₦airaland Forum

[quote author=ekt_bear link=topic=660681.msg8269458#msg8269458 date=1304681888]Anyway, let me not be overly pessimistic. A mediocre first year doesn't mean years 2, 3 and 4 have to be bad.[/quote]^With all due respect, I must disagree. A mediocre first year in this instance shows that the next 2-4 years are going to be bad in Osun state. Aregbesola is showing a pattern of behavior: no commissioners after 7 months, 20,000 unsustainable populist jobs, and now a meaningless MOU with a UK borough. It is obvious that he is a weak leader who is all about flash and little substance. In my opinion, it is highly probable that he will turn out to be like Niyi Adebayo of Ekiti state (Fayose's predecessor).

Southwark Borough? Why not Alimosho Local Government in Lagos state as well? Signing an MOU with a UK equivalent of a local government council, and some people are getting excited. Plus ça change!

Beaf:
It was a coup carried out by middle ranking officers from the SS and Middle Belt, launched from Great Ogboru's company, fiogret in Ikorodu; but they gained little after its failure.

^
This is only just part of the story. If you will recall: General Babangida at that time was trying to establish the National Guard. This was to be modeled along the lines of the Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard; an army that would be personally loyal to him and further consolidate his scheme to turn himself into a president for life. The people named in your article were the fronts through which he imported weapons for his National Guard. Ogboru's Fiogret company warehouses were used to store the weapons. Ironically; those same weapons and the men being recruited to form the nucleus of the National Guard were subsequently used against him on April 22, 1990. We can only speculate as to the reasons why Col. Nyiam and co turned against IBB; for none of the surviving coup plotters has owned up to the real reasons why they fell out with the man they were working for.

While Orkar's coup did not succeed; it severely weakened IBB's hold on power and paved the way for the rise of Abacha, who subsequently became the de-facto number 2 man in government. During the initial hours of the Orkar coup, when the outcome was in doubt and IBB's whereabouts unknown; Abacha toyed with the idea of seizing power himself, but he decided to stand down and instead rallied troops from Ikeja cantonment to crush the coup. Undoubtedly, the Orkar coup was the bloodiest in Nigerian history. For hours, an intense firefight raged around Dodan Barracks and Obalende in Lagos between Orkar's troops and Abacha's soldiers.

Pataki:
Are you a very good chess player?

We could play here on Nairaland, if you are up for it.

^
Try chess.com; there's a Nigerian Team there too!

Mai Suya:
surprised to see that, according to Forbes, the Queen of England is not even among the first 10!

^She's at number 12, but carefully note the distinction as to her personal fortune thus excluding palaces, the Crown Jewels etc. I suggest this is a deliberate ploy to under-report the extent of the British Monarchy's fortune. Unlike most of the other monarchies; the British Monarchy is an institution in itself separate from the individual who happens to be king/queen. If this distinction is borne in mind; then things become clear.

As to influence. . .ERII is monarch over 16 independent countries.

People celebrating in Alheri, Jos on news of Jang's victory.

@OP: Thanks for bringing this up. I do recall challenging some of my Muslim friends on how Islam is practiced in Northern Nigeria. Unfortunately, they instead interpreted it as an attack on Islam. If Muslim intellectuals do not take up the challenge of educating their less educated counterparts then they should understand that sooner or later these less educated ones will turn against them. I say this because most times when Non-Muslims are attacked and killed in Northern Nigeria; Northern intellectuals are often found silent. They forget the lesson of Martin Niemoller:

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

If they think they are immune; they should look to Afghanistan and Pakistan.

^
Do denominations matter?
Anyway, the church where I worship is part of Evangelical Church of West Africa.

^
I 'll check for the Asterix. I don't celebrate Easter (it's pagan).

^^
All past history: I am sure Mr Bakare is familiar with this scripture:

Ezekiel 18:24 But when the righteous turneth away from his righteousness, and committeth iniquity, and doeth according to all the abominations that the wicked man doeth, shall he live? All his righteousness that he hath done shall not be mentioned: in his trespass that he hath trespassed, and in his sin that he hath sinned, in them shall he die.

@Topic: It does matter who wrote the Bible.

