The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Fear

  • ‘The fear of Badoo…’

    ‘The fear of Badoo…’

    We are at the mercy of the gang in Ikorodu. No fewer than 50 residents have been killed in the last three years since the gang launched its attack on Ikorodu neighbourhoods.Some residents who moved into Ikorodu after they completed their houses have since relocated to other parts of Lagos for fear of being killed by members of the gang.

    I am very sure that they use  (‘African insurance’) because there is no way their victims would not shout for help or raise the alarm while being mutilated with cutlass or smashed with heavy stones. This is the puzzle that residents and the police have not been able to find answers to

    Adeola Ibiyemi’s relative joy took flight and has not returned several months after his sister’s family was wiped out by unidentified suspected ritualists called ‘Badoo’ in the Ibeshe area of Ikorodu in early 2016.

    “I am yet to get over the shock of the incident,” said the 25-year-old artisan turned okada operator.

    “I was devastated, hence, I relocated from my house which was a shouting distance from my sister’s residence in Ibeshe in order to overcome the trauma of the incident, ” he said.

    But rather than his relocation assuaging the tragic killing of his sibling and children, his new abode brought back the memory of the scenario in which his sister and her children’s life were snuffed out. A few months after his arrival, the blood-sucking gang, in the early hours of September 29, last year, took their gory lust to church premises at Oke-Ota community in Ibeshe and shot dead six members of a family. The victims, Celestine Nwokoye, a taxi driver at the Murtala Mohammed Airport, his wife and four children, including an eight-month-old baby, were slain in cold blood.

    “The incident at the church shocked me beyond words. I started recalling what I saw at the scene where my sister and her family were killed. I did not know whether to relocate again from Ibeshe or not because the killings have since increased in the community,” he added.

    Like Ibiyemi, Ademola Shotineyin, another resident, recalled how the gang killed occupants of a building on his street during a night attack. He explained that the residents no longer sleep with their eyes closed to avoid being caught unawares by the gang.

    “I know of a man who was alongside his wife and children in October 2016 on my street. We were shocked to find the family in a pool of their blood at dawn. They were killed by the gang for rituals. Now, we no longer sleep with our eyes closed for fear of being attacked by the gang members.

    The marauding gang had earlier struck in June 2016 in Ibeshe. They killed a Ghanaian woman after raping her and inflicted injuries on her eight- month-old baby. Not satisfied, they returned to the community in July 2016, raped and blinded a 60-year-old Francisca, while her 10-year-old daughter who raised the alarm was brutalised.

    ”Four months later, precisely on October 21, 2016, the gang allegedly stormed Oluwoye area of Ibeshe, where a man, identified as Kazeem, his pregnant wife, Afusat, 30, and the couple’s two children- Rodiat, 6, and Opeyemi, 5, were stabbed to death.”

    The brutal killing of innocent residents reoccurred on April 11, 2017, when the gang bared its cruel fang on the family of a school leaver, Lucky Ebhodaghe. The teenager, his father and mother were hacked to death at their residence in Ibeshe Tuntun in a midnight attack. The assailants inflicted deep machete cuts on Lucky’s father, while his mother was initially raped before being killed.

    On December 26, 2016, the gang maimed Azeezat Oriade and her brother, Habeeb, on Saka Adegbose Street, off Olu Odo Road, Ibeshe, and also killed a woman and her three children on Mosafejo area of Agbowa are of the community.

    “We are at the mercy of the gang in Ikorodu. No fewer than 50 residents have been killed in the last three years since the gang launched its attack on Ikorodu neighbourhoods.

    “Some residents who moved into Ikorodu after they completed their houses have since relocated to other parts of Lagos for fear of being killed by members of the gang. The situation is made worse by the near-absence of a proactive security measure to checkmate the gang.”

    Pattern of killings

    The gang, it was learnt, usually sneak into their victim’s homes in the dead of the night while tired residents are snoring in their beds after a hectic day’s work. They would pull down iron bars and window’s net to enter into their victim’s homes.

    This was the case in the attack on the Ebhodages when the gang tore the window net and cut burglar- proof iron to gain access into the victims’ apartment, before inflicting machete cuts on them. Curiously, while the attack was ongoing, neighbours of the deceased were not aware of the incident until the next day in the noon.

    “Badoo boys use juju (’African insurance’) which tranquilises their victims and neighbours whenever they want to attack any building. That is the reason why it has become very difficult to arrest them at the scene or identify who they are,” a resident, who chose not to be identified, said.

    “I am very sure that they use juju because there is no way their victims would not shout for help or raise the alarm while being mutilated with a cutlass or smashed with heavy stones. This is the puzzle that residents and the police have not been able to find answers to, ” he added.

    The gang, it was also learned, usually wipe the blood of their victims and private part of their female victims with a cloth after they have been raped.

    It was observed that Lucky Ebhodaghe’s mother was raped by the Badoo cult group as her underwear was torn into shreds when people saw her lifeless body at the scene of the attack, while it was also observed that her private parts had been roughened. The bottom line is that the gang rape their female victims and use them for rituals,” said a resident who identified herself as Omobolanle.

    It was the same scenario when members of the gang attacked a family of six in Adeke bus stop, Adamo, Imota area of Ikorodu on May 3, 2017. The gang killed a man, Taofiq Agbaje, his wife Simiat, and two of their four children, Rodiat, 10, and Toyeebat, 8, while the couple’s two other children, Mardiya, 13 and her one-year-old sister reportedly sustained injuries. The gang had sneaked into the couple’s apartment after tearing the window net and removing burglar-proof of their home.

    “They hit the couple and their children with hard objects and wiped away their blood with clothes suspected to be handkerchiefs”, said a community leader who did not want to be identified.

    The gang has intensified their terror activities with the result that fearful residents have started relocating from the affected communities. “The situation”, according to a community leader, Chief Christopher Adejuwon, ” has become unbearable for the residents who are daily tormented by the killing of innocent people and feel insecure as there is an inadequate security of their lives and property.

    “Quite a number of landlords who are members of the community development association have abandoned their houses and relocated from Ibeshe for fear of being killed by the Badoo boys.

    “We have made several appeals to the Divisional Police Station in the community and other security agencies to save us from the killer gang but, nothing much has been done to protect us as the gang has become emboldened to further kill more people. We are calling on the state government and law enforcement agencies to save us from this heartless gang.”

