The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Nigerian Newspaper

  • Trufest excites young dancers, marks 10 years

    Ten years on, despite logistic challenges, Trufest International Dance Festival continues to attract participation by younger generation dance companies from within and outside the country.

    Last Thursday, dance buffs and contemporary dance enthusiasts were treated to an evening of entertaining dance sessions at Alliance Francaise Mike Adenugba Centre, Ikoyi, Lagos. It was the opening ceremony of this year’s edition of the festival, which marked its 10th anniversary in Lagos. No fewer than 12 dance troupes will be on stage all through the duration of the festival, which will run till October 6.

    Founded by Adedayo Liadi’s Ijodee Art Organisation, the festival uses dance as a medium of communication and breaking boundaries in the country, on the continent and the world at large.

    Liadi said the idea of Trufest Festival came to him while he was in Uruguay in 2003 during a festival. “Then, I was part of Dance Meet Dance Festival. From 2006 till now, we are still pushing on and it has been free of charge for all participants including workshop, feeding and gift items. Importantly, the festival is to impact knowledge and create opportunities for younger ones. With the level of participation from young dancers, I begin to have a strong hope for the future,” he said.

    He noted that this year’s festival, which has as theme Creating new opportunities festival was to tour university campuses in Port Harcourt, Oyo, Bayelsa and Lagos. “Unfortunately, I got information that schools would not be in session. So, we decided to cancel the tour of cities and focus on touring Lagos. Now, the festival will move from Ikoyi to Ajegunle and Bariga,” he added.

    On selection of final participants for the festival, he said: “We sent out call for entries and we got about 50. And 15 entries were selected out of 50 received. But, we made sure the entries contain messages that the audience will take home.”

    Participating companies featuring at the festival are from France, South Africa, Benin, Cote D’ Ivoire and Nigeria and they include Ijolomo Dance Company, Ennovate Dance House, Ijogbenro Dynamic Troupe, Mary (Soloist), I Dance Network, Danzkiijo Arts Productions, Crown Troupe of Africa, Ijodee Arts, Moseg Creativities, African Ribs, Dynamic Tales Entertainment Company and Alapelaca Inc.

    The festival promotes artistes, the dance companies and also contributes to the socio-cultural and economic development of Nigeria. It accommodates solos, duets, trios and group dance performances.

    Trufesta festival focuses on new and old dance creations from different parts of the world and creates opportunities for emerging creative talents (dance artistes and choreographers) of different backgrounds to collaborate, share ideas, work together, exchange experiences, network and perform together.

    Since 2006 the festival has hosted creative works from Europe, Africa, South America, Canada, Australia, USA and Asia.

    The festival creates positive energy, unity amongst artistes, good atmosphere to learn, improve and showcases great performances at various levels. It also promotes conventional and unconventional works, dance classes, workshops, discussions and seminar. Over the years, the platform has become the meeting point for the town and gown to deliberate and work as one big family in the same space for the progress of dance.

  • E-payment transactions hit N203.35tr in six months

    Electronic payment (e-pay-ment) transactions worth N203.35 trillion were carried out by banks between January and June, this year, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) half-year e-payment figures  have shown.

    The data, released at the weekend,  showed that the deals occurred through cheques, Automated Teller Machines (ATMs), Point of Sale (PoS), m-Cash, CentralPay, Remita, Nigeria Interbank Instant Payment (NIBSS) Instant Payment (NIP), mobile money, among other channels.

    The report showed that 3.4 million transactions worth N2.2 trillion occurred through cheques; 504 million transactions worth N49.35 trillion through NIP;  424.5 million  transactions worth N3.23 trillion through ATMs. PoS attracted 187.6 million transactions worth N1.39 trillion, while web transfers attracted 47.9 million deals worth N223.9 billion.

    Others are mobile money, 104.7 million transactions worth N1.9 trillion and Remita’s 21.6 million transactions worth N9.8 trillion.

    On annualised, the data showed that nine million cheques were issued last year compared with 10 million in the preceding year; 875 million ATMs and 295 million PoS transactions, among other data.

    The e-payment powers were conferred on the CBN by Sections 2 (d) and 47 (2) of the CBN Act, 2007, to promote the development of efficient and effective systems for the settlement of transactions, including the development of electronic payment systems; the CBN hereby issue the following Guidelines on Operations of Electronic Payment Channels in Nigeria.

