The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Count

  • Let the votes count

    •As Anambra goes to the poll tomorrow, it must be voting without tears

    Tomorrow, Nigerians have the opportunity to assess the progress made by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) since the last general election. It is, in a way, a test run ahead of the 2019 elections. The whole world is therefore keenly watching developments in that state.

    Since the return to civil rule in 1999, Anambra State has always presented the country with bizarre commentaries in political situations. At first, it was Dr. Chinwoke Mbadinuju who was elected the helmsman. He turned out to be the weakest link of a naturally weak chain. The state had the dubious distinction of the only one, where teachers had to go on strike for more than a year. Civil servants were unpaid for months. Social and political activists became endangered. The situation was so bad that even the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had to deny the governor its ticket for the 2003 election, the only incumbent so denied.

    This was followed by the election of Dr. Chris Ngige, who turned against his godfather, Mr. Chris Uba, and thus incurred his wrath. It led to the infamous abduction of the governor in broad daylight. Only then did it come to light that the mandate was stolen from the rightful winner, Mr. Peter Obi of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA). But, Ngige was in office illegally for almost three years.

    He eventually assumed the office, but ran into bumps all through as he had a hostile PDP-dominated House of Assembly to work with. He was illegally unseated, replaced with his deputy, Mrs. Virginia Etiaba, until the Supreme Court nullified the impeachment after one year of being sidelined.

    The absurdity did not end there as he was still battling in court for his political life by election time in 2007, arguing that his tenure should not be terminated contrary to the constitutional provision that he was entitled to a four-year tenure. Dr. Andy Uba who had served as a Special Assistant to President Olusegun Obasanjo, was elected and had the shortest occupancy of the Government House – 17 days.

    Obi won at the Supreme Court and was restored to office. Today’s incumbent, Mr. Willie Obiano was Mr. Obi’s protégé, but the relationship turned sour in months. Today, Obi has turned to the PDP to salvage his political relevance in the state. He is doing everything to teach the governor a lesson, and as such they are sworn enemies.

    This narrative became necessary to situate the present setting in Anambra State. The state has a history of approaching elections as battles. Each candidate and political battle is backed by battalions and the war chests are ominous. Votes are commodities sold to the highest bidders. It is usually victory for the strongest, not the best or the most popular.

    This is why we call on the candidates to realise that the whole world is watching the scene as this is a stand-alone election. It is also one election that would be used to gauge the electoral progress in Nigeria. The candidates and political parties should live up to the expectation of the change agents they should be by scrupulously adhering to the rules, as another governorship election in the state is only four years away and the losers today, could be winners tomorrow.

    The security agencies and INEC should also play by the rules and be fair to all. Let the electorate turn out in large numbers to exercise their franchise. They should teach politicians the lesson that the people are the king, the sovereign. Unless this is done, they will be treated as expendables in the process. Selling their votes is neither noble nor smart as it mortgages their future.

    It is unfortunate that the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), a separatist group, continues to threaten fire and brimstone. The security agents have a duty to protect the people and the votes. They must be firm and fair in keeping irritants at bay. Anambra State is in focus. We have another chance of showing the world that we are able to conduct free and fair elections.

  • Time to Count Our Blessings

    May is a significant month in the Nigerian political calendar. It is the anniversary of the birthday of Nigeria’s present and longest lasting experiment in democratic governance. It will turn 18 years on May 28 and activities that will mark the event are now the preoccupation of the Federal and state governments throughout the country.

    In Taraba State, the event is particularly significant. It is the second anniversary of the most visionary and pragmatic government the state has had since the birth of this democratic dispensation in 1999 – the administration of Arc. Darius Dickson Ishaku. It is therefore time to count our blessing and it is expected that the government will roll out the drums for a deserved celebration on May 29. The atmosphere in the state is already filled with excitement as the sate prepares for that great day.

    The Ishaku administration is widely perceived in the state as highly motivated, very hard working and highly productive, in fact, the only one in many years that came in with a determination to work and with a clear and articulate blueprint of what is to be done and how it could be done.  It came into office in 2015 nursing a hunger to fulfil long delayed or denied expectations of the people. The second anniversary celebration provides an opportunity to celebrate the achievements of those two action-packed years of the Rescue Agenda of Governor Ishaku.

    Those two years represented a period of regular payment of salaries, of revival of dead or dying industries and infrastructure and a period of immense achievement in poverty alleviation through empowerment of youths, women, farmers and many others who hitherto were idle and poor. Already a central planning committee under the chairmanship of Mr Anthony Jelason, Secretary to the Government of Taraba State, is working assiduously to ensure a very successful outing for the government on May 29. This column will bring you very juicy stories about the events as they unfold in Taraba State. Keep a date with us.

