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Tag: BUHARI

  • APC chieftain greets Buhari, Ambode

    APC chieftain greets Buhari, Ambode

    A Lagos-based chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Mrs Sola Oyedele has congratulated the President-elect, Gen Muhammadu Buhari, his vice, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, Lagos State Governor-elect, Mr Akinwunmi Ambode, his deputy, Mrs Risikat Adebule and other APC elected candidates on their victories in the just concluded general elections.

    Their victory, she said, is a plus for democracy and the beginning of new things to come for Nigerians.

    According to Mrs Oyedele, the newly elected APC members across the country will definitely bring back the lost glory of the country.

    She urged the leaders to lead well to ensure that dividend of democracy for all.

    According to Oyedele, the opposition party Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was defeated because of its corruption, non-transparent mode of administration, lack of focus, selfishness, greed, arrogance and lack of control.

    She advised the party to embrace unity and avoid ethnicity and tribalism in the ongoing zoning of crucial national positions, for it not to disrupt the peace, harmony and love in the party.

    Mrs Oyedele appealed to the party leaders to avoid wrong selection and imposition in the forthcoming local government election. She urged Lagos State Governor-elect, Ambode to continue to build on the legacy of the National Leader, Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu, which was sustained by His Excellency Babatunde Raji Fashola.

    Oyedele also urged him and his deputy to work harder and increase the APC followership in the state.

    She appealed to the President-Elect, Gen Muhammadu Buhari to tackle corruption which has become endemic in the country and has drawn Nigeria back among the comity of nations.

    According to her, Buhari looks like the needed messiah that will redeem the country from the current hopelessness and drift.

    She therefore urged Gen Buhari to appoint credible people into his cabinet so that governance can again have focus and Nigerians can again gain from selfless service of true patriots.

     

  • All accredited media free to cover Buhari, says APC

    THE All Progressives Congress (APC) has said that all accredited media organizations, including the African Independent Television (AIT), are free to cover the activities of the President-elect, Muhammadu Buhari.

    Its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, in a statement in Abuja yesterday, said the incoming Buhari Administration would not discriminate against any media organisation, irrespective of its role during the electioneering campaign leading up to the recent polls.

    The statement, however, enjoined all media organisations to observe the highest level of professional standards in carrying out their duties.

    “There is a Code of Ethics guiding the practice of journalism in Nigeria, and this demands every journalist to ensure a strict adherence to the highest levels of ethics and professionalism in carrying out their duties.

    “There must be repercussions, within the realms of the law, for media organisations which have wantonly breached the Code of Ethics of the journalism profession and turned themselves to partisans instead of professionals. But such repercussions will not include barring any accredited media organisation from covering the activities of the president-elect,” APC said.

     

  • Buhari gets G-7 invitation for Berlin summit

    Buhari gets G-7 invitation for Berlin summit

    The German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, has invited the President- elect, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, to the forthcoming Group of Seven industrialized nations of the world (G-7) summit in Berlin.

    The invitation to the summit slated for May 8 and 9 in the German capital was delivered to Buhari by the German Ambassador to Nigeria, Michael Zenner, at the Defence House, Abuja, on Tuesday.

    The G-7 nations are Canada, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, and the United States.

    Merkel is the head of the G-7 group.

    The Ambassador, however, did not elaborate on the details of the letter, but told journalists after holding a closed- door meeting with the President- elect that he came to congratulate him (Buhari) on his election and handed over to him the letter from the German Chancellor, inviting him to the G7 summit.

    “We have a very deep and intense relation with Nigeria and there are several areas where we can deepen our relation and develop them further such as in the area of economy and energy among others.

    “We have a bi- national commission with Nigeria and we are one of the countries with which Nigeria has this bi-national commission and it covers the whole range of political, economic and security areas. There are many areas in which we can move further and deepen our very close cooperation,” the envoy stated.

    The French Ambassador to Nigeria, Denys Gauer, who was also at the Defence House, said the French government was ready to collaborate with the Nigerian government to end terrorism in the country in particular and the sub-region in general.

    He told journalists after his meeting with Buhari that “As the French Ambassador, I came to congratulate the President- elect for his brilliant achievement. His election is an enormous achievement for Nigeria and the democratic development of Nigeria. The people of Nigeria had expressed their confidence in the President- elect. The challenges of Nigeria are enormous and I have come to wish him success.

    “We also held a small talk about our bilateral relations. As you know, our relationship has developed quite well in recent years. In the economic field, Nigeria is already the first commercial partners of France in Africa.”