    Despite repeated assurances given in 2016, by both the security agencies to arrest the situation and burst the gang, there seems to be no let in their dastardly activities as they continue to unleash horror on Ibeshe and other Ikorodu communities.

    Exasperated over the continuous activities of the gang, residents of Itesiwaju area of Ibeshe took the law into their own hands on Saturday, July 23, 2016. That day, a member of the gang had sneaked into a parish of the Celestial Church of Christ in the community during a vigil and abducted an eight- year- old girl whom he allegedly raped into a coma. He was caught and set ablaze by an angry mob.

    However, the release of a suspect within the same period, according to residents, might have emboldened members of the gang to continue with their violent killing of residents.

    A resident of Oke Ata area of Ibeshe said: ” At Ibeshe, vigilant residents arrested a suspected member of the gang sometime in 2016, but the suspect was released no sooner than he was arrested to the chagrin of the aggrieved residents. He was released for want of diligent prosecution by the police, hence, the gang’s members are further emboldened to continue with their dastardly killing of hapless residnts.

    We are tired of being killed or maimed by members of Badoo gang in Ikorodu and its environs. We have carried out peaceful protests to concerned government agencies since the gang turned our neighbourhoods into a human abattoir, but nothing has been done to help us.

    “We are now using this opportunity to once again draw the attention of the state government, the police and other concerned security agencies to our plight. We are tired of being brutalised and killed by some heartless youths who are being sent by their unidentified godfathers to carry out killings for ritual purposes.”

    Responding, the Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Olarinde Famous -Cole, an Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), said investigations were ongoing to contain the activities of the gang. He said the police had stepped its surveillance in Ikorodu area of the state in order to ensure protection of lives and property.

    “Investigation is ongoing as regards ritual activities in the area. Increased police visibility and adequate security is in force in the entire axis of Ikorodu and Lagos,” Olarinde said.

  • No cause for fear in Epe, says govt

    FOR the second time in one week, farmers, especially in Epe, a riverine community in Lagos, yesterday got an assurance on their safety from the government.
    The government “adequate measures” were being taken to protect them from kidnappers, who have been unleashing terror on Epe
    Rising from the monthly Security Council Meeting chaired by the Governor Akinwunmi Ambode, the government assured residents and investors of its commitment to their security and well-being.
    Commissioner of Police Fatai Owoseni, who briefed reporters after the meeting, said the council reviewed the security situation in the state in the last one month and resolved to redouble efforts at maintaining law and order.
    Owoseni said: “I can tell you that so many commitments have been made. The governor about two weeks ago led security council members to Epe where so many commitments were made and some of the measures and strategies are being put in place to check this menace.
    “I want to assure the people within that axis that the commitment of the government to their security is unwavering and we can assure them that they will be able to do what they are doing to earn their livelihood without fear of molestation or threat of being attacked.
    “We have so many plans and I think that we are not supposed to reveal much about our strategies for now because it is a cat and mouse thing but most importantly is the commitment of everyone to the fight against crime. On the part of the State Government, I can assure the people that the commitment is unwavering.”

  • The fear of padding

    Never before was a budget so embroiled in controversy like that of 2016. For sure, what happened during the processing of the budget must have happened before. The only difference is that whatever it was, it was kept away from us. Unknown to us, a cabal had always been at work in the preparation of the budget. In the days of the military, those in the Ministry of Finance, the Budget Office and the National Planning Commission (NPC) just gave us figures which we lapped up.

    The bureaucrats in the civil service know how to doctor (read as pad) a budget. Ministers who do not know their onions do not stand a chance with them. The more they looked the less they saw whenever these bureaucrats came with their abracadabra when computing the figures. Any minister of finance must be a step ahead of them in order to beat them in their own game. But they know how to win those ministers to their side.

    They tell them stories of how things were done in the past with everybody smiling home at the end of the day. ’’Oga, abi you come count bridge for here’’, they will tell a gullible minister. In no time, he will join them and become a pawn in their hands. They will commit all sorts of atrocities in his name and he will not be able to call them to order. The preparation of the budget was and may still be a means of stealing public funds. If we did not know in the past, we now know that budgets were never prepared with the best of intentions, at least going by the 2016 standard

    All those involved in the process had their own agenda and that was what is in it for them. What happened during the preparation of this year’s budget during this time last year was an eye opener. Being the first budget of the Buhari administration, the government did all it could to come out with a budget that will pass the integrity test, but the cabal still had its way. Even before the estimates were sent to the National Assembly, we had started hearing about padding here and there. The various ministries which were to forward their proposals to the Ministry of Budget, which is the clearing house, had doctored the figures to suit their own  needs.

    They put in irrelevances and allocated money to them, which they expected to cash once the National Assembly approved the budget. The assembly too has since become wiser to the ways of civil servants. Its members know how to handle such matters and can even beat the civil servants at their own game. They know what the civil servants had done in compiling the budget. So, they wait for them at the budget defence stage. By the time they ask one or two questions, the ministers and their coterie of aides will be looking askance. Then, they will be told to go back and take another look at the estimates, which is euphemism for them to go and add the lawmakers’ cut, if they have not done so. This thing has been on for ages and those involved have been doing it to the detriment of our collective will, while they have been smiling to the banks.

    The harm done to the budget by these padders is enormous because the money allegedly allocated to some projects is not eventually seen. The projects just appear on paper while the money ends up in the pockets of individuals. The most painful is that of the lawmakers, who are expected to protect the people’s interest. They too are on the take having been brought on the groovy train by unscrupulous bureaucrats. The lawmakers have perfected the act of making money with the budget. Since, according to them, they did not come to Abuja to look at the Eagle Square, they have found it profitable to pad the budget than to make appropriate funds for the people’s needs.

    We have heard from former House of Representatives Appropriations Committee Chairman Abdulmumin Jibrin how the lawmakers padded this year’s budget for their own gain. Jibrin was not saying anything new. It had for long been in the public domain that our lawmakers are corrupt. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo said so many times while in office, but we did not listen to him. Unfortunately, we were not allowed to see the end of Jibrin’s allegations as his colleagues hurriedly suspended him before he could release more details about budget padding and corruption generally in the House. But the nation has learnt a big lesson from it all. Once beaten, they say, twice shy. With the benefit of hindsight, President Muhammadu Buhari has warned that he would not allow next year’s budget to be padded. Apparently still smarting from what happened to this year’s budget, he said in Abuja last weekend that he would prevent the padding of the 2017 Budget.