    While the preparations were going on for Democracy Day were going on, members of the Governing Council of the Kwararafa University, Wukari, came into Government House on a “Thank You” visit to Governor Ishaku. The University held its maiden convocation ceremony in March this year and the state government played a key role in ensuring the success of the event. Governor Ishaku, accompanied by many of his colleague governors from other states attended the ceremony. The University’s visiting team to Government House, Jalingo on Wednesday May 10, was led by the Council’s newly appointed chairman, Dr. Julius Bala who was a primary school classmate of Governor Ishaku. The visit provided the opportunity for reliving memories of their days in school. But beyond that, they also exchanged ideas on what could be done from both ends to help the university.

    Dr Bala described the achievement of Governor Ishaku in the two years he has been in the saddle as amazing. He said he just had the privilege of driving round Jalingo a couple of weeks ago and he could not belief it was the same Jalingo that he had known before. The city, he said, now has an unbelievably high number of tarred roads with many and unique water tanks dotting everywhere. “I’m also told that that these changes are not limited to Jalingo, that they are everywhere in the state. If all these have been achieved in just two years by one man, wouldn’t it be wise for the people to retain this same man for more years”, he asked rhetorically.”

    Dr Bala thanked Governor Ishaku on behalf of the Council for all he had done to help the university in the past without which, he said, the university would have been unable to achieve one hundred percent accreditation of its programmes and made a success of its convocation. He said the institution still needed help to become financially stable and sought the assistance of the Governor to convince General T.Y Danjuma to invest in the institution.

    Governor Ishaku used the occasion to again talk about his passion for education. He said his administration was investing heavily in education because education is the bedrock of development and noted that whatever assistance his administration was offering towards the development of education was an investment which will forever impact positively on the future development of the society. He promised that his administration would continue to do whatever was required to reposition education for greater achievement.

    Ishaku promised to assist the university in developing its housing project, an issue which also featured on the “shopping list” presented to him by the Council’s chairman. He directed the state Commissioner for Housing to go take a look at the University’s housing project to ascertain in which ways the state government could help. But Ishaku gave the University’s management a hint on how it could drive the institution towards self-sustenance. He called for the establishment of a consultancy unit in the university which he said was the secret of financial stability achieved in most of Nigeria’s first and second generation universities.

    The Governor also used the occasion to talk about the achievements of his administration. Apparently reacting to Dr Bala’s comments on the immense contribution the renovated Jalingo Airport is contributing to tourism in the state, Ishaku said the government was planning a terminal’s building which will also be one of the best in the country. He said the Green House, a unique agricultural project of his administration, has been completed and plans were on for the project to be commissioned by the Acting President Yemi Osinbajo in the nearest future.

    His administration has also successfully reactivated five out of 25 industries he met on their “death beds” when he became governor in 2015 and all the five of them are now making profit. But he expressed worry about lack of continuity of government programmes and projects by succeeding administrations, a trend he said, was the reason for the slow pace of development in the country. “I have noticed that one government will spend time and funds building an institution but a destroyer will later come in the form of a new government and everything achieved will be destroyed. I’m greatly worried by this trend”, he said. He expressed the hope that some of the legacies his administration was sacrificing for today would be allowed to serve the needs of the people for a long time.

  • Abia: Our votes must count -Wachuku

    Abia: Our votes must count -Wachuku

    Chuku Wachuku, a former Director-General of the National Directorate of Employment, spoke passionately about the current political situation in Abia State in this interview with Adejo David. Excerpts: 

    The most topical issue in Abia State today is the post-election matter. What is your take on it?

    As the chairman of the Governing Council of Abia State Polytechnic, a former Director-General of the National Directorate of Employment, the National President of the Association of Agriculture and Industrial Entrepreneurs Group of Nigeria and as an electorate who hails from one of the three local councils of the state where the last gubernatorial election was cancelled by the Appeal Court, I can say that I am an elder in Abia State and a stakeholder.

    Talking about the last governorship election in my state, I dare say that the election was largely free and fair. The people voted their choice, we all voted our choice, we voted Dr Victor Ikpeazu and that is who we want as our governor.

    It is not Supreme Court judgment yet, it is Appeal Court. There are three areas you go to get judgment; one is the election tribunal which confirmed Ikpeazu’s victory at the poll. Now the Court of Appeal has nullified this victory citing irregularities in three local government councils of Abia State, one of which is mine.

    It is very confounding to say the least; this has no basis anywhere in the Electoral Act. If you want to say re- run after you have established malpractices, well that may be fair enough, but voting must be established at the polling units. You don’t just have somebody come from Abuja to say he thinks someone was voted in.