    While pushing for the full use of e-payment, CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele said for Nigeria to actively play at the world stage, “our payment system must be successfully benchmarked against the global best practices, as in most developed nations of the world.”

    He said e-payment provides safe and efficient mechanisms for making and receiving payments with minimum risks to the CBN, payment service providers and end-users.

    To make the e-payment vision a success, the CBN, in collaboration with key stakeholders in the payments community, developed the National Payments Systems Vision 2020 (NPSV 2020). The NPSV 2020 is a sub-set of the Financial Systems Strategy 2020 (FSS 2020).

     

  • Hyundai unveils 45 EV Concept

    Hyundai has introduced an electric vehicle concept named 45 EV Concept at the International Motor Show (IAA) in Frankfurt.

    The vehicle signifies a new era of Hyundai’s automotive design, focused on electrification, autonomous technologies and intelligent design.

    The dramatic exterior of 45 excites the imagination, also drawing inspiration from the vehicle that first established Hyundai’s design DNA, the 1974 Pony Coupe Concept. The car’s name also owes itself in part to the 45-degree angles at the front and rear, forming a diamond-shaped silhouette that further foreshadows the design direction of future EV models.

    The concept strips away complexity, celebrating the clean lines and minimalistic structure of the original coupe concept. Combining heritage with vision, 45 incorporates the evolution of Hyundai’s ‘Sensuous Sportiness’ design language.

    According to Senior Vice President and the Head of Hyundai Design Centre, SangYup Lee, the 45 clearly reveals how Hyundai heads towards the future through heritage.

    Lee said: “Through the 45 built upon our design language ‘Sensuous Sportiness’, Hyundai wants to present our vision on how we want to reshape people’s in-car lifestyle in the era of electrification and autonomous driving.”

    The 45 reinterprets the concept’s distinctive lattice radiator grille with a ‘kinetic cube lamp’ design, while a fastback profile epitomises stability and dynamism, characteristics accentuated by the vehicle’s significant width and forward-oriented posture. The daylight opening (DLO) terminates in the fast angle of the C-pillar, which generates a feeling of dynamic forward motion even when standing still.

    Innovative technology is inherent in 45’s details. At the bottom of the door, active LED lights show drivers how much longer they have before needing to recharge, even before they get in the car. Some tech features may influence forthcoming Hyundai production models, emphasising Hyundai’s open architecture for the future, and leaving room to include self-driving system applications. These include a hidden Camera Monitoring System (CMS), while self-cleaning side cameras replace traditional wing mirrors, ensuring perfect visibility at all times.

    Reimagining the in-car experience, the interior becomes a unique living space capable of transforming to accommodate a range of passenger lifestyle demands. Inspired by furniture designs, the minimalist cabin is fitted with an inviting fusion of wood, fabric and leather, creating a warm atmosphere that is both relaxing and spacious. Lounge chair-style rear seats and front seats can rotate to face other passengers, and swivel as occupants open the door for convenient entry and exit.

    The batteries in the fully electric 45 are set throughout the car’s ‘skateboard floor,’ contributing to its spacious interior. Clean lines, ergonomic placement of controls and ‘high-end electronics’ feel for the interior fixtures further enhance the feeling of space while reinforcing the simplistic modernity of 45’s design. Front-seat passengers can interact with the infotainment system via a projection-beam interface, replacing a single central touchscreen with a series of displays and functions integrated into the dashboard itself. Clever storage ideas include door mounted device pockets to hold tablets or PCs.

    The 45 embodies Hyundai’s ‘Style Set Free’ strategy for future mobility that emphasises personalisation of design and function. It was the centrepiece of Hyundai’s Frankfurt display, which showcased various future innovations in vehicle technology and integration of lifestyle applications.

     

  • Nigeria@59. Boldly plan 60,000Mw.Nigeria@60

    ABCDEFGGHI=Avoid Bribery & Corruption Daily Everywhere For Good Governance Here Immediately for a Nigeria@60.

    With one day less than one year to become 60, what prospect is there that the coming 364 days will be used any more constructively than the past 59 years and one day? Government which could act at lightning speed always chooses the slow path especially when fixing roads, the lifeline of business, and growth activities. At 59, we cannot understand why potholes cannot be filled with urgency even during the rainy season. People have different needs and priorities than politicians.

