₦airaland Forum

A senior White House coronavirus adviser has said the world needs to "get to the bottom" of the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic while adding that the WHO and China need to do more to reach the definitive answers in the matter.

China refused to give raw data on early Covid-19 cases to the WHO-led team probing the origins of the pandemic. There have been growing calls for a fuller probe on whether the Covid-19 virus may have escaped from the Chinese laboratory.

"It is our position that we need to get to the bottom of this and we need a completely transparent process from China. We need the WHO (World Health Organization) to assist in that matter. We don't feel like that we have that now," said WH Covid advisor Andy Slavitt on Tuesday during a briefing.

"We need to get to the bottom of this whatever the answer may be and that's a critical priority for us," he added.

Answering the same question during the briefing, Dr Anothy Fauci, the Biden administration's top medical adviser said they "feel strongly" that the world should continue with the investigation and go to the next phase of the probe that the WHO has done.

"Because we don't know 100 per cent what the origin is, it's imperative that we look and do an investigation," he added.

This statement comes a few days after an explosive Wall Street Journal report stated that three researchers from China's Wuhan Institute of Virology sought hospital care after they fell ill in November 2019, a month before Beijing reported the first patient with Covid-like symptoms.

"The US government has reason to believe that several researchers inside the WIV became sick in autumn 2019, before the first identified case of the outbreak, with symptoms consistent with both Covid-19 and common seasonal illnesses," the report read, fueling debate of the lab leak theory.

The revelations come amid growing calls for a fuller probe on whether the Covid-19 virus may have escaped from the Chinese laboratory. It also comes on the eve of a meeting of the WHO decision-making body, which is expected to discuss the next phase of investigation into the origin of Covid-19.

Earlier this year, the WHO report determined that the possibility the virus came from a lab was "extremely unlikely," noting there was "no record" any lab had closely related viruses. The probe was criticized by various countries including the US, and UK over its limited access to "complete, original data and samples."

The organization was also accused of being overly deferential to China throughout the course of the study, which was co-authored by 17 Chinese scientists -- several of them from state-run institutions.

China refused to give raw data on early Covid-19 cases to the WHO-led team probing the origins of the pandemic. Beijing has been accused of delaying access to international investigators for months after the initial outbreak, virtually guaranteeing that the lab had been deep-cleaned before any forensic analysis could be done.

Peoples' Party (PPP) chairperson, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has said that the hike in prices of essential goods during the month of Ramadan shows the incompetence of the Imran Khan-led Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government.

Bilawal said on Wednesday that Imran is turning people hostile against the government by providing patronage to the "inflation mafia", adding that the promised Ramadan package is nowhere to be seen, Geo News reported.

"The Ramadan package announced by Imran Khan is nowhere to be seen," Geo News quoted Bilawal as saying. "Most of the saving markets are selling more expensive items than the open market."

He added that the change of finance ministers could not alleviate the sufferings of the masses.

A new opinion poll conducted by the market research company Ipsos from March 18 to 24 has shown that around 73 per cent of Pakistanis feel that the country is heading in the wrong direction.

With a sample size of 1,000 people, 62 per cent of the respondents identified inflation, poverty and unemployment as the biggest issues confronting the masses, reported The News International.

Religious freedom conditions in Pakistan continue to worsen as the government systematically enforced blasphemy and anti-Ahmadiyya laws, according to a report released by the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).

The USCIRF on Wednesday released its 2021 Annual Report documenting developments during 2020.

"Religious freedom conditions in Pakistan continued to worsen. The government systematically enforced blasphemy and anti-Ahmadiyya laws and failed to protect religious minorities from abuses by non-state actors. There was a sharp rise in targeted killings, blasphemy cases, forced conversions, and hate speech targeting religious minorities," the report stated.

In its report, USCIRF stated that Pakistan's treatment of religious minorities is best assessed through the prism of its treatment of the Ahmadiyya community, who continue to face severe official and societal persecution for their beliefs and self-identification as Muslims.

