The Nation Newspaper

Tag: President Goodluck Jonathan

  • FG establishes power sector intervention fund

    FG establishes power sector intervention fund

    The Federal Government on Monday approved the establishment of Power Sector Intervention Fund with initial deposit of N300 billion to facilitate speedy development of the nation’s power sector.

    President Goodluck Jonathan made this known at an International Conference on Power Sector and Infrastructure Financing at the Presidential Banquet hall, Abuja.

    Jonathan, represented by Vice President Namadi Sambo, said that the setting up of the fund would enable industry players have access to cheap long term funds.

    “To enable industry players have access to cheap long term funds, government is hereby setting up a “Power Sector Intervention Fund”.

    “The financial resources for this special Fund will be pooled from the Federal Government, Development Financial Institutions (DFIs) as well as local and global and financial partners.

    “The Coordinating Minister for the Economy will give details of the operational structure of the fund. But, will essentially, provide avoidable refinancing and unlending services to the sector.

    “On its part, the Federal Government will make initial deposit of N300 billion.”

    Jonathan noted that under the National Integrated Infrastructure Master Plan about 2.9 trillion dollars was needed for infrastructure development efforts between 2014 and 2045.

    He said the energy sector alone needed about 900 billion dollars in the next 30 years, saying that a significant percentage of the amount was expected to come from the private sector.

    The president said that the power sector alone needed 10 billion dollars for Generation and Distribution companies to meet the target of additional 5,000 megawatts in the next few years.

    According to him, the nation’s transmission grid requires an annual investment of about 1.5 billion dollars for the next five years to ensure its reliability and stability.

    Jonathan challenged participants to come up with practical funding strategies and help to facilitate the unlocking of the much needed capital for the infrastructural development in the country.

    He said already the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) had commenced the aggressive implementation of the expansion blueprint funded by a mix of appropriation and funds from financial and multilateral institutions.

  • Good riddance

    Good riddance

    At last, the President sums up courage; fires controversial Stella Oduah

    Whether President Goodluck Jonathan finally got his mind made up for him, or he made it up by himself; or whether the President asked the embattled former Minister of Aviation, Ms Stella Oduah, to resign or he gave her the boot, what is important is that Ms Oduah is no more a minister of the Federal Republic. If the President studied the newspapers on Thursday when the news made the headlines, he must have seen that the other ministers that also lost their jobs: Police Affairs Minister Caleb Olubolade, Minister of Niger Delta, Godsday Orubebe and Minister of State for Finance, Yerima Ngama, were more or less footnotes in the matter. The issue was Stella Oduah.

    And this is understandable. It is true that the present government had been rocked by many scandals: the fuel subsidy scandal, pension scandal, etc, Oduahgate is simply in a class of its own. It was one that recommended itself for instant judgment, yet, for over four months, President Jonathan’s courage failed him to show the minister the door. A minister who approved the purchase of two bullet-proof cars at a staggering cost of N255million without authorisation over four months ago ought to have had her case decided since, if not for the fact that the government loves wasting time on irrelevancies.

    Quite interestingly, just as President Jonathan was still thinking about how to handle the scandal, a lesser incident occurred in Ghana in which the deputy minister of communications, Victoria Hammah, was sacked for saying that she would not quit politics until she had made $1million. It was a God-sent example that should have shown President Jonathan the light; but he chose not to see it. The House of Representatives set up a committee to probe the matter and the committee found her guilty, making the full house to recommend to the President a review of Oduah’s appointment. Again, the President ignored the representatives. He then set up his own committee. Months after, mum was the word from him on what the recommendation of the committee was. But it was obvious the report was not what the President expected, otherwise he would have hid under it to exculpate Ms Oduah.