[quote author=ekt_bear link=topic=653282.msg8192816#msg8192816 date=1303616277]He just hates Buhari and the CPC too much. I can understand his position. . . my guess is that he is a Plateau man.[/quote]^
I don't hate Buhari. On principle I am opposed to retired Military men and ex-coup plotters running our democracy. I opposed OBJ's candidacy in 1999. I am also opposed to those who subvert our constitution because they feel they have an entitlement to forever lord it over the rest of Nigerians. Buhari also has the added negative of being a very divisive figure based on his history and antecedents (selective justice in the 80s, selective PTF projects, comments on Sharia, leading a delegation Lam Adesina etc). Due to the nature of Nigeria; consensus building is required. Buhari cannot do that (witness the failure of the alliance with ACN - the only real chance he had of forcing a run-off). I would gladly have supported either Ribadu or Shekarau if they represented a real chance of preventing Buhari from stealing the Presidency.

I am from Kogi state,

[quote author=ekt_bear link=topic=653282.msg8192677#msg8192677 date=1303612835]Now, perhaps the statistic doesn't have value; maybe that is what you are saying.[/quote]^That is what I am saying because: Blacks are not equally distributed though out the 50 states, for example ranging from 0.4% in Maine to 65.8% in DC. Obviously we would expect higher Black voter turnout in the areas with higher concentrations of Blacks due to a "mass" effect. I believe a similar factor was at play in the SE: Consider this eye-witness account:

o9999:
i went to vote and yes there were party agents present (PDP, ACN and CPC mainly),
Even old iliterate men and women came out,
the turn out was shocking (most people went out of thier way and treckked far distances when they had to come and vote) and yes I SAW,  dats y the voter turn out was ninety something percent, everyone was shocked.

But the shocking part was,

ALL the agents around were encouraging people to vote for Jonathan,
By this, i mean an old woman wanted to vote for APGA and was looking for "okuko" when d ACN party representative corrected and said and i quote "NO MA, IT IS UMBRELLA FOR TODAY".
The woman said no, dat she does not want the current governor again so does not want umbrella, and the agent went ahead to explain to her dat noo, this one is not governor but president so she shld put umbrella.

Is this wrong, ans = YES, but if u call it rigging, then say this,
In the SE and SS, not a party, but the PEOPLE rigged (here irrespective of the party they belonged to, including CPC encouraged ALL to vote for PDP)

and note too. this waas done for THE PERSON (JONATHAN) noy the party (PDP)
Now whose fault is that?

This indicates there was a community-wide consensus in favor of Jonathan in the SE (even included the CPC agents) similar to what obtained among the Black community for Obama. You have to understand the mentality of the oppressed, which is what is at play here.

[quote author=ekt_bear link=topic=653282.msg8192677#msg8192677 date=1303612835]The 12 points, I'm not sure that is the issue. When looking for outliers, one way is to do mean/variance stuff, look for things several SDs away from the mean. I've not compute the mean and SD, so don't know. I'd also want to look at a lot more data probably. . .  maybe rather than voter turnout by state, voter turnout by county.[/quote]I await the results of your investigation.

[quote author=ekt_bear link=topic=653282.msg8192583#msg8192583 date=1303610887]Turnout as in, "What fraction of eligible black voters in state X came out."[/quote]^
Like I said: it's meaningless asking for a state by state statistic on the fraction of eligible black voters that turned out. The Pew center report does not report that neither does the link from GMU. However the Pew center report does state that:

Their voter turnout rate increased 4.9 percentage points, from 60.3% in 2004 to 65.2% in 2008

alluding to the Black vote.
Looking at the GMU link; does the voter turnout in Minnesota render it suspect, seeing as it fully 12 percentage points above the national average?

[quote author=Rhino.5dm link=topic=653282.msg8192628#msg8192628 date=1303611684]All the youths were busy playing football on the major street.[/quote]^This is a rather weak argument. I am sure you realize the youths were below the voting age of 18 years which is why they were not in the polling stations. Unless of course you assume that like Bauchi state; children vote in the south. I am sure you can do better than this.

John Campbell has an agenda. He presents himself to Americans as an expert on Nigeria. But the reality is that he actually knows little about how Nigerians think and what our motives are. I know this firsthand because late last month I attended a talk he gave at the Chicago Council ostensibly to promote his new book on Nigeria. Much of what he said was incorrect and based on stereotypes. Even some of my American colleagues who are closely involved in Nigeria disagreed with him.
It is no surprise therefore that Campbell will say what he says: he desperately needs this elections to fail so that his credentials as a "Nigeria" expert will be validated.

