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Tag: African leaders

  • Respect rule of law, AFBA tells African leaders

    Respect rule of law, AFBA tells African leaders

    The African Bar Association (AFBA)  has urged the continent’s leaders to respect the rule of law and uphold democratic norms.

    It stated this on  Saturday at the end of its National Executive and Governing Council meeting in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital.

    AFBA president Mr. Hannibal Uwaifo told host Governor Nyesom Wike, who was decorated with the AFBA gown of excellence, that the association chose the state “in recognition of its peaceful nature and unusual transformation.”

    Declaring the session open, Wike called on AFBA to help deepen democracy and uphold the rule of law in the country.

    He promised to continue to provide basic amenities and dividends of democracy in the state and afterwards led the lawyers on an inspection tour of several developmental projects initiated by his administration.

    In a chat with The Nation, Uwaifor said: “We had representatives from different parts of the continent, and the difficulties we had was that the flight schedules could not be coordinated easily. We thank God that the two-day meeting was  successful, We thank J. B. Daudu (SAN) for presiding over the council meeting and I chaired the Executive Council meeting. I feel very  happy that the AFBA has reached the level it has reached at this time.

    Chairman of African Women Lawyers Forum of  AFBA,  Iyom Josepine Ananih said the meeting covered quite “a lot of areas” including human rights problems in different parts of Africa.

    She said: “We took very strong  positions about them because the AFBA is the voice of Africa and we have to be a credible and  an audible voice.

    “We need to speak out and I am happy that we were all together with one mind determined to speak and stand firmly for the less privileged in Africa and to stand against any government that is abusing human rights in Africa.

    Ananih said the theme of the conference concerned the ease of doing business in Africa and the meeting resolved to stand against exploitation of African business people.

    She said: “Africa has  the largest  market, Africa has a huge potential for prosperity but the way business is being done in Africa, people from outside come and exploit Africans and we are saying no, it should stop.

    “We need to also look at ways of doing business in Africa so that we can make it easy for people to come and do business in Africa  and for Africans to also benefit from those interrections.

    “As they are coming to do business to make profit, the people they are doing business with in Africa will also make something from those transactions.

    “They will also make sure that they also have confidence for those people who think that Africa is a dark continent filled by 419ers, who deceive prople.”

    Another participant and former minister for youths and development, Inuwa Abdulkadir said: “I feel delighted that these things are  happening after some  years of slumber of the AFBA which is really a sad experience.

    “I feel happy too that Nigeria is driving the process of resuscitating or  re-awakening the African Bar Association, because Nigeria is answering its name as the leader of Africa in all spheres of human endeavour.

    “The importance of having the AFBA cannot be overemphasised as there are a lot of efforts to integrate Africa in terms of social and economic challenges the continent is facing.”

    He stated that Africa “is the target of every investor in the world today and the African economy is key to other economies in the world. Even the so called developed countries are looking at Africa, because whether anybody likes it or not, because of the population we have in the continent, there is no doubt that  the market is here.

    “So, whatever is happening elsewhere in the world, whether by or among the so called super powers or biggest economies, you can’t do away with Africa as a  market,  as a source of raw materials and a source of labour in some instances.”

    Abdulkadir said the focus of  AFBA now is “to assist African governments and nations on how to do business in Africa, how to make it easy to come and invest in Africa in terms of the legal frameworks and to provide a the framework for safeguarding Africa’s interest as a continent”

    Council member, OkeyAkobundu stated that the meeting had provided Africans with a voice to champion their rights.

    He said: “With the attendance of former NBA president Chief Charles Idehen and his full participation at the meeting, lawyers in Africa and indeed all Africans could be said to now have a voice and champion for their rights in today’s Africa.

    “People within repressive governments can now have AFBA fight for it without fear of individual harassment. The future of enduring and deepened democracy and sustainable development of Africa has just begun.

    “Of course Nigerian lawyers are being offered another platform for cross border interactions and practice.