    What is particularly annoying is that while it took this long for President Jonathan to get Ms Oduah out of his cabinet, he did not waste time in throwing away Barth Nnaji, the former Minister of Power, over conflict of interest. This selective approach to the anti-corruption war (is there any war?) does his government no good. Some have contended that Oduah was doing well in the aviation sector; but Nnaji too was making slow but steady progress on power supply until he was given the boot. In Oduah’s case, her so-called good performance in the Ministry of Aviation was questionable. Even as at the time she was said to be doing well, the arrival hall of the Murtala Muhammed Airport in Lagos was a sorry sight whenever it rained, as buckets and other items had to be brought in to collect rain water from the leaking roofs. Those who say the President dilly-dallied for this long on Oduah’s case because he wanted to be thorough, or because he did not want to be stampeded into taking actions would do well to ponder the Oduah saga vis-à-vis other cases that he almost summarily disposed of.

    Without doubt, the Oduah saga made many Nigerians wonder what it was that made President Jonathan adamant on retaining her. I cannot think of anyone in recent Nigerian history that has survived such an onslaught. But that the President eventually bowed to public pressure has convinced me that it is true that when a child gets to a place of fear, it is natural for him to be afraid. But it is not only a child that frets when he gets to the home of fear; elders too do. That was why Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, hitherto thought to be a strong man, became lily-livered and had to pull the brakes at a point when he discovered that his insistence on having a third term by all means was going to backfire. In Nigeria, few people live to regret toying with handover dates. The docility that Nigerians are usually accused of, and which their leaders often exploit, does not extend to toying with transition schedules!

    Anyway, now that President Jonathan has fired Oduah and thus relieved himself of the moral burden, he still has to decide what to do with his petroleum minister, Diezani Alison-Madueke. If the Jonathan government was embroiled in any scandal, the fuel subsidy scandal which became public knowledge barely seven months after the government was sworn in, is the most talked-about. Since then, there have been sundry other allegations of fraud rocking some parastatals under her ministry, particularly the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), whose books are in a mess. No one can say for sure how many billions of dollars could be missing from its record. Yet, the minister under whose nose these unfortunate developments are happening sits pretty in office, years after. We never had it so bad.

    It bears restating that no matter what the Jonathan government does, it won’t go far if it does not tackle corruption. Yet, it does not seem the President has the nerve for this task. His self-inflicted distractions on which he wastes precious time and scarce resources cannot permit him to do any tangible thing. Imagine the man-hours lost to the war to dislodge Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State! Whereas if the President had led well, he would not have to lose sleep over whether his party’s lawmakers and governors are defecting; all he would lay bare for Nigerians is his score card which should be speaking for him now, about three years after his assumption of office.

    This excludes the period he spent to conclude the tenure of his former boss, Alhaji Umaru Yar’Adua. If the President’s kernel is cracked for him by some benevolent spirits (because if it is in terms of performance, his government is a monumental disaster) and he manages to get a second term, the story cannot be different. If care is not taken, this is how we would continue to be adrift, and by the time he realises time is no longer on his side, it would have been late and he, like his political godfather, Chief Obasanjo, would start looking for third term. Yet, his government does not seem to have answer to any of the country’s challenges, no matter the number of terms it is given. To worsen matters, it cannot even arrest corruption. So, that is double jeopardy for Nigerians. This is why many Nigerians feel that it is immaterial if President Jonathan sacks his entire cabinet and decides not to work with ministers again, more than enough damage has been done to his government. Now, he would have not just to claim to be fighting corruption but must be seen to be doing so.

    Well, now that Oduah is gone, that is one down. But she is not the only clog in the wheel of the country’s progress. In terms of performance, most of the present ministers are not just there, that is why we are making progress in reverse; although the government boasts a surfeit of attack dogs, sycophants and mischief experts. The truth is, Nigerians had expected a near clean sweep of the cabinet because if a government is as inept as the one we have now, throwing only four ministers into the unemployment market cannot make much difference.

  • Energy sector requires $900b, says Jonathan

    Energy sector requires $900b, says Jonathan

    President Goodluck Jonathan has said Nigeria needs about $900 billion to fix her energy sector over the next 30 years.

    Speaking during the Nigeria Power Financing Conference held at the Banquet Hall of the State House, Abuja, yesterday, he said a significant percentage of the fund has to come from the private sector.

