The Nation Newspaper

Category: Letters

  • Ekiti 2014: Much ado about polling

    SIR: Due to the culture of relentlessness during political campaigns preceding elections, it could be misleading to go by the results of opinion polls, particularly if you have got two contradicting opinion poll results like in the case of Ekiti State where different opinion polls have trumped up both the PDP and the APC candidates as likely winners of the June 21 governorship election.

    If the recent Abuja-based NOI polls purportedly carried out for an ANAP Foundation had scored PDP’s Ayo Fayose highest, it could have truly served only the interest of the PDP federal government; and you would pardon the Ekiti APC which promptly called it a voodoo opinion survey.

    Ditto could the subsequent opinion poll carried out by the Ekitipanupo Research Group be doubted even by neutral observers, let alone the PDP which might have jumped at condemning it as false.

    While the Labour Party, the Accord Party and the rest have been revealed as trailing far behind by the two opinion poll results, they are still supposed to be fighting hard on the campaign fields to out-stage the PDP and the APC and be able to prove the two surveys wrong.

    While the crowds at the campaign grounds can be deceptive, the frequency and the ease of crowd-pulling can be reassuring, at least, to a prospective winner. So can the enthusiasm of such crowds help a prospective winner in assessing the genuineness of the support being given. The readiness and the massiveness of the people’s participation in promoting a particular candidate can also be a good guide in determining his popularity.

    If you see the popular and up-coming artistes like Yinka Ayefele, Wasiu Ayinde, Sina Peters and several upcoming others like the sensational “new Hubert Ogunde”, staking their reputation to line up and compete to sing-praise a candidate, it could be a good measure of the candidate’s acceptability even if we won’t rule out commercial motives or mere desires to gain limelight behind their competitive participation.

    There is only one candidate who enjoys such robust, massive and rousing supports in Ekiti State today and he is the incumbent. He is the only one too whose political party has been attracting teeming defection from the opposition parties in the calibres of a former governor, former commissioners, a former assembly member, a current assembly member and former  local government party chairmen, to mention only the leading figures.

    If an ex-senator has also decamped to the opposition party, the monarch of the ex-senator’s town was to, shortly after, declare the incumbent as the “Awo of our time”, as if to decry the ex-senator’s defection.

    If the obvious variables above would not be enough to guide us towards the direction the votes would go, come June 21, the current advertised denial of the Labour Party in Ekiti State, that it entered into a joint action arrangement to vote-in another party’s candidate for “a first four year term” would confirm to us the true positions of the three visible candidates in the race.

    The PDP and the Labour Party had been the apparent partners of a sort from the onset with the PDP donating one of its former lawmakers to Labour Party as party chairman without formally defecting from PDP to Labour party.

    The Labour Party’s current radio denial has, no doubt, revealed the PDP’s fear of defeat;  the fear that had apparently led the party to wanting to activate a working agreement which Labour Party was however no longer willing to honour so as to “govern in the second term”.

    If opinion surveys would confuse us, this advertised denial by the Ekiti Labour Party which reveals a panicky attempt to resort to practically fusing the PDP and the Labour Party would convince us that the two parties should come behind the APC in the 2014 gubernatorial race.

    That is what to expect.

     

    • Jide Oguntoye,

    Oye-Ekiti

  • My thought on Chibok abduction saga

    SIR: First let me offer my deep sympathies to the missing Chibok girls and their families. What they have been through, the unending injustice, frustration, pain, worry and fear, are almost too harrowing to consider at once. Our prayers go out on behalf of you and your families. May Almighty God provide safe and speedy return for as many as are still missing.

    I heavily doubt there is a man more reviled today than Abubakar Shekau. Already drunk off the blood of thousands of innocent victims, he has now stepped up his campaign of terror to target school children. Perhaps it was the scale and impunity of the act, or the heart-breaking accounts of desperate parents trying to mount their own rescue mission into a dangerous forest, deterred only by the risk to their daughters’ lives; something snapped in the consciousness of a nation and world that had previously watched from afar. Whatever Shekau’s calculus was, he has definitely succeeded in drawing the outrage of even Al Qaeda leaders, for whom the kidnap and trafficking of young girls is apparently too extreme.