     

  • Re: Our agenda for Buhari by doctors, others

    SIR: The pharmaceutical society of Nigeria wishes to express its gratitude to your publication for your exclusive on the above subject matter.

    We however wish to draw your attention to the caption – Our agenda for Buhari by doctors, others… While conceding that editors have a liberty to decide the captions that suits them best, it is imperative to point out that the aforementioned caption assaults sensibilities and deals fatal blows on the pride of health professionals especially pharmacists.

    It is painful that at a time we continue to seek mutual respect for all concerned in the health sector, this type of caption encourage the conqueror mentality doctors in collaboration with some biased stakeholders continue to impose on our perennially volatile health sector.

     

    • Gbalagade Iyiola, MAW

    Mushin, Lagos.

     

  • Boko Haram is a fraud, says Buhari

    Boko Haram is a fraud, says Buhari

    President-elect,  Muhammadu Buhari has said Boko Haram will be denied a recruitment base when local communities realise that its claim of being a religious group is a fraud.

    “The fraud called Boko Haram can be defeated by denying it a recruitment base,” Buhari told visiting leaders of Nassarawa State who came to congratulate him on his emergence as President-elect.

    “No religion allows for the killing of children. They have nothing to do with religion.

    They are terrorists and we will deal with them as they deal with terrorists anywhere,” he said.

    Buhari said he is pained by the destruction of schools in the Northeast, an action he said could deny thousands of youngsters access to education and a better future unless something was done urgently to avert this tragedy.

    “The worst thing anybody can do is to deny children access to education. That will be destructive to their lives and we are not going to allow that to happen,” the President-elect assured.

    Buhari said his government will help the states to get more money to improve infrastructure by ensuring that all federally collectible revenues are paid directly into the federation account and each tier of government given its due share.

    “As at now, the government does not even know how many revenue accounts it has. We will give all the tiers what is due to them but will hold them to be accountable as we would the federal government.”

    Buhari while describing Nassarawa state as his own “political laboratory”, meaning the only CPC-controlled state of the 36 others adjudged the experiment as having been a success.

    “From one state, I now have 22 political laboratories.”

    He commended Governor Al-Makura for surviving his many impeachment plots, saying “without Nassarawa, there would not have been an APC.”

    ‘No religion allows for the killing of children. They have nothing to do with religion. They are terrorists and we will deal with them as they deal with terrorists anywhere’

  • The other corruption Buhari must fight

    Retired General Muhammad Buhari’s presidential electoral victory of February the 28, has attracted an admixture of favours and misfortune to both the leadership and citizenry of the Nigerian state. It is truly a fortune to Nigeria for what such a victory portends for the mental re-engineering of Nigerians most of whom have unabashedly embraced corruption as a way of life. Yet it is a misfortune for it altered rather destructively, albeit partially, the political configuration of the country, which was hitherto fragmented through the agency of political parties, thereby beclouding the electorate’s senses of perception in certain parts of the country, into voting sheepishly and uncritically all in the name of pursuing the much desired change through the instrumentality of Buhari.  And one wonders whether most of the candidates so voted at the governorship and senatorial polls and subsequently declared winners and returned elected or reelected have anything in common with Buhari.

    I thought it appropriate to contribute this piece in view of the mono-dimensional nature of most of the comments and contributions made so far to navigate before the General an express way to fighting corruption in the country. Such contributions seem to have promoted the perception that corruption cannot but be economic in nature. I venture to call attention to religious corruption or corruption in religion and more importantly academic corruption or corruption in educational settings. It may not be out of place to articulate the rationale for my decision to address such an important aspect of corruption that is hardly accorded its deserved attention in our national discourse.  I am a teacher trainer with professional experience covering no fewer than four universities, three at home and one overseas. I am actively involved in teacher preparation in a number of universities in Nigeria and have seized the opportunity of my engagement with both students and lecturers to collect data across disciplines, across universities and across the years, with a view to conducting systematic studies on various dimensions of corrupt tendencies in Nigerian colleges and universities. Yet I shall, in the present article, restrict myself to the teacher factor in tertiary educational corruption.