    Obasanjo presented 400 engineers as FERMA with green pickup trucks. Nigerians applauded. Mumu!! There was no return to the ‘Rule of Engineering Law’ just worse rubbish roads ever since. Governance failure!! Sadly, Nigeria’s political history is weighed down with political versions of our ‘Nigerian Dream’ as we were serially and perhaps irreversible ruined by greater and greater failed mega-contracts amounting to trillions while abusing the intelligence of Nigerians by saying that Nigeria has no money.

    Amazingly, Nigerians are angry, vexing and flexing federal might with P&ID. Hurray!! But every deal, without exception is believed to cheat Nigeria! Why we no vex before? Think! If Buhari was not in power, we probably would have swept this under a huge carpet, with money going both ways. But we know Nigeria’s contracts are routinely awash with maximum failure and corruption. The suffering on the Lagos-Ibadan road, mirrored across Nigeria, only needed good maintenance contracts. Are any heads rolling? Our politicians are as guilty as the guilty in P&ID, only free to loot Nigeria.

    At 59, why does Nigeria’s ‘Evil’ still prevail against the electrification of Nigeria to the UN recommended 150,000Mw so Nigerian students can read through the night in a clean air and zero noise pollution atmosphere. At 59, families and business cannot overcome burning money daily to overcome the curse of 3,000Mw – one USA village supply. Partially xenophobic South Africa has 45,000Mw!

    At 59, Nigeria, under the ‘Evil’ political powers, now exports its most precious commodity, its educated professionals, the new intelligentsia, our citizens who hopefully will continue to repatriate billions of dollars from UK, USA, the Middle East Alaska etc. and increasingly now Canada. At 59, less educated, and less wanted, youth flee their disappointing homeland’s political ineptitude and government abandonment as a tsunami of Nigerian illegal migrants to become dead in the Sahara, drowned in the Mediterranean around Lampedusa Island, body parts donors, forced sex workers or unwilling and deceived prostitutes. At 59, ‘Evil’ still perpetuates the muddy quagmire on rubbish roads built and rebuilt at minimum speed and maximum extra cost to budgets, life and limb.

    At 59, ‘Evil’ causes the refusal of all governments to properly predict and control the traffic from 6am to 9pm to allow citizens to work and return home in a predictable manner daily. At 59, ‘Evil’ forces happily check particulars, especially on a Sunday, of terrified female and their children going to church and amused expatriate visitors to give them a good impression about Nigeria. At 59, bullying traffic officers pull vehicles out of heavy traffic instead of prioritising the removal of the traffic obstacle. At 59, we have no ‘pothole- filling strategy’ for the numerous government staff to fill ‘the millions of potholes of Nigeria’ by direct local empowerment labour, not contractor fraud. At 59, our neighbourhood association filled two dangerously growing leprous potholes with cement instead of a Nigeria@59 party. What did you do?

    At 59, we are being given government ministry of works assurance that certain ‘key’ roads will be ‘ok’ for the ‘ember months’ traffic.  Name one country which operates its public service responsibility around an ‘ember months’ calendar. Is road use not daily? What is a ‘key’ road? Every road budgeted and paid for once or twice but not done is a key road to Nigeria’s existence. The words ‘Key roads’ remind me of the hated term ‘core subjects’.

    At 59, the concentration on core subjects has cost Nigeria a broad educational range by forcing teachers to ignore the personal education needs of millions of students deliberately denied teaching and learning time with so-called non-core subjects.

    I refuse to ever use the hated word ‘minority’. Imagine a country seeking to become a nation@59 still unable to give a glimmer of hope and meaning to ‘True Nationalism’ with proud face and throbbing heart facing the flapping green-white-green from the flagpole when the national anthem is played. This is a country that even cheats its main ambassadors -athletes and fallen heroes- soldiers and pensioners- who die on undeclared battlefields and in never ending pension verification exercise queues without basic facilities like chairs and shade, while staff seeks bribes.

    Everyone is born with automatic pride in home, family name, state and country. It is the country’s failure to deliver the fundamentals of civilized life that erodes the citizens’ pride in that country. At 59, Nigeria is a country with a history of failing its citizens in security etc. Of course, the country is an inanimate object and it is actually the rulers, leadership, heads of household failures which collectively result in the perceived failure of society and therefore the country Nigeria to meet local and international yardsticks of civilization.