"The year saw a surge in targeted killings of Ahmadis. Between July and November, five Ahmadis were murdered, including 57-year-old Tahir Naseem, an American citizen accused of blasphemy who was shot in a courtroom in July.

"In May, the government formed the National Minorities Commission (NMC) required by a 2014 Supreme Court decision, however Ahmadis were excluded," the report said.

It further stated that Pakistan's religiously discriminatory legislation, such as the blasphemy and anti-Ahmadiyya laws, used in combination with new media rules, contributed to egregious human rights abuses and fostered an overall atmosphere of intolerance for religious minorities that often leads to violence and discrimination.

In August, over 40 blasphemy First Incident Reports (FIRs) were registered, mostly targeting the Shia minority during the month of Muharram.

In 2020, there reportedly were 30 Christians, including seven on death row, jailed in Pakistan on charges of blasphemy, said the report.

Reports also highlighted the issue of abduction, forced conversion to Islam, rape, and forced marriage remained an imminent threat for religious minority women and children, particularly from the Hindu and Christian faiths.

"Pakistani courts systematically failed to protect and provide justice to victims, who are often forced to testify that they converted voluntarily to protect themselves and their families from further harm.

In April, Myra Shahbaz, a 14-year-old Christian schoolgirl, was abducted at gunpoint. Despite Myra telling police she was drugged, raped, and forced to sign papers her abductor later used to allege that she was 19 and had voluntarily married and converted, the court ordered that she be returned to her abductor," the report mentioned.

As per the latest US rights commission's recommendations to the US government, it stated that "Repeal blasphemy and anti-Ahmadiyya laws; until repeal is accomplished, enact reforms to make blasphemy a bailable offense, require evidence by accusers, ensure proper investigation by senior police officials, allow authorities to dismiss unfounded accusations, and enforce existing Penal Code articles criminalising perjury and false accusations."

Amidst growing territorial disputes with its neighbours and military tensions with the United States, China has projected defence expenditure growth of 6.8% this year. This allocation is the sharpest increase since 2019 and the third yearly increase during the last decade. President Xi Jinping has already vowed to make the People’s Liberation Army the strongest military globally, and this spending reflects that goal. Moreover, this increased spending highlights the consequences of its continued territorial aggression and hardened military posture. After making the world suffer due to its inept handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Chinese economy is witnessing a recovery, even as the rest of the world is reeling from the recession.

According to the new figures from the Ministry of Finance, unveiled in early-March, before the beginning of the annual National People’s Congress meeting in Beijing, military spending is expected to be close to $208 billion (1.35 trillion yuan) in 2021. In 2020, the spending was $209.16 billion (1.268 trillion yuan). While these figures show the trend in Chinese military spending, they do not reveal a complete picture. Two key organisations are excluded from this: the People’s Armed Police (PAP), which is responsible for maintaining internal security and law and order and People’s Armed Police Force Coast Guard Corps or Chinese Coast Guard, which enforces the country’s territorial claims in the contested waters of the South China Sea.

There is much lack of transparency about China’s actual defence expenditure, but one trend that has become clear since 2010 is that China’s internal security spending (including the PAP budget) has exceeded the external defence spending and the gap between them is increasing. In 2017, China’s internal security spending was equivalent to about $349 billion – compared to the official external defence spending of $150 billion. This was on the back of its heightened crackdown in Xinjiang and Tibet’s autonomous regions, following frequent instances of social unrest and violence. This budget ceased to be publicly available after 2013, subsequently shown as a percentage of total budgetary spending. Similarly, estimates from 2017 show that China has spent on an average $1.74 billion annually on its Coast Guard, making it the world’s largest Coast Guard fleet, with coercive capabilities.

The defence budget also does not include spending on the space programme, military-owned commercial enterprises, defence mobilisation and costs of operating military bases in the province, among others. If one includes all this, then according to the U.S. Department of Defense, China’s actual spending could be higher than $200 billion – more than the combined expenditure of its neighbours, India, Russia, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan.