    Indeed, the outcry, from Nigerians as well as the international community, has been nothing short of impressive, spurring action where there had previously been none. Nations with the best counter-terrorism operations have offered assistance, now received, in personnel and resources; voices heretofore silent about terrorism have begun speaking up specifically about Boko Haram. It seems now that credible efforts will be mounted, that the tide may yet turn, families made whole.

    Yet, these positive developments come with a stark dose of reality. With each passing moment, locating and recovering the missing girls will only get harder. If, and hopefully when they are recovered, these children will need extensive medical and psychological assistance to overcome the trauma they have no doubt experienced at the hands of their captors.

    Along with the aforementioned international statements of support has come stinging criticism about the handling of this tragedy by the state and federal governments. Equally disheartening was the finger-pointing and political sniping between the two. It is, to put it simply, shameful, and unworthy of the urgent plight of these girls. There will be time for heads to roll (and roll they must) but this is the time for cooperation an action. It is time to show Nigerians and the world that this government is capable of confronting all forces of disintegration and terror.

    There is no doubt that the government has been very slow in grasping the seriousness of this abduction that has bought pains to parents and the nation as a whole.This administration was treating the abduction with business as usual attitude until there was a global outcry of Bring Back Our Daughters.There were conflicting information from agents of government as to the safety,whereabout and number of the girls that returned.The contradiction was so much that a US Senator concluded that there is no government in Nigeria. The way the government handled the unfortunate incident has brought to Nigerians shock, shame and embarrassment.

    What this ugly incident has bought to the consciousness of Nigeians is the capability of the Nigerian military in terms of training, equipment and command structure to fight this insurgency effectively.The military deserves better funding to rid the nation of this menace soonest because  negotiating with the insurgents should not be an option.The emergency rule in three affected states has not been been justified by the success of the insurgents in unleashing havocs on communities on daily basis in the North-east.Nigerians deserve more and demand more from government protection from all forms of terrorism that have been unleashed on our nation.

    Finally, I believe Nigerians need to lift the veil of hypocrisy and look within. This country is a major international player in the trafficking of women and children for sex and cheap labour. This industry is fuelled, more than anything, by extreme poverty and desperation, the same factors that fuel political and religious terrorism. Even if and hopefully when Shekau and his followers are captured or killed, the circumstances that animate him will still exist and possibly spread, unless we put a credible effort toward making this country work for everyone.

     

    • Senator Robert Boroffice OON

                 National Assembly, Abuja

  • Kaduna crisis: Let’s learn from the past

    SIR: As a young adult, more than a decade ago in high school, full of dreams for the future – a very big dream of a big house with a big living room with high windows to let in sunlight and air every day. I wanted to have kids, watch them grow to responsible citizens.  A very big dream indeed.

    Then the bombshell:  A religious disturbance had erupted in Kaduna.  Houses that belonged to non-Muslims were either vandalized or razed to the ground and people that were not fast on their feet were either brutalized or burnt and their corpses left by the road side and houses in the wake of this wanton destruction.

    The peace and tranquillity of the lovely city where people of different tribes and religions worked and co-existed as one before was shattered and leveled to the ground all in the space of weeks.

    I was devastated! It was like my world had crumbled and I could not begin to imagine what had happened to make friends and neighbors suddenly become enemies. Non indigenes and visitors were being preyed on and killed and their houses and belongings destroyed in the wake. Children and women were killed in large droves and corpses littered the once clean and beautifully lit streets and I could just hear the “ghosts” of the dead crying for mercy and justice.

    I wondered in my little mind which couldn’t really comprehend this man’s inhumanity to man. Did people consider the consequences of the war before they embarked on it? Did they realize that destruction takes the fraction of a second but reconstruction can take a lifetime? Did they realize the legacy being left behind for the younger generation? Why is love which is preached by all religions hard to give? All religions are from God, then why the segregation?

    All these questions burdened my poor fragile mind and brought buckets of tears to my face. I shed tears for my Kaduna of yesterday which is lost and gone forever. But my young mind refuses to give up because I know it is time for the people to live and co-exist in peace for the young ones to have a brighter future.

