable, sold into marriage and slavery. If the girls were Israeli or American, there would be dedicated security groups authorised, trained and funded to punish anyone who stole or enslaved even one of ‘Our Girls’ without being brought to justice. If any of ‘Our Girls’ is pregnant and claiming to be ‘happily married’, that girl would be brought home to declare freely her desire to go back if she is old enough.

    Both parents and  ‘Our Girls’ will need intensive one-on-one psychological support  requiring the recruitment of an army of mainly female psychologists and psychiatrists some requiring to give or take crash courses in clinical psychology and ‘Post Traumatic Stress’, PTS. Each girl should have a strategy worked out for her to enable her catch up the six months lost or do WAEC delayed exams and get results.

    Nigeria must not forget that refugees and the military also require PTS care. Since ‘Our Girls’ were taken, Boko Haram has killed between 3-5,000 citizens. The veteran soldier and politician David Mark and his fellow ‘leaders of the National Assembly (NASS) have maliciously manoeuvred to damage the economy further by approving a law allowing them to claim their NASS salaries for life, so ‘There is money, O!’ also for ‘Our Girls’ from Chibok to be rehabilitated. We know that this is just a pretext for all NASS members ‘living and dead’ to also claim ‘Permanent Pensions’. Will their grandchildren get something or at least ‘automatic ticket’? Why not? Power don drunk! God go vex for dis one, 0!

    This is such an idiot country where soldiers are not paid pensions in the middle of a war, no two wars – the Boko Haram War and the Fulani War and we all saw on TV serving solders asked to confront the demonstrating pensioners. The same serving soldiers face being sent to battle even as their compatriots return in back dead and 98+12 are being court martialled for matters surrounding equipment and welfare institutional failures. Will Boko Haram reveal who is funding it? Can it be trusted to stop the violence?

    Last week, the Fulani War was discussed in this column. Surely now that even the Boko Haram is on the negotiation table, it is time for a total ceasefire for the Fulani War, which is a local war with no international funding or fighters. We must not trivialise this Fulani War claiming 20-50 citizens a day or weekly for years. What is good for Boko Haram War is good for the Fulani War. Where is the negotiating team? It is one failure of the 2014 Non-Sovereign National Conference that it neither addressed nor offered any commission to stop the Fulani War.

    Arthur Wharton is ‘Lesson for Today’. He was an athlete, footballer, first African professional footballer in England and is being celebrated this week. Did he run 100 yards in 10 seconds? When? Which clubs did he play for? What position did he play? Where was he from, Nigeria or Ghana? Which school? Did he die poor?  Google him for your children. Do not go too far to find role models and heroes. Your heroes are with you. Have you heard of Olaudah Equiano, Nigeria’s best known slave and first best-selling author? And when did he live? Google please!

  • ‘Our Girls’; Naira; 2015 manifestos: Kerosene Vs Gas stoves; Fulani War: Fast from blood cow meat!

    ‘Our Girls’; Naira; 2015 manifestos: Kerosene Vs Gas stoves; Fulani War: Fast from blood cow meat!

    Our girls are still missing since April 15even as we pray and write about them and call their names to keep them in the public eye and ensure they are a serious point of focus of government’s attention.

    The naira should not be devalued in the face of dwindling oil sales. Cut the excessive salaries and perks of political office holders for a start.

    It will be disgraceful if no 2015 political party plans and manifestos seriously address the need to replace slow, smoky kerosene nationwide with quick, clean domestic gas and upgrade solar power to a major source of power. The experts say government should provide 1-3million gas cylinders and cookers and give them away instead of all these political gifts. The idea is reduced kerosene imports, reduced cooking time by two hours a day for all mothers, cleaner kitchens and air, fewer lung illnesses and cancellation of kerosene subsidy.  Solar power must be taken seriously in sunny Africa where the government is still planning only 20,000Mw by 2020 when the population and demand would expect about 200,000Mw.

