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Tag: Jonathan

  • Jonathan nominates Nnamani, Okiro, Obi, others for board appointments

    Jonathan nominates Nnamani, Okiro, Obi, others for board appointments

    FORMER Senate President Ken Nnamani and ex-Inspector-General of Police (IGP) Mike Okiro are among those, whose names were sent yesterday by President Goodluck Jonathan to the Senate for clearance for appointments into federal boards.

    Also nominated was Justice K.M.O. Kekere-Ekun for confirmation as a Justice of the Supreme Court.

    Nnamani was nominated to chair the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) and Okiro to head the Police Service Commission (PSC).

    Other nominees include: Aminu Dikko from Kaduna (representing the Northwest zone) as the Director -General of the ICRC; Mrs Comfort Saro-Wiwa from Rivers State (Southsouth); Janet Febisola Adeyemi from Ondo (Southwest); Mrs Yabawa Wabi from Bornu (North east); Musa Elayo Nasarawa (Northcentral) and A.U. Kanu Abia (Southeast), all members of the ICRC.

    Other nominees into the PSC board are: retired Deputy Inspector-General of Police (DIG) Yakubu Mohammed (Northwest); retired Justice Olufunke Adekeye (Osun); Aisha Larai Tukur (Taraba); Mrs Comfort Obi (Imo); Chief Torngee Gem Toranyiin (Benue); and Dr Otive Ogbuzor (Delta).

    The President Jonathan also wrote to withdraw the nomination of Mr Adesoji Olaoba Efuntayo as the Secretary of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

    Efuntayo was replaced with Mr. Emmanuel Adegboyega Aremo (Southwest).

    He urged the upper chamber of the National Assembly to confirm the nomination of Mr. Adulphus Joe Ekpe as the Director-General of the National Lottery Commission (NLC).

  • Africa requires $100b to fix infrastructure – Jonathan

    Africa requires $100b to fix infrastructure – Jonathan

    President Goodluck Jonathan has said for Africa to effectively tackle the various challenges bedeviling the continent, it must build the necessary infrastructure across transport, communication and energy sectors.

    Already, it is estimated that the continent requires about $ 100 billion annually for the next decade.

    Jonathan, who spoke on Wednesday at the Infrastructure Summit of the World Economic Forum in South Africa, described infrastructure as a major challenge facing the African continent.

    Consequently, Jonathan said the situation has led to structural and high level of unemployment.

    Besides, he said poor infrastructure serves as additional burden and cost to businesses, thereby making it difficult for them to compete.

    The president said, “In the last decade, Africa has come a long way from being mainly associated with economic stagnation, high inflation, high external debts, and civil strife. Today, the situation has changed due to significant macroeconomic, structural, and political reforms. Economic growth on the continent averaged five per cent annually in the last 10 years.

    ” However, despite this recent economic growth success story of the continent, infrastructure deficit on the continent across transport, energy, and communication remain binding constraints to further growth acceleration, our ability to compete, and the reduction in poverty.

    “Inadequate and poor infrastructure in Africa remains a major constraint to the continent’s realisation of its full economic potential. Due to the relatively poor infrastructure and low connectivity on the continent, we have the lowest level of inter-regional trade. While we account for about 12 per cent of the world’s population, our share of global trade is just about two per cent. This is also a reflection of the fact that our economies are less diversified compared to other global regions.

    “Most importantly, poor infrastructure serves as additional burden and cost to our businesses, making it difficult for them to compete, and accompanied by structural and high level of unemployment. To effectively tackle these challenges, diversify our economies, reduce poverty and provide employment opportunities for our bulging youth population, we must build necessary infrastructure in Africa across transport, communication and energy sectors.”

    “Over the course of this past decade, African stakeholders have recognised the need to plug the gaps in infrastructure on the continent. From studies and reports on the subject, it is estimated that Africa requires about 100 billion United States dollars annually for the next decade, whereas only a quarter is being spent today.”