    Card reader is salient to the Electoral Act; it is not an intellectual act. The people, who introduced card reader, introduced them as experiment and they know it could be faulty. So, that’s why they also introduced forms whereby if it (card reader) could not capture, you vote manually.

    Now, talking about the election, there was no violence, we voted freely and fairly and Ikpeazu won. This was admitted, the result was admitted by the INEC. Now, how can anybody turn around and tell me that my franchise must be denied.  So, I actually represent a new movement we call:  “Our vote must count”. We are in the process of collecting signatures of over 500,000 of our people; registered voters. We are going to publish this because we voted and our vote must count. What I am saying is that we have done elections already and we say our votes must count.

    So, this movement is made up of people of these three councils, viz: Isiala North, Osisioma and Obingwa. Are you telling me that out of about 250,000 votes of the entire number of people who voted will have to be cancelled and nullified? What basis are you going to declare somebody else winner?

    So, we are glad that at least the Supreme Court is looking into the matter; I am so glad that the Chief Justice of Nigeria himself raised the alarm about conflicting judgments here and there; the facts are there.  Even in the case of Lagos State, the Supreme Court ruled that the card reader is not the sole instrument to judge an election with.

    The same Supreme Court pronounced that the Zamfara governor is duly elected because the card reader should not necessarily come into effect. That is just part of the instrument; you cannot come out and disenfranchise more than three quarters of the electorates.  This is not a system where minority rules and majority keeps quiet. This is where everybody’s votes must count; there is no question of minority or majority here.

    Now, if the other candidate is from our zone, is he telling us that even his own vote too should not count, that you can actually cancel his people’s vote?  Did you establish any thuggery?  No.  Did you establish any irregularities?  No.  Did you establish any malpractice?  No. Just some mere allegations made by some incompetent individuals.

    What about the influence of APGA in the South-East?

    There is no APGA in Abia State. I can tell you authoritatively that there is no APGA in Abia State; there is no APGA in my local government.  Their state chairman rides about on okada. You may say that is no yard stick for measuring but these are rag-tag people who are funded by one money bag because everybody needs to have a platform to contest an election. No APGA in Abia State and there has never been.

    What is the way forward?

    We are waiting for the Supreme Court which I believe will be favourable and based on that, we have also calmed everybody’s nerve down, we spend more time telling the people not to take the law into their hands because the law is clear. If the interpretation of the Electoral Act is what it is supposed to be and as it will be interpreted by those academic and legal- minded people at the Supreme Court, then that mandate belongs to the governor.

    Again, you can’t have people like me with my background; you can’t have Chuku Wachuku and you say my vote cannot count. It does not just happen that way. So, this movement which has been launched is collecting over 500,000 signatures and we are going to publish it in the papers and that will show your votes, your polling where you voted and your signature and let me see how somebody can say you can just wake up and cancel 250,000 votes, does it make sense to you?

    Even a rerun will be considered an injustice but in any case, if you rerun it ten thousand times, Okezie Ikpeazu will still win. It is as simple as that, particularly now that they have seen his colour.

    What if he loses at Supreme Court?

    He is already an elected governor.  We elected him. We are law abiding citizens; at our level, we are governed by law. If the Supreme Court decides otherwise, we are law abiding citizens but I don’t think that will happen because these votes must count, you don’t disenfranchise three quarters of the electorate by a stroke of your pen. But we are not losing sleep over that because we know that Supreme Court will do the right thing. We thank God it is the last port of call.

    The rate of unemployment in the country is already alarming, considering your track record in this area, what can be done?

    As former Director-General of the National Directorate of Employment (NDE) and also former President of the National Association of Small Scale Industries (NASSI) and currently, Founder, Association of Agriculture and Industrial Entrepreneurs, you will credit me with knowing one or two things about jobs creation.

    Now, agricultural entrepreneurs and industrialists will rule our economy tomorrow. This is the sub sector that creates millions of jobs.

    How will this association work?

    It is an advocacy, you dialogue with the government, you dialogue with stakeholders to determine and promote common interest. Everybody will tell you that some of the biggest problems that small scale businesses are facing, especially at the entrepreneurial level, are that when they ask for loans, they are required to bring collateral that they can barely raise. Government has just got to come up with an effective way to actually surmount these hurdles. We intervene in this regard.

    Government has initiated so many policies with funds amounting to billions that nobody is assessable to. We can help in this regard.

    As a member of the National Council and the former President of NASSI, I can boldly tell you that government cannot create employment, employment creation is private sector driven? The government should stop wasting money on parastatals that end up producing nothing, end up consuming the budget assigned to them and not creating one job. You have organisations with over N4billion annual budget, yet they create nothing – no jobs, no value, just duplication and multi-duplicity of functions. Investing in agriculture and entrepreneurship will change all this.