    “The expansion of learning and practice horizon is provided within this association. And with Nigerians in all parts of Africa the AFBA platform provides opportunity for cross border collaborations with a view to meeting clients’ needs outside Nigeria with minimal pressures.”

  • Black men, African leaders are wicked -Uzorka-Whyte

    Black men, African leaders are wicked -Uzorka-Whyte

    She set out early in life, as a teenager, to research into the make-up of the average black man and African leaders. Today, the octogenarian author and politician, Chief (Mrs.) Adaobi  Uzorka Whyte, is not amused by what she saw while in the field as a top politician and women leader. In this interview with Assistant Editor, Yetunde Oladeinde, she shared her disappointments with past and present Nigerian and African leaders, including fellow octogenarian, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. Excerpts  

    You wrote story books before this, why is your new book different?

    The story books just came because of some crisis in my place. Mainly, I started by lamenting, I am an African woman lamenting the destiny, the slave mentality and wickedness of the black man. I started with my first book, which is the abuse of the Nigerian child and the second was the plight of the Nigerian woman. These are the things that have bothered me so much when I watch the Nigerian environment, which is my own environment in Africa. As I started growing up, I didn’t understand the life of the black man, so I started to research my environment. I started to document from those two books, that was in 2002. This is just an extension of my lamentation about the destiny, slave mentality and the wickedness of the black man.

    What inspired all these?

    Apart from my personal experience, which if we really want to talk about the Nigerian environment, you find out that I am one of the luckiest. I see my fellow Nigerian suffering in the midst of plenty. When we talk of tradition, I worked in my area, among the men, to become a chief. Then, I saw what was going on in the community; I saw that the majority of our traditions tend to punish the people. In fact, as a youth, I really got inspired to write what I saw in widowhood, traditions and divorce. I now see that whatever we are doing, we always want to cheat our people. As a teenager, I started watching the environment, the governance and as I was growing up, I heard about white men and colonization.

    Having compared all that from my village in Ndoni, Rivers State, I was taken to Jos at the age of eleven. From Jos, I came to Lagos in 1961. From that point, I started making comparisons. At the initial stage, I was angry with the White man for colonizing us. I was angry with them for making us to lose our identity. As a young girl, I got baptized in the Catholic Church and I was given the English name Suzanna but by the time I clocked 20 years, I dropped that name. However, at a point I had a great challenge over my marital name, I decided to add my father’s name, Uzorka and I was bearing Uzorka Whyte, yet, it didn’t remove anything. As I continued to watch the governance of Nigeria, to watch the action of our religious leaders and our political leaders, I have discovered that the white people have done us good. They gave us better life because apart from that colonization, they conquered us; they scrambled over us and decided to rule us. All the things that you can think of that brought development were brought by the white man.

    What motivated you to become a female chief in the midst of the men?

    The life that we are living today, not just today, from the beginning, is for men. From my youth, I saw that women are negative, men are more positive, so in our community, I became a founder of the Ndoni Women Organization. I now found that our women are not interested in anything related to community development. Hence, I decided to join the men in the group known as Ndoni Community. It is open to men and women. I was 18 years when I joined them and attended the first meeting in my uncle’s house in Jos. Here, I discovered that those men were more positive, more active in community affairs than the women. I tried to find out why our women are so negative but till today I have not been able to get an answer.

    I am talking about the grassroots and you find that whenever there are positive things to do, the women are more interested in uniforms. Where two or three women are gathered, they want to make uniform. Men can wear their tee shirts, shorts and finish the job. So, you find that from the grassroots to the Federal, women don’t really know what is happening in Nigeria. From that early stage, I continued to get involved in politics. I continued to drag our women. When we go to the political meetings, you would find that there were no women on the high table and once I called my Woman Leader to ask why this was so and she could not give me a tangible answer. I found that our duty was to sing choruses and dance for them. I became worried on the political side but in my community, I still continued with the community meetings. It was because of my working with them and being activists, fighting social ills in the community. In 1993, I was elected the Deputy President-General and later became the President- General of the organization.

    At what point did you join mainstream politics?

