Sometimes I think our country is a punching ball foR America, about two years ago, I thought American press has turned the tide by posting more positive news on Nigeria, now it is the reverse and they wish to see our country fall to pieces just like Somalia, Obasanjo has started to knit closer ties with China , maybe that is the reason for the change in their political reportng!!!! oh please America, why do you write articles on Africa AT ALL when you de hate Africa people, ehhh? EVEN ABOUT SOUTH AFRICA THEY ONLY GIVE NEGATIVE NEWS!!! WHAT IS BEHIND ALL THIS Bleep, ooo


Nigeria's savior, and menace

The leader of Africa's most populous nation is endangering not only his own legacy but his nation.
November 11, 2006

OLUSEGUN OBASANJO has done more for Nigeria than any leader in its modern history. Now that legacy is endangered — by none other than Obasanjo himself. Nigerians and the international community should keep the pressure on Obasanjo to step aside.

Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation and the United States' fifth-biggest source of imported oil, was a basket case until Obasanjo was elected in 1999. Since then, he has reformed the nation's chaotic banking sector, battled its endemic corruption and built a foundation for democracy in a nation that has never seen a peaceful transition from one elected leader to another.

But he also is nearing the end of his second and final term as president, and he has shown a worrying reluctance to step down as planned in April 2007. Five months ago, he tried to rewrite Nigeria's constitution to allow for a third term but was rebuffed by parliament. Other recent actions look suspiciously like the machinations of a budding dictator, and they may not only undo most of the good Obasanjo has accomplished but perhaps plunge his country into civil war.

At the core of the troubles is Nigeria's crusading Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, a 3-year-old agency that already has sent about 2,000 people to prison on corruption charges. (According to the commission's chief, Nuhu Ribadu, an estimated $380 billion has been stolen or wasted in Nigeria since independence in 1960.) Yet as the commission has started taking on the country's 36 state governors, many fear that Obasanjo is using it to target his political opponents and disrupt the April elections.

Even if the financial crimes commission isn't on a political witch hunt, there is no way to avoid the appearance of one so close to an election. Obasanjo should suspend the panel until after April. He also should beef up the elections agency. If he doesn't, and voids the elections to maintain power, a bloody civil war is almost certain to follow.

Which course the Nigerian president takes will affect more than his legacy and his nation. An armed insurgency in the country's south cut oil production by 25% this year, playing a key role in the run-up of crude prices that only recently began to ease. Obasanjo has a chance to become a respected elder statesman who could influence continental politics long after leaving office and bring much-needed international attention and aid to Africa. Or he could be another in a long line of Nigerian despots, cursed by his people and forgotten by history.

source: http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-nigeria11nov11,0,776171.story?coll=la-opinion-leftrail

The question is whether the reporting is true, not whether the report is negative.
1. does the president seem reluctant in stepping aside when his term expire?
2. is there a possibility of the country moving into chaos as a result?
3. are the allegations that  the crime commission is being use as a political weapon being misguided?
people should stop looking for conspiracy theories and just seek the truth.

FIRST -
On the issue of receiving bad press. Is it that we are always receiving BAD press, or that we are not doing what we should do? If we are up to the task at hand, who cares about bad press?

SECOND -
a lot of bad things happen in America too. Some crimes that happen there havent happened in Nigeria, and yet Nigeria's bad press is worse than America. Why? they have people whose job is just to make the country look good to the international world on a daily basis. Now, do we have such a focus in our government? NO.

who is afraid of the press? put your house in order and let the press take care of itself.period.

man,
when you call Americans to come and investigate plane crashes,  when you invite  Scotland yard and Canadian police to come and investigate murder, when  a presidential aide was charged for money laundering with a presidential jet and when  we refused to  depoliticize NTA and make it like SABC  or ALJAZERA, what do you think? Boy that country is really sick and it needs diagnosis.

man,
when you call Americans to come and investigate plane crashes,  when you invite  Scotland yard and Canadian police to come and investigate murder, when  a presidential aide was charged for money laundering with a presidential jet and when  we refused to  depoliticize NTA and make it like SABC  or ALJAZERA, what do you think? Boy that country is really sick and it needs diagnosis.