    ‘’I am waiting for the 2017 Budget to be brought to us in Council. Any sign of padding anywhere, I will remove it. I have been in government since 1975, variously as governor, oil minister, head of state and chairman of the Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF). Never did I hear the word ‘padding’ till the 2016 Budget’’, he said, adding that such would never happen again under his watch. Well said sir, but what did we do to those who padded this year’s budget beyond relieving them of their jobs? They should be brought to book to deter others who may wish to toe the same path.  If we do not do that, it will amount to paying lip service to the anti-corruption crusade.

     

    Cuba after Castro

    Cuba’s strongman, the irrepressible Fidel Castro, died last weekend at the age of 90. His death marked the end of an era in that island nation. Castro was a communist to the core. Even when communism was dying worldwide, he remained committed. He ruled his country with iron hand and called the bluff of many world powers, including the United States (US), which he railed against for years.   The Bay of Pigs episode will forever define his sour relations with the US. Cuba gave the US a bloody nose in that bitter enterprise following the failure of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to topple him between April 17 and 19, 1961. Since then, Cuba and the US have been fighting a cold war. There is no doubt that Castro loved his country, but he loved power more. This is why he did not allow democracy to thrive. He ran a one-man government and when he became ill few years ago, he handed the reins to his younger brother, Raul. The younger Castro, who was his elder brother’s defence minister and head of the armed forces, has been running the show for eight years now. At 85, age is not on his side. With his brother gone, he should be thinking of what Cuba will look like when he too eventually goes the way of every mortal.  The Castros have done their best for Cuba, but their best legacy for their country will be to leave it in the hands of capable people after they are gone. This is now the task of Raul Castro. Will he let go and allow the country to rediscover itself and chart a new course before the end comes?

  • His Excellency’s fear

    Moseyn Ekiw was topsy-turvy. As a junior minister in the immediate Federal Administration, he was extremely close to the wife of the President who ensured he got almost everything he wanted. In return, he was generous to her using public funds meant for the development of the primary education.

    At a point, he was paying her $1m every month. There were other kinds of gifts too. Cars, houses and so on. He had done this with no fear in his heart; after all, their party, the Umbrella Peoples Party (UPP), was meant to be in power for 50 years in the first instance. And as at that time, the party had only done a decade and a half.

    But things changed, the party was booted out of power at the federal level. A new party formed some two years before the last general elections, Broom Revolution Party (BRP), took the reins of power in Naigra. He stopped being a minister too but was lucky to become governor of Waters State after fighting a legal battle that initially looked like he was going to lose.

    Reading the newspapers and watching discussions on television stations brought him nothing but sadness. Topsy-turvy was the best way to describe his mood, especially when alone. Outside, he still put on the usual strong man’s mien.

    As he sat on the two-seater in his Quiet Room, his phone rang. He ignored the call. He grabbed a copy of The Country, that newspaper he liked to describe as useless all because of its critical stand on his administration.

    On its front page was a detailed report about the former President’s wife’s messy probe over some millions of dollars found in some accounts which she claimed belonged to her. As one who was giving her huge sums in dollars regularly when he was a junior minister, Ekiw was afraid that at some point, the investigators might stumble on facts linking him to the whole messy deals. And that was the last thing he needed. Kidnappers were making his life hell; cultists were doing theirs; and armed robbers were not left out of the drama that his life had become since he took over from Timiro Ihceama.

    As he made to drop the newspaper, his phone rang again. He picked it.

    “Good morning your Excellency,” said Ogbogboro Maxwell, the leader of the umbrella body of youth from Water-lodged territories.

    “Good morning Max,” Ekiw replied.

    “Your Excellency, I need to come and see you right away. As a matter of fact, I am right in front of your lodge. Tell the security to let me in. It is urgent I see you right away and it is not something I can discuss on phone. We don’t know who is tapping our calls…”

    “Okay, they will let you in and lead you to where I am…”

    “Thanks your Excellency…”

    Ekiw grabbed his phone and called his Chief Security Officer. Five minutes later, Max was sitting in the Quiet Room. The first thing that caught his attention was the front page report in The Country.

    He grabbed it and said: “This is why I have come to see you, Your Excellency. We can’t allow this to continue. These people cannot continue to rubbish our former First Family. We must stop them…”

    “How?” Ekiw asked.

    “Let’s occupy the offices of the Commission Against Financial Crimes. We will start with the one here and later we will move to the federal capital. I will mobilise youths and we will occupy till we are assured the probe of the former first family will be stopped. We will make it look like a spontaneous thing, not influenced by anybody and we will get the media to cover it adequately. Your media aide can work with us in the background.”

    “And do you think that will achieve anything?”

    “Your Excellency, there is no harm in trying. We will present our case like that of victimization and add a tinge of threat to it. We will threaten to make the country ungovernable if our icons are continuously harassed. We will remind them that if the former first family had tried to stay put in power, no one would have been able to stop him. We will deliver a letter to them letting them know what peace in our region means to the country.”

    Ekiw thought of the proposal for some time and eventually gave his blessing.

    “I will send N30 million to your account. How fast can we do it?”

    “If I get the money now, we can do it today…”

    “You will have the money in five minutes…”

    “Okay then, let me go and start the mobilisation so that the protest can take place in the next one hour…”

    “Don’t forget to mobilise reporters too. We must get the message out there. Get someone to co-ordinate the social media too…”

    “No wahala, your Excellency.”

    Max took his leave. Ekiw grabbed his phone and called his media aide.

    “Get in touch with Max. He will brief you about what you need to do for him,” he said before his aide could even say yes sir.

    Five hours later, he tuned the television to Newstrack and there was Max with a big mega phone and hundreds of youths in front of the office of the Commission Against Financial Crimes. He increased the volume to hear his statement.

    “This nonsense must stop. You guys must stop harassing our icon. Mama contributed a lot to this country. This is not how to pay her back. Whatever money you find in her accounts were gifts and to the best of our knowledge taking gifts has not become an offence in our statute books. Our culture as Africans even frowns at people who reject gifts.