    In 1999, I became very active in PDP but before PDP I had joined other political parties. I worked with CNC, under Dr. Olusola Saraki, the father of the current Senate President. I led my people under him and I admired him because I saw that he cared for the poor. But when I left his group, I started working with other groups. It is my involvement in politics that made me to know that the black man is wicked and that is what I have documented in my books. Why I say this is because government money is not meant for individuals; it is for the people. It is to develop the country, develop the communities and the states.

    But unfortunately, as I got involved in politics, I started attending political programmes and I was sad about the things that I saw. All our politicians do is during elections, they go to the grassroots, rural areas, all the corners of Nigeria, giving peanuts to those poor people and after that they go away with their votes, take the votes to the Government Houses and from there they continue to gather all our contracts, money that is supposed to be used for development. All they give us are abandoned projects, all over Nigeria, from Lagos to Abuja. As I continue to see things, I continue to do my research and I found out that the black man had been wicked from the onset, before the white man came.

    Our politicians have established themselves as slave masters; they have taken over from the white. They came and met us in indigenous slavery. Before they came, we were exchanging 20 human beings for one horse; we were castrating the strong slaves to be eunuchs, so they can preserve the harems for kings to protect their wives. But we try as much as we can to hide our secrets and expose the white people. By the time they came, we were already enslaving our people and that is why today, after many centuries, we are still kidnapping our brothers.

    You would turn 80 in two months, which means you are in the same age bracket with Gen Olusegun Obasanjo, how would you assess his performance in politics?

    I came across him because of the way he was coming to Rivers State during Peter Odili’s regime. Then Obasanjo made Rivers his second home; he changed his wardrobe to Rivers wardrobe. When you see him then, he was only wearing our outfits. I only came in contact with him during programmes organised by Peter and Mary Odili. As a politician, Obasanjo has disappointed me. In this new book, I have written about him because by the time Obasanjo was becoming president, I was full of great expectations. I named Obasanjo the favoured general because God favoured him. He was a man who had the opportunity for the first time to rule Nigeria two times. He was the man God granted the grace to come out of prison to the palace.

     

  • African time and African leaders

    Time is seen as three dimensional – the past, present and future. From the philosophical point of view, time is both conceptual and perceptual. By conceptual time we mean time as it is everywhere, irrespective of geographical locations or boundaries. This does not refer to time as measured by the clock. For instance, the instant time “now” is the same everywhere, irrespective of geographical locations. This is time as it conceptually is. But when we talk of time, say 3pm, in Nigeria, we are talking of perceptual time, i.e., time as measured by our clocks which is uniformly the same everywhere in Nigeria. In other words, 10am is 10am and not 11am or 12pm. Since the measurement of time is itself governed by the rotation of the sun, so that night and day occur at different times and places all over the planet earth (the world), perceptual time is relative. This is why perceptual time is measured differently in different parts of the world. Even if we take a trip to the planet Mars – our nearest neighbour – our clocks which measure perceptual time would read differently as it would have suffered from what is called Fitzgerald contraction, while the conceptual time remains spatio-temporarily the same.

    By African time we mean, first in the traditional sense, the substitution of what John Mbiti, an African philosopher –theologian, calls “phenomenon calendars” with “numerical calendars” in which the events or phenomena which constitute time are reckoned or considered in their relation to one another. Thus, an expectant mother counts the lunar months of her pregnancy. Among the Ankore in Uganda, cattle are at the heart of the people. Therefore, the day is reckoned with reference to events pertaining to cattle. Even in these cases, Mbiti’s contention is well supported by some examples from Nigeria. For instance, among the Moslems, the timing or Ramadan fast is tied to the rising of the moon. Among the traditional Yoruba people, the date of birth of a person may be calculated by specific events in the past. Thus, a person’s age can be reckoned from the point of view of a significant event during the time of his birth say, during the Kiriji war (1877-1886). It does not matter whether the war took two to five years to fight. The date of birth would be reckoned as occurring anytime during this period. A child born during the Biafra war (1967-1970) would, in the year 2016, be said to be between 46 and 49 years old while the exact date of birth becomes irrelevant.