  • Jonathan: we helped found a new South Africa

    Jonathan: we helped found a new South Africa

    President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday urged his South African counterpart, Jacob Zuma, to let both countries strengthen their ties. He spoke while addressing the South African Parliament in Pretoria. Excerpts: 

     

    At this forum, it is only proper that we acknowledge and pay tribute to those who made the freedom and democracy which our two countries enjoy today possible. Generations of young Africans grew up in the last 50 years to witness and study the singular and collective heroism, as well as the inspirational examples of many icons of the South African anti-apartheid struggle, Chief Albert Luthuli, Walter Sisulu, the Madiba, President Nelson Mandela, Oliver Thambo, Govan Mbeki, Steve Biko, Chris Hani, and other men and women of valour and integrity who were imbued with the spirit of sacrifice, patriotism, and devotion to the common good.

    This new “Rainbow Nation” where freedom and equality are now established as inviolable principles is the product of their vision and dedication.

    Similarly in Nigeria, our people will forever remember the efforts and contributions of Dr. Herbert Macaulay, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Sir Ahmadu Bello, Ernest Ikoli, Margaret Ekpo and many others who fought hard to secure Nigeria’s independence from divisive, colonial rule. These men, and women, in our two countries, paved the way for the freedom we enjoy today. The people’s liberty was well fought for and earned.

    The huge debt that we owe the heroes of our history is not to be complacent with the freedom of our people and the democracy that we have established. We can stand on the shoulders of the icons of our history: in so doing we will be able to look much farther into the future, but this also comes with a responsibility and a duty: the duty to ensure that as leaders in Africa today, we also leave worthy legacies for successor generations.

    Mr. Speaker, distinguished parliamentarians, ladies and gentlemen, twenty-two years ago, Africa’s living legend, President Nelson Mandela, was released from prison. Since then, your country has travelled, more steadily on a path of progress and grown in stature. We do not only have a new South Africa under black majority rule, its institutions and processes have become inclusive. A new generation has emerged that is fired by a sense of unalloyed patriotism and common destiny.

    Here we are, today, with the Head of State of another African country addressing the Joint Sitting of the Parliament of a free, independent and democratic South Africa that has assumed its rightful place in the comity of nations.

    We have arrived at such a moment as this, because the people of South Africa never gave up their belief in the rightness of their cause in their quest for freedom and equality. The peoples of Africa and the rest of the civilised world did not also relent in the support they gave to the people of South Africa to remove the shackles of racism, apartheid and colonialism which combined to hold them down for so long.

    The role played by individual nations, including my country Nigeria, in the struggle for the emergence of a new South Africa that is non-racial, independent and democratic is already part of the special linkages between our two countries. In those dark seasons, Nigerians stood by their South African brothers and sisters, because we shared your pain and concerns. Today, we also stand shoulder to shoulder with you as brothers and sisters and as partners, working together in pursuit of mutually beneficial interests.

    Suffice it to say that throughout the long-drawn, anti-apartheid struggle, although we were not geographically contiguous, Nigeria was, nevertheless, considered a Frontline State, by the sheer fact of our commitment to the just struggle for freedom in Southern Africa.

    It is important to recall, that this was a cause every Nigerian was committed to, not just those in government, but the people themselves. It was for this reason the Southern African Relief Fund (SARF) was created.

    This was funded with deductions from the salary of every Nigerian worker, irrespective of rank, both in the public and private sectors as well as donations from ordinary Nigerians in all walks of life, including students. This fund was placed at the disposal of the liberation struggle.

    Nigeria provided scholarships for students from South Africa. Our musicians waxed albums in support of the anti-apartheid struggle, a memorable one in this respect being Sonny Okosun’s timeless piece, “Fire in Soweto”. Our poets wrote protest literature denouncing man’s inhumanity to man; whenever South Africans protested against injustice, Nigerian students also took to the streets in support and solidarity.

     

  • ‘Jonathan needs spiritual cleansing’

    A cleric, Chief Augustine Adegunloye Bolade, has warned President Goodluck Jonathan to undergo spiritual cleansing before the 2015 general elections, if he wants to win.

    The proprietor of St. Augustine Healing Home, Lagos, told reporters in Lagos that the President needs a spiritual rebirth to avoid some evils.

    He said: “President Jonathan urgently needs spiritual cleansing. He should also heed the spiritual advice of the elders by breaking the country’s spirituals jinx, which is affecting the nation presently.”