    The ravages of Boko Haram know no bounds but the Fulani herdsmen and terrorist associates are close behind.  Now they are killing soldiers, governments can no longer ignore them. When an NGO raised an alarm, the Kaduna State government did not decry the deaths. Instead it created fictitious ‘motives’ for the NGO’s alarm. Governments always react to the speaker rather than to the substance. The Fulani War has historic/military/economic components, unlike the Boko Haram War which has politico-religious-international terrorism dimensions.

    There is an urgent need for a solution to the Fulani War terrorising citizens in seven states in North and South, costing 3,000 lives, livelihood and ancestral homes creating victims and refugees. If you want to know what a refugee goes through, then wake up one day, move into your garden shed or into the open with nothing for a day – little or no food and water, poor shelter, no toilet, no news, no money, no toiletries or bedding and no family. In other countries the deaths of 30-50 people a day would be a Matter of Urgent National Importance, MUNI, at National Assembly and NEC meetings and effective military manoeuvres. Under pressure perhaps, the National Conference ignored the matter.

    The Fulani War requires an initiative, framework and a Truth and Resolution Commission. Farmers are traditionally peaceful but fiercely protective of lands, crops and families. There is no human being who will watch while an animal eats his crops and livelihood-unless he is dead. In the quest for peace in this Fulani War, there are questions. What is the Fulani relationship with other ethnic groups it did not militarily defeat in the past? There are over 100 other ethnic groups in the North. Is the Fulani hierarchy executing a military plot/plan to obtain by guerrilla warfare what it could not obtain by war in the historical past – the subjugation or pacification of the non- Fulani controlled areas? Is the federal government turning a blind eye to the Fulani War but always coming down on the recipient of such violence if any resistance or attempt to arm for defence occurs? Is the accusation by the Fulani of cattle theft genuine or the retaliatory seizing of cattle in compensation for the destruction?

    Why are cattle moved by foot when, like all other commodities from the North like onions or tomatoes or yams, they can be fully prepared or fattened in the North and then shipped by rail and the road as methods of choice and safety? A three day North-South trip by trailer reduces the ‘Need to Feed’ and amount of feed taken from the farmers on the foot route by millions of metric tonnes of grass by 99%. Dr Wale Okediran, former member House of Representatives, offered solutions in his book Tenants of the House which should be read by members of any Peace Commission on the Fulani War. Of course if the Fulani War is not just about cows and is more about power, the commission would have to expand its brief. This war has already caused losses of peace and tranquillity in the haven of peace, the Plateau. Additionally there will be consequences for feeding the nation, food prices, shortages and even famine. Why do we trivialise the terrorisation and deaths of babies, children, youth and adults, all ‘Fellow Nigerians’ deliberately targeted and without any protection?

    The Fulani War needs massive media attention and government must step in with troops before more soldiers and civilians are killed.  If it is only about cows, and not politics, then it is time for all Nigerians to fast and pray for an end to the Fulani War. Who wants to eat a cow that has fed in the farms of the murdered and dead? Is this not ‘Blood Cows’ like blood diamonds and blood oil? If we Nigerians stop eating cows in sympathy with the deceased as we pray for solutions, perhaps the herdsmen will stop this violence. How can anyone sit with family and eat cow meat knowing someone died to allow the cow to reach the table? Whatever the cause and conclusion, the Fulani War needs a truce. Unlike for the Boko Haram War, we cannot blame foreign backing for the Fulani War unless we agree that we are all foreigners to each other in Nigeria.

     

  • ‘Our Girls’; Hedima; All Hail Ghana; ‘Nigeria’s Fall from Beacon to Beggar’ –Leadership Question?

    ‘Our Girls’; Hedima; All Hail Ghana; ‘Nigeria’s Fall from Beacon to Beggar’ –Leadership Question?