    We are in partnership with a raw material developing cluster; we are going to be talking with the Minister of Science and Technology; I am bringing in the Raw Materials Research and Development Council (RMRDC) and we are going to create clusters of industries in every local government in Nigeria. I am glad oil prices have crashed. I hope they crash some more because it will awaken that spirit of “can do” in us.  It will force us to produce what we consume and we will produce enough to even export and we are indeed exporters.

    The Abia State Government has been doing some serious jobs towards creating clusters. They are creating clusters in the required value chain and we are going to be partnering with them seriously and we are going to partner with many state governors. We are going to have to find a way to be ingenious about creating jobs.

    My advice to President Muhammadu Buhari is that he must do a critical input-output analysis. How much has the government put into our parastatals in the last five to ten years? What impact have we achieved?

  • ‘Let our people’s votes count’

    The Abia State government has called on the National Judicial Council of Nigeria (NJCN) to ensure that voters are not denied their fundamental right of deciding who governs them.

    The government reiterated that it would be an act of injustice to disenfranchise the about 300,000 registered voters in Obingwa, Osisioma and Isiala Ngwa councils where elections were cancelled.

    In its December 31, 2015 ruling, the five-member Appeal Court panel cancelled the results of Obingwa, Osisioma and Isiala Ngwa councils and declared Alex Otti of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) winner of the April 11, 2015 election.

    But Governor Okezie Ikpeazu’s Chief Press Secretary (CPS), Godwin Adindu said the judgment was replete with fundamental flaws that never before existed in Nigeria.

    His words: “This is the first time a governor is being disenfranchised together with his siblings, cousins, relatives, village and community. He’s being denied the vote of his state and federal constituencies, even when his opponent did not field any candidate in these areas.

    “This is the first time a governorship candidate, who never raised a state constituency candidate will turn around to ambush the results from the area for cancellation. APGA did not field candidates for the House of Assembly in Obingwa East and West, yet it ambushed the governorship election results for total cancellation.

    “This is the first time somebody who never raised a candidate for a federal constituency will ambush the results from that constituency for annulment. APGA did not field a candidate for Obingwa/Osisioma/Ugwunagbo federal constituency, yet it ambushed the governorship election results. Solomon Adaelu of the PDP, representing Obingwa/Osisioma/Ugwunagbo federal constituency, did not have any APGA rival in the contest.”

    Adindu urged the NJC, led by the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Mahmud Mohammed, to monitor the situation as Mr. Otti had boasted that he would get victory at the Supreme Court.

  • Making certificates count

    Making certificates count

    As the world shrinks due to globalisation, new and complex challenges are emerging rapidly; these challenges need newer and sometimes radical tools to help address them. Most people agree that education, especially at the tertiary level, plays a fundamental part in addressing complex present day challenges. For us to address a critical challenge like the shrinking labour market and the rapid production of graduates yearly, we have to explore ways of making our certificates count.

    For those who have been opportune to sit on job interview panels, one recurring decimal is the gulf between certificates presented and applicants. How, for instance, do you reconcile a first class or second class upper degree certificate with an individual that can hardly express himself, either written or orally? Our tertiary education system – more than ever – has an onerous task of looking beyond the mere award of certificates to ensuring they beneficial to individuals and the larger society.

    I find it strange that some undergraduates go through higher education for four, five and sometimes six years without having inkling about where the degree they are acquiring will lead them after school other than the porous hope that they will get some job and start a career somewhere.

    This lacuna has led to the proliferation of workshops, seminars, refresher courses and conferences bent on bridging the gap created by the quest for certificates by graduates, a failure of our educational system in adequately preparing graduates for the future. Trust Nigerians for not missing out on opportunities. A new “industry” of motivational speakers and “life” coaches has developed with a very ripe market of “buyers” for these services in the half-baked, poorly trained and ill-exposed products of our educational system. This is, however, not to imply that some of these workshops and conferences are not necessary, some credible ones definitely are.

    Without doubt, education is one of the major arbiters of socialisation but when it is reduced to mere ability to obtain a certificate by fair or foul means; it becomes a tool for underdevelopment and retrogradation, sometimes on scales hardly imagined.Our past leadership crises is a pointer to this.

    For qualitative education to be achieved and sustained, critical value must be placed on it so that those who receive it can see beyond its “putting food on the table” and refocus on the imperative to apply the gains of education to the needs of society. In other words, education, especially at the university level, needs to be properly valued and repositioned.

    A look at some of the curricula in our tertiary education system seem to suggest that we are gradually being left behind as some courses have not been reviewed to fall in line with the changed times. It is sad to know that some of our lecturers are still relying on researches conducted years ago; some of these no longer fit current challenges. For instance, of what use is churning out hundreds of thousands of graduates every year without requisite entrepreneurial skills? But today, as I have argued elsewhere, teaching and scholarship has been watered down with regular research gradually becoming a rarity.