To mask its growing military ambitions, China is finding new ways to conceal its spending on augmenting military capabilities. Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the research organisation which maintains the most authoritative data on China’s military budget, has over the years developed a framework to cover all spending for military purposes, including indirect spending that supports the functioning of the military organisation for instance pensions. The hydra-headed nature of Chinese policies combined with civil-military fusion means that the development of any technology will be necessarily used for military purposes, affording a new capability to the Chinese military, not necessarily funded out of the defence budget. All these have implications for China’s military activities and, therefore, its neighbours. SIPRI, accordingly, is now revising its framework to analyse financial resources China dedicates to military purposes.

Yet, this approach too faces challenges due to a lack of transparency in China’s budgetary expenditure. This is particularly true of its defence R&, where there are only estimates available from SIPRI, the U.S. Department of Defense and International Institute of Strategic Studies. Another category that has been an essential part of Chinese military posture and which fundamentally affects the regional security dynamics, but where spending can only be estimated – either in millions or billions – is China’s island-building activity in the South China Sea.

For more than a decade, China’s military spending has surpassed its annual GDP growth, reflecting the priority it attaches to military modernisation. Beijing has cited growing US-Taiwan proximity, deployment of U.S. aircraft carriers in the region and other developments for its budgetary increase. Yet, it is also true that this sustained increase in military capabilities has shifted the balance in favour of China when it comes to many territorial contestations. This has emboldened Beijing to adopt a hardened military posture towards its neighbours, which has escalated tensions and increased the risk of a regional conflict with wider consequences.

It is clear that despite Covid and the attendant slowdown in economic growth, Beijing is expected to remain on course in its military expenditure and will look for new ways to conceal it from the increased scrutiny of the outside world.

In 2018, tens of thousands of poor farmers flooded cities all across India calling for government action to ease their difficult lives. Their immediate demands were higher prices for their output and loan waivers for their debts. With elections looming in 2019, pundits predicted serious problems at the polls for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Modi offered the farmers limited price supports but held the line on loan waivers. Instead, he promised to implement structural reforms after the election. The opposition Indian National Congress countered with a promise to “waive all farm loans” across the entire country—an expensive solution decried by economists as a populist magic wand.

When the test came, Modi’s BJP won in a landslide. One year later, the Modi government finally responded to farmers’ concerns with structural reforms intended to permanently raise agricultural incomes by giving farmers access to better prices from wider markets beyond their home districts—that is, with the 2020 farm acts. Rammed through the Indian Parliament in September on voice votes with little opportunity for proper legislative scrutiny, the three bills sparked pandemonium in the upper house. But that was nothing compared with the scenes in the streets.

Though opinion polls document broad popular support for Modi’s farm reforms, they have drawn some of India’s richest farmers onto the streets of Delhi and into the world’s media spotlight. That’s right: India’s better-off farmers, or at least farmers from those parts of India with the largest farms and the highest farm incomes.

Despite what activists and Western celebrities supporting the protests would have us believe, most of those who’ve been protesting the new laws since September aren’t drawn from the ranks of marginalized subsistence farmers driven by debt and despair to the edge of suicide.

They represent instead the politically powerful (and heavily subsidized) remnants of India’s traditional landlord caste. These farmers fear that the laws will help large agribusinesses undermine the current state-directed system for buying farm produce and ultimately lead to the dismantling of the price support system on which they depend.

They are demanding that the government repeal the reforms and guarantee the future of price supports. Modi’s reforms aim to transform Indian agriculture from a locally managed rural economy into a modern national industry.

At the center of the controversy are Modi’s three new farm laws. The first allows farmers to sell their produce outside their local area if they think they can get a better price than that offered by their local government-run markets. The second (and most controversial) allows farmers to engage in contract farming by selling their produce in advance—a widespread practice in the West but sensitive in India because of the potential for abuse.

The third allows private distributors to set up large-scale warehouse operations without fear of being prosecuted for hoarding food. The overall goal of the reforms is to transform Indian agriculture from a locally managed rural economy into a modern national industry. They will allow small farmers to specialize in niche crops that can be marketed nationwide through large-scale wholesalers.