    “If you people  claim to be fair, then probe her predecessors too and make their accounts’ statements public. Picking on her alone in itself is corruption. You people are corrupting the anti-corruption war and that shows you are confused and need to be re-directed.

    “If this nonsense against our most important female icon does not stop in the next few days, we will occupy your headquarters and nothing can stop us. And as we are occupying your headquarters, we will also cripple the economy by ensuring no one pumps a single barrel of oil in our region. This country belongs to all of us and we need to be fairly treated. You conspired against our region by pushing our man out of power. Now, you will not even allow them enjoy their lives outside power. This is arrant nonsense and it must stop and if you refuse to stop it, we will force you to do so…”

    Max’s performance impressed Ekiw. He spoke well, he told himself and called his media aide.

    “How are we doing on the social media?”

    “We are trending sir…”

    “Take over lindaikeji and other blogs too with comments. You know how you do it now. And also flood our own blog. That one you started when I was minister,” he instructed an dropped the call before the poor chap could soak in the message.

    H e was soon on his bed trying to sleep, but sleep he could not. He caught the image of someone who had murdered sleep and throw it out of the window. But he was used to battles and this one he would fight.

    He got out of bed, put a call through to the former president’s wife and they chatted about the whole development for some time.

    “You must continue the protest. We are in this together. Shebi, you know,” the ex-president’s wife told Ekiw.

    “I know ma and I can’t afford to leave it to you alone. Not even now that you are not in the country. I have to take up the battle discretely. Next week, Max and his boys will match on Abuja. We are already working on it…”

    “Okay, thank you. We go talk later. Make I go sleep…”

    “Sweet dreams ma,” he said as he hung up.

    He grabbed some sleeping pills and flushed them down his system. Five minutes later, he was in the land of the living death. But, he would wake up to face his fear.

  • An unreasonable and irrational fear of mental illness: (Part 1)

    There is probably no area of healthcare or medicine that is unreasonably feared like mental health disorders.

    The mere mention of psychiatric illness in the public and even among clinicians seems to drive exceeding panic into the minds of the listeners. Yet, this apprehension is unjustified and unreasonable.

    The data from the World Health Organisation (WHO) and researchers across Nigeria and, indeed, in the world, paint a very but different picture.

    In the barest minimum, one in every five Nigerians suffers from one form of mental health disorder or the other.

    If we translate this figure into real numbers to reflect the population, then we shall begin to see the enormity of psychiatric illnesses in the country.  Assuming that we accept the  population of Nigeria to be 180 million, that means about 36 million Nigerians are mentally unwell. This percentage proportion (not the numbers) is comparable to what is obtainable in the United K and United States.

    To make matters worsisome, mental health is not only stigmatised but very often erroneously attributed to drugs misuse as well as supernatural forces in Nigeria. Sadly, various religious groups, including traditional religious groups, want to “cast out the demon” that is causing mental illness in an individual sufferers.

    The apprehension of the society and individuals against mental health sufferers is understandable but nonetheless irrational. The society’s fear of violent mentally disordered person is palpable.  When I ventured to work in mental health in the UK, on my first day, I was a bit timid until my senior colleagues informed and counselled me that only two per cent or less of mental health patients are actually violent or aggressive. Ninety-eight per cent go about without causing trouble.

    This reflection holds true till this day. Certainly, the few violent conducts of mentally ill patients that got into the media seem to blow the events out of proportions, yet thousands of innocent people in the world are killed by non-mentally ill persons daily via accidents, gun shots, poisoning, wars, and violent-related behaviours. Scientific evidence does not support most cultural and religious positions on mental health. That is not to claim that religion and cultures have no role to play in the healing process: they certainly do as we shall see later.

    Thus, in this series on mental health, we shall be dealing with causes of mental health illness. In the weeks to follow, we shall be looking at the common disorders of anxiety, depression, psychosis as well as mental illness in children, special situations such as pregnancy and care of the elderly.

    Let us take a greater look at the causes of mental illness albeit, specific and definitive causes, which are a continuing subject of investigation.

    Taking a cue from Mind Charity (UK), the following factors could potentially trigger a period of poor mental health.

    Childhood abuse:  Abuse can come in various forms. It may be in the form of sexual exploitation of the innocent child—be it rape or inappropriate entry into the child or misuse of the child.  Trauma to the child or neglect of the child could result in psychological adverse effects to the extent that the individual could develop mental illness either in childhood or later in adulthood.

    Regardless of age, social isolation or loneliness could lead to depression, anxiety or frank psychosis.  Similarly, someone experiencing discrimination and stigma could have his personality compromised due to degradation and undignified devaluation of the person.

    Such individual could suffer from a variety of mental illness.  Bereavement or grief either due to loss of a human being or due to loss of something significant  can result in depression or psychotic depression.

    In the same vein, severe or long-term stress may be at work, home or due to major illness may lead to mental disorder. Being gainfully employed contributes  positively and significantly to our financial, social and mental health. Deprivation and lack of independence coming from unemployment or losing your job could lead to mental health disorder.

    In line with the effect of unemployment, social disadvantage, homelessness, or poor housing poverty and being in debt could cause one to suffer from the diseases of the mind. When a person cares for a seriously ill individual, such carer too could suffer ill effect to his or her mental health.

    A person who is suffering from long-term illness, such as cancer patients, could break down due to stress and develop depression or anxiety. There is also no doubt that misuse of substances such as marijuana, cocaine, heroin and alcohol could result in mental health disorder.

     

    • To be continued next week
  • Fear grips residents over Bayelsa earth tremor

    Fear grips residents over Bayelsa earth tremor

    Niger Delta environment is sick. The air, land and water have all been polluted. Aquatic life is disappearing. Air-borne diseases are rife and all bodies of water even the sea have been poisoned.

    The widespread environmental pollution in the region is man-made, caused by years of reckless exploitation and exploration of crude oil; mindless vandalism of oil pipelines, oil wells and other installations in the name of agitation; oil theft and illegal refining of crude oil.

    There is, however, a new threat to the region which has compounded the woes of the environment. It is constant occurrences of earth tremors which have raised fears of possible earthquake in the region. A team of the Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) recently identified earth tremor  as another environmental challenge facing the people of the Niger Delta region.

    ERA, in its report, says tremor is the latest addition to the much-talked-about pollutions occasioned by gas flaring, explosion, leaks, oil spills and threat posed by flood and coastal erosion.