    Nigeria will be great again, but does it have to take so long? Why not 60,000Mw.Nigeria@60 in 2020? [to be continued]

  • Patoranking, Teni, others perform at NickFest

    It was a day of fun at Balmoral Event Centre, Victoria Island, Lagos, as children and parents thronged Nickelodeon family festival.

    The event, headlined by Patoranking, Teni the entertainer, Fireboy and Rema had the performing acts take their slots on the Nickelodeon stage to thrill the excited crowd. It was indeed a night of glitz, glamour, great music and slime. Their exhilarating performances set the venue in a delightful mood which had kids, parents and other music lovers engage in a sing-along.

    The venue was well lit with a relaxing ambience created by the Nickelodeon traditional bright orange colour.

    The excitement continued as children in attendance witnessed the arrival of their favourite Nickelodeon characters live at the festival. They  include SpongeBob Squarepants, Adventure Bay’s intrepid pups, Skye, Rubble Marshall and Chase from Paw Patrol, and everyone’s favourite genies, Shimmer and Shine and The Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles who is performing in Nigeria for the first time.

    Moreso, celebrity guests such as Davido’s daughter Imade, Noble Igwe, Wizkid’s son, Boluwatife, Kemi Smallz, Sensei Uche, IK Osakioduwa, Osas Ighodaro, Dr Sid, BBNaija Ex Housemate, Sir Dee and a host of others were present at the event.

    NickFest host of the day, Mannie Essien and Amarachi Uyanne kept the mood alive with their spirited delivery.

    Speaking at  the event, Alex Okosi, Executive Vice President and Managing Director VIMN Africa, owners of Nickelodeon, said: “We are indeed grateful that our family-centric TV entertainment content was transformed to an event experience that has brought joy and entertainment to families. We have had an incredible show of support from parents and kids year after year and Nickfest in Nigeria continues to gain more fans.”

    Meanwhile, Teni, ahead of her new song titled, ‘Billionaire’, set for release on Friday is set to make three lucky people richer.

    On Monday, Teni took to Instagram to reveal that her team will be helping the selected winners to start up a business of their choice.

    “I’ll be picking three people that need help starting their business ventures,” she wrote.

    ‘Billionaire’ is produced by Pheelz Mr Producer.

     

  • Nissan recalls 1.2m vehicles

    Nissan North America is recalling 1,228,830 model year 2018-2019 Nissan Altimas, Frontiers, Kicks, Leafs, Maximas, Muranos, NVs, NV200s, Pathfinders, Rogues, Rogue Sports, Sentras, Titans, Versa Notes, Versa Sedans, Infiniti Q50s, Q60s, QX30s and QX80s.

    Also being recalled are model year 2019 Nissan GT-Rs& Taxis and Infiniti QX50s, QX60s, Q70s and Q70Ls.

    The back-up camera and display settings can be adjusted such that the rear view image is no longer visible and the system will retain that setting the next time the vehicle is placed in reverse.

    The lack of an image in the back-up camera display increases the risk of a crash.

    Nissan will notify owners in phases, and have dealers update the back-up camera settings software free of charge.

    The recall is expected to begin October 21, and all affected VINs should be activated by November 11.

     

  • A chained judiciary

    •Nigerians must unite to make our courts truly independent

    When the Chief Justice of a country speaks, he deserves attention; whatever he says cannot be ignored. So, when the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) said the country’s judiciary is in bondage, all lovers of democracy and rule of law should feel sufficiently worried. Money may not answer to everything; but it answers to many things. Indeed, a judiciary that is cash-starved is no judiciary; it is truly a judiciary in bondage.

    Chief Justice Tanko Muhammad bared his mind on the worrisome trends affecting the judiciary last week Monday, at the special court session marking the beginning of the 2019/2020 legal year of the Supreme Court and the inauguration of 38  Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SANs). He also spoke of the need for all citizens and governments to obey court orders, poor salaries of judicial officers, among other worrisome trends in the judiciary.

    Justice Muhammad likened the country’s judiciary to a cow that is tied firmly to a tree and yet is expected to graze freely in the meadow. According to the CJN, “If you say that I am independent, but in a way, whether I like it or not, I have to go cap in hand asking for funds to run my office, then I have completely lost my independence. It is like saying a cow is free to graze about in the meadow but at the same time, tying it firmly to a tree. Where is the freedom?”