    The rising of the sun, for example, is an event which is recognized by the whole community. So long as the sun rises, it does not matter whether it rises at 5am or 7am. This is why, according to Mbiti, when a person says he will meet someone at sunrise, it does not matter whether the meeting takes place at 5am or 7am, as long as it is during the general period of sunrise. But our main concern here is about mathematical time which suffers a great blow under what we call “African time”. For instance, when a person says he will meet another person at 8am, it does not matter whether the meeting takes place at 10am, 12pm, 8pm, 9pm or even 11pm. What matters is that the meeting takes place on that day. This is to say that it does not matter whether a particular meeting is fixed for 4pm, in so far as it takes place on that particular date, showing up two or four hours later at 6pm or 8pm is as good as being prompt in time. Time, therefore, is meaningful only at the date of the meeting or event, and not at the mathematical moment i.e. 4pm prompt.

    The above concept of African time should explain why, in Nigeria, mathematical time is never respected by our leaders whenever they turn out for events they themselves had fixed for say, 10am prompt. That was why the Nigerian university Vice-Chancellors were once summoned to Abuja less than 24 hours for a meeting fixed for 10am the following day by the Executive-Secretary of the Nigerian Universities Communion (NUC) sometime in the 80’s. Although the mathematical time for the meeting was fixed at 10am, it did not start until 2pm! In other words, 10am is not 10am but 2pm, a manifest contradiction and absurdity.

    It has become the general practice among our top political functionaries, especially the governors and ministers, to turn a 10am appointment or event to 12pm or 1pm, i.e., two or three hours late. In most cases, prominent personalities, including our royal fathers, would have to wait under a scotching sun for a governor or minister whose arrival would be heralded by the blaring of sirens to show their importance and majesty as a semi-god for whom the other poor mortals have to wait endlessly and who must wait, whether or not they like it, until their excellencies and honourables, enjoying time immunities, deem it fit to show up at the official event many hours late. This means that all our events as advertised are necessarily meant for local consumption by people already used to African time. Time is life, and any hours wasted in one’s life can never be regained. Time is no respecter of persons, and is too short to be wasted away in a nonchalant manner.

    However, not every Nigerian subscribes to this concept of African time. For example, the late Dr. Olikoye Ransome-Kuti was reported to have left an event that did not start at the time advertised. Some say the former governor of Lagos State, Babatunde Raji Fashola, would not tolerate lateness in the take-off of events. I once attended a funeral service where the casket was brought in when the priest was preaching, with just about 35 minutes to the end of the funeral service. That is how bad the effect of African time is in our lives.

     I remember a particular time when Nigeria hosted an international event – football/soccer event. The Head of State at that time was programmed to kick off the opening ceremony of the soccer event at 4 or 5pm prompt. But our Head of State was late while the whole world was waiting! He did not kick start the event until five minutes later, at which time the whole world was embarrassed as the television coverages that usually take off at the exact mathematical, though at different perceptual but synchronized, time all over the world were kept waiting by Nigeria for five wasted minutes! On that day, Nigeria complicated things for international television stations, advertisers and viewers!

    Perhaps our leaders should be told in strong terms that, in civilized countries, time is money and every hour lost translates to billions of Dollars and Naira, and that keeping to time is a mark of disciplined and civilized behaviour. Waste of valuable hours as well as lack of their judicious use is one of the reasons for our underdevelopment and lack of progress. Therefore, one would like to see a Nigeria where our leaders see time as sacred and never to be wasted or abused. When a president of the United States want to address the nation say, at 9pm, all television stations are at alert while viewers normally expect him to start his address at exactly 9pm. I believe he does this perfectly by waiting on the door from Oval Office five minutes before 9pm while the door is opened for him to start his speech on the dot of time. This is the culture we must imbibe in this country, i.e. preparing and waiting for the exact time a particular event is to start and keep to that time, no matter what. It is a mark of honour to do so. We must stop the culture of erroneous advertisement of an event for 10am prompt when, in fact, the word prompt is never respected anytime, anywhere by our leaders. Keeping African time, which is already part of our culture, is the bane of our lives in this part of the world. Something must be done about it as it does no good to our image in the international community.