    Jonathan was represented at the conference by Vice President Namadi Sambo. The forum was titled: “Private Sector Financing/Support for the Power Sector and Infrastructure.”

    Stressing that the government alone could not fund the infrastructure development, the president said the power sector alone requires $10 billion for power generation and distribution towards adding 5,000 megawatts (Mw) to the national grid.

    The president called on power sector operators to do everything possible in order to provide appreciable power supply to Nigerians by June this year.

    He said: “Under our national infrastructure master plan, substantial amounts are required for infrastructural development efforts in the next 30 years covering 2014 to 2045. The energy sector alone needs an infusion of about $900billion during this period. Of this, a significant percentage is expected to come from the private sector.

    “The power sector alone needs about $10billion for generation and distribution companies in the next few years to enable us add 5,000Mw to the national grid.”

    According to the president, the transmission grid requires an annual investment of about $1.5billion for the next five years to ensure its reliability and stability, adding that the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) has commenced aggressive implementation of the expansion blueprint by leveraging funds from both the appropriation, financial and multi-lateral institutions.

    He said: “The Federal Government is also undertaking new investments in power as well as renewable energy such as solar, wind and hydro power plants and also in major gas infrastructure. This infusion of resources from other sources will go a long way in fully realising these efforts.

    “Besides power, we are also making huge investments to meet our other infrastructural needs including our road networks, telecommunication, railway, water resources, water rails, aviation and so on.

    “The government alone cannot fund infrastructural needs in Nigeria. Today’s global economy depends on the active involvement and sustained contribution of all stakeholders, especially the organise private sector. This conference therefore comes at the appropriate time. The opportunities for foreign direct investments and returns in Nigeria are attractive.”

    He said the economy is growing stronger everyday, adding that it is hoped that the conference will come up with practicable strategies for the power sector, and that it will devise strategies to unlock the much needed capital for wider infrastructural development.

    “I urge the private sector operators to go the extra mile and provide appreciable electricity supply to anxious Nigerians, at least by June this year. I believe this can be done and Nigerians are eagerly waiting for this.

    “ The power sector is very critical to the attainment of our national goals. Our commitment to of greater service delivery in this sector remains very strong and unshakeable given its strategic importance to the development of our country.

    “Today, our per capital electricity generation is still low and this cannot lead us to our national development target. We must fundamentally reorganise the power sector to improve performance as well as increase our generation capacity to meet both industrial and domestic needs of our nation.”

  • Jonathan, Tukur and a government of Jezebels

    I must commend President Goodluck Jonathan for removing Alhaji Bamanga Tukur as National Chairman of the PDP and finally dumping him. It really is good riddance to bad rubbish because that man was a disaster to his party. PDP itself is bad enough but to have a self-conceited and vainglorious ancient dinosaur who is completely fixed in his ways, who believes that anyone and everyone below the age of 60 is still a ‘’young’’ man or woman and who sees the world from the prism and mindset of a 1960’s Viet Nam war veteran that is still suffering from post-war traumatic syndrome was a disaster waiting to happen. This was a man that drove goodwill away from his party in the same way that shelltox drives away mosquitoes from a bedroom. As long as Tukur was in charge the continued demise of the PDP was guaranteed. He was not only a scourge to the ruling party but he was also a beautiful, eager and willing undertaker to it’s long lost glory and a tremendous source of comfort and joy to those of us in the opposition APC. We shall miss him sorely and I must confess that he did a great job for us whilst he lasted. May he enjoy his forced and long-overdue retirement from public office and partisan politics and may he live long enough to see the PDP defeated and an APC President sworn in 2015.

    I also commend the President for removing and reshuffling a large number of his key commanders in the military a couple of weeks ago and then retiring no less than three of his four Service Chiefs just the other day (16th January 2014) and appointing new ones. This was the right and proper thing to do after the precious lives of no less than 7000 innocent Nigerian citizens were cut short by Boko Haram in the war against terror in the last three years. It was also the expedient and responsible thing to do given the fact that no less than 200 of our gallant soldiers were killed in one battle alone against Boko Haram (and later buried in mass graves) just a few months ago simply because they ran out of bullets and after a whole army barracks was burnt down to the ground and the family members of military personnel were slaughtered, again by Boko Haram, just a few weeks ago. Something had to give and heads had to role simply because we were not making any headway in the war against terror and instead we were suffering heavy casualties and embarrassing losses.