    We join Justice Muhammad in asking: “where indeed is the freedom”? The late Dr. Kwame Nkrumah made a similar analogy when he said political independence without economic independence is useless.

    We wonder whether there is a grand conspiracy between the executive and legislative arms of government to keep the third arm, the judiciary, in this sorry state where it has to go cap in hand begging for funds. This is not just tantamount to a disregard for the rule of law; it is also bad for the principle of separation of powers. The principle vests the legislative, executive, and judicial powers of government in separate bodies. The idea is to ensure that none of the arms becomes overbearing as to lead to abuse of powers. Each arm is expected to act as checks and balances on the other for the ultimate good of the society.

    But what we have in the country is a situation where both the executive and the legislative arms treat the judiciary as an extension of the other two arms. As a matter of fact, they seem comfortable seeing the judicial officers going about looking for funds. In this situation, how can we be talking of an unfettered judiciary? We are all familiar with the saying that “he who pays the piper dictates the tune”. Although the CJN tried to give the impression that despite this financial challenge, the courts still “don’t pander to anybody’s whims and caprices. If there is any deity to be feared, it is the Almighty God. We will never be subservient to anybody, no matter his position in the society,” we know this is easier said than done.

    We deplore the continued subjugation of the judiciary to the other arms of government. The courts are the last hope of the common man. So, nothing that can compromise the independence of such an essential arm of government should be encouraged.

    We therefore call on all lovers of democracy to challenge this state of affairs. It is not a matter for the judicial officers alone but one that all Nigerians must show sufficient interest in. We are all in chains when the judiciary is in chains. Lawyers, judges, the civil society and indeed all Nigerians must stand to be counted in the effort to extricate the judiciary from the apron strings of the executive arm of government. A situation where the independence of the judiciary is in doubt can only encourage chaos. Although not a few Nigerians would say the corrupt judicial officers would remain corrupt no matter what the society does to gift them good life, it is still better to give the arm of government all that we can afford to make life meaningful for the judicial officers. It is only then that we can stand on a strong moral pedestal to demand untainted justice delivery that we can all be proud of.

     

  • Trump and Iran: Bully meets his match

    It is sad, tragic really, that the most powerful nation on earth, one of the most politically advanced and sophisticated, should be the one being governed by a virtual illiterate such as Donald Trump. Trump is arguably the most ill-equipped and unsuitable for the high office of all the past presidents of the United States, at least in recent memory. He has neither military background nor public service experience prior to being catapulted to the highest office in the nation. How, in the name of all that is noble and decent could Americans entrust the world’s greatest nuclear button to so vacuous a mind! Whatever happened to their vaunted political sophistication, you may wonder. Well, democracy has its shortcomings after all.

    A Donald Trump in any Third World country would not be considered abnormal at all. Since assuming office in January 2017, America’s foreign policy has revealed his infantile knowledge of the complexity of world politics. And whenever he is confused on how to proceed, he resorts to sheer braggadocio and verbal bullying, as if he can make the rest of the world conform to his juvenile tantrums by merely waving America’s military might. Like the bully that he is, he once openly threatened North Korea with nuclear annihilation, until he discovered that Chairman Kim Jung-Un does not take kindly to threats. After Kim Jung-Un angrily fired off a few more ballistic missiles to prove his point, a scared Donald Trump scampered home and turned attention to his usual punching bag, the news media that won’t throw nuclear bombs!

    A basic characteristic of illiterate bullies like Donald Trump is that they are often at a loss what to do and how to react when their bluff is called. Never able to anticipate a day when their bluff would be called, they are ill-prepared and simply lapse into incoherence and confusion once someone stands up to them. Iran has stood up to Trump!

    Experience has shown that Trump is all bluff and bluster, no substance! And having bluffed his way through a crooked business life, he is now scared silly because the game of politics is a different business entirely, that world politics is much clumsier and treacherous, that even so-called powerful states generally have an imperfect control over situations outside their territories. Due to poor intellectual preparation, Donald Trump is grossly incapable of processing information; he is susceptible to acting whimsically, and always resorts to his natural default setting: winging it. A remorseless and compulsive liar who would claim victory where none is obvious, Donald Trump shows he is not only congenitally immoral but frankly amoral as well.