    According to him, several innocent souls that were used for sacrifices in the nation’s seat of power are responsible for some of the evils bedeviling the nation.

    The cleric said the Jonathan administration inherited most of the ills affecting the nation.

    Bolade said he had made several predictions in the past where he stressed the need for urgent spiritual cleansing in Nigeria.

    He said this is important for the country to overcome its myriad of problems.

     

  • Why I canvassed Jonathan’s re-election in U.S – Kuku

    The Special Adviser to the President on Niger Delta and Chairman of the Presidential Amnesty Programme, Kingsley Kuku, on Tuesday explained his call for the re-election of President Goodluck Jonathan during a recent visit to the United States of America.

    He said it was informed by his belief that the Jonathan’s administration has stabilised the nation’s economy and can do more if given the time to implement certain pacts signed with ex-agitators in the region which will help in stabilising the fragile peace currently in place.

    He noted that over 85 per cent of agreement reached with the former Niger Delta agitators has not been implemented due to some factors, stating that further delay in fulfilling these obligations could affect the relative peace in the region.

    Kuku, while debunking media report that he threatened a resurgence of violence in the South-South should Jonathan be schemed out of the 2015 presidential race, said he merely appealed to the conscience of Nigerians and the rest of the world to give Jonathan a chance especially when the Constitution stipulates a two-term of four years for him if he so wishes.

    Claiming that the President has not given any of his aides the mandate to speak on his behalf regarding the 2015 presidential contest, Kuku said he was speaking the minds of stakeholders in the Niger Delta region.

    He said: “What I said in the U.S has been completely misrepresented. I spoke of the possibility of a degenerate Niger Delta if we do not value the fragile peace we have in the area today. I did not say that the Niger Delta will resort to violence if the President was not re-elected in 2015. I never said that and I couldn’t have said that.

     

     

  • Nigeria’s corruption exaggerated, says Jonathan

    Nigeria’s corruption exaggerated, says Jonathan

    President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday said the corruption in the country is exaggerated.

    The president spoke in Cape Town, South Africa, while addressing the Nigerian community in the town.

    He is on official visit to South Africa.

    Jonathan said: “Those who talk about corruption are the most corrupt, we must build strong institutions. Putting heads together along with the heads of the corruption agencies like the EFCC and the ICPC, that what we should do because the perception is so bad and sometimes we also amplify it.

    “Sometimes when you look at the figures, somebody comes out with a figure and if you don’t confront it, the recent statistics about funds being moved out of the country is so big and we started asking why is it so and we also realised that there if this policy of regulating the movement of money, and business people like Peter Obi will tell you that the Anambra man will not want to wait; he wants to move his money and go and buy. He did not steal the money. If you ask him to be transferring $10,000 to China, how long will it take him to do that? And so they will find a way of taking the money out and because it is not the conventional way of transferring the money, it all ends up as if all is for corruption. There is element of corruption; I am not saying there is none. In Nigeria now, anybody who wakes up and does not talk about corruption you have not said anything. If somebody is preaching, you must talk about corruption; if you are in wedding, you have to talk about corruption.

    “So the perception index is quite high but we all collectively must work to reduce it. I am not saying there is no corruption; there is still some corruption in the country, but we must all work very hard and strengthen the institution to bring the corruption down. And also the issue of security and crime, one of us mentioned the issue of Boko Haram in some parts of the North. We have kidnapping in the Southsouth and the Southeast. This must stop. We will do everything to bring it to an end.

    “But for our brothers and sisters in South Africa, we thank you for this beautiful evening and I must thank you for the wonderful work you are doing. We are doing very well and I want to encourage you to continue to do very well.

    “For those who won scholarships, I just want to inform you that we have different products, not just from the Federal Government, Nigeria is a Federal system, the states are semi-autonomous sub national governments and a number of states are also having some scholarship programmes. Sometimes, the states have bursaries, sometimes scholarships. At the federal level, the population of this country is very high, it will be extremely difficult or impossible for you to now declare scholarship for every Nigerian that is schooling; yes we will get to that point, but for now we have selected products and for some of you who are quite good with what is happening in the world, all that we can advise is that always try to get the information and when it comes up, you apply.