    The incoming administration may need to show interest in who teaches and how teaching is done in our tertiary educational institutions. It certainly will interest the administration to learn that not all those who teach in such settings have any business with education. When a teacher teaches what he knows not, the outcome of such an exercise is better imagined than experienced. And when a teacher is deficient in knowledge and skills, it may not really matter whether students work hard to excel or not.  Scientific studies have revealed that a teacher with low academic quality is not likely to have academic integrity. And where there is no integrity, it may not be out of place for a teacher to give marks for sex or for cash. Consequently, some lecturers are ready to give you any score no matter how high, as long as you are ready to pay. And now that such sub-standard teachers are fast growing in number owing to our questionable retention system, the academically sound and morally upright ones most times feel unsafe and insecure. This is because every scores inflator, marks manipulator or randy lecturer has an academic godfather to protect him or her.  It is only in rare circumstances that a case concerning a lecturer’s insistence on exposing his fraudulent colleague is decided in favour of the ‘puritanist’ lecturer. Why is he trying to expose him?  Why is he always complaining about corruption? Is there an incorruptible one in Nigeria? What does it profit him to expose his colleague? These are some of the comments that are normally generated by an anti-corruption stance among lecturers, which is why our faculties are now bereft of radical and outspoken academics.

    The corrupt teacher finds a fertile ground in the lazy and fraudulent students who are ever-willing to ‘pay’ for high grades in whatever form. Accordingly, corrupt academic practices have now become a joint venture between lecturers and students. Given that every public university in Nigeria has some percentage of sub-standard lecturers who can hardly write or speak well and as such bribe, influence or manipulate their way to even becoming professors, students with tempting material or other forms of gratifications find no strain in earning high grades and most of them even end up becoming lecturers. This is so because once they are assisted to graduate with inexplicably high grades, they are encouraged by their academic god-fathers to proceed to higher levels and within a twinkle of an eye, are declared as having successfully completed their doctorates! I dare not share with Nigerians how some lecturers navigate their ways to doctorates within their departments and how any lecturer attempting to shout ‘foul’ is horrendously suppressed. Yet, there are brilliant lecturers virtually every where even though the sub-standard elements are fast out-numbering them.

    When an empty-headed teacher operates in an educational setting and attains the peak of his career one can imagine how colossal his damage to the system is.

    Nigeria’s educational system is fast getting predominantly peopled by wrong sets of certificate carriers and such an unfortunate experience flourishes unchallenged.  One is constrained to ask whether having a poorly trained pilot fly a plane will not culminate in an immediate crash. One is equally constrained to ask whether having a surgery performed by a quack surgeon will not culminate in a death. One is equally constrained to ask whether the legal profession is not sensitive about the quality of legal professional practice.  Although not without their own degree of corruption, the aforementioned professions place premium on professionalism and are able to monitor and control their operations through non-university based professional bodies. Conversely, a lecturer can spend two hours teaching nonsense in the lecture room, unchallenged, for there is no monitoring. He can also make as much money as he wishes and sleep with as many students as he likes or even attract from his students building materials for his housing projects, without being questioned. At the end of it all, highest bidders among students attract highest scores. That explains why we are no longer able to distinguish between good scores that were earned by sharp brains and high grades that were achieved with big boobs. Okey Ndibe once wrote about sexually transmitted degrees and I venture to say that only a meticulous observer can appreciate and distinguish the academically earned degrees from the sexually and romantically achieved as well as the materially or financially attracted certificates. Little wonders that many of today’s graduates from our universities cannot write a good paragraph.

    Aside the ubiquitous publications that lecturers present for elevations, which have now become the easiest thing for university lecturers, can there also not be an efficacious quality-assuring mechanism to determine the worth of every teacher? Can there not also be an effective strategy to sanction the morally bankrupt teachers? Can there not be a good and meaningful way of rewarding hard-work and commendable scholarship? Can there not be a credible means of making lecturers with integrity proud of their own incorruptible nature rather than persecute and coerce them into criminal compliance or irrational conformity.

     

    • Rufai, Ph.D teaches at Sokoto State University.

     

     

     

     

     

  • Group challenges Buhari on corruption

    Group challenges Buhari on corruption

    A non-governmental organisation (NGO) with international network and interest in African affairs, Jose Foundation, has urged President-elect, Mohammadu Buhari, to fight corruption. In a statement in London, the foundation also canvassed for the setting up of a shadow government by the opposition, as it is practised in the United Kingdom, to checkmate the incoming government and help fight corruption rather than defecting to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC). The statement signed by its President, Prince Martins Abhulimhen, congratulated Gen. Buhari and President Goodluck Jonathan for his support for the incoming government. Abhulimhen added that the foundation is at an advanced stage of organising a technical workshop in London targeted at Nigerian politicians, as part of its contributions towards strengthening democracy in Nigeria. According to him, the workshop will educate and enlighten politicians on the need to set up a shadow government to check the activities of the ruling government and proffer solutions when and where necessary. Gen. Buhari recently expressed reservations over politicians defecting to the APC, saying “I hope the people that are defecting will accept the fact that they are joining the people who succeeded. So, I don’t think they will just come and say they want to be ministers next month, simply because they were ministers before.” The foundation, Abhulimhen added, “will contribute its technical know-how to assist Nigerian politicians in setting up the shadow cabinet, to help deepen the culture of democracy, in the context of the evolving political order.” Abhulimhen advised Gen. Buhari “to look beyond party to get honest Nigerians who will serve Nigerians and put the interest of the country beyond selfish interests.” He noted that Nigeria is blessed with many qualified and enlightened men and women that will be useful in the new Nigeria and that the President-elect should look both within and outside the country, with a view of inviting capable hands to move the country forward. The foundation’s president called on well meaning Nigerians to cooperate with the incoming government, so that it can deliver dividends of democracy to the benefit of the people.