    However, in the last few days, hostility has gradually returned to threaten the fragile and relative peace of Southern Kaduna. The peace in Kachia, was disrupted on Sunday, as adherents of the two major religions were embroiled in crisis, following an alleged demolition of places of worship by Christians and Muslims from different communities in the Kachia locality. The crisis had led to a forceful demolition and burning of mosques and churches in the area, causing tension and panic across the state. On Saturday when the youths saw damage in the prayer ground, hell was let loose; the youths suspected members of a nearby church to be responsible for the continuous damaging of the prayer ground and descended on the church, causing it to be demolished. The alleged suspects did not take the demolition of the church lightly as they went burning and demolishing mosques in the area.

    Security agencies, religious leaders and indeed elders should all be on the watch in order to prevent a re-occurrence of the massacre and bloodshed that swept lives and properties more than a decade ago. Church and mosque leaders should preach and teach the adherence of their religion on the need to see their neighbors as an extension of themselves in order to uphold the sanctity for human lives and to ensure and atmosphere for peace and tranquillity without which development cannot be achieved. Forgiveness and tolerance is what we should all imbibe.

    Nelson Mandela has exemplified forgiveness and tolerance and for black people to live and co-exist together in mutual love and respect. We owe it to him to carry on his legacy as he had enjoined us to do and we don’t necessarily have to wait for our leaders. The onus is on us and we have the responsibility to create a future we want for ourselves and our children

     

    • Dr Hussain Obaro,

    Ilorin

  • Boko Haram and Nigeria’s future

    SIR: The Boko Haram has lately assumed dramatic and most dangerous dimension with the recent abduction of innocent and harmless girls at Chibok Unity School in Bornu State by the Islamic sect.

    Presently, the U.S. was reported to have arrived in the country with sophisticated military hardware and intelligence for the rescue operation of the abducted girls and for tracking their abductors. Israeli security experts are also expected to assist in the military operations. Other nations have offered similar assistance to Nigeria thereby internationalising a crisis which under normal circumstances ought to have been handled by the Nigerian authorities.

    It is common knowledge that the Boko Haram insurgency has become a threat to the corporate existence of Nigeria. The terrorist organization is already holding Nigeria by the jugular waiting to strangulate her at any moment.

    One issue that has so far eluded both the Nigerian authorities and foreign collaborators however is the issue of unmasking the insurgents’ local and foreign sponsors. The Nigerian authorities should take advantage of the foreign intervention to unravel the mystery surrounding the true identity of both the local and foreign sponsors of this terrible phenomenon known as the Boko Haram with a view to tracking them to face the full weight of the law for their heinous crime against their fatherland and humanity.

     

    • Nze Nwabueze Akabogu (JP)

    Enugwu-Ukwu, Anambra State.

  • CBN and dirty notes

    SIR: One of  the core functions of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is issuance of legal tender currency for the nation. A  time was when it discharged that function creditably with what was then the clean notes policy whereby once notes went into circulation and came back through the banks, they were sorted into clean and dirty  notes.

    The clean notes went back into circulation, while the dirty ones were destroyed. The bank had a note processing process for ensuring the successful implementation of this policy and bore the entire cost!

    I was therefore amazed to read in the papers that licensed banks are now being asked to do this sorting or pay a penalty for not doing so!

    This has resulted in the stinking, ragged notes we are now being saddled with and the racket of our currency notes being hawked like ‘akara’ at parties and motor garrages, with banks’ cash managers smiling to the bank.

    The CBN should put a stop to this mess by ensuring that it resumes its mandate of supplying the needed notes without burdening the licensed banks. The CBN is not a profit making organisation, which is why its enabling act only talks of operating surplus, NOT,profit

    It should not therefore shirk the responsibility to commit funds to fulfill this function.

    As for the currency hawkers, they remain in business because some people are foolish enough to throw their money away because they want to make a show. If one must present an individual with a gift, why not put the amount in an envelop to give the person rather than pay as much as N200 per N1000 to procure mint-fresh notes?