^You know asking for the turnout rate among Black voters on a state by state basis is meaningless, because the distribution of Blacks varies markedly from state to state with some states having high concentrations of Blacks and others negligible.
In any case:

Pew Research Center: Their voter turnout rate increased 4.9 percentage points, from 60.3% in 2004 to 65.2% in 2008

Nearly all (95%) black voters cast their ballot for Democrat Barack Obama.

texazzpete:
Thanks for your intelligent and insightful comment.

^
Don't mind them. Earlier in the week, they were all in their herd-mentality crowing that SW votes were what gave Jonathan victory. Now the herd has decided to face another direction.

^
It is now quite clear that GenBuhari just like his namesake has come seriously mentally unhinged.

Mob mentality and hysteria on this thread.

Misleading post. And those of you with an agenda and an axe to grind deliberately did not see the highlighted word. Rubbish.

The statement however urged INEC “to transparently review and take appropriate and transparent action on all [size=18pt]allegations[/size] of ‘under-age’ voters, violence and intimidation, ballot stuffing and inordinately high turnout in some areas of the country”.

In any case; all the major powers have recognized the legitimacy of the newly elected Jonathan Administration. And there is nigh unanimity by both local and international observers that the elections were a marked improvement from previous ones. So all you haters: eat your hearts out.

[quote author=tpiah! link=topic=650409.msg8165443#msg8165443 date=1303235272]of course i could be wrong.[/quote]^You are wrong. Each and everyone of those tribes exist and more. I hope you are not one of those who think everyone north of Nsukka is Hausa?

"Sprung out of thin air"? Are you serious or just joking? Some of those tribes were established Kingdoms and empires before the British came. Research the Kwararafa Empire.

^Sorry if the 83% turnout in Imo has got your goat. Take your case to the Presidential Elections Tribunal. Or even better offer your expertise to CPC, to help them prove their case.

[quote author=ekt_bear link=topic=648868.msg8159896#msg8159896 date=1303175154]80%+ voter turnout is simply not credible.[/quote]^Oh, but it is. If the South Sudanese could muster above 90% voter turnout in their referendum, is it the SS/SE that has suffered so much in Nigeria and been shut out from power that will not turn out en masse for a candidate that is their own. You may see this as just a mere election, but the average Igbo and SS sees it as more of a referendum. As someone said; they took this election personal. Interestingly, the elections mirror almost exactly the primaries in January.

^why bother? Almajiris can't do maths.

This post-election violence was long predicted:

http://www.nigeriavillagesquare.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=18233&Itemid=154

NEXT: FLASH: Rioters burn Emir of Kano’s palace in Dorayi

[quote author=Kilode?! link=topic=648868.msg8152035#msg8152035 date=1303103552]Jonathan will be smart to align with them and get this country restructured, supporters such as Beaf believe he would, but with the pro-establishment haws around him, I'm not sure he can.[/quote]^No problem. Some of us hope such an alignment will be realized. But it will be good if we all acquaint ourselves with the history of some other parts of the country too. Just as the SW were resisting the NPC in the 60s, so were parts of the MB in the same period. The narrative that it was only the SW is not quite true in the light of history.

Donlittle:
. . .or will they fight ppl like me ni?

^
You really don't know. . . They will behead you: no questions asked.

[quote author=Kilode?! link=topic=648868.msg8151905#msg8151905 date=1303100504]How many votes did Buhari get in the SW? Go figure why.[/quote]^
I see. So why is the number of votes Buhari got in the SE/SS now an issue? And BTW read my post carefully. . .I no where made the assertion that the SW were pro-North. I only said, it seemed they were beginning to forget.

^
That's your problem not mine. I understand what's biting you.

[quote author=ekt_bear link=topic=648868.msg8151830#msg8151830 date=1303098451]People will go to any lengths to find justification for outcomes they like, no matter how implausible they seem. . .[/quote]^
You are entitled to your opinion. CPC also scored just 1.03% in your home state of Ekiti, but that result is not implausible to you. SMH. Some people will go to any lengths to avoid seeing what conflicts with their cherished opinions. I am vindicated by the fact that these results turned out precisely as I predicted.