    Our Girls’ are still missing. No mention in the 54th Oct 1, President’s speech. Imagine the meeting of the ‘Presidential Speech Think Tank for Oct 1 Speech’ at which the insertion of the Chibok Girls was discussed.  The arguments would include: If the Chibok Girls were mentioned, the opposition would have said the President was using them for cheap publicity. If the Chibok Girls were not mentioned they would have said the President was insensitive to their plight. It was a no-win situation but they should have been mentioned. They were more than mentioned in all our hearts.

    Let us remember Wing Commander Chimda Hedima, aged 39, executed so maliciously by Boko Haram and all others killed in the service of Nigeria. We sympathise with his family and pray that his compatriot is found alive. May he Rest In Peace and may his family not be abandoned by an incompetent and ungrateful nation and have to beg for school fees and food.

    The Ghanaians are coming ‘back’ with a bang. The older readers will remember how Nigeria was both first and second home to our brother and sister Ghanaians in the pre-colonial and post-independence era. Names like Kofi, Kwame, Kwaku, Kwesi, Adadevoh, Kotey, Kojo were not commonplace but always mystical. There was Kofi, a giant, in our class in St Gregory’s College Ikoyi in 1961. The Great Nkrumah was our idol as was Lumumba, and Nkrumah covered all Ghanaians with his glistening shadow of protection, authority and visionary Pan Africanism. The fabulous Kente cloth was admired, and  groundnut stew was a prized delicacy. History lessons made the Ashantehene, The Gold Coast and The White Castle known to every Nigerian school child. In the 1950 and 60s the view from the decks of The Elder Dempster Lines ships named Motor Vessel MV Accra, Aureol, Apapa of the Ghanaian cities of Takoradi and Accra were part of our regular exotic stops on the 13 day passenger Liverpool -West Africa Route. As active youth, we could not understand the necessity of the Ghanaian military to bring Osagefo Nkrumah down and were devastated. Later while reading Kwame Nkrumah’s speeches alongside our Nigerian equivalent, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, who never got to the top job here, I used to say that we were 10 years behind Ghana in everything. Everything, especially in activities of a political nature. Many Nigerians feel we arguably committed the greatest mistake of our modern history by not following the Rawlings execution by our own execution of our own almost permanently wayward leadership, political and military. We must juxtapose this with the rivers of blood and tears likely to flow from the court martial of our 98+12 Fellow Nigerians in uniform for protesting incompetence and unpreparedness for battle and being used as cannon fodder. I still remember visiting the famous Ghanaian Pa Adadevoh on Ikorodu Road in the 1960s. His daughter married into our family. Later I was taught Chemical Pathology by Professor Adadevoh and staying in his house during the strike that killed Kunle Adepeju. Late Doctor Ameyo Adadevoh was a child in the house. May Her Gentle Soul Rest In Perfect Peace. During their own recession, Ghanaians took economic refuge in teaching and other jobs in Nigeria. When they went home on leave, Ghanaians took toothpaste and toilet rolls. Then came the reactionary ‘Ghana Must Go’ and most went home determined to build.

    Ghana made a full recovery. Ghana never had oil until recently but still recovered, though the cedi has fallen dramatically through Western banking policies. When the economic downturn hit Nigeria, in spite of our oil wealth and First Gulf Oil Windfall of Babangida’s time, due to our incompetent and thieving rulership, we Nigerians in turn fled as economic refugees to Ghana and beyond, even reaching Spain through the island of Lampedusa. Why? Firstly it is easier to do business in Ghana -cheaper costs and stable electricity needed by the growing Nigerian manufacturing and professional community in Ghana. Secondly, it is education. There is a tsunami of students ‘fleeing’ Nigeria and paying to study in Ghana. This is in addition to the ocean of students who, like our oil, are exported annually to the UK and Europe and USA as raw material and re-imported as professionals. The reasons are steady annual academic calendar, recognised qualifications and tranquillity on and off-campus although there are some deaths, not as many as in Nigeria from cultists. Thirdly, we are to import electricity from Ghana when we used to export to Ghana. Wonderful for Ghana but disgraceful for Nigeria. Ghana has become an oil state even as our oil exports are threatened. It is nearer by ship to the USA and EU. I only hope that Nigeria’s politicians and civil servants, all receiving national Honours like ‘CON-men’ etc., are ashamed enough to realise their responsibility in this catastrophic ‘Fall Of Nigeria From Beacon To Beggar’ due to their greed and failure.  As we watch Ghana grow we must not be jealous. We had the opportunity and squandered it. We must implement diversification reforms and undress the federal government. Nigeria which no longer teaches history, geography, civics or has PE, Physical Education lessons must reform. Nigeria is losing its soul, its youth, to other countries. Who will lead ‘Nigeria’s Educational and Electricity Revolutionary Recovery’ after 30 years of ‘The Leper, Locust, Rat and Thief’? ‘If Ghana Can Do It, So Can We’.