    • Abiodun Sopitan

    Oregun, Lagos

  • Resolving the LASU crisis

    SIR: The unfortunate situation at the Lagos State University, Ojoo, Lagos State has unnecessarily dragged on for too long. This should not be. All stakeholders should wade into the matter to avert further harm to the students, parents, academic life and the image of the university. Over the years, critical stakeholders in the university had called for an overhaul of the institution. In a bid to resolve the crisis, various unions in LASU, including the Student Union Government, once stormed the Lagos State House of Assembly with the main demand that the state government should set up a Visitation Panel to look into the various challenges that have reduced the ivory tower to a ‘glorified secondary school’.

    That was the origin of the panel which proposed an increase in tuition fees, replacement of the then vice-chancellor, intervention of the government in the upgrade of infrastructural facilities and the intensification of efforts towards the accreditation of courses being offered, among other recommendations.

    A major component of the union’s demands is for the state government to totally reverse the fees being charged students, which currently ranges from between N197, 000 to 350, 000. The union and others are also demanding the cancellation of the ‘no vacancy, no promotion’ policy of the institution and decried the non-implementation of the Universities (Miscellaneous Provision) Act already operational in other universities.

    No doubt, the problems affecting the education sector are enormous. The major one, which is adequate funding has become a mirage. No level of education in the country is an exception. This was what informed by fee hike by LASU authorities. However, public institutions are not designed to charge fees like the privately-owned counterparts because of their perceived primary role of providing affordable education for all, as basic social and constitutional responsibility.

    Unfrortunately, in this part of the world, it is still not easy to get the people to buy into the culture of endowment and huge private investment in education. That is where LASU is caught-up in a fix of reality.

    As it is, there is urgent need – more than ever before – to create internal, effective funding mechanisms to augment the dwindling government allocations and subventions, attracting endowments, engaging in impactful and profitable research for the corporate world that could in turn be used to generate capital for the economy.

    The way out of the crisis is for the Lagos State Government to immediately reduce the new regime of fees by 50 per cent, suspend the anti-labour and discriminatory ‘no vacancy, no promotion’ policy, and implement the provisions of the Universities (Miscellaneous Provision) Act. It should engage all the stakeholders in a comprehensive discussion on the need for slight adjustment of fees. The deployment of hard-line tactics, unnecessary propaganda and official arrogance will be of no help at all in this case. Sincere dialogue by simply laying the facts bare as it were will be imperative. The time lost to industrial unrests in the university over the years should not be allowed to continue. This is a big challenge for LASU authorities and the Lagos State Government to surmount without further delay.

    • Adewale Kupoluyi 

    Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta

     

  • Omisore’s ranting on Osun REC

    SIR: It was Joseph Goebbels, Adolf Hitler’s propagandist-in-chief who made the infamous statement that “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it”.

    It is this same infamous path that Iyiola Omisore, the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party PDP) in the August 9, election, has been threading, with his repeated call for the removal of Ambassador Rufus Akeju, Osun State Resident Electoral Commissioner.

    He has been making this inane call since 2012 and has heightened it since he emerged the flag bearer of his party. The allegation is actually a two-in-one. The first is that Akeju is biased because, according to Omisore, he had a relationship with APC leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu. The second is that a court had ordered the removal of Akeju, which INEC refused to carry out, thus retaining him in flagrant disregard for the court.

    The unsaid implication of this allegation is that Akeju is an APC mole in Osun ready to do the bidding of the party with INEC’s tacit approval.

    Omisore in his characteristic recklessness threatened solemnly at his party secretariat in Osogbo that he would never allow Akeju to conduct the coming governorship election. How he would stop the election is still not known. He might as well have it in mind to violently disrupt the election and I hope the security agencies have taken note of this threat to the election and should call him for questioning. To be forewarned is to be forearmed. He could also have meant that he would crash Abuja’s power on INEC to have Akeju thrown away from Osogbo. Whatever is in the dark recesses of his mind, he did not mean well.

    However, the truth of the matter is that there is no subsisting court order on Akeju. PDP had gone to court and obtained an injunction against INEC for the conduct of the 2011 elections. Strangely, the same PDP went back to court ask for ‘stay of execution’. The judge, Babs Kuewumi, was alarmed, and told them pointedly that normally, it is the defendant whom judgement was awarded against, that seeks ‘stay of execution’ and not the plaintiff who won the relief he sought from the court. He then granted PDP the ‘stay of execution’.

