Jonathan, forget the threat of the Northern senatorial caucus, do away with OBJ, forget  the establisment. Mr Acting President be your own man, sack all the current ministers and appoint your own men. What is the point of u being  th Command In Cheif of the armed forces and you cannot even sack minister's that are out of tune with reality on the ground, not only some of them clearly does not see u as their bosses,  insubordination is rife and openly done to the full glare and amusement of the ever wacting public. It would appear some minister's are more powerful than the CinC. ( only in Nigeria if this where to happen abroad I would say because you have the wrong skin colour but damn it you are a true son of the soil ) are Southern CinC less than the Northern ones  ( It is times like this that one tend to appreciate the rascality of OBJ ) 

Since you cannot sack erring ministers changing the seige military command structure in and around Abuja would be a no go area for u, the composition of the personal in around the biggest Barracks in the country does not reflect the tribal representation of the country.  I thought I read somewher that the recruitment procedure into the officers cadet is done on an equal reprensentation of all 36 state of the country. To now have Officers from Kano / Katsina region just 2 states out of 36 states manning those important barracks speaks more than volume. I just hope all is well 

Thirdly, Mr acting President you might be telling yourself I am only here for 15 months and dont really want to drag or bogg myself down by tribal issues in the army or erring ministers,  I have a job to do and my people in the Niger Delta are hoping I complete some major projects for them b4 I leave office. I will give u some suggestions :

1. Lagos -Benin expressway, I read somewhere, I think it was a Senator from Edo state that said it " it is faster to travel to london from lagos than travel to Benin. That road is a degrace and should be fixed as a matter of urgency.

2. East-West Road would create a lot of employment in the Delta region and is a road worthy of finnishing off b4 the end of your term.

3. Coastal Road would be the most ambitious road project in Africa today, it would take extreme ingenity  to pull this off, the road would have according to soucres between 12 to 15 long bridges on large water masses. This road May well being a pipe dream for now but if u pull it off then you can be rest assured u have the votes of both the SS,SE, and SW. Southerners would speak with one voice once again, a feat not repeated since the 1914 almagamation of Southern Protectorate of Nigeria with Northern Protectorate of Nigeria.

4. The Coastal road from Calabar to Lagos was part of an ambitious road network drawn up during the Muritala / OBJ regime. It is an integral part of a huge ring road to built around Nigeria. The Coastal Road on getting to lagos would connect to the Lagos - Badary expressway and then head Northwards just by the western borders of Nigeria to Sokoto some 1000 miles away. The Road would go from Sokoto to Maiduguri through Nigeria's NW, NC, NE borders. There would be arteries from these roads to major cities like kano, Maiduguri. From Maiduguri the road would come down through Nigeria's Eastern borders to Yola then down to Obudu in CR finally joining the Coastal Road in Calabar. This is an ambitious project I dont see it happening for another 100 years but then I am not a mind reader u mind be intrested in this road in order to appease the NW States of Niger, Sokoto, Kebbi, and Zamfara State by santcioning the Badagry - Sokoto road part of this project. That could be vote winner for u and the North might consider wavering their right to the Presidency if this road comes to fruition.

Last but not the least Choose the best Northerner as your VP if u are not running. I dont expect u to run,  unless of course some of those mouth watering projects mentioned above are up and running. The world in general is going for younger Candidates, Britain would soon be ruled by men who are 42 and 39 years old, Obama is only 47 years old. I would suggest the El-Rufai's and Ribadu's are as good as any of the older guys throwing their hats in the ring. Give the young generation a chance they have never being giving b4.

One thing I don't understand about Nigerians is we can spend all the money in the world training our kids, BSC,MSC,Phd yet when the kid comes home and tells his dad let me run your company, we say no,  u are a small boy what do u know about running a Company or running a Goverment funny enough all tribes in Nigeria are guilty of this rather strange behaviour. It is time the money spent on those youths come to fruition pass the buck to the younger generation Mr acting President and u would have made a lot of people's Day.

Some good candidates within the PDP

El-Rufai / Duke

Ribadu /Soludo

El-Rufai / Soludo

Ribadu / Duke

Lamido Sanusi - current CBN Governor might be a dark horse, he has a no nonsense atitude towards excessive gluttony. I must say I was impress by his " some of those bank cheifs should be tied to a stake and shot".

I am sure there are more out their.

Why must Duke be at the bottom of the ticket? why not

Duke / El-Rufai ?

Why must Duke be at the bottom of the ticket? why not

Duke / El-Rufai

Same reason why Jonathan cannot run. If at all the Northerners would allow a Southerner to run dont u think they would prefer to do business with an acting President they know than some body that they dont know.

so its up to a section of the country to determine who runs for President?

so its up to a section of the country to determine who runs for President?


No it is not up to a section, it is up to an unwritten constituion within the PDP to rotate the Presidency every 8 years between Southern Nigeria and Northern Nigeria. Unfortunately Jonathan is a member of the PDP hence he has to abide by their rules. However he might want to run next year, that dream or reality cannot be acheived with the bunch of ministers at his disposal at the moment.