    • Professor Makinde is DG/CEO, Awolowo Centre for Philosophy, Ideology and Good Governance, Osogbo, Osun State.

  • Group to honour outstanding African leaders

    Independent Pan- African Support Youth Parliament (IPAYP) has concluded plans to stage its 2nd Africa Leadership Award ceremony and empowerment workshop holding September 22 and 23 in Nairobi, Kenya.

    Giving this hint at a press conference in Lagos, the President of the parliament, Mr. Obinna Sixtus Nwoke said the 13 persons and two institutions that would be honoured been chosen by external observers, who considered their immense contributions towards creating jobs, entrepreneurship excellence, strengthening African institutions, among others.

    According to him, there was an urgent need to give the youths more opportunities to hold sensitive public offices, but quickly submitted that the forum was no formed to abuse or attack government, but to engage it constructively to do the needful.

    The president pledged that since Africa was one entity, the parliament would not relent in ensuring that it remains united in good governance, peace and security, borderless inter-trade, and capacity building.

    IPAYP is a youth support forum, which spread across the continent and is committed toward empowering and developing the continent’s young persons. The event, it was gathered, is in collaboration with African Youth Commission (AYC).

  • What African leaders must learn from Mbeki, by scholars

    What African leaders must learn from Mbeki, by scholars

    Diplomats and political scientists re-examined the state of politics, policy-making and diplomacy on the continent when Dr Adekeye Adebajo, Executive Director of the Centre for Conflict Resolution in Cape Town, South Africa, presented his book, Thabo Mbeki: Africa’s Philosopher-King at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), Lagos.

    If Nigeria  is to take its place at  its leading place in the continent’s advancement, political scientists say, active the development of the human capital should be in front-burner of this administration. While urging leaders to borrow from the Mbeki’s example, the experts called for an enabling political, social and business environment, along with a better policy implementation.

    Ambassador Oladapo Fafowora, who chaired the event, decried the challenge posed by bad leadership on the continent. He, however, noted that African political scientists are too critical about the political class, observing that the problem facing the continent is complex.

    “The problem in Africa is leadership. However, the problems facing African leaders are enormous.  Where are our leaders coming from? How do we train and mature our leaders? The leaders are  not connecting with the people. They leaders are very impatient and want to grab what the whites had in a century. These are issues we must address if we are to resolve the  socio-political crisis, we are faced with. When a transition is too rapid, it can lead to chaos,” he said.

    While praising the author’s effort at writing a biography on South Africa’s Thambo Mbeki, Fafowora lamented that it is unfortunate that “most of the well-trained political scientists have gone into politics, working for politicians”. He said: “I urge you to come home and partner with like minds to solve the socio-political crisis in the country. My only regret is that instead of coming home to Nigeria where his expertise is needed, Adebajo is in South Africa where there are better facilities, better pay and motivation for scholars than what they’d get in Nigeria. South Africa is our great rival. They have better structure, higher per capital income and they take leadership seriously.”

    Adebajo has served on United Nations missions in South Africa, Western Sahara and Iraq. He was formerly the director of the Africa Programme of the New York-based International Peace Institute when he was also an adjunct professor at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA). Along with the biography on Mbeki, the author has written five books: Building Peace in West Africa; Liberia’s Civil War; The Curse of Berlin: Africa After the Cold Warand UN Peacekeeping in Africa.

    At the book presentation were ambassador-turned-monarch, Oba Christopher Ariyo; the book reviewer, Prof Adele  Jinadu; President, Oxford and Cambridge Club in Nigeria Mr Akinfela Akoni and Chief Information Officer Roland Kayange.

    Although he did not have an interview with Mbeki, the author, Adebajo, who is a political-economist,  said he was inspired by his leadership strength and foreign policy. He bemoaned the country lacks maintenance culture, while citing Nigeria’s political and economic structure as reason for his choice of working in South Africa.