     

  • ‘Our Girls’; What country@54? The Great Greed’; ‘OBJECTION’ 40 years later

    ‘Our Girls’; What country@54? The Great Greed’; ‘OBJECTION’ 40 years later

    Our Girls’ are still unaccounted for since April 15. For them, what is there to celebrate today 1-10-2014, Independence Day? One of them has turned up or has one? Is she pregnant? Perhaps. The lives of so many brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers and other family and also friends are in emotional tatters this 1-10-2014. The pain is unquantifiable and all so needless and spread around the areas of conflict in the North-east and the areas of the Fulani War across 10 states. Blood is dead and children women and men are dead. Does no one care? Are we just to say a prayer to a God who gives us everything we need and satisfies our need but not our greed but who we do not listen to or obey? Can no one with appropriate weapons and uniforms prevent this calculated murder and mayhem across Nigeria? Now there is rumour and counter rumour about who started and who is involved in Boko Haram funding as revealed by a foreign expert whom we have no real doubt about. There are additional questions about helicopter and jet plane crashes and cargoes and the fate of ejecting pilots.

    I received a tragic first-hand account of one of many citizens of towns captured temporarily by the Boko Haram. His family escaped into Cameroon before circling back into Nigeria. Thank God they are all safe but how many are not? In addition, his house was overrun and his magnificent library built up book by book of more than 2000 volumes over 40 years was burnt, reminiscent of Rome burning Alexandria, Egypt. And who will compensate for such a loss of home, history, memory and library? Nigerians deserve much better medical care for surviving Boko Haram and Fulani Wars. Just as Ebola has forced us to begin the update of our sanitary systems, these Wars should force us to upgrade our emergency facilities. He who buys weapons of war should cater for the casualties of that war. In a war zone in 2014, 54 years after Independence, good medical services must include a decent modern electronic artificial limb service suitable for human beings, not goats.

    What manner of country @54 is still at war with itself since October 1st 1960? Instead of another party and day off work, all 100+m of us should be forced to stand still for one hour and think deeply, and take stock of our sorry state as an LGA, state, country and consider if we are actually a nation. Once again, we have the opportunity to take stock and the result is not good. Have enough citizens not died? Have enough citizens not tried? Has enough blood not been shed? Have enough citizens been left for dead? Have enough true Nigerians not been born? Do our children not deserve better from those who have seized the ruler-ship? Why is our national fabric so torn and badly worn? God has given Nigeria more than its need. But still our political and contractor classes cannot satisfy ‘The Great Greed’.