    Education is supposed to prepare young people for the challenges of facing the future and making the best of it. It is supposed to help students to discover themselves, nurture their innate abilities and give vent to their God-given talents. Education is not supposed to put food in the hands of a hungry lad. It is supposed to help him learn the skills of scouting, hunting and getting food to satisfy the hunger as well as create value out of his acquisitions which can be exchanged for a store of further value which eventually translate to wealth creation.

    Education can therefore not be about passing examinations and getting promoted into the next grade. It cannot be about acquiring certificates or certifications that do not empower the holder to add value to society in real terms. I see it as a journey in self-discovery (which is why it never ends), a journey that leads a man to the place of his assignment, the duty post that enables him to contribute not only to the enrichment and betterment of society but also towards empowering him to attaining self-actualisation.

    It will appear the one thing our educational system has not failed to do is to glamorise riches and make it the ultimate in any human pursuit. In spite of the hollowness of the type of scholarship that is delivered across the educational chain in Nigeria, young people are not left without the now common desire and vaulting ambition to get rich as quickly and ‘effortlessly’ as possible. Is becoming successful no longer a process?

    A side effect of this is that ‘success literatures’ have taken over the book stands and libraries as a testament to the widespread subordination of hard work and diligence to riches at any cost. This in addition to the earlier stated point about the success-teaching entrepreneurs who have created a burgeoning industry out of the lacuna that has been created by formal education.

    Where did we derail? From the beginning of the quest for certificates, our prospective undergraduate is engaged in a rat race of passing his Unified Tertiary Matriculation examination (UTME) exams to scaling the extra road block of Post-UTME screening exercises. While in this race, most of them may not have been properly mentored to know what they are up against.

    The journey of higher education in Nigeria places unduly strong emphasis on students passing examinations and acquiring certificates. Serious attempt to link or lead the students and eventual graduates to discovering their calling and how the education being acquired will empower them to be masters of their destinies in the very near future are most times discounted.

    It is very easy to find graduates who know next to nothing in their chosen field of study. Again, you may ask, “how did he get the certificate?” The answer is simple – by passing exams! So those who contend that Nigerian graduates are ill-prepared for the real world of work cannot be more right after all.

    What’s my take on this? I believe the time to rethink our entire tertiary educational system is now. Education must be structured to unleash the potential in every learner, leading them to acquire the much needed skills to become a source of value addition to life and the nation.

    Much of the ignorance that encircles contemporary Nigeria today certainly stems from the education industry. It is easy to point to government’s lacklustre attitude as the major problem of the educational sector. But that cannot be the whole truth. The education industry is also an adversary unto itself. Beyond turn-coat Ministers of Education, who even as academics helped to under-develop education, teachers and students have not lived up to expectation. In the lower levels (especially in the public schools), there are quack teachers who cannot read or write good English, and yet English remains the language of instruction.

    Given the role of education in human societies, Nigeria’s future remains very bleak indeed. I say so because the educational system is merely a pastiche of the society. This is especially true of the universities which should be centres of excellence, but which have become a pitiable extension of the rotten political system in Nigeria. If the universities – indeed, the entire educational system – must be the vanguard of excellence and development, they have to operate at a level higher than the ugly realities that define contemporary Nigeria.

    An important question to ponder is this: must every secondary school leaver go to the university? Why can we not resuscitate technical/vocational schools, equip them to award certificates in select vocations such as carpentry, auto mechanics, masonry, photography, craft, pottery, printing technology, etc.? If done properly, it would reduce the unnecessary strain on the varsity system while affording some youths the opportunity to gain practical proficiency in some chosen fields without acquiring degrees in the universities for which they are ill-equipped.

    More than anything else, we need the return of a vibrant intelligentsia that can bring back the era of all round research that addresses societal needs. We should rebound from the long history of the humiliation of the collective psyche of the intelligentsia which dates far back to the military era. It is not too late for a reawakening.

     

  • ‘Votes must count in Akwa Ibom’

    ‘Votes must count in Akwa Ibom’

    Uwem Ankak reflects on the malpractices that married the recent presidential and National Assembly elections in Akwa Ibom State and warns about the danger of rigging in the next Saturday’s governorship and House of Assembly elections.

    For almost eight years, the people of Akwa Ibom have been under the suffocating influence of Governor Gods’will Akpabio, who, in active connivance of the federal might, had subjugated the people to a dizzying  and unbearable level of mental and emotional torture, self doubt and humiliation in the name of governance. They persevered, prayed and hoped that someday and somehow, and by some touch of providence, they will have a Daniel come to judgement and free them from the internal slavery which they are subjected.