    In fact, there has been history of earth tremors in the region. For instance in June, 2014 ERA/FoEN reported an incident of earth tremor in Ikarama, Okordia clan, Yenagoa Local Government Area Bayelsa State. A similar incident was reported at Oboburu on 25th October, 2014 in Egiland, Rivers State.

    Recently, on July 11, residents of some communities in Ahoada West, Rivers State and Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, raised the alarm over earth tremor in the areas. They said the earth quaked in the night of July 10.

    The people of Akinima in Engenni clan, Ahoada West, were very disturbed. A resident and businessman, Mike Ogbakusi, whose house is located close to an oil facility belonging to Shell, said the tremor occurred in the area at about 11.15pm.

    He said: “The whole place was shaking, though it didn’t last long; it just shook and everybody was shouting. The tremor even extended up to Mbiama and Igbogene, people at Igbogene in Yenagoa also noticed that there was an earth tremor.

    “We don’t know the cause, but people are afraid. It has happened in the past and, I think this is about the fourth tremor we have experienced here. And Akinima community has written to the Ministry of Environment, Rivers State.

    “But up till this moment nobody has come from the Ministry to ask the people what is actually happening; whether there was tremor or no tremor; nobody has come, not even Agip or Shell. So, that is the situation we are in in Akinima now; we are living in fear.”

    He appealed to the government to send experts to the area to assess the development. “We are not geologists. We don’t know anything. We want experts to come and tell us what actually happened and precautionary measures to be taken.

    “So that we will be guided, we don’t know when; maybe the earth will open and all of us will go in; we don’t know. We are not experts, we don’t know what is actually happening so we need experts to come and educate us on what has actually happened.

    “There is a lot of exploration going on in our environment and people are shooting dynamites here and there; and we don’t know what is happening, buildings are cracking”, he said.

    Ogbakusi said the quaking earth must have been caused by the seismic operations of oil companies in the area. “Whenever, they are entering the bush, they will be shooting and, running their lines.

    “If you go inside our community now you will see  their seismic operation related lines running in between buildings. They explore in the day, but the tremor was experienced at night.  When we experienced the tremor; it was like something shifting; not necessarily hearing the sound of an explosive.

    “But you can feel that the earth moved, shook. People ran out from their houses when it occurred; to find out what was happening.This is the fourth time such a thing is happening in this environment.

    “If you go to the home of the paramount ruler, the secretary of the community will tell you the date of the letter the community wrote to the Rivers State Ministry of Environment. The other one happened about two years or one and half year ago; now this one has happened again.

    “I witnessed the tremor which just occurred two days ago and the previous ones. I cannot say which company is responsible for the seismic activities going on around us presently; what I know is that this area is covered by Shell and Agip”, he said.

    A female resident who introduced herself as Animasum Markalso said she experienced the tremor that occurred in community. She said: “Between 11:00pm and midnight, there was a sound and at that same moment; the building shook heavily. Although the shaking or tremor didn’t last long, there was an accompanying sound.

    “I have experienced it in the past. But I was shocked by this one; I thought it was an earthquake. I even tried to run to my husband to ask him what was going on but because he just returned for the weekend and was tired I decided not to bother him. But, my mind ran amok; thinking of possible causes and also whether the world was coming to an end.

    A civil servant, Nwakam Paul, said such incident has been recurring in the community. “It is about the third time since I returned from the north that I have observed it. This one was a little mild than the rest.

    “It normally happen like an accident, within the twinkling of an eye it is gone. But we just noticed it; that something strange had happened.  I don’t know if we can attribute the cracking of buildings in the community to these earth tremors. The other time it happened even electric poles and wire were obviously seen shaking, moving.

    “People ran to the street when it happened in the past because it was a strange phenomenon. We are neither geographers nor geologists and we have never subjected the incident to serious scrutiny and reach logical conclusions and so; even though there are exploration activities going on around us; we don’t know what to attribute the cause of the earth tremors to right now.

    “We cannot say it occurs annually, maybe bi-annually. And, I didn’t hear any accompanying sound when it happened few days ago and; it happens quickly, like lightening. Within the space of one to five seconds; it is done.  I was wide awake when it happened”, he said.

    Even a neighbouring community, Akinowiso, was affected. A resident of Akinowiso, Paul Peters, said: “When we experienced the movement or shaking of the earth last time; it led to cracks in my building. I managed to patch some of the cracked spots because I had little cement in the house but no money for major repairs.

    “Then, with this very recent shaking of the earth again has widened the cracked sections of the building. I am confused, but I want to use this opportunity to appeal to the government to investigate the phenomenon and take appropriate steps to prevent this earth tremor from happening again.

    “I am saying so because I am not the only victim; if you move around this community you will discover others who suffered the same fate; whose houses have cracked as a result of the earth tremors. And, we are afraid, not knowing what might happen the next day.

    “So, the government should listen to us and take proactive steps before more damage is done.We are yet to see any government official since we are experiencing this earth tremor in our environment”.

    Also a resident and indigene Delta State, Paul Harrison, said he would relocate from Akinowiso if the incident happened again.

    “Well, the thing is that I am a stranger and if the earth tremor continues I can take my wife and children and relocate. Such relocation of strangers can affect the place in terms of commercial activities and development.

    “I have spent about seven years in this community and this earth tremor has happened up to four times. The day it happened around 11:00pm, suddenly everywhere shook. I thought somebody was knocking on my door and, when I went out I saw people running out from their houses towards the roads.

    “They later said it was a vibration from the ground; just like an earthquake, very seriously. So, we had to check around the house whether it had cracks as a result of the quake.

    “But we didn’t discover any crack. The shaking happened twice and it was brief; lasted just about five seconds. We even heard a loud sound; as if someone used dynamite; very serious”, he said.

    In Igbogene, Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, residents also confirmed that a tremor occurred in their environment at about 11:22pm on the fateful day. A resident, Victor Idiedo, said the quake lasted for about a minute.

    He said: “The first thought that came to my mind was whether armed robbers have come to invade my compound, de-roofing my building so I started shouting armed robbers, armed robbers. My elder brother who lived behind me also came out.