I heard he works from 7:00 am to 11 :00 PM since he took over, what he needs is 30 men and women who are prepared to put their money where their mouth is. Wake at 7:00 and finish at 11:00 not necessarily literally, but people who share the same vision. If you put the money on the table no matter how huge the project is, it would be done. Afterall men in the past attempted to build the Tower of babel in other to see the face of God. If men are determined they can move mountains.

KnowAll:


Same reason why Jonathan cannot run. If at all the Northerners would allow a Southerner to run dont u think they would prefer to do business with an acting President they know than some body that they dont know.

What rubbish, what do these northerners think they are? GOD?.

KnowAll:

so its up to a section of the country to determine who runs for President?


No it is not up to a section, it is up to an unwritten constituion within the PDP to rotate the Presidency every 8 years between Southern Nigeria and Northern Nigeria. Unfortunately Jonathan is a member of the PDP hence he has to abide by their rules. However he might want to run next year, that dream or reality cannot be acheived with the bunch of ministers at his disposal at the moment.

I heard he works from 7:00 am to 11 :00 PM since he took over, what he needs is 30 men and women who are prepared to put their money where their mouth is. Wake at 7:00 and finish at 11:00 not necessarily literally, but people who share the same vision. If you put the money on the table no matter how huge the project is, it would be done. Afterall men in the past attempted to build the Tower of babel in other to see the face of God. If men are determined they can move mountains.

Unfortunately that rule is a figment of immagination of certain people. If you want your immaginary rule to continue then please push for it to be backed by a section of the electoral act reform document. Those who may have been present during rotation policy are not even active members of PDP today! So for that rule to continue it has to be reviewed and backed by a document in the electoral act because there is no proof that if a Northerner takes over in 2011 he will not want to run for a second term in 2015.

So this so called rule must be recognised by the electoral act, otherwise Jonathan Goodluck simply has no reason whatsoever to jettision his opportunity.

Afterall the North has had more leadership opportunity and have not done much with it. So I don't understand the basis of this clamour for Jonathan to step down.

U[b]nfortunately that rule is a figment of immagination of certain people[/b]. If you want your immaginary rule to continue then please push for it to be backed by a section of the electoral act reform document. Those who may have been present during rotation policy are not even active members of PDP today! So for that rule to continue it has to be reviewed and backed by a document in the electoral act because there is no proof that if a Northerner takes over in 2011 he will not want to run for a second term in 2015.


I wont call an unwritten gentlemen's agreement which is already in the public domain a figment of anybody's imagination. Even those who are least intreasted in politics are aware of this unwritten rule, it is as real as the country called Nigeria except Nigeria is a figement of someone's imagination.

Jonathan a top member of the PDP, the previous VP of the nation who is meant to be a guardian and custodian of this unwritten rule cannot come out today and say he does not know such rule exist when people like you and I knows it exist otherwise we would not be talking about it today.

Let me ask you guys a question. What part of the country do you think stands more chance of winning presidential elections if there is no zoning arrangement? I think the zoning arrangement favours the south.

Akanbi_edu:

Let me ask you guys a question. What part of the country do you think stands more chance of winning presidential elections if there is no zoning arrangement? I think the zoning arrangement favours the south.

it will be nice to test the so called nothern dominance and unity when they are in opposition. It is so easy to be united when you are in power. But when you are not, money can be used to induce division amongst the most united.

How ironic that on the year of our 50th year anniversary as an independent nation we have a southerner (though temporarily) for our leader.  What happens now?  Is Mr. Acting President going to sit on the presidential chair and stall needed reforms instead of making some necessary changes? Or is he going to make a difference?   

Like El Rufai said, I believe the main focus should be on the Niger Delta rebels, electrical power shortages, road inadequacies and most importantly electoral reform.  The recent massacres in Jos, Maidugiri et al are as a result of brazen vote rigging.  Something you would think that a nation 50 years of age and so blatantly in the international public eye would no longer be doused in.  Isn't it fraudulent electoral voting that got the PDP in the presidential seat today? And wasn't the selection of Goodluck Jonathan by Obansanjo and his cronies more of a concession to the Nigerian people than a true democratic choice by the people for the people?  But we are lucky, I don't think they would have ever envisioned this,

Mr. Acting President change is most effective from the inside, you are inside and you are in charge, effect some change.

Best,
Ada - liberatenigerianow.

OYB_MEND:

it will be nice to test the so called nothern dominance and unity when they are in opposition. It is so easy to be united when you are in power. But when you are not, money can be used to induce division amongst the most united.

I like your response.

My thinking is that population wise, the northerners will rule Nigeria more. The southerners have adopted the one man one woman family life, with 2 or 3 children. This may lead to even more population unbalance in the future as the northerners still marry more than one wive and plenty children especially at the lower cadre of the society.

Apart from that, the southerners can't seem to agree on anything, talk about especially the Yoruba/Igbo division/rivalry.

The middle-beltans have a problem with the north though, but they still prefer the north to the south when it comes to alliances.

This leads to even another question. If elections are credible and zoning arrangement is not respected or not in place, and a zone win presidential election more, will other zones accept the result as true democrats?