    Yet despite the fact that both

    moves

    were commendable they will

    change nothing because they are both too little and too late. The PDP will continue to sink because it is a political party that has lost it’s bearing and it’s soul and it has mortgaged it’s conscience. It has also lost the source and strength of it’s inspiration and moral authority in the distinguished person of President Olusegun Obasanjo who really was the glue that bound the party together and kept it going against all odds. Though Obasanjo remains in the PDP he has also wisely opted out of participating in it’s affairs. This is a manifestation of his disgust with the President and the former National Chairman and he has now become the official ‘’navigator’’ of the newly emerging power in the field of Nigerian politics which is known as the APC. Frankly speaking the PDP has become a party that is beyond redemption and the removal of Tukur cannot change that. I say this because no sensible person will go back to a stinking carcass simply because the head of the dead animal has been cut off and thrown away. A carcass remains a carcass whether you cut off it’s head, legs or any other part of it’s body or not. Whichever way, it remains as dead as a dodo and it only awaits a formal burial. The truth is that the vultures are already feeding fat on the rotting and decaying cadavar of the PDP and whether anyone likes to hear it or not the truth is that that party can never be whole again. As I said 8 months ago it is a party that has been rejected by God and whose leaders are suffering God’s judgement for their unjust, gluttonous, wicked, foul and evil ways.

    In the same way I have to say that no matter how commendable and honourable in intention the recent changes in our military High Command may be they will achieve nothing either and, in practical terms, they will serve absolutely no purpose. This is because the morale of the army is very low due to the massive losses that they have recorded in the war against Boko Haram and because they have a Commander in Chief who does not care about their welfare, does not ‘’give a damn’’ about their fortunes and does not have the guts to lead and inspire them with strength and courage. Worst still he has refused to arm and equip them properly or give them a free hand to fight and prosecute the war against terror with the ruthless precision and decisive resolve that is required. They say that if an army of sheep is led by a lion it will win every battle. In the same vein they also say that if an army of lions is led by a sheep it cannot win any battle. The latter is the case in Nigeria. In our military we have an army of lions who are well-trained, professional, strong, courageous, ready to go and capable of doing anything that is required of them as long as they are properly-led, well-armed, well-equipped, well-motivated, well-supplied, adequately encouraged, thoroughly inspired and well-supported. However that same army of noble and courageous lions is led by a sheep who, by his own words, has told the world that he is not a lion, he is not a warrior, he is not a fighter and that he is not a king. If anyone has any doubts about that permit me to refer you to my essay titled ‘’A President Without Balls’’ and the two updated versions of the same essay titled ‘’The Gutless Eunuch and Spirit of the Jagaban’’ and ‘’The Gutless Eunuch and the Lion King’’ respectively. They can all be found on my website-www.femifanikayode.org or you can just google them. To have such a man as Commander-in-Chief actually encourages and tempts the enemy to attack us because weakness and a reluctance to lock horns and engage and to be strong, forceful and decisive when provoked or attacked always attracts aggression. As long as such a weak and uninspiring man remains the Commander-in-Chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces please be ready for more casualties and more losses regardless of how lion-like, courageous or professional our soldiers may be.

    However there is hope. If Good

    luck Jonathan wants his for

    tunes and the fortunes of his party to change and if he wants peace to return to our shores he simply has to take the following nine steps.

    1. He has to resign as President forthwith and undertake to stay out of Nigerian politics for the next 10 years.

    2. If he cannot step down, he must give a public undertaking to the Nigerian people that he will not run for re-election in 2015 and he should not change his mind at the last minute.

    3. He must apologise to Nigerians for the mess he has created of the economy and ask forgiveness for his manipulative ways and the gross incompetence and ineptitude that he has displayed while running the affairs of this country over the last three years.