They will also create new risks, as farmers are transformed into entrepreneurs. Neither the risks nor the rewards will immediately affect the livelihoods of the protesting farmers. Their subsidies and support structures will remain in place, at least for now. But the reforms will upset rural hierarchies and undermine traditional ways of life—thus threatening the power base of a group that has dominated northwest India’s politics for more than two centuries.

Delhi’s farm protesters mainly hail from the Jat community, a caste group that spans northwest India and eastern Pakistan, covering the entire area of the old Punjab province of India before Partition. The Jats were historically an agricultural and military caste, analogous to the yeoman farmers of medieval England. In modern India, that association persists, whether or not individual Jats work in agriculture. Jats are mainly concentrated in Haryana (where they are predominantly Hindu) and Punjab (where they are predominantly Sikh), while most Muslim Jats now live in Pakistan.

Jats make up a relatively small proportion of India’s total population, but their concentration in Haryana and Punjab, and their association with the land, makes them locally powerful in these two states. Modern democratic India does not report population data by caste, but Hindu Jats are believed to constitute roughly one-quarter of the population of Haryana, while Sikh Jats make up a little more than one-fifth of the population of Punjab. In both states, Jats form the single largest caste group.

It has been estimated that Jats own roughly three-fourths or four-fifths of all agricultural land in Haryana and eastern Punjab, respectively. Nearly all medium- and large-scale farmers in both states are reputed to belong to the Jat community. The farm protesters’ claim to have mobilized 200,000 tractors for their Republic Day rally on Jan. 26 confirms the prevalence of relatively large-scale farmers among the protesters, given that few Indian farmers own enough land to practice mechanized agriculture. Even today, the typical Indian farmer is still 10 times more likely to own a bullock than a tractor.

Farm incomes in Punjab and Haryana are the highest in India, with the average farmer in these states earning more than twice the national average and nearly three times as much as their neighbors in nearby Uttar Pradesh. They also garner the lion’s share of government support. More than 90 percent of their cropland is covered by heavily subsidized irrigation. And the government buys almost the entire output of Punjab and Haryana farmers at minimum support prices that are set far above market levels. The results are huge and growing official stockpiles of wheat and rice, much of which ends up being given away to the country’s poor—or simply rotting in place.

The Jat farmers of Punjab and Haryana have long lobbied India’s government to maintain an agricultural system that is both economically wasteful and environmentally destructive. And why shouldn’t they? India is a democracy, and in a democracy, the squeaky wheel gets the grease—and the subsidies. The fact that India’s richest farmers are vocally demonstrating for policies that secure their livelihoods should come as no surprise. And the fact that they have convinced international celebrities and activists like Rihanna, Greta Thunberg, and Meena Harris to take up their cause is perhaps a bit odd but nonetheless impressive.

But when authoritative Western media outlets uncritically buy in to the “poor farmers” narrative, the result is pure misinformation. Articles suggesting that the BJP’s new farm laws threaten the livelihoods of as many as 800 million people must wrestle with the reality that in a country where 52 percent of the working population is engaged in agriculture, only 6 percent of the population actively disapprove of Modi’s performance in office. On the theory that most people—and especially poor people—are keenly aware of how government policies affect their pocketbooks, the default assumption must be that most Indian farmers believe that the new laws will actually help them, not hurt them.

The farmers converging on New Delhi should be leading the reforms, not protesting them. India’s poorest farmers need the reforms because most of them do not have access to the high levels of government subsidies that benefit the larger-scale Jat farmers of Haryana and Punjab. Forced to sell to local middlemen at spot prices, they lack options for marketing their produce outside their home districts.

They also lack access to financing and futures markets, management tools that most Western farmers take for granted. The new laws are designed to address these problems while maintaining minimum support prices for the relatively small number of farmers who actually receive them.