  • Indigenes appeal to Buhari to end demolition

    Natives of Kpaduma communities in Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC) of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) have called on the incoming administration of Gen. Muhammadu Buhari to end the incessant demolition of communities in the territory.

    Speaking on behalf of the natives at a news conference on Kpaduma communities’ court case against the Senator Bala Mohammed-led administration, Secretary to Kpaduma communities, Simon Baba-Yerima said with the incoming administration, there is hope for the natives against marginalisation and threat of lives by the present administration.

    According to Baba-Yerima, a situation where ancestral homes of the natives are demolished and they are driven out to look for where to reside, their farmlands are taken from them without adequate compensation, is inhumane to the natives of the FCT and should be discontinued in order for peace to reign in the territory.

    “So, we pray that the incoming administration of Gen. Buhari will put a stop to the menace and inhumane treatment that is meted on the natives of the FCT by the present administration. We have suffered a lot in the hands of this government.

    “We believe that as a leader who has the passion for the masses and not only for the high class in the society, he will listen to our cries and bring soccour to the FCT natives. We are also asking that as when the new administration comes on board, we should be carried along in order for things pertaining to the FCT to go smoothly for the benefit of everybody.

    “We are also pleading that the new minister of the FCT should be a native of the FCT. He should be chosen from any of the nine ethnic groups in Abuja, so that our rights will be protected. If we have a minister from the FCT, he will understand our problems and fashion out proper means to solve them without threat to the lives of anybody in the territory,” he said.

     

  • I’ll revisit $20b missing oil money, says Buhari

    I’ll revisit $20b missing oil money, says Buhari

    The last may not have been heard of the $20 billion “missing” oil money.

    “The new administration will take a look at it,” President-elect Muhammadu Buhari said yesterday.

    Former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, who is now the Emir of Kano, alleged that the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) failed to remit $20 billion to the federation account, but a committee, which investigated the issue, claimed that about $10 billion was unremitted. Accounting giant PricewaterhouseCoopers was brought in. It said only $1 billion was unaccounted for. Details of its report are yet to be made public.

    But Petroleum Minister Diezani Alison-Madueke has said the money, which was transferred by NNPC to the Nigeria Petroleum Development Corporation (NPDC), was being sent to the treasury.

    This is not likely to be the end of the controversial matter, going by Buhari’s view.

    Speaking while receiving a delegation from Adamawa State led by the governor-elect, Senator Jibrila Bindow, at the Presidential Campaign Office in Abuja, Buhari also said that it was unfortunate that the PDP government had practically destroyed the armed forces.

    He reiterated his earlier pledge to fight corruption and restore the confidence of Nigerians in the economy while taking practical steps to create employment for the youths.

    Buhari, who is scheduled to take office on May 29, said: “I heard that some people have started returning money; I will not believe it until I go and see for myself. You all know what the Emir of Kano talked about when he was the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria when he said $20billion,  not naira, $20 billion was unaccounted for; they said it was a lie. Instead of investigating it, they sacked him.

    “And God in His infinite mercy made him the Emir of Kano. In any case, that is what he wanted and since this was documented, the new administration will take a look at it.”

    Gen. Buhari, who decried the level of destruction inflicted on the nation by the Boko Haram insurgency, said: “I thank God for your visit. From what he (leader of delegation) has said on this problem of Boko Haram, we thank God it is now evident that this is not a religious problem, but purely terrorism. I said it earlier, all the religions we practice, both Islam and Christianity, do not support terrorism.

    “So, to go and kill people either in the mosque or in a church, market, motor park or to go and slaughter children in school, anyone who commits such a crime either does not know what Allahu Akbar (God is great) means or does not believe in it. This is terrorism. It is our hope that God gives us the power to end this.”