    “No prophet is honoured in his own land. That is the story of Mbeki.He will be remembered as a Pan-African. His foreign policy is his most successful legacy. He was the most prominent philosopher king of his generation. Though Nkrumah and Mbeki held international conference but Nkrumah had a federalist vision, while Mbeki sole self-confidence and sense of African identity into the black South Africans.

    “South Africa may have white dominated economy but they have infrastructure. Ajaokuta was commissioned in 1971 yet we have not been able to produce steel till today: we cannot generate electricity either. If you want  me to come home, you’d have to fix most of this these things. It is important we have leaders that rule by examples, not allow reckless politicians to mess the country,”Adebajo said.

    The book reviewer observed that the mutual relationship between South Africa and Nigeria should be re-examined. “However, given the size of Nigeria’s economy and its population, the potential “Thabo Mbeki: Africa’s Philosopher-King, the book under review, is a pocket-sized but thoughtful and closely argued political biography of Thabo Mbeki, the former President of the Republic of South Africa, whose presidency of his country served more or less as the denouement of his apprenticeship and later frontline role in the anti-apartheid and the broader liberation movement in Southern Africa. A major objective of the book, we are told, is ‘to rescue Mbeki from the parochialism of South African perspectives and restore him to his rightful stature as an important pan-African political figure.’

    “But ‘rescuing Mbeki from the parochialism of South African perspectives,’ by painting him ‘as an important pan-African political figure,’ and casting him in the role of ‘Africa’s philosopher king,’ sets this political biography in the broader canvass of the recent intellectual and political history of Africa in its engagement with democracy, development, globalisation and resurgent, if subtle racism as a global phenomenon…

    Briefly put, we need to theorise Pan-Africanism or the African Renaissance as a social and political field of action, distinguishing between it as an idea or theory and as practice or movement,” Jinadu said.

     

  • Terrorism: African leaders need to work closer, says Buhari

    Terrorism: African leaders need to work closer, says Buhari

    President Muhammadu Buhari yesterday said ending insurgency in Africa would require stronger collaboration and commitment from governments, financial institutions and security agencies in tracking sponsors of terrorist activities.

    In a farewell audience at the State House with the High Commissioner of Kenya in Nigeria, Mr. Tom Amolo, Buhari said terrorist attacks in Africa bear similar trademarks of intense planning, strong alliances and proper financial sponsorship, which must be thoroughly investigated and reversed.

    In a statement by the Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, Buhari said: ‘‘Terrorist activities always have financial sponsorships and this can be seen in their acquisition of weapons, their movements and other logistics.

    ‘‘Here in Nigeria, we saw that Boko Haram had strong material resources and they had a close link with ISIL,’’ he said.

    The President said African governments must make efforts to dissuade the younger generation from joining the terrorist groups, which explore youthful minds for suicide bombings.

    ‘‘We need cultural orientation to succeed against terrorism,’’ he added.

    The outgoing high commissioner said he enjoyed his stay in Nigeria and looked forward to returning to the country.

     

  • Again, Buhari rejects calls for Naira devaluation

    Again, Buhari rejects calls for Naira devaluation

    •Says no to devaluation of naira

    African leaders and bankers turned out at an economic summit in Egypt yesterday, vowing to push for trade and investments on the continent despite growing security concerns in the region.

    More than 1,200 delegates including President Muhammadu Buhari  aim to sign business agreements during the two day summit at the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, to attract private sector investments in Africa.

    Buhari said at the forum that growing security concerns in Africa were absorbing huge resources.

    “The new problem affecting investments is international terrorism… lot of resources that could be used for development are being diverted to address security issues,” Buhari said.

    Organisers hope the “Africa 2016” conference can build on a 26-nation free trade pact signed last year to create a common market on half the continent.

    Analysts say that despite the continent’s economic growth rate of more than four percent, Africa still accounts for about only two percent of global trade.

    The forum is aimed at “pushing forward trade and investment in our continent to strengthen Africa’s place in the world economy,” Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said in his opening remarks at the conference.