    The few daring ones who attempted to voice their concerns and raised a voice in protest are either in a permanent silent mode or have traumatic tales to tell. Make no mistake, Akpabio and his goons are no respecter of persons or institutions. Ask Obong Victor Attah, the ex governor, whose regime gave Mr Akpabio the leeway to state and national limelight, and you would be regaled of what he went through in a state he can, at best, be referred to as one of the founding fathers. Chief Don Etiebet, undoubtedly, a veritable face of the Akwa Ibom people, whose company offered Mr Akpabio a job and was one of the referees for his march to governance as a state commissioner, has unpleasant tales to tell. For Obong Attah, I am sure he won’t forget in a hurry the humiliating experience he got while going to attend the burial ceremony of Chief Tony Emenyi, the pioneer State Chairman of the Peoples democratic party. The ex-governor advance party was waylaid and barricaded on his way to Oron and was forced to turn back. The man had to beat a hasty retreat and went home. Talk of the Machiavellian principle of having to eliminate and decimate your godfathers to have a safe rule.

    But, this duo and a couple of others like Wing Commander Sam Ewang, a former military Administrator of Ogun State; Chief Ime Sampson Umanah, a well-known businessman and philanthropist, and a former deputy governorship candidate; General Edet Akpan, a former Director General of the National Youth Service Corp (NYSC), were lucky to be alive to narrate their tales of woes. Others, like Chief Paul Inyang, a PDP chieftain in the state; Chief Robert Obot, the Okuibom and head of the Ibibio traditional and chieftaincy institution; and more than 180 were not that lucky. They are cold, six feet beneath, in the grave! These are incidences that Akwa Ibom people would not forget in a hurry. No arrest, prosecution or even a reprimand have been recorded. The perpetrators have tacit support of the state as demonstrated by the lopsidedness in the way those cases were handled. And this is about deaths, attempted deaths, kidnapping ( a strange phenomenon our people never knew, even at the height of militancy in the Niger Delta), cultism, rape, child theft, etc.

    If the people were frightened of untimely deaths, they were overwhelmed by the quantum of financial recklessness in the state. Apart from the published accruals to the state from the federal account, the income from internally generate revenues has always been, in the almost eight years of Mr Akpabio’s reign, in the realm of speculation and gossip by the citizens of the state. An insight into the way the administration spends the state funds could be gauged by the comment of the Minister of Finance, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who, in a convocation speech at Babcock university, Ogun state, told an astonished audience that Akwa Ibom State had not spent up to 10 percent of its revenue from the Federation in the development of the state. Every Akwa Ibom person knows this truth to be absolute. For those who follow the uncommon transformation series on television across Nigeria, and who may have been hoodwinked by the aesthetics and colouring of that programme, you would have noticed that since 2009, you have been watching the same pictures with different narratives and from different angles.

    You probably must have seen the concentric flyover, few kilometres of roads, e-library, underground water drainage (…IBB road, Uyo and other places were flooded during the rain last week), Ibom Tropicana, completion of airport (started by the Attah administration), Ibom power plant which the previous administration had commissioned a section, etc. These were projects you were seeing in the uncommon Transformation series since 2009. After that, the major project you will see would be the football stadium in Uyo, the one aptly tagged ‘ The nest of champions (really?) The ongoing project, I will like to add charitably, are the specialist hospital, which contractors have moved out of site for non payment, the Uyo – Ikot Ekpene highway, a less than 22 kilometre stretch. Decorations, roundabouts dots a few places. But, the most debilitating is the debt profile of the state, put conservatively at about N600b. Adams Oshiomhole, Edo state governor gave an insight some weeks ago on the state of debt and a state which is moving steadily to a debt slavery.

    In all these, the Akwa Ibom people have not seen any industry, even at cottage level, which the administration has built. The few ones which the late Dr Clement Isong, former governor of old Cross River State sited in now Akwa Ibom State such the Battery, Biscuit, Ceramic, Qua Steel mill, Paint Industry are moribund and we are told, have been sold out to the brothers and cronies of the state governor. It is on record that, in the eight years of the Akpabio Administration, no economic enhancing projects have been initiated in the state to help the teeming population of university graduates who daily pound the streets of Uyo, with forlorn faces without any hope or access to social safety nets.

    Rather, what we see are white elephant and entertainment spots like the Tropicana (a cinema house), an e-library which are not even equipped for the benefit of even those who need it. But, this is a state who earned over five trillion naira from the federation account in the last eight years! This sum is almost equivalent to the revenue that accrues to all the five eastern states of Nigeria! In Anambra state alone, we have seen a state that not only established Orient Petroleum, but made the environment very conducive for one of the biggest brewing companies in the world to establish a plant! In the neighbouring Cross River State, big businesses are pouring in also, and thanks to the former governor Donald Duke (another president Nigerians desire), the world biggest electric company is building a plant there. There are farm settlement and international processing plants everywhere. It is today the hub of fruit juice business in Nigeria today.