    “We give scholarships but it is not generalised that by this time of the year we are giving scholarships across the whole group. But wherever you are, like the minister was talking about Diaspora students, students’ schools are all over the world and students are always Diaspora population. But I assure you that we will continue to work with you, we have our country at heart, we have the commitment and the political will to improve the fortunes of our country. “

     

  • Jonathan approves recruitment of teachers for Federal Unity Colleges

    Jonathan approves recruitment of teachers for Federal Unity Colleges

    President Goodluck Jonathan has approved the recruitment of 1000 English and Mathematics teachers for the nation’s 104 Federal Government Colleges.

    Minister of State for Education, Ezenwo Nyesom Wike dropped the hint yesterday in Abuja at the openning of the first phase of the continuous professional development programme for Mathematics and English Language Teachers in the Federal Government Colleges.

    The Federal Ministry of Education is training 144 Mathematics and English Language teachers in inclusive teaching approach.

    Wike said that the Presidential approval was aimed at improving the quality of education offered by the Federal Government Colleges.

    He said: “Though, every subject is important, you all know that Mathematics and English Language occupy a special place in the nation’s education system because of their relative importance.

    “Arguably, across every career and every discipline, the relevance of Mathematics and English Language is self evident and will only continue to grow. This is why as a matter of national policy, these subjects remain compulsory.”

    He regretted the poor performance of students in the two core subjects, pointing out that the ministry was determined to address the situation.

    Wike said: “I need not over-emphasise the fact that the quality of the teacher is the most important factor that determines students’ achievements in the school system.

    “There is no way effective teaching can take place without the teacher having a deeper understanding of the subject matter, the confidence, as well as the aptitude to effectively teach the subject matter to students.”

    He noted that to achieve the desired result and concentration on the part of teachers, the two-week workshop is residential for all participants.

    In his remark, the ministry’s Permanent Secretary, Dr MacJohn Nwaobiala, decried the student-teacher ratio of 1:350 students in Mathematics and English Language.

    Prof. Adewale Solarin, the Chief Executive of National Mathematical Centre (NMC), attributed the failures in Mathematics and English Language during public examinations to the dearth of qualified teachers.

    Coordinator of the workshop and director of Basic and Secondary Education in the Ministry. Chike Uwaezuoke said that the approval was the first time in 15years that English Language teachers of Federal Government Colleges have been involved in capacity building.

     

  • Ex-police chief Tsav faults Jonathan’s war against Boko Haram

    A former Lagos State Police Commissioner Abubakar Tsav has criticised President Goodluck Jonathan’s fight against Boko Haram insurgents.

    He alleged that the President is not honest with the process.

    The retired police commissioner noted that Dr Jonathan’s anti-terror crusade poses more questions than answers.

    According to him, there are doubts on who were responsible for the kidnap of elder statesman, Alhaji Shettima Ali Monguno.

    Tsav questioned the possibility of Boko Haram insurgents kidnapping the former Petroleum Minister when the area was swarming with security operatives.

    The former police chief also decried the spate of violence occasioned by frequent clashes between the insurgents and the Joint Task Force (JTF) operatives.

    He said: “…Borno and Yobe states have been turned into war zones. About 350 streets in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, are blocked by the JTF. These apart, mosques and churches are normally provided with armed security during Friday prayers and Sunday church services. So, how was it possible for Boko Haram to kidnap Alhaji Monguno after the Jumat prayers and in broad daylight without any reaction from the JTF? Or, were they withdrawn from the mosque?”

  • The Jonathan–Amaechi saga

    Those who made the uncanny connection between the seat of our presidency, Aso Rock, and untimely deaths when Dame Patience Jonathan ‘died for seven days’ sometime ago, may have overlooked a more potent harmful force operating from that coveted locus of power. While death at Aso Rock of a President, or of even an obtrusive first lady, is ungainly and distracting as it has proved to be for our political transitions, what should really give every one of us a nightmare is the perennial gross abuse of presidential powers, particularly the type that scorns our constitution. More than death, a strain of abuse of power has become standardised and customised in Aso Rock.