    “It not only aims to present investment opportunities that Africa offers to the international business community… but aims to pave the way for active decisions, communication and cooperation.”

    Organisers are also seeking to turn the spotlight on Egypt as its economy remains sluggish after years of political turmoil following the ouster of longtime autocrat Hosni Mubarak in early 2011.

    Heavily dependent on tourism, Egypt’s economy was dealt a body blow when a Russian airliner broke up mid-air on October 31, minutes after taking off from Sharm el-Sheikh.

    All 224 people on board, mostly Russian tourists, were killed when the plane blew up over the Sinai Peninsula. The jihadist Islamic State group said it brought down the jet with a bomb on board.

    Egypt says it still has no evidence that a bomb downed the plane, although Moscow has acknowledged that a “terrorist attack” caused the disaster.

    “Africa 2016 forum is expected to position Egypt as a gateway for foreign investments into African markets,” Omar Ben Yedder, member of the organising committee, told AFP.

    Those attending the summit organised by Egypt and the African Union include the presidents of Sudan, Nigeria, Togo, and Gabon, and dozens of ministers and senior officials from Africa involved in trade and investment.

    President Buhari spoke of his administration’s determination to ensure national food security before export of food products abroad.

    He said that that  government decided to lay emphasis on agriculture and solid mineral development because Nigeria, being a mono-economy dependent on oil, and with a teeming unemployed youth population must now find a  way out of the current slump in the global oil market.

    “The land is there and we need machinery inputs, fertilizer and insecticides,” he said.

    On calls for the devaluation of the naira, President Buhari said that Nigeria cannot compete with developed countries which produce to compete among themselves and can afford to devalue their local currencies.

    “Developed countries are competing among themselves and when they devalue they compete better and manufacture and export more. But we are not competing and exporting but importing everything including toothpicks. So, why should we devalue our currency?,” the President queried.

    He added: “We want to be more productive and self-sufficient in food and other basic things such as clothing. For our government, we like to encourage local production and efficiency.”

    Those who have developed taste for foreign luxury goods, he said, should continue to pay for them rather than pressuring government to devalue the naira.

    Optimistic that Nigeria would get out of its current economic downturn, he noted that another major problem militating against economic revival is the huge resources deployed towards fighting insurgency and international terrorism.

    He, however, commended the support being received from the international community in the administration’s fight against terrorism and cooperation in tracing looted funds stashed away in foreign countries.

    Responding to a question on his performance since he assumed office, the President said that his administration has been quite focused on three fundamental issues of securing the country, reviving the economy and stamping out corruption.

    He said that those accused of stealing public funds are cooperating by voluntarily providing useful information while investigations and prosecutions are ongoing.

     

  • African leaders urge member states to support fiight against Boko Haram

    African leaders urge member states to support fiight against Boko Haram

    African leaders meeting in Addis Ababa have called on member states of the AU to volunteer resources to combat the spread of the Boko Haram across the Lake Chad Basin and the Al Shabaab in East Africa.

    The Peace and Security Council (PSC), holding its regular meeting at the Heads of State and Government level to discuss a response to terrorism, the crisis in Burundi and the stagnant efforts to end the political crisis in South Sudan, called for stronger measures to deal with the crises affecting the continent.

    “Nobody can deny that our security is threatened by global terrorism,” said Teodoro Obiang Nguema, President of Equatorial Guinea and Chairman of the Council.

    “This situation demands collective mobilization on our part in addition to cooperation and coordination.”

    In an effort to enhance the cooperation and coordination, the PSC Chairmanship proposed to all African countries to consider providing support to countries affected by the Boko Haram crisis in West Africa.

    “The PSC is ready to make its contribution to enhance this process and to help build a stable and prosperous Africa.

    “Africa has continued to deal with conflicts, faced threats and increase in terrorist attacks, organized crime and the illicit smuggling of small arms,” the PSC Chairman warned.

    UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon, who also attended the high-profile Summit, said the extent of radicalisation and the expansion of terrorism threats across borders was a cause for great concern.

    “There is urgent need for coordination…as I have said before, bullets make the terrorist but development prevents terrorism.