    “When we came outside we saw people trooping out and asking ‘what is happening that the earth is moving, quaking everywhere?’ A neighbor recorded crack in his house. And, since we didn’t hear or read about the incident in any of the local media houses, I decided to reach out to Alagoa Morris of ERA/FoEN; to hint him.

    “Meanwhile, I read from one of these online news on 29thJune, 2016 that about six states likely to be affected by earthquake. This raised my fears on the spur of the moment, because Bayelsa State was named among the six states.

    “I was scared and, that was why I got in touch with Alagoa Morris. When I made further inquiries, I received information that some communities in Ahoada West local government area of Rivers State were also affected; even Akenfa, though mildly”.

    Idiedo, however, said he had never experienced such incident at Igbogene adding that there was no explosion before the tremor. “I have lived in this community for over 10 years and this is the first time I am experiencing such a thing like this.

    “There was no explosion, just that the building was shaking. I was fully awake and I have never experienced such in my life before. A minor crack occurred as a direct result of the earth tremor in the neighbourhood.

    Plates and other things in my cousin’s house fell down from where they were kept as a result of the quake. Some of the breakable ones got broken”, he said.

    Another resident of Igbogene, Chief Etekpe Friday said: “We were about going to bed when I heard a very high vibration. My window shook heavily; even the ground vibrated. I thought immediately of what the cause could possibly be; thinking if rodents around could be responsible. I had to resort to prayers. So, I had the vibration experienced in my house”.

    ERA in the report compiled by its Bayelsa State Coordinator, Mr. Alagoa Morris, said a renewed search for oil could have been responsible for the earth tremor.

    The report said: “ERA.FoEN is very much aware of renewed and heightened search for oil and gas within this environment; in Yenagoa and Ogbia local government areas of Bayelsa State and beyond; even as attested by one of those who spoke to ERA at Akinima.

    “This has been on for about three months or more now. It is also a common knowledge that explosives are often used during these seismic operations. When a similar incident happened at Ikarama community in June, 2014; it attracted the attention of the Bayelsa State Ministry of Environment.

    “What is not clear is whether anything significant was made beyond the visit of officials of the Ministry then. Ordinarily, not just for the records; experts would have been invited to investigate and come up with reports for stakeholders to know what the prognosis is and allay the fears and concerns of the people/communities.Currently, the people in affected communities are apprehensive”.

    Therefore, ERA asked the three tiers of government to should rise up to the occasion and take appropriate steps to identify what actually happened and why.

    It appealed to the relevant agencies of Federal Government, including the Science Ministry, Environment, NDDC and Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs to get experts who will work effectively with the State governments, Local governments and communities affected to unravel the mystery around earth tremors in our communities.

    It said such studies should provide practical solutions to the problem, allay the fears and concerns of the affected communities and take take steps to prevent real earthquake from happening.

    The report said: “All stakeholders, including the media should follow up on this with a view to halting whatever danger that is on its way.

    “Communities should be more alert, document and keep accurate records of happenings around them. They should also report such strange occurrences to relevant NGOs, media and the government”.

  • Fear of real change

    It is obvious all is not well with this country at the moment. Increasingly, it is getting clearer that fundamental modifications in the structure of the Nigerian state are inevitable to stave off systemic dysfunctions that are at the root of the cycle of crises that have been buffeting this federal contraption.

    Resurging tempo of centrifugalism; a plethora of challenges at the economic level leading in the main, to inability by governments to pay salaries, loss of jobs at the private sector with the banks taking the lead and deteriorating living conditions especially of the poor, are clear evidence that we need to get back to the drawing board to get our bearing right. Though this thinking is not entirely new, for some inexplicable reasons, it has failed to receive the support of some vested interests.

    And for that reason also, whatever gains this country would have harnessedthrough restructuring have continued to elude us. But hard as we try to shy away from it, its imperative continues daily to stare us on the face. That was the uncanny dialectics at play last week when President Buhari told State House workers that it was disgraceful that two thirds of the states of the federation cannot pay salaries to their workers.

    Hear him: “27 out of the 36 states cannot pay salaries. This is a disgrace to Nigeria”. The same contradiction was equally manifest in his comments on the resurging militancy in the Niger Delta region. Again, he had this to say: “Unfortunately, the Niger Delta with their myriads of organizations that are competing over which one can do more damage to the country and the oil wells and oil companies. For how long are we going to do this?”

    The two issues are very fundamental. So also is the question of how long shall we continue to be in this pass?Answer to why states cannot pay salaries can be located in the structure of the federation while the militancy in the Niger Delta will continue as long as people of the area see the organization of the Nigerian state as inequitable and incapable of guaranteeing even development in the area. These are the issues to contend with. And how can we go about addressing themwithout tinkering with the way this country is structured both on political and economic lines?

    Ironically, president Buhari who seeks answers to the posers is opposed to discussions on restructuring the polity. In his recent interview to mark his one year in office, he had in reaction to a question said he had neither read the 2014 National Conference report on how to move the nation forward nor called for a brief on it. He went further to say unequivocally that he would want the ‘report to go into the so-called archives’.

    So when just after a month he came up with the issue of how long we shall continue to live with the inability of states to pay salaries and the militancy in the Niger Delta, he was inadvertently cornered by the contradictions of the unresolved issues of our federal order. Incidentally, much of the solutions to these nagging national challenges were the major concerns of that conference report.

    So if Buhari is serious in finding durable answers to the two challenges, he has to reconcile himself with his averment to consign the conference report to the dustbin of history. In spite of differences in the management styles of state governors andsleaze in public places, the current situation where the states depend solely on hand-outs from the federal government for survival is at the root of their predicament.

    That has been the raison d’etre for calls for fiscal federalism and devolution of powers. The idea here is to whittle down the overwhelming powers of the centre and the concomitant bitter competition for its control that is at the centre of the simmering fission within the polity. States cannot pay salaries because most of them cannot survive on their own as presently constituted. They do not have the capacity to fund themselves because of a convoluted order that has rendered them mere appendages of the centre where life literally begins and ends. States cannot pay when they depend solely on oil revenue which the central government disburses at intervals. They cannot pay when a disproportionate chunk of what should go to their kitty is appropriated by a centre that espouses federal tenets but in reality unitary. And where they manage to pay salaries, other services suffer irretrievably.

    For states to do that and be in a position to discharge their statutory duties very effectively would require the restructuring of the fundamentals of our federal order.It is obviously a political action that seeks to unleash the creative energies and potentials of the component units for rapid development along their designed paths.