    Why is power used to erect a malignant tower? When did politics become just another Master Class in ‘Budget Disappearing Tricks’, ‘Executive Lawlessness’, ‘Criminal Corruption’ and ‘Neglect’? It seems that too many politicians are boastfully vast in saying the right things 100% in manifestos but deliver only a fraction, 20-40% of the promises in spite of adequate funds. How can we live in a country that allows 40-75% of budgets disappearing in inflated salaries, mirage projects and hyper-inflated contracts?  Yes, of course there is corruption worldwide but it is unsustainable above double digit corruption percentage rates. Entire countries were built on the corruption of slavery, stolen raw materials from colonised countries and still today the Mafia and other similar organisations have infiltrated government organs which are often ‘Fountains Of Fraud’ and corruption on their own. The stories that came out of cash-cows like Nigerian Ports Authority, Nigerian Football Federation, Pension funds and the most recent ‘unsolved’ and unsettled atrocities – Oil subsidy scam, the $600,000 oil bribery scandal, jets with $9.3m on board, etc.

    In my poetry collection OBJECTION written in 1989 there is a poem called ‘An Ode To An Adolescent Nation’ better known as ‘Objection’ about Nigeria being on trial at 28 years old for failing its people. The older ones among the readers will recall the incidences below. Unfortunately, the poem could have been written today with the items changed

    JUDGE: At 28 years old, You stand accused of / Pride in your nothingness/How do you plead?

    NIGERIA:            Guilty out of innocence/ I’m only 28, my Lord/ A minor in the league of nations/ Childish pranks/ Youthful exuberance. Objection!

    JUDGE:                Did you ‘Objection!’/  When 2/3 of 19 became 12 2/3 and 53 suitcases passed

    Through the eyes of the needle/ When $2.8 billion in oil money missed monitoring?/When health care eluded the common man?/And education cutoff points left goats in school/And the gifted at home?/ When railway rotted and rusted?/When your people dined from dustbins?/ And kwashiorkor came calling on the kid?

    NIGERIA  Stop! Stop

    JUDGE    Nigeria, you are sentenced to one year/ Of total goodness/Failure in this is fatal to your nationhood/                Will you fail?

    NIGERIA   I’m still young, inexperienced/I’ll only be 29 next year

    JUDGE  Excuses, excuses/  A fool at 28…

    Has anything changed since 1988? You be the JUDGE in 2014 for Nigeria@54! Have a Prayerful Anniversary.

  •  ‘Our Girls’; Fulani War; CBN Gov: High Interest; Bank of Extended Family’; Ebola: NUT, Toilets; $9.3b jet

     ‘Our Girls’; Fulani War; CBN Gov: High Interest; Bank of Extended Family’; Ebola: NUT, Toilets; $9.3b jet

    Our Girls’ are still missing since April 15, and we have nothing to show for the investigation. Our neighbours have successfully released Nigerian hostages on more than two occasions with heavy casualties among the Boko Haram abductors. We wish our military escalating success in this war as it prepares to execute or reduce the sentences of 12 mutineers with reason. Government has more control over and should pay as much attention to the Fulani War especially as even soldiers have now been killed as government is indifferent to civilian murders. The government should act before Nigerians take it upon themselves to give up cow meat as part of fasting and praying to rid the country of this growing curse of marauders who daily grow more blood-thirsty.

    There is a high financial cost of political rallies and the many smiling, not sober-looking politicians, at this time of high civilian mortality and morbidity across towns and farmlands from the Fulani War and Boko Haram War and our lost Chibok Girls. The political situation shows little connection with the realities of suffering victims displaced and injured by the bombings and mayhem in farmlands and villages.

    There is still moral trouble at CBN after 100 days of Godwin Emefiele’s governorship. No new direction to bail Nigerians out of their misery at the ground floor of life. We know banks do not like to rock the boat except when it comes to suddenly worsening the exchange rate, a feat they manage to do without batting an eyelid. When they sit at meetings, do the Directors etc even ever consider what businesses will yield profits to accommodate 21-25% loans with power and taxes so high? Worldwide the stimulus to business is cheap power supply and cheap loans or low single digit interest rates. Even the Islamic Bank knows this. So why do Western trained bankers ignore the needs of the people? Unfortunately in the warped wisdom of the CBN, the MPR is maintained at 12%. But government has been forced by certain interested parties to see that the interest rate is too high for normal business and has therefore ‘granted’ interest rate reductions to single digit for aviation, Nollywood and most recently for some housing initiatives and Small and Medium Enterprises.