    4. He must write a letter of condolence and pay a token fee of compensation as restitution to the families of every single one of the 7,000 innocent Nigerians that have been killed by Boko Haram in the last three years.

    5. He must take off the kid gloves, stop interfering and give the military the green light to use all necessary means to prosecute the war against Boko Haram and he must win that war.

    6. He must remove one Esho Jinadu who is better known as Mr. Buruju Kashamu (a rather strange name that does not have it’s origins in Yorubaland but instead sounds like a low quality brand of Indian tea) as the leader of the PDP in the Southwest and honour the demand of the American Courts and the ruling of the Nigerian Federal High Court and Court of Appeal by extraditing him to the United States of America to answer serious charges of drug smuggling in that country forthwith.

    7. He must direct his Ijaw supremacist kinsmen to desist from threatening the lives of other Nigerians that oppose his government and who keep threatening brimstone and fire and the dismemberment of Nigeria if he is not allowed to come back in 2015,

    8. He must direct Chief E.K. Clark, his new-found political father and mentor, to stop insulting the Yoruba people and desist from attacking our leader Asiwaju Bola Tinubu on his behalf.

    9. He must give a public undertaking that the other four Presidents that run this country with him and that act as his ‘’co-Presidents’’ will also step down with him forthwith or, if he insists on staying till 2015, give an undertaking that he will fire them with immediate effect and bar them from playing any role whatsover in the running of the affairs of our country from now on.

    Those four co-Presidents are, in order of seniority, 1. Dame Patience Jonathan (our amiable First Lady)

    2. Allison Dizeani Madueke (the Minister of Petroleum Resources)

    3. Stella Oduah (Minister of Aviation) and

    4. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala (Minister of Finance and the Co-ordinating Minister).

    President Goodluck Jonathan, even though he is the public face of the small cabal of co-Presidents that presently rules Nigeria and even though he is the one that was given a lawful mandate from the Nigerian people in 2011 to lead our country, comes a distant fifth in the pecking order. He is co-President No. 5.

    Yet it is not too late. If our Presi

    dent can find the courage to take

    these steps, peace will return to Nigeria immediately and our people will once again have hope. The problem that we have in our country today is not an ageing former Party National Chairman called Bamanga Tukur who had lost touch with reality, who never knew how to play the game and who did not know when to call it quits. And neither was it a set of tired and exhausted army commanders and Service Chiefs who did their best but who received no real and tangible support or encouragement from their Commander-in-Chief in the field of battle. The problem that we have is the President himself- a President who prides himself on his own weakness and incompetence . A President who is as confused and as clueless as the comic character, called Chancey Gardner in the celebrated 1970’s Peter Seller’s Hollywood blockbuster titled: Being There.

    A President who does not understand the meaning of the word ‘’class’’ or ‘’honesty’’ and who breaks his own word consistently. A President who has abdicated his responsibilities, destroyed his own political party, divided his own country, alienated his own friends, humiliated his own mentor, abandoned his own people, brought ridicule to his own faith, cowers before his own officials, betrays his own governors, scorns the international community and breaks his solemn oath to protect and defend the Nigerian people. A President who does not even have the nerve or the guts to call to order any of the numerous Jezebels that control him. He is the problem we have in our country today and until he resigns, is impeached or is voted out of power nothing will change and Nigeria will continue to go from bad to worse. That is what you get when you vote for a man who never wore shoes to school. May God deliver our country.

     

    •Chief Fani-Kayode is former Aviation Minister

     

  • Jonathan needs a role model

    Jonathan needs a role model

    President Goodluck Jonathan’s supporters and admirers think many of his critics are either deliberately offensive or are zealots of the opposition. They are wrong. His critics, who owe no one any apology, are simply disappointed with a politician they risked everything to support in his unsteady effort to claim the presidency when his predecessor was too sick to continue. The late Umaru Yar’Adua was of course a tested administrator and his mind sufficiently robust in terms of the ideals of politics to elicit profound admiration from both friends and foes, but his illness and the hijack of state power by shadowy figures led many to damn the consequences of trusting the untested Dr Jonathan with more powers than he ever countenanced in his meteoric and fairy tale rise to prominence.