    It is therefore the height of mendacity for Omisore to turn around to allege that INEC is disobeying court order. I ask again, which order?

    When the PDP at the meeting of political parties with INEC chairman in Osogbo asked for the removal of Akeju, Prof Attahiru Jega told them that they should bring credible evidence of Akeju’s bias or any allegation they might have against him. They have not done this; instead, they have continued on this Goebbelian path of repeating a lie so often with the false hope that people will believe it.

    Interestingly, the defeated Osun PDP candidates in the 2011 elections did not challenge their defeats. Even Omisore who was roundly thrashed and humiliated by his opponent, Senator Babajide Omoworare, even in his ward, did not challenge the result at the tribunal or the regular courts. Only Honourable Wole Oke went to the tribunal and the appeal court and came back empty-handed.

    Osun PDP did not boycott the elections conducted by Akeju and no election conducted by him has been upturned by any election petition tribunal, appeal court or the Supreme Court. What then is the basis of the vilification of this man by Omisore and his gang? Is he looking for the fall guy for his inexorable defeat in the coming election, as always?

    • Femi Igbayilola,

    Osogbo, Osun State

  • Re: As we crucify Nyako

    SIR: Mohammed Haruna’s piece in The Nation of April 24 titled “As we crucify Nyako…” is a resource material for the dust-bin.

    I have nothing against Nyako and his friend, Mohammed Haruna but I urge those close to them to always admonish them with the mantra of Martin Luther King Jnr, that ‘’we must learn that to passively accept an unjust system is to co-operate with that system and thereby become a participate in its evil’’.

    While the editorial of The Nation unequivocally condemned in strong terms Nyako’s needless and reckless memo, Mohammed Haruna wrote to coat the devilish memo with silent and conspicuous approbation. This man could not even condemn the lugubrious and devastating trade of those who kill in the name of education and religion in his piece. To him nothing is wrong with the satanic trade but something is wrong with government’s intervention to end terrorism. All he could do is to manipulate stories to paint ‘MEND’ as the real terrorist invading part of northern Nigeria.

    I can’t understand why he wrote – ‘’instead of support, Nyako… has been suffering from splendid isolation – indeed worse’’.

    What type of support was he talking about; to sink Nigeria in the ocean of disintegration or support to spread the content of the malicious memo?

    Nigerians want to know what he meant.

    It is shocking to note that the man could not find space to vehemently deprecate the on-going transmutation of northern Nigeria into a huge slaughter slab by men whose heart belong to the devil. To the likes of Mohammed and Nyako, the anti-terror war is geared towards depleting the numbers of voters in the north. Both men want the federal government to fold its arms and watch with amusement while the children of Sodom and Gomorrah have it all to themselves.

    His call for ‘sincere dialogue’ at the end of the piece is laughable. Perhaps he was not in town when government made several attempts to dialogue and the offer was rejected by those agents of doom. As a lover of peace, I urge him to carry on with his own ‘sincere dialogue’ for peace to reign in the north.

    As we crucify Nyako, we must do so with ruthless and brute conscience; we must do so, not on cross but with chains of odium.

    Ehi G. O.

    Benin City.

  • For Oputa , Otedola and Amaka Igwe, a tribute

    SIR: There is some truth to the old saying that there are only two days in a man’s life of which he could actually determine or do nothing about:  the day a man is born and the day a man passes on. Everyone experiences death. Death and dying are an inevitable part of human existence. Some people know ahead of time when their death will occur. For instance, terminal illnesses, when diagnosed ahead of time, allows its victim to set his or her affairs in order, make relationships right, and say goodbye to loved ones. In this case, every person involved has a chance to gradually adjust and make peace with death, as much as possible.

    However, not everyone has this chance as many deaths occur suddenly, like the case of Amaka Igwe, Nigerian film maker, Nolywood icon , entrepreneur, prolific producer and who recently died in the unripe age of 51 having given so much to the world. A visionary and pioneer of modern Nigerian TV drama and film, she hit national limelight as the writer and producer of award-winning TV soap ‘Checkmate’ and its off shoot ‘Fuji House of Commotion’.