    Why have these groups been favoured thus abandoning the ‘rest of us’ in a high interest rate trap in what can only be described as ‘Bankers Fraud’ or ‘Bankers’ Interest Rate Conspiracy’ against the nation which has the highest interest rates in the world? Do we not have lobbyists for the common man? Why the government and CBN ignore the masses for similar ‘grants’ is obscured in the bowels of CBN monetary policy and federal myopia. Government was happy to boast about Nigeria being the largest economy in Africa. Well for the information of government financial gurus, the economy is even bigger. Government and all economists must know that there is an undiscovered bank, hidden in plain sight, with no walls and vault, which is why Nigeria survives the stress of 21-25% interest rates. This bank is everywhere and nowhere, at every level of society and it charges zero interest rates with no collateral and with good will as the only criterion. That bank is the Bank of The Extended Family, BEF. The BEF is the saving grace of millions of families, providing instant funds at the speed of an ATM almost in every home. These funds are often life and death funds for emergency medical attention, one year rent for junior workers, school fees, wholesale purchase of merchandise for small shops, car repairs, even for weddings and funerals. Government and CBN can easily bring this ‘Extended Family Support Economy’ into the main stream by the simple act of making available single interest loans to all Nigerians and not just the chosen few.

    The NUT may not be totally altruistic in its demands for a delay in the date of resumption of schools. After all, there is supposed to be serious money for Ebola monitoring. Ebola is the new cash-cow and a metaphor for the abysmal sanitation facilities in most public hospitals and schools. Ebola has exposed what we have been saying for years about the disgraceful sanitation status in our schools and hospitals. If there are 200 children in a school, expect them to need toilet facilities at least twice in eight hours, 400 times. Well 3000 pupil schools need facilities to cater for 6000 toilet visits and hand-washing of course and even sanitary disposal of sanitary towels in mixed and girls’ schools. These are the sanitary foundations of civilisation, a civilisation that we are still struggling to achieve even though we can afford to send a private jet with $9.3m in cash to but not toilets or running water but for gun-running. NUT is so very vocal today for hand thermometers and ‘training’ at a cost per head. Unfortunately I have never seen or heard that the NUT has even once complained about the absence of toilets and water in even one school. It is time the NUT rose to meet the challenges of deficits in schools. The $9.3m cash, N1.4b, N1,400/Nigerian, aboard a private jet, supposedly for sweet South African small and medium arms is a very dumb move. Such money could have gone up in smoke if there had been a phantom plane crash. Maybe the seizure is fake to ‘disappear’ the money.

  • ‘Our Girls’; Dr Ameyo Adadevoh Foundation, Brig Gen Adekunle, RIP

    ‘Our Girls’; Dr Ameyo Adadevoh Foundation, Brig Gen Adekunle, RIP

    Our Girls’ are still missing since April 15. This is unbelievable as is what the families are going through! The spat between government and the Bringbackourgirls campaign should be terminated immediately. The suggestion that a political party is responsible for Boko Haram is ridiculous even though it had some of its origins in political thuggery. Now thugs are politicians themselves having overthrown the hand that fed and led them by cutting out the ‘middle man’.

    Dr Ameyo Adadevoh has painfully been laid to rest and also her stance as a proud doctor of integrity has been reinforced by sympathisers at a Night of Tributes and a Funeral /Commendation service activities in Lagos, Nigeria and Accra, Ghana where the President of Ghana honoured her.  Of course we would all have preferred her to be with her husband, son, family, colleagues and Nigerians in general. However she has gone to face an interview to fill a vacancy in Heaven that we are sure she has already passed with flying colours and is her usually sparkling self even in Heaven. The Dr Ameyo Adadevoh Foundation set up to conduct research especially in viruses is a welcome contribution to research and a valuable way of perpetuating Ameyo’s good name.  We must also note that if six months ago, Ameyo or anyone in clinical or research medicine or veterinary medicine had applied for a research grant for ‘Awareness About Deadly Viruses’, ‘Availability Of Deadly Virus Preventive Clothing Kits’, ‘Viruses In Bush Meat Samples In Nigeria’,  or ‘Vaccination Status Against Deadly Viruses In Nigeria’ or applied for ‘More Media Outreach Education For Deadly Viruses’  we in medicine know that such a person, and even Adadevoh herself,  would have been sent packing as ‘dreaming’ or ‘unrealistic or planning to ‘waste scarce funds’.