    Buhari spoke also on jobs, describing unemployment as Nigeria’s biggest problem. He said: “I went to 35 out of the 36 states of the federation. I went to some states about six times. I went for town hall meetings in Kano, Lagos and here in Abuja. I met with religious leaders in churches of all denominations.

    “From the airports to the streets, we saw youths running after our vehicles, sweating; some walking the whole distance to wherever we were driving to. Whether they went to school or did not go to school, they don’t have jobs.

    “This is the biggest problem we have in Nigeria today. Apart from security challenges, the next thing is to find jobs for our youths. Our youths form 60 percent of our population in Nigeria and without jobs, these people who are still bubbling with energy will constitute a danger for this nation. If our youths don’t get jobs, we will not enjoy our stay in this nation.

    “But one of the things we can do for you to fight poverty in Adamawa is the abundance of arable land that you have. Where I come from (Katsina State), the Sahara (desert) has eaten into the land and our populace who were not opportune to get  formal education became private guards because there is no more land to farm.

    “But for you in Adamawa, you are blessed with land and water for agriculture. The 16 years of the PDP has further impoverished the people. It was the PDP, not the APP, not the CPC, not the APC because of that, within the next four years, we will do our best.

     ”The three things we in the APC will give priority to are the issues of security, the economy and the war against corruption. These are three things that affect all the states in Nigeria.

    “We hope that like I have been hearing over the radio that we have regained most of the territories captured by Boko Haram; we thank God. But, among the worst atrocities committed against Nigeria by the PDP is what it has done to our military.

    “It is our military that went to Barma; the same army that when I was commissioned second lieutenant, I did not spend three weeks before I found myself in Kinshasa (in Congo), then (the civil war) in Nigeria, Sierra Leone.

    “Then to say Nigerian soldiers failed to retake 14 local government areas out of 774, for me who served in the military, I find it incomprehensible, except if I go there to find out what is the reason for this. The kind of leadership brought upon us by the PDP, whether it is documented or not, it can never be forgotten in our history.

    “Because of the (Boko Haram crisis) some of our fellow Nigerians from the Northeast don’t know where their parents are; some don’t know where their children are; their houses have been burnt, their cities, like Bama, Michika, Mubi, Madagali and the rest of them.

    “Some have built houses outside and when trouble starts they don’t even bother to carry their bags; they take a ride on Achaba (commercial motorcycle) and they flee Nigeria and leave us with the crisis. God help us.

    “I hope those of you who have been elected as members of the legislature: the Senate and the House of Representatives at the Federal and state levels, you will work with us.

    “I urge you to be patient and ensure that anything that will benefit our nation receives your support. We will try our possible best and ensure that we repair hospitals, schools, roads and ensure that we get drugs in our hospitals, books and other equipment.”

    Bindow urged Buhari to help build institutions, such as health and education. Besides, said Bindow, Buhari should fight corruption.

  • ‘Buhari , Tinubu ‘re architects of Nigeria’s modern democracy’

    ‘Buhari , Tinubu ‘re architects of Nigeria’s modern democracy’

    DELTA State All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship candidate, Olorogun O’tega Emerhor, has described President-elect Muhammadu Buhari and the party’s National Leader, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, as the great architects of the nation’s modern democracy.

    Emerhor, in a statement by his Director of Media and Political Communication, Dr. Fred Latimore Oghenesivbe, said Buhari and Tinubu worked hard to rescue the nation from the 16 years’ stronghold of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

    He said it was “obvious now that there will be a great light at the end of the tunnel for Nigerians who have been fasting and praying for change occasioned by the reckless corruption in high places in government”.

    The governorship candidate in the last election added that the misrule of the PDP provoked Tinubu, Gen. Buhari and other progressives to deploy time, treasure and talents towards the rescue of the nation from the “unprogressive cabal”.

    Emerhor said: “Asiwaju Tinubu and Gen. Buhari have finally etched their names in global political hall of fame through consistent and absolute commitment towards the entrenchment of political structures that produced the paradigm shift in our democratic experience as a nation.

    “The Nigerian nation owes the duo a lot of gratitude for their unrepentant resolve to free the country from the bondage of socio-economic backwardness and return her to the enviable status of the giant of Africa. Today, we see a great light in front of us and General Buhari is that vessel that Almighty God has chosen to restore the integrity of Nigeria in the comity of nations.”

    Emerhor noted that Nigeria under the leadership of the President-elect would witness swift revival in the area of security, commerce and industry, agriculture, power generation, functional refineries, education, mining, aviation, science and technology, infrastructural development, transportation and job creation for Nigerians.