    Like it did to Amaka Igwe, the cold hand of death equally caught up with  a  former Justice of the Supreme Court, Justice Chukwudifu Oputa, albeit at the prime age of 96. The late Justice Oputa, one of the few judges with incorruptible reputation in the country was appointed to head a panel constituted to investigate rights abuses during 15 years of military rule between 1976 and 1999 when President Olusegun Obasanjo took office as elected president on 29 May, 1999. Fondly referred to as ‘Socrates of the Supreme Court’ , the late justice  Oputa was a gifted orator and prolific writer with over 40 publications in papers, lectures, conferences and seminars .

    Like Igwe and Oputa, former governor of Lagos State, Sir Michael Otedola, was equally not spared the cold treatment of death at the age of 88. A great entrepreneur and uncommon philanthropist, Sir Otedola touched and transformed several lives through his many business enterprises and philanthropic activities.

    As Governor of Lagos state, his achievements remain indelible.

    While praying  for the repose of the souls of these eminent and illustrious Nigerians, we should  draw vital lessons from their commitment to humanity, selfless services and other such traits that made their sojourn on earth such a memorable one. There is no better time than now for Nigerians to draw inspiration from these departed compatriots in order to build a better, peaceful and united country.

    • Tayo Ogunbiyi

    Alausa-Ikeja

  • Boko-Haram: Why not secret mission?

    SIR: Conceal your intentions: keep people off-balance and in the dark by never revealing the purpose behind your actions. If they have no clue what you are up to they cannot prepare defense – 48 Laws of Power, (Law 3).

    If we must overcome the enemy of our beloved country Nigeria, we must learn how to attack Boko-Haram secretly without publicizing our moves. Publicizing our moves will do no good, and it will be detrimental to the military men on the mission. This is because when the terrorist know the number and strategy which the Nigerian armed forces are using, they will get to develop their own plans which will easily overcome the plan of our armed forces.

    America discovered the hideout of the then head of Al Qaeda Osama Bin Ladin and it was not publicised. For several month they monitored the hideout secretly, secretly they attacked the hideout in Abbotabad, Pakistan. Had it been that Osama know that the American special squad were coming for him , he would have changed location. But in the case of Nigerian armed forces dealing with terrorist, reverse is the case.

    I found it very difficult to answer these questions: did Boko-Haram announce before they abduct our 234 school girls? Did they announce the first and second Nyaya bomb blast? Did they announce the Madalla Christmas day bomb blast? Did they announce the multiple bomb explosion in Maiduguri and the rest? Absolutely the answer is NO. but whenever our armed forces are trying to make a move, they myopically publicize it and by this lapse Boko-Haram get to know how they will operate and avoid areas which are not safe for them.

    On Friday May 2, four battalions were mobilized for Sambisa forest and this new development was publicize by the media. The publicity of this move is not a welcome development because it will do the military men on this mission more harm than good and this is because since BH are aware of their coming, they will know how to best prepare for these four battalions. They are publicizing this for we the masses to know their moves and to calm our nerves, but we are not interested in knowing their moves, what we are interested in is the end result of their moves.

    “The General who wins the battle makes many calculation in his temple before the battle is fought. The General who loses make but few calculations beforehand.” -Chapter 1, The Art of War.

    What I am tryig to say is that our armed forces should always strive hard to set a working plan that will yield a pragmatic result for our beloved country Nigeria without really publicising the strategy.

    We are tired of incessant bomb blast which is gradually becoming norms in the Northern part of Nigeria and we are tired of kidnappers; be them Boko-Haram or any body who they might be.

    I always wonder how many Nigerians do these insurgents want to kill? Do they really have human sympathy at all? Do they even believe in God? I always go deep in thoughts regarding these questions because I know that neither the Qur’an or Bible is in support of killing of innocent people especially children and women.

    I also commend the effort of the Nigerian armed forces towards combating terrorism in Nigeria and I advise the Nigerian armed forces to work as a team, they should forget their differences be it religious or ethnic difference. We hope on you people, because without the armed forces we are not safe ad our country as a whole will be unsafe. The weakness of the armed forces is the downfall of our beloved country which we never prayed for.

     

    • Jamiu Abdulrazaq,

    Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University Lapai