    After the failure of his initial fixation on North Korea, on which he had threatened fire, fury and nuclear annihilation, the bully turned his attention to Iran, a country he imagined would be easier to intimidate. Unlike North Korea, Iran does not possess nuclear weapons but instead immense national pride predicated on ancient Persian civilization that is centuries older than the United States and its Western cronies. Like North Korea, it also does not take external bullying lying down. Since Trump’s ill-considered pull-out of the JCPOA, a multilateral treaty intended to prevent Iran from building nuclear weapons and force it to respect to its commitment to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, he has tightened sanctions against the country and blackmailed many other countries to conform, in the vague hope that these actions would engineer his much desired regime change in Tehran. Well, Iran like Venezuela has turned out a harder nut for Trump to crack. In recent months, Iran has matched America wit for wit, word for word, action for action and threat for threat. It engaged in a tit-for-tat action over seizure of its oil tanker by British forces in the Strait of Gibraltar at the behest of Donald Trump by seizing a British oil tanker in the Persian Gulf. It successfully shot down a US military drone gathering intelligence over its territory, and signalled its capability and readiness to affect the flow of oil and maritime trade through the choke point which is the Straits of Hormuz. Though it has denied its involvement in the recent drone attacks against Saudi Arabia’s huge oil infrastructure, Iran-made weapons and Iran-supported Houthis in Yemen were implicated. In his speech before the UN General Assembly on Wednesday September 25, Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani indicated that a foreign attack on his country could ignite a war that would incinerate the entire Middle East. This is no empty threat, for Iran has both symmetric and asymmetric capabilities to start a regional war.

    Looking Donald Trump eyeball to eyeball, Iranian leaders have not blinked, unlikely to blink, and have firmly stated their unwillingness to enter into any dialogue whatsoever with Trump unless and until he returns fully to the JCPOA and remove all sanctions. This is unlike North Korea whose leader met twice with Trump, which allowed him to claim some sort of Pyrrhic victory. Iran on the other hand is a much tougher cookie to deal with. The Iranians have unmistakably given indication that they possess capabilities that even the reputed greatest military power on the planet must sensibly consider before taking actions against their country. Indications are that Iran is eminently capable of combusting the entire the Middle East and putting America’s allies and interests in the region in jeopardy if attacked. In recent weeks, Iran’s actions have threatened not just the geopolitical neighbours alone but global economy at large. Iranian weapons were reportedly used to bomb and cripple Saudi Arabia’s gigantic oil infrastructure. Even though Saudi Arabia parades impressive US-made military weapons and radars, they were of no effect in the face of outside attacks.

    In the wake of the recent devastating bombing of Saudi Arabia’s massive oil-processing infrastructure, Trump characteristically thoughtlessly blustered that America was “locked and loaded” to respond, only to eat humble pie a few days later when confronted with the realities of Iran’s deterrent capability, i.e., to cause such extensive and unconscionable regional havoc that no one wants. All he can do for now is send more US troops to Saudi Arabia to help the Saudis defend their oil industry which they couldn’t do by themselves even with their huge military arsenal. Now the Saudis are no longer starry-eyed about what American power can do in the Middle East; they are now treading cautiously. It seems that Donald Trump, the illiterate bully who believes that all you need to effect a regime change in any country is wave America’s military might, has finally met his match in Iran!

    What will Trump do next?

    It is hard to predict with any confidence, after all we are dealing with an impulsive, erratic and unstable personality, not some cerebral and analytical mind who can easily be second-guessed. What is clear though is that Iran is ready to go for broke if attacked. Any war in the Middle East would definitely not be in anyone’s interest. The costs and consequences are simply beyond contemplation. Let us just pray that President Trump does not stupidly spark a conflagration that would incinerate the entire region.

  • Minister advises residents to hold leaders accountable

    The Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister, Malam Muhammad Musa Bello, has urged residents to hold government, community and traditional leaders, to accountable to promote good governance.

    Bello, represented by the Minister of State for FCT, Dr Ramatu Tijjani Aliyu, gave the advice at a ceremony to mark the 59th Independence Anniversary.

    He stressed the need for the residents to initiate community action, galvanise and mobilise the citizenry to actualise the true ideals of the FCT.