    With such action, the discontent that aggravates militancy due to the yawning disparity between the huge resources found at the backyard of the Niger Delta people and their abysmal poor level of development would have been adequately staved off. With it also, complaints bordering on the skewed allocation of oil wells to people almost exclusively outside the zone which the Ijaw Youths Congress has seriously complained about will be redressed.

    Similarly, the inequities that reinforce competition to control the centre and take advantage of its disproportionate resources would have been put at bay. So the answers to the question posed by the president can really be found in restructuring which has been seriously addressed in the document he has curiously relegated to rust in the archives even after the nation had spent stupendously to put it together.

    Had he read it or called for briefs on it, he may have found to his chagrin that in that document lie answers to the poser on why states cannot pay salaries. Ditto the reasons for resurging militancy in the Niger Delta and similar primordial tendencies that have reared up their ugly heads. Perhaps, he may also come to terms with the reality that as long as we trifle with the matter of instituting a true federal order, so long will these challenges be a recurring decimal.

    So when Governor Abdulfatah Ahmed of Kwara state sought to make a distinction between economic restructuring and its political variant, he was merely referring to two sides of the same coin. He said in a recent interview that restructuring in the past had been based on political exigencies and that is why its economic impact has not been felt. Now, he would want it to be along economic lines. But even when based on political exigencies, its overall benefits are usually felt within the economic realm. For, the difference between politics and economy in this instance is just a very thin one.

    Ahmed however, struck the right chord when he viewed restructuring as the process of reviewing the way we have been doing things and if that has not taken us to the promised land, we seek new ways of getting there. That is the real issue and not this rabid obsession with insinuations that it is a way of dismembering the country. On the contrary, continued opposition to restructuring may facilitate disintegration more quickly as has been shown by resurgent agitations for self-determination and national sabotage.

    It is also evident in the increasing resort to holdingthe nation together through coercive apparatus of the state. But then, for how long shall we continue to hold this country together through the force of arms? Is it not a huge contradiction that 56 years after independence, we still rely overwhelmingly on gunboat diplomacy or the actual deployment of same to compel loyalty for the government?

    It also smacks of educated guess to contend as some have attempted that restructuring and the fight against corruption cannot go together. They can and do go together. For us to fight corruption decisively, we must get at the root of it. And the way to it is by understanding and addressing those negative attitudinal dispositions that starve civic structures of their attendant moral bearing thereby reinforcing corruption. In them, we will find why our society does not frown at people who steal from the coffers of the government, without qualms.  Only then, shall we be able to effect real, lasting change.

  • Mr. President, very many Nigerians live in fear

    Dear President Buhari, in the light of the on-going Fulani herdsmen’s killings and destructions in many places in our country, many of us Nigerians are living in fear. In most of our rural countryside, our farmers and their families are afraid to do their accustomed work on the farms. Across our country, farms, the handwork and means of livelihood of our farmers and their families, are being destroyed by roving cattle. When farmers’ families go to sleep in the night these days, they are no longer sure whether their farms will be there in the morning, or whether the cattle herds would have wiped out everything during the night. They are no longer sure whether their villages will be allowed to sleep peacefully through the night, or whether the killer herdsmen will come in the dark, kill villagers, destroy and burn the houses, and rape the women and girls. Nobody is sure where and when the sudden attacks will come, or what the magnitude of the killings and devastations will be. State governments, local governments, and traditional rulers, all are unsure what to do to protect their people. One governor burst into tears when he saw the scene of rampage in a village in his state.

    The situation is desperate, Mr. President. As you very well know, we seriously need to improve agricultural productivity in this country. To that end, most authorities and leaders of our country have been trying to encourage our people to return to the land. Since you became president, you have repeatedly contributed your very influential voice to the call for agricultural growth. And you have made it a priority in your policies, plans and programmes. In many parts of our country, especially in most of our southern states, the return to farming is still very slow and very hesitant. But now, the Fulani herdsmen are scaring farmers away from the farms. A very major disaster is being enacted.

    In response to the disaster, a whirlwind of agitated comments and cries is sweeping through most of our country. To allow these fears and this whirlwind to continue is inimical to the well-being of this country. It could even wreck this country – and lead to its collapse. Mr. President, you must take steps without delay to bring this dangerous situation to a satisfactory end. We need to have a definitive and lasting solution. Merely ordering the Nigerian military and police to stop these herdsmen from attacking farmers and villagers, as you have done, is not enough. As long as these killer herdsmen remain, and as long as important questions about them remain unexplained, the wild and inflammatory speculations will continue to shake Nigeria.

    We Nigerians need, want, and demand, to have answers to many questions concerning this situation. Who really are these so-called Fulani herdsmen? From official and non-official sources, we are getting loads of information about their identity, about why they are behaving as they are now behaving, and about the sources of their strength.

    We are told that these people are ordinary nomadic cattle herdsmen. We are also told that the recent civil commotions in the Maghreb (especially in Libya) makes it easy to get sophisticated weapons in the Sahel parts of West Africa, as a result of which these herdsmen have been able to acquire even such highly sophisticated guns as AK47. But, how do ordinary nomadic herdsmen afford to buy expensive things like AK47 rifles? How are they able to train to use such sophisticated weapons?

    The suspicion is being voiced in the media that some rich and influential Nigerian citizens have been supplying the herdsmen with these weapons, and training the herdsmen to use them. If yes, who are these rich and influential Nigerian citizens? What are these rich and influential Nigerian citizens trying to achieve?

    You, Mr. President, were recently reported to have revealed in an interview with CNN in London that some of these herdsmen are really Libyan militiamen, trained under Ghadafi, well-armed and well-trained fighters who fled southwards to West Africa after the fall of Ghadafi. If so, how did these militiamen become cattle herdsmen in Nigeria? Who gave them thousands of cattle to herd?

    You said in the interview, Sir, that these militiamen have become an Africa-wide problem. Why has the government of Nigeria never informed Nigeria about this problem? What steps has the Nigerian government taken to prevent the problem from coming into Nigeria or to expel it from Nigeria? If no step, why?