    Do you know how much brilliant research has been reduced to nothingness by a near absence of research grants for over 30 years?  Be truthful, how many politicians think research grants are of any value? There are hardly any research grants anyway in spite of the efforts of the National Universities Commission and the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) in this regard, for which we are grateful. All research in Nigeria, arts or science, relevant or utopian, is chronically and seriously under-funded by both government and the private sector. Anyone asking what the budget for ‘Medical Research’ in Nigeria should be, would do well to Google South Africa’s Medical Research Council Grants’ for 2013 and 2014.  There will be found the sums spent by South Africa, not USA or UK or the EU. Research is research. It can never be ‘Nigerian factor’ with short cuts and fictitious results. The reader must be informed of how difficult good research can be in Nigeria where absence of power, libraries, funds and honesty make the truthful researcher an endangered species.  If Nigeria equals South Africa’s volume of medical research funding, that would be something but still not enough. Why? With being the very boastful ‘Largest Economy In Africa’ comes responsibility to deliver deliverables including research fund levels at percentage of budgets just as other countries fund their own medical and other research . This funding must be delivered as a routine, independent of tampering by authorities and politicians.  Remember to google South Africa, Nigeria’s, UK’s, USA’s Medical Research Council or equivalent grants. The supreme price paid by Ameyo, the matron, and others in the line of dedicated and distinguished medical duty was unnecessary. Perhaps it will make the authorities take research seriously for a few minutes? Can we expect more in this knee-jerk, fire-brigade society which always lacks a plan even for seasonal market fires? Remember we still are ravaged by the multiple murdering typhoid, malaria and maternal mortality, (TMM), but who cares? The anti-Ebola strategies are creating massive awareness of queuing and hand washing and improved sanitation, toilet provision, water supply in hospitals, schools, markets and homes. These preventive measures, considered ‘normal signs of civilisation’, must be taken seriously in buildings, approvals for schools, review of government schools, budget allocations and maintenance. Remember the mathematics. One hundred million + will use the toilet, if available 400,000,000+ times. They must be made to last forever, if Dr Adadevoh and other medical professionals are not to have died in vain. Stubborn Nigerians were forced learn the art of queuing from draconic Buhari-Idiagbon military regime. Now ‘NO CONTACT, QUEUE WITH A CONSCIENCE’ to leave ‘ANTI-VIRUS SPACE’ between each person as the manifestation of the fact that ‘’The fear of Ebola is the beginning of ‘NON-CONTACT QUEUES’ wisdom’’. The spin-off is that it may bring the improvement in personal hygiene with reduction in all the biological warfare diseases, TMM.  EMERGENCY RELEASE OF SUCH FUNDS AND EXECUTION OF PROJECTS IS STRATEGIC NATIONAL IMPORANCE.

    We salute another hero; a major war hero, untainted retired Brig- General Benjamin Adekunle, aka Black Scorpion, of the Third Marine Commando is dead. Long live his memory. He also cleared the port by dumping most of the unclaimed goods into the Apapa Marina.  The disrespect for soldiers past, especially in the south of Nigeria, laxity in payment of their pensions and refusal to recruit their experienced brains to fight the new security challenges, will be Nigeria’s downfall. We do not need Boko Haram to reach Ore or Ibadan before planning an exit or resistance strategy.