    The minister also enjoined residents of the territory to insist that the right things were done and be committed to the building of  Abuja as envisaged by its founding father’s.

    He said the development of the FCT had not been without challenges, many of which were associated with commitment of residents to the ideals of which the territory was founded.

    Read Also: Buhari greets ex-minister Yerima at 80

    According to him, FCT has lived up to the dreams of her founding fathers, as over the years, it has become a melting pot of cultures, traditions and people from virtually every village and hamlet in the country.

    He said: “Let all of us, therefore, use the occasion and opportunity of our 59th Independence Anniversary to rededicate and re-commit ourselves to building the FCT of our dreams. It will gladden me as I have no doubt it will gladden the hearts of our founding fathers because it will be the realisation of their dreams, if every resident of the FCT truly regards the territory as home and will treat here as such.

    “For far too long, many residents of the FCT consider her as simply a location where they live out of necessity to make a living, while their hearts lie somewhere else.

    “I must say that for the FCT to really make the dreams of her founders become a reality and truly become a home for all Nigerians, we must treat her the way we treat the homes in which we live daily. I have often times said that as residents of the FCT we owe ourselves and indeed the entire country to treat it as our one true home.

     

     

     

     

  • University for the Deaf?

    The report that the Federal Government has reached an agreement with Gallaudet University in the United States for the establishment of a University for the Deaf in either Abuja or Ogun State is a pointer to the fact that slowly but surely, the government is thinking about the education of the hitherto neglected segment of the Nigerian population, the deaf. They constitute a sizeable number of the Nigerian population that have individually tried to paddle their own canoe amongst the able bodied.

    The Gallaudet University is a federally chartered private university for the deaf and hard of hearing that was founded in 1864 initially as a grammar school for both blind and deaf children, and named after the founder, Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet. It is officially bilingual with American Sign Language and written English as means of instruction.

    What it means then is that over the past 155 years, the school has developed and produced worthy alumni. The school is the only one of its type globally. However, while we appreciate the effort of the government and the National Association of the Deaf to cater for the deaf by the establishment of the university, we belief that it might be a tad too premature and might prove very challenging equipping such a university that would be optimally valuable to both the deaf in particular, and the country in general.

    Nigeria has large populations of both the physically and mentally challenged that have been neglected over the years unlike their counterparts in the developed world. There is a huge number of the blind and those with physical disabilities and different grades of mental disabilities like autistic children and those with either cerebral palsy and down syndrome. We expect that the priority of the Federal Government should be an all-inclusive care and concern for all those with disabilities through policies and social re-orientation of a population that is largely fatalistic about disabilities in ways that the stigma and exclusions these groups suffer would be addressed comprehensively, to make them maximally productive and happy to be alive.

    At the moment, there are very few disabled people that are able to fully access education as most people, especially parents, believe such disabilities are spiritual punishments and as such they are left to fend for themselves through either begging or doing other menial jobs. The government can make their lives matter through deliberate policies and their implementation, as they are just as hungry for life and ready to contribute to national development.

    A dedicated university for the deaf in the country at the moment is a bit premature as the needed infrastructure and human capital are not in place. The deaf need professionals in sign language and the number in the country cannot be enough to pull through at a tertiary level at this time. Recruiting these professionals from other countries that have invested in their training might not be economically rewarding at this point of the country’s economic crisis.

    In the alternative, we recommend that while the country puts the establishment of the university in a future to-do-list, the immediate focus should be first to re-orientate the population to accept the physically and mentally challenged, make more policies and laws that would protect them, or if the existing ones are enough, see to a better implementation to impact fully on the targets. There ought to be laws compelling all town and building planners to create special stairways, walkways and dedicated car parks for the physically challenged.

    The government can equally subsidise the education of the physically challenged, including the deaf, and award scholarships to the talented ones, either academically or for other vocational studies that can equip them to earn a living for themselves rather than being dependent on parents or the larger society that treat them with some sense of caution because of a misbegotten cultural belief system .

    We commend the conception of the idea for a specialised university for the deaf but we feel that there is a reason the Gallaudet University is the sole such university in the world, given the enormous resources such an institution requires. Such an institution in Nigeria might turn out a white elephant project given the infrastructure and other logistical requirements to run it. We see how well we are running our regular universities. Such mindset does not show we are ready for specialised university like that for the deaf.