    The principles those who fought for Dr Jonathan in 2010 promoted are of course unassailable, and they would be as eager to fight for them today as they did many years back, notwithstanding the disillusionment only hindsight is capable of giving. But given his almost total lack of inspiration, not to say his bland and offensive manner of railroading inchoate policies through the legislature and the bureaucracy, those who fought for him in 2010 are now almost sorry they did. The problem, it occurs to them, is not that Dr Jonathan is intrinsically bad, especially in the light of his often likable bursts of bucolic homilies. The problem is that since he assumed office, Dr Jonathan has not for once given any indication of one statesman, living or dead, whose style or ideas he admired, shared or is competent to redact.

    By training and by temperament, whether off the cuff or smuggled into his speeches by speechwriters, Dr Jonathan indeed only manages to give indication of someone who rose too rapidly politically to have the time to imbibe deep, noble and inspiring ideas of statecraft and leadership. Metaphorically speaking, his bones are perhaps too creakily dry to lend themselves to something delicate, lustrous and engaging. Other than his homiletic forays, no one has heard him declaim on any great issue with the depth, sagacity and nuance of a statesman. Could we therefore expect that far into his presidency and well into middle age, he is capable of the instinctive moulting familiar only to youths? I have my doubts. But this must not stop us from making recommendations to him.

    Africa does not have a long list of statesmen and great leaders – perhaps only Nelson Mandela in the truest sense of the word – but Dr Jonathan lives in an era when science and technology have obliterated boundaries. He has an illustrious global list to pick from, if he is capable. He is a zoologist by training. He will have to adjust a little to begin studying man in greater detail than he is accustomed to, beginning with history. He does not have to have a military background to choose well, nor is he required to be a lawyer or political scientist. All he requires are the discipline and the passion to learn and to imbibe the lessons of time and history.

    My private suspicion, frequently restated in this place, is that Dr Jonathan is too far gone to profit from this advice. Had he the gravitas and adornments that line the souls of great leaders, it is inconceivable he would have permitted, let alone perpetrated, the atrocious assault on the constitution still ongoing in Rivers State and elsewhere.

  • Okonkwo, Bismark: We’d resist pressure on same-sex

    The western campaign against the same-sex law recently signed by President Goodluck Jonathan will amount to nothing.

    This was the consensus last week at the council of African Apostles, an interdenominational ministerial body that met in Lagos.

    The council, which boasts of leading preachers like Dr Mike Okonkwo (Nigeria), Bishop Tudor Bismark (Zimbabwe), Dr Mensa Otabil (Ghana) and Bishop Joe Imakando (Zambia), among others, converged at the headquarters of The Redeemed Evangelical Mission (TREM) for an apostolic impartation.

    The meeting coincided with the conclusion of the 21-day fasting and prayer by TREM for the redemption of Nigeria.

    Speaking with reporters, the chairman of the council, Bishop Tudor Bismark, said Africans are united in their resolve to stop the importation of the same-sex culture to the continent by western forces.

    Bismark said regardless of the pressure, Africa will never succumb to supporting same-sex or encouraging the practice, saying the Bible is very clear on the issue.

    He said church leaders on the continent will mobilise their members and lobby government officials to resist the pressure to bow.

    According to him: “African Christians are united in their responses and attitudes. We know that this is an agenda that is packaged as a human right issue. We are aware of where this is coming from and prepared to resist them.”

    Okonkwo added that those into homosexuality and lesbianism cannot be allowed to live anyhow and destroy the nation.

    He dismissed talks about the law infringing on fundamental human rights, saying no one can be allowed to engage in acts capable of destroying the nation.

    Okonkwo said: “The Bible is very clear on gay issue. He made them male and female. We do not support homosexuality and there are no two ways around it.

    “They can’t live the way they like because there are things that destroy a nation. If you are talking about laws that have been signed that also infringed on fundamental human rights, there are many.