    In Akwa Ibom State under  this present regime, we have seen a state that drove away a refinery project, Amankpe Refinery. This a project that some well-meaning indigenes of the state put together in far-away United states of America and was frustrated from take off. This company should have delivered more than 5,000 direct jobs and thousands of indirect jobs. The full story of the botched Amankpe refinery would be told to the world sooner than later. Nigerians would be shocked to know how pettiness, selfishness in government drove away a multi billion dollar project and denied its citizens the opportunity to earn a living, and ultimately benefit from the value-chain the business would have provided.

  • Make your vote count, council chief urges students

    Barely two weeks to the commencement of voters registration exercise slated for 15 August 2014, in Cross River State, chairman of Akamkpa Local Government Area, Hon. Joseph Itotup, has urged students to come out en masse to participate in the exercise. He said it was the only way to exercise their franchise in the 2015 general elections.

    Itotub spoke when students under the aegis of the National Association of Akamkpa Students (NAAS) visited him in his office last week. He said arrangements were on to ensure students in the area gain requisite skills acquisition to be self-employed.

    “We are making arrangements to make sure all youth from this area are trained in various skills and to give indigent students scholarship studying various professional courses in and outside the country. As the Chairman of this council, I would continue to create an enabling environment for you because I know we have prospective governors and law makers here. I assure you that very soon, I would release your bursary which would be increased to N20,000,” he said.

    The president of the association, Enyam Kelvin, said he was working hard for the welfare of the students in the various tertiary institutions in the country.

  • Count President out of Rivers crisis, say Okupe, PDP

    Count President out of Rivers crisis, say Okupe, PDP

    Senior Special Adviser to the President on Public Affairs Dr. Doyin Okupe and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday dissociated President Goodluck Jonathan from the Rivers State political imbroglio.

    Okupe, who spoke with reporters in Abuja, said Amaechi was too small for the President to fight, adding that the crisis should be situated within the local politics of Rivers State.

    He said: “For the avoidance of doubt and at the risk of repetitiveness, we wish to state categorically that in spite of what the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) will want the Nigerian people to believe, President Goodluck Jonathan is absolutely unconnected and definitely not involved in the political crisis that seemed to have engulfed Rivers State in recent times.

    “The President is not, has not and will never engineer any act that can cause disaffection between Governor Rotimi Amaechi or any other Governor and the state legislature or any other institution of government.”

    The President’s aide insisted that since Jonathan’s election as president over two years ago, his personal and official mien had revealed a personality that has utmost respect for democracy and rule of law.

    Okupe described the position of the opposition as “condemnable, extremist and fundamentally flawed”.

    He added: “We therefore call on our distinguished and honorable parliamentarians and the general public to ignore and disregard the self-serving and unpatriotic call for impeachment of the President by the Action Congress of Nigeria.”

    In a statement yesterday, Acting National Publicity Secretary of the PDP, Mr. Tony Okeke, said the call for the impeachment of the President was “malicious and the height of political irresponsibility”.

    The statement said: “President Goodluck Jonathan has continued to display commitment, candour and sincerity in handling national issues. It is therefore a sign of frustration, desperation and defeat for the opposition to call for the impeachment of the President on account of the issues in Rivers State.”

  • ‘How to make Africa’s intellectualism count’

    Africa has remained under-developed because of lack of belief in the ideas of its people, speakers at a book presentation and foundation inauguration said yesterday in Lagos.

    This lack of belief, they said, is born out of poverty and unwillingness to discard an inferior mentality.

    To reverse this trend, there is the need to accord greater value to African indigenous system and depend less on Western ideas in solving the continent’s development problems.

    In a bid to promote Africa’s effective participation in the world of ideas and ensure that its development is spearheaded and sustained by the ideas of its people, the Okali Seminal Ideas Foundation for Africa (OSIFA), was inaugurated.

    The Founder/Chairman of the foundation, Dr Agwu Ukiwe Okali, regretted that Africans do not receive corresponding respect for their intellectual competence and abilities, despite the fact that they can hold their own in any task anywhere.

    The consequence, he said, is that the developed world does not consider Africa as a good ideas source.

    Also launched at the event was a book by Okali, entitled: Of Black Servitude without Slavery: the Unspoken Politics of Language. It is the first volume of OSIFA’s Africa Seminal Ideas Series.

    The author holds a Bachelor of Laws degree from the London School of Economics and Political Science, as well as a Master of Laws and Doctor of Juridical Science degrees from Harvard Law School.