    In the past week, a stranger that fiction type of story in a real democracy has been making the rounds. Like in the past under former President Olusegun Obasanjo, several accusing fingers are pointing at the current occupant of Aso Rock, President Goodluck Jonathan. According to the reports, Governor Chibuike Amaechi may be impeached by 5 members of the state House of Assembly, made up of 32 members. The preamble to that report was that 27 members of the state assembly loyal to Governor Amaechi have been suspended as party members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), by the newly court installed National Executive Committee of the start branch of the party. Now in a classical case of passing off, the suspension of the legislators from their party has been strangely elevated to a suspension from the House of Assembly; and the five members allegedly sold on this illegal plot are working to execute the plans.

    Now it is an open secret that Governor Chibuike Amaechi has been accused of nursing presidential ambition, to the chagrin of the presidency and their party hierarchy. While he denies the ambition, his body language is showing otherwise. In reaction, the presidency has been openly and covertly putting all manner of stumbling blocks on Amaechi’s part, to kill the ambition in infancy. Some of the high jumps put in Amaechis’ part include the ‘discovery’ that he bought a private jet with the state money in the name of a foreign company; and that the papers for the operation of the aircraft has expired. The presidency has also allegedly recruited Governor Godswill Akpabio, the Niger Delta Minister, Orubebe, and Minister of State for Education, Nyesom Wike, to clubber Amaechi to submission. While Akpabio is heading the anti-Ameachi group to stop his re-election as Chairman of the obtrusive Governor’s forum, Wike allegedly aided the sacking of the state party executive by an Abuja High Court; which led to the emergence of the new executive that sacked the 27 lawmakers.

    While all the above developments may be excused as real politicking by Amaechi’s opponents; the allegation that the Presidency is aiding five legislators out of 32 to impeach Governor Amaechi if indeed true should be condemned and resisted by every democrat. Such development is not just an abuse of power, but a gross violation of the constitution, which Mr. President, the Governors and the Ministers swore to uphold. Indeed any person lending support to such a mission must note that he or she has joined a disreputable assembly bent on pulling the democratic rug from our feet. For the avoidance of doubt, the planners should read the whole of section 188 of the 1999 Constitution as amended. That section provides the tedious process for the removal of a Governor or a Deputy Governor from office. The five members under any guise do not even qualify as one-third of members necessary to sign a notice of allegation as required in subsection 2. Furthermore, subsection 4 provides that two-third of all members of the Assembly must approve, before an investigation into the allegation can be conducted; and same number of Legislators is needed to adopt the findings of the panel, confirming that a Governor is guilty of gross misconduct before he can be removed from office.

    Regardless of these very clear provisions of the constitution, there is a palpable fear within Rivers state, if the speaker of the state House of Assembly is to be believed, that five of his colleagues are planning to ride roughshod over the constitution, and declare Amaechi removed from office. According to the speaker, Hon. Amachree, the idea is to precipitate crisis in the state to enable President Goodluck Jonathan declare a state of emergency in the state pursuant to Section 305 of the constitution. To confirm the potency of the allegation, the state House of Assembly has adjourned indefinitely and has accused the group of five of planning to use a fake mace to achieve their unconstitutional plans. While the presidency has denied these allegations, there is serious malcontent across the state as most pro-Amaechi public officials from the state are shouting that the presidency has plans to induce crisis in the state.

    If truly President Jonathan is planning to use Aso Rock’s unconstitutional templates, patented by former President Olusegun Obasanjo across Plateau, Oyo, and Bayelsa states against the governors that act against his interest; then he must remember that driving in a reverse gear in a busy road will lead to an accident. No doubt our political terrain is getting busier. As many have sensibly argued, an abuse of presidential powers that an Obasanjo could get away with in his time, a President Jonathan may not get away with. Moreover our politics is supposed to be maturing, and President Jonathan should not seek as alleged to diminish it. It is also important to remind Governor Chibuike Amaechi and his fellow Governors, that they should also stop abusing the constitution by arbitrarily sacking elected local government council officials, in the overall interest of our democracy.