    “This is not just about that but a fundamental, moral issue that can destroy a nation. I am standing with the president on the position he has taken.”

    On the proposed national conference, the presiding Bishop of TREM said talking is important to a peaceful coexistence, saying Nigerians have bottled up too much and deserve to be heard.

    He acknowledged the conference might be hijacked but said it should be given a chance.

    Okonkwo explained: “Yes, somehow it will be the usual way they do things in Nigeria. They might try to hijack certain things but I don’t think it will be totally out of place for people to talk. No matter what, there will be still some things that will be discussed that can still be helpful.”

  • Nigeria’s bad luck party?

    Being the incumbent should, ordinarily, stand President Goodluck Jonathan in good stead in the run-up to next year’s presidential election but at the moment he is not even sure of having a strong, united party behind him.

    At the president’s inauguration three years ago, the governing People’s Democratic Party (PDP), which he heads, had a comfortable majority in both chambers of the National Assembly.

    He could have any bill passed into law, notwithstanding opposition parties’ views. That is no longer the situation.

    Floor-crossing by its legislators has wiped out the PDP’s majority in one chamber – the House of Representatives.

    Although the party retains its dominance in the other chamber – the Senate – the president cannot pass any bill into law without co-operation by opposition party members.

    This is one reason why this year’s federal budget is sitting unattended in the assembly.

    This time last year the ruling party had 19 of the 36 state governors.

    By the end of the year, five of them had formally defected to the main opposition party, the All Progressive Congress (APC), and more may be waiting to do so.

    This means that, because the governors control their legislatures, President Jonathan cannot get through any amendments to the constitution – under Nigeria’s federal system, two-thirds of state parliaments must approve any such changes.

    It also means the president will have to work harder for votes in those states next year, should he run for president.

    This leads on to why the ruling party is now in a crisis situation.

    The major cause is the president’s undeclared intention to run for another term in office next year.

    This is why the tenure of the party’s national chairman, Bamanga Tukur, became a problem for many party leaders, who accused him of arrogance and failure to consult.

    He has now resigned after months of pressure; his opponents, angered by his perceived support for President Jonathan’s re-nomination, had been demanding his removal.

    While the storm within the party was gaining momentum, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, political benefactor of Mr Jonathan and a strong influence within the party, wrote a damning letter last month cataloguing alleged personal shortcomings of the president and his style of governance.

    The letter was more devastating than if it had been written by the leader of the main opposition party.

    President Jonathan replied, denying all the allegations.

    He said that the former president had done him “grave injustice” with the public letter.

    He accused Mr Obasanjo of trying to incite the populace against him.

    His supporters within the PDP leadership and his political aides fired a barrage of denunciations against Mr Obasanjo but the resultant controversy has not helped the president.

    Yet another political bombshell was delivered by the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria.

    He alleged that nearly $50bn (£30bn) was unaccounted for from crude oil receipts taken by the national petroleum corporation.

    Official denials followed shortly afterwards but in the end it was admitted that about $10bn was yet to be accounted for.

    There was a report last week that the president directed the central bank governor to resign because his letter had been leaked, but that the governor refused, apparently calculating that it would be difficult for the president to muster the two-thirds majority in the Senate needed to sack him.

    It seems the president has dumped Mr Tukur in the hope this can save the party, which has won every election since the end of military rule in 1999.

    His own political future remains uncertain.

    It is not only raining over President Jonathan, it is like a deluge falling on him.

    He may have to draw on all the luck of his first name to sail through.

     

    Culled from BBC

     

  • Cleric warns Jonathan against cabals 

    The General Overseer of God’s Mercy Revival Ministries Lagos, Pastor James Akanbi, has warned President Goodluck Jonathan to shun unhealthy advice from politicians that could work against the overall interest of Nigerians.

    Akanbi made this appeal in an interview with The Nation at the first anointing service of the church.

    The service with the theme I shall weep no more attracted thousands of worshippers and featured song rendition, bible teaching, prayers and prophetic ministration.