Yet the fact remains that hundreds of thousands of farmers (no one knows the true number) have swarmed the nation’s capital, blocking roads, camping out, and sometimes clashing with police. They have persisted in the face of official condemnation and the threat of coronavirus infection. They have found ways to organize and communicate even after the government tried to dampen the protests by shutting down mobile phone and internet networks. They have even risked the possibility of sedition charges carrying lengthy prison terms.

What could motivate so many people to brave so much hardship if not a threat they see as truly dangerous? But it’s not the threat to their livelihoods that has brought the Jats out into the streets. It’s the threat to their political power. The BJP’s farm reforms will empower smaller, poorer, lower-caste groups by giving them new outlets for their produce that circumvent long-established channels.

The position of the Jats in Haryana and Punjab may be secure for now, but in a generation or two the reforms could transform them from a coddled agricultural aristocracy into a welfare-dependent rural peasantry. Their natural inclination is to try to stop the clock of liberalization—and if possible to turn it back. A better solution would be for them to find a way out of the cycle of dependence in which they are now trapped.

The traditional Jat landholders of Haryana and Punjab may be well-off by the standards of rural India, but they find themselves increasingly marginalized in India’s rapidly modernizing society. At a time when increasing numbers of lower-caste and outcaste urbanites are joining the 21st-century information economy, Jat farmers are being left behind on the farm. Reflecting this, Jat activists have even lobbied for the caste to be recognized as an official “backward class,” meriting affirmative action in university admissions and government employment. Coddled in a government subsidy bubble, their continued prosperity increasingly depends on maintaining a political dominance that is slowly slipping away.

In a vain effort to assuage the protesters’ fears, Modi has offered to put the reforms on hold for 18 months. That won’t help anyone—least of all the protesting Jats. A better solution would be to incorporate into the reforms a transition plan that offers the better-off farmers of Haryana and Punjab a route forward into the 21st-century market economy.

These farmers lead the country in mechanization and employ millions of migrant laborers from neighboring states. They have the modern managerial know-how that Indian agriculture needs to succeed. They should be leading reforms, not protesting them. The challenge for Modi and the BJP is to find a way to bring them on board.

By Prof. Nnaemeka Chinedu

The March 27, 2021 bye-election into Aba North and Aba South Federal Constituency Seat may have come and gone but its behind clearly exposes the fact that the people of the South-East are not as opposed to the All Progressives Congress (APC) as is being peddled in some quarters. This is in view of strong showing of the APC but for the strong arm tactics adopted by those who think they control the levers of power in the state.
 
All machinery of government in Abia State and beyond practically relocated to the Enyimba City for the federal constituency election. From the other two senators of the state to all the commissioners, members of the State House of Assembly, local government chairmen and even councilors. They were all in Aba for one purpose: to swing the election in their favour. They saw the resolve of the people to connect with the centre; they saw the Mascot Kalu ship coasting home to victory and the flung the floodgate of violence. Indeed, much become known of the gravitas of a politician when all the power blocs in a state and their over 10,000-strong army of thugs are arrayed against him.

As a close watcher of South-East politics, I dare say that no other politician in the entire country is working as hard for the APC like the Senator representing Abia North is doing for them in Igboland. The phrase “in the entire country” is no slip. It is what it is. While other bigwigs are promoting APC in its natural habitat, Dr. Orji Kalu, former two-term governor of Abia, has taken upon himself the onerous task of evangelizing APC in a region where a mere mention of the party or its totem is considered a taboo. And he is making a mince of this, bringing into the fold eminent personalities like a former Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Azubuike Ihejirika (retd).
   
In the run up to the bye-election, the gospel and campaign of the APC preached by the inimitable Kalu, Chief Whip of the Senate, were well received by the people such that the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) became panicky and mobilised thugs to avoid the humiliation of defeat. Dr. Kalu spent 10 days and nights campaigning in 30 wards of the federal constituency and all his whistle-stops witnessed wild jubilations from the people. There is pictorial and video evidence which showed the legendary Kalu freely mingling with the people without being heckled or assaulted in a city whose people are quick to punish failed politicians at the slightest opportunity. Kalu’s