    Why have some prominent Fulani leaders been representing these militiamen to us as merely Fulani herdsmen and claiming Nigerian citizens’ rights for them – even though they must know that they are, in fact, extremely dangerous Libyan killers? Why have some Fulani spokesmen been threatening that they would break up Nigeria if these Libyan militiamen are thrown out of Nigeria?

    Do we now have the president’s word that Nigeria is under invasion by Libyan militiamen? And, what does the Nigerian government intend to do about that?

    A highly placed citizen from the Middle Belt, Governor Balarabe Musa, warned in 2014 that a new insurgency was in the offing – a new insurgency different from Boko Haram, better organized, better armed and much more dangerous than Boko Haram, and planned by some highly influential Nigerians for the purpose of achieving some major political objective in Nigeria. Are we now seeing part of that insurgency?

    Some Arewa North citizens have threatened again and again in recent years that the North would go to war rather than accept certain kinds of change in Nigeria. And they have also repeatedly assured us that the North is more ready for war than the South. In the background of these threats, there have been repeated reports in the media since 2012 that large quantities of arms are being illegally imported into Nigeria.

    Are today’s depredations by the Fulani herdsmen part of what these various members of the Northern elite have been threatening? Are the Libyan militiamen part of a mercenary army that some influential Nigerians have hired to wage war against some parts and peoples of Nigeria?

    Some Northerners are frenetically demanding “grazing reserves” for the herdsmen. Some are threatening that we Southerners will find ourselves in greater danger if we refuse to grant land for such grazing reserves. Some say that they will break up Nigeria if the herdsmen are refused entry into Southern Nigeria. We Southerners suspect a hidden agenda for these grazing reserves. What are the true purposes of the grazing reserves?  Are they designed by some people to house illegal armies of occupation in the states of the Middle Belt and the South, for the purpose of intimidating the peoples of those places? Are they meant to be jihadist instruments for forcible Islamization? Are they designed as weapons of one ethnic group’s conquest of Nigeria?

    Mr. President, you owe Nigeria clear, truthful, and statesmanlike answers and explanations on this situation. More importantly, you owe Nigeria policies and actions that will remove this horrible threat from our country – in the interest of the peace and existence of our country. We Nigerians pledge our strongest support to such policies and actions when you design and implement them. But delay is dangerous.

  • Fear in OAU over ‘malaria epidemic’

    •University: it is not true 

    There is fear among students of the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State.

    Reason: Suspected malaria epidemic on campus.

    It was learnt that more than 70 students “visited” the university’s health centre in the last three days to complain of similar symptoms.

    Investigation revealed that they complained of headache, stomach ache, body weakness, irritation, fever, vomiting (in some cases), sore throat and loss of appetite.

    Many students are raising the alarm over the disease and calling for an immediate intervention.

    However, the school’s Acting Director, Medical and Health Services, Dr. Adedayo Irinoye, denied that there was an epidemic on campus.

    According to him, “If there is any outbreak, we will be the one to first inform the public.

    “Malaria is endemic on the campus but there is no epidemic. The cause of the students’ sickness is multi-facet.

    “Some are caused by anxiety over examination coupled with poor nutrition, increase in stress and change of climate.

    “We have doubled our manpower and adjusted our roasters.

    “As we speak, we have not referred anyone to the OAU Teaching Hospital.

    “The symptoms are those of malaria and the students are treated before leaving in good health.

    There is nothing strange happening, there is only increase in traffic.”

    Also, the school’s spokesman, Biodun Olarenwaju, said the situation was not peculiar to the school alone.

    He noted that the increase in the number of sick students might be linked to climate change.

    “It is just a kind of reaction to the climate change and it is not peculiar to OAU.

    “We have competent medical doctors and researchers who would have detected if the complaints are unusual.

    “That we admitted 150 students as being reported on  social media is propaganda.

    “Our beds are not filled up yet. We have only 14 beds. Everything is under control,” he said.

  • ‘We live in fear of One Million Boys’

    ‘We live in fear of One Million Boys’

    •Gang writes residents: we’re coming

    The One Million Boys, a dreaded band of hoodlums, has written to residents of Ojo in Lagos, threatening to attack them.

    The residents are calling on the government to come to their aid before the group strikes.

    A resident, Ola Akintunde, said the hoodlums usually attacked people with machetes, adding that some of them were caught and handed over to the police during their last operation.

    Another resident, simply identified as Joshua said: “These boys are heartless; they steal from you, beat you to the point of death without being scared. Vigilante teams have been organised to stay everywhere. When it is 10pm, they wake everybody to be on the alert to guard everywhere.”

    Atiku Dosu said he had been staying outside with others to guard the area because of the gang’s activities, adding: “We live in fear. We stay awake overnight and by morning, we go for our businesses. We don’t have time to sleep again. We have advised that every street in this community shouldn’t take them for granted.”

    A security man told The Nation that every resident should be conscious of the situation.

    He said: “We need to be security conscious and for our people to know when and how to go about securing the neighbourhood. When the news of the one million boys supposed visitation got to us, it got everyone afraid; this has made us cautious of where we go and how we talk.

    “People have come out in large numbers which is very encouraging and it shows we are ready. I couldn’t believe my eyes when residents came out in large numbers to risk their lives.”

    Another resident who gave his name as Danbaba said the One Million Boys forced people to sleep with their relations or neighbours.

    He said: “The crazy thing about this gang is that after they rob you of your property, they will beat the hell out of you, order you to have an affair with your relation or neighbour and if you refuse, they would leave you with big injuries that will cost huge amount of money to treat yourself.”

    Eleven suspected members of One Million-Boys cult group were arrested four weeks ago for terrorising Badagry residents and charged to court.

    But, yesterday, the residents complained that the cult group has returned to their community, looting and attacking people.

    A resident, Elvis Jones, said they were shocked to learn the group was back.

    He said: “I don’t understand. Is it that they released the suspected cultists or what? Why should they return to the community when the police are involved? Is it until we are killed that government will attend to our case? They have been causing mayhem here. I sit for hours guarding my house after strenuous office work. It is unfair. Whenever I go to work, I return early in order not to face any traffic.”

    A resident, Sewande George, said she was thinking of relocating to another area, adding: “This is how insurgent groups start. Do we want to start harbouring another set of Boko Haram insurgent group in Lagos? This is a pathetic situation. How much do we earn and some useless boys will keep robbing us. We need to be protected in this area. The government should help us.”