  • Jonathan and his ethnopolitical zanies

    Jonathan and his ethnopolitical zanies

    It is not known whether President Goodluck Jonathan appreciates the unusual and fanatical commitment of both Kingsley Kuku, Special Adviser to the President on Niger Delta, and Mujahid Asari-Dokubo, leader of the Niger Delta People’s Volunteer Force (NDPVF), to his cause, especially his masqueraded interest in seeking re-election in 2015. But since he has not publicly denounced the two gentlemen’s remarks, it makes sense to say that he probably connived at their extreme, almost ethnocentric, and quite provocative remarks. The president could do with brilliant advisers. If he had a few around him, they would have counselled him to distance himself from the ethnopolitical zanies that surround him, men who specialise in waving red rag to a bull, and who are adept at instigating ethnic and political animosities.

    On April 25, Hon. Kuku aimed for the country’s jugular when he made a thoughtless and inflammable statement in the United States suggesting that Nigeria’s peace and security depended on Dr Jonathan continuing in office. With his characteristic speciousness and exaggeration he declared: “It is true that the Presidential Amnesty Programme has engendered peace, safety and security in the sensitive and strategic Niger Delta. Permit me to add that the peace that currently prevails in the zone is largely because Jonathan, who is from that same place, is the President of Nigeria. That is the truth. It is only a Jonathan presidency that can guarantee continued peace and energy security in the Niger Delta…I hope the US is aware that with peace and stability in the Niger Delta, Nigeria’s economy will remain buoyant enough to empower the Federal Government to contend with terrorism and other forms of insecurity in other parts of the country. However, if we allow anything to hurt the peace in the Niger Delta, Nigeria’s economy will be endangered and energy security in Nigeria and even America will not be guaranteed. The attention and interest of the US in Nigeria must remain the stability of the Niger Delta and the easiest way to ensure this is to encourage President Jonathan to complete an eight-year term.” Absolute, disgusting piffle.

    Hon Kuku made these ludicrous remarks at an interactive session with senior officials of the US State Department led by the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State (Bureau of African Affairs), Ambassador Donald Teitelbaum. It is of course not anybody’s fault that Hon Kuku’s befuddled mind elevates the Jonathan factor as a component of regional peace above the humongous and pacifying payouts to individuals in the name of pipeline security contracts and amnesty projects. Irrespective of what anybody thinks, the special adviser has made up his mind what to believe, and no one, no matter how sensible and logical, can dissuade him. But as he prated along like a schoolboy, he unwittingly gave his bewildered American hosts a disturbing impression of the hollowness and spuriousness of the Nigerian mind.

    It never rains but it pours. Just when commentators thought no one associated with Aso Villa could make a more nonsensical comment than it was the dishonour of Hon Kuku to make, another hysterical entertainer stepped out. Alhaji Asari-Dokubo, a security contractor for Jonathan’s government, boastfully threatened Nigeria with venomous statements suggesting that Nigeria could disintegrate if Dr Jonathan was not given a second term. Of course, the NDPVF leader does not set great store by performance or competence. Hear the grandiloquent closet militant: “Recently, the Special Adviser to the President on Niger Delta, Mr. Kingsely Kuku, made a statement in the United States of America that the peace being enjoyed in the Niger Delta would not be guaranteed if President Goodluck Jonathan was not returned in 2015… I want to go on to say that there will be no peace, not only in the Niger Delta, but everywhere if Goodluck Jonathan is not president again by 2015, except God takes his life, which we don’t pray for…We must have our uninterrupted eight years of two terms…For a very long time, our resources from the Niger Delta had been used to feed and fund Nigeria…”

    Hardball believes that the fulmination by Dr. Jonathan’s supporters does not represent the opinion of the Niger Delta, for there are many in the oil region who have their heads screwed on right. It must indeed be a misfortune of immense proportions that a region which produced eminent thinkers like Professors Tekena Tamuno and E.J. Alagoa also managed in the same breath to concoct human vacuums like Hon. Kuku and Alhaji Asari-Dokubo and inflict them upon the nation. Scientists explain this ‘miracle’ as genetic mutation, indicating that the sensible must ineluctably co-exist with the hallucinative. They are right.