    “I urge member states especially in Africa to be at the forefront of adopting the plans to enhance border security and efforts to stop kidnapping across borders,” Ban said.

    Boko Haram, which has carried out a series of attacks in Nigeria, Niger, Cameroon and Chad, emerged as the world’s deadliest terror group with its killing of 6,664 people in 2014, according to the Global Terrorism Index, which has been tracking the extent of deaths inflicted by terror groups.

    Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari was among the African leaders who attended the PSC Summit.

    Several other African heads of state, including President Omar El Bashir of Sudan, Macky Sall of Senegal and Allassane Ouattara of Cote d’Ivoire attended the debate.

    In her opening remarks, the AU Commission Chairperson, Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, said the extent of terror attacks have grown to their highest proportions in the last 10 years, marked by “grim stories” of terror attacks against civilians.

    “The Boko Haram attacks in West Africa, the attacks in Kenya and Somalia and other individual countries targeted by the threat of terrorism show it is a universal threat we need to tackle.

    “We must also fight for the hearts and minds of our people, especially our young ones,” Zuma said.

  • Buhari, Modi, African leaders to meet on terrorism, others

    Buhari, Modi, African leaders to meet on terrorism, others

    President Muhammadu Buhari will leave Abuja tomorrow for New Delhi to participate in the Third Summit of the India-Africa Forum.

    It was established in 2008 as the official platform for the advancement of mutually-beneficial relations between India and African nations.

    Buhari, the Indian Prime Minister, Mr. Narendra Modi and other participating Heads of State and Government at this year’s summit, which follows the Second Summit held in Addis Ababa in 2011, will deliberate on issues of common concern to their countries, such as climate change and international terrorism.

    The leaders, according to a statement by the Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, are also expected to discuss joint collaboration to accelerate the pace of socio-economic development, alleviate poverty and eradicate hunger, disease and illiteracy.

    The President will be accompanied by Kano and Delta states’ governors, the National Security Adviser, Maj.-Gen. Babagana Monguno and the permanent secretaries in the Ministries of Defence, Power, Communications Technology, Agriculture, Foreign Affairs and Industry, Trade and Investment.

    Buhari is scheduled to hold bilateral talks with Modi and other senior Indian government officials on Wednesday, ahead of the opening of the summit on Thursday.

    He will also meet with chief executive officers of Indian companies with existing or prospective interests in Nigeria before returning to Abuja on Friday.

  • Dangote urges African leaders on job creation, poverty reduction

    African leaders have been advised on job creation and poverty. Achieving real economic integration in Africa would require that Africans work together to ensure economic and political stability on the continent, Dangote Group President Aliko Dangote said at the weekend.

    He said efforts must be made to break the barriers and borders between countries to allow free flow of goods, services and people.

    Alhaji Dangote spoke shortly before the Prime Minister of Ethiopia,Hailemariam Dessalegn inaugurated his (Dangote’s) 2.5 million metric tonnes per annum (MMTPA) cement plant in Mugher, Ethiopia. The firm has a prospect of about 7,000 jobs.

    He urged African leaders to make the environment conducive for the growth of the real sector as a sure way of creating jobs to reduce poverty in the continent.

    He stressed the need for a genuine collaboration between the private sector and governments at all levels for the much needed real sector growth, noting that there must be deliberate efforts to encourage Africans, not just foreigners alone, to invest in Africa.

    “Take, for example, my company, Dangote Cement, is currently investing in 16 African countries, with plans to invest in many more over the next few years. There are a number of other successful pan-African brands today such as MTN, Shoprite and Ecobank. We need to encourage this trend to see more investments in Africa by Africans.

    “Above all, there is the need to encourage the private sector to collaborate with governments across Africa, to address the issue of infrastructure deficit, which has plagued the continent for decades,” he said.

    Dangote pointed out that manufacturing, and not trading, is the best way to grow an economy.

    “This event, which we are witnessing today, attests to the fact that we took the right decision when we decided to transit from trading in our home country, Nigeria, into manufacturing,