    Okali had a distinguished career at the United Nations (UN), last serving as Registrar of the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, with the rank of United Nations Assistant Secretary General.

    He said: “We (Africans) are not providing intellectual input to thing. We don’t see African input. Every society has its ideas by which it resolves its survival issues. The only difference is articulation.

    “We need to have a system for collecting and articulating the various ideas concerning everything. This is one of the things we want OSIFA to do,” he said.

    Immediate past Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Dr jean Ping, who was the keynote speaker, said “the outside world” has foisted on Africa a persistently negative assessment of its intellectualism.

    This, he said, has led to a loss of self-confidence by Africans and an apparent inability to break out of a state of “ideas-dependency”; worsened by the myth that “no good thing has, or can, come from Africa.”

    Ping said despite effort by many scholars to re-evaluate and re-direct attention to African cultures, African intellectualism continues to find itself “acquiescing in, and often, indeed accepting, and living this dangerous myth about the continent.”

    The consequence, according to him, is that approaches that evolved from African environments and cultures are hardly put into consideration when addressing developmental problems.

    “Instead, the instinct is automatically to reach for the foreign-scripted manual or blueprint for solution,” he said.

    Further compounding the problem, Ping said, are poverty and “the pressures of the stomach.”

    He said due to poverty and their generally-deprives circumstances, the primary pre-occupation of majority of Africans is with meeting daily survival needs.

    “The work of re-focusing African minds to accord greater value to African indigenous systems, will, therefore, be greatly lightened by visible improvement in the way African states manage their affairs…

    “A political dispensation that sets a high store on the value of good leadership is, therefore, needed to elevate the image of Africa and bolster the effort of re-launching African intellectualism into the world of ideas, and re-directing it towards fostering African development.”

    Reviewing the publication, writer/critic Prof Kole Omotoso called it “a book to crow about.”

    He said European languages as well as a few other non-European ones harbour in their systems, blatant concepts, ideas, expressions and words which are anti-black and so racist against Africans and people of African descent.

    The book, he said, deals specifically with English, highlighting the fact that it is simply unacceptable that such a world-wide means of communication should be the carrier of racist sentiments, consciously and unconsciously, on a daily basis, around the globe.

    “That an African should take on the crusade of ridding the English language, as well as the other European and non-European languages, of this blemish is something to crow about,” Omotoso said.

  • Can we count on FERMA?

    Can we count on FERMA?

    •The agency once again promised to repair all bad roads. But we’ve heard that before

    The deplorable state of federal roads, especially in the south-west, has suddenly caught the attention of the Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA). But we do not know how far this would go, especially when there was a presidential directive by the Presidency to FERMA, months ago, that all critical Federal Government highways must be fixed by December 2012. Already, we are almost mid-way into the second month of the year and nothing concrete has taken place on these strategic federal roads.

    The Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, for instance, has consistently been an object of ridicule for years. Could the problem be that of inadequate funding? FERMA reportedly requires about N320 billion yearly to maintain and put in shape Nigeria’s 194,200 kilometres of roads. According to Olajide Adeniji, the agency’s chairman, 34 percent of this sum will be required for the federal road networks, 16 percent for state roads and 50 percent for local government roads.

    In our view, FERMA should concentrate on federal roads rehabilitation that falls within its purview. After all, despite the fact that the Federal Government spent over N1.05 trillion to develop road networks between 1976 and 2012, during which hundreds of kilometres were purportedly improved, rehabilitated and maintained, the state of roads, especially federal roads across the country, remains pathetic.

    What then has FERMA been doing since inception when its impact cannot be felt by the populace? With the awful state of federal roads across the country, we doubt if the agency has attained its professed 35 per cent efficiency since its establishment.

    We can count quite a few of these bad roads which include: Benin-Asaba-Onitsha Road, Benin-Shagamu (Ofusu-Ajebandele) Road; Benin-Ekpoma-Auchi Road, Sagamu-Port-Harcourt, Lokoja-Abuja and Ewu-Uromi-Agbor roads. Even more obvious are the numerous dangerous craters on the Lagos-Abeokuta and Lagos-Ibadan expressways that are begging for FERMA’s attention. What has happened to the zero potholes target set by the agency? What has happened to the all-important presidential ultimatum of December, 2012?

    In view of this not so inspiring performance and disregard for presidential order, we are not surprised that FERMA still has the effrontery of coming out to pledge its commitment to the rehabilitation, this year, of major highways in the south-west geo-political zone. This is in spite of the fact that the south-west is just one of the six geo-political zones in the nation with roads, that require attention. Most roads in the south-south, south-east and north-central, among others, must be attended to by FERMA as a matter of urgency.