    He urged Jonathan to work in the best interest of Nigerians in every situation and stop being a puppet of some cabals whose interest could throw back the nation from the annals of history.

    These cabals, he said, have been in control of the leadership of the country for decades and always want to protect their own interest by every means.

    He opined that the development of Nigeria lies solely on firm, honest, forthright and committed leadership.

    Such leadership, he added, must strive to provide essential services directed at making life suitable for the rural poor.

    God, he claimed, told him that the president will be a spokesman to the few cabals, if he gives in to the pressure from them.

    Should this happen, Akanbi stated that the masses will be in for trouble as they won’t be able to access quality health care, potable water and other essential services.

  • IBB’s phantom letter

    But last week was not all about phantom video; it was also a week of phantom letter. Of course Nigerians are familiar with the word ‘phantom’. It was very popular during the military era, when military officers could be executed or put in life jail over phantom coup. Interestingly, the man purported to have written the phantom letter was also an active participant in that era when ‘phantom’ became a household name in the country. I am talking about no other person than General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, better known as IBB. Some say he is a self-styled president; others yet call him ‘the evil genius’. The gap-toothed general was said to have dispatched a bombshell to President Goodluck Jonathan, on the worrisome state-of-the-nation, last week.

    Coming barely a few months after former President Olusegun Obasanjo wrote a stinker to President Jonathan, one would have started wondering what the retired generals wanted. When Obasanjo wrote his own letter, they said he did because President Jonathan has sidelined him in the scheme of things. So, what would have been the motivation for IBB to write such a short but sharp letter to the President? Could it be that he too wants to be remembered for one favour or the other? But, just as I was wondering why the new service chiefs could not begin their assignment by taking their retired boss to task for writing a letter he is not supposed to write (or, put in official jargon, for inciting Nigerians against the hard-working government), the general denied ever writing such a letter.

    General Babangida might not have known the import of his denial; but I put it to him that it has denied the media huge revenue. Imagine the headlines: IBB to Jonathan: do something now’; or even at simply ‘IBB writes Jonathan’, there would have been no unsold for many newspapers that day. As a matter of fact, till today, newspaper owners would still have been smiling to the banks while editors would be jubilating that they at least have a respite from sweating to get good stories to sell their papers. Honestly, this denial spoilt the day for some people. You may not get what I mean now; maybe you will when ‘the column that never was’ is eventually released.

    Well, denial or no denial, the new National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Adamu Muazu met with IBB on Friday. If it was a coincidence, it must be an exceptional one indeed. Perhaps it pays to be an ‘evil genius’!

  • Dasuki urges personnel on security

    The National Security Adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan, Col Sambo Dasuki (rtd), has urged security personnel on their roles.

    He spoke at the Conference on Security and Governance in West Africa at the New Chelsea Hotel, Abuja.

    The three-day event, organied by CLEEN Foundation with the Altus Global Alliance, brought together security and governance experts in West Africa to exchange opinions on a study carried out by Altus.

    The research carried out by experts, according to the CLEEN Foundation Executive Director, Oluwakemi Okenyodo, is likely to pave the way for a security blueprint for interventions in West Africa and other parts of the continent.

    She said: “Over the years, the perception is that security personnel may have aggravated conflicts in the some areas but the study also reveals that security personnel y have developed good practices for security engagements in the region.”

    To curtail this development, critics called for “a good practice guide for security interventions in conflict zones, which was expressed in the research.

    Mrs Okenyodo said: “As a result a good practice guide for security interventions in conflict zones will be distilled from this research based on the findings of the Study and opinions elicited from stakeholders in the conference.”

    The Chairperson of Altus Global Alliance, Dr Pramod Kumar, participants, who were drawn from West African countries such as Liberia, Ghana, Niger Republic, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Burkina Faso. Dignitaries from the international community, including the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the UK Department for International Development (DFID), the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF), the African Security Sector Network (ASSN), and the Ford Foundation, would also be in attendance.

    The Regional Representative of Ford Foundation, Mr Innocent Chukwuma, urged security operatives to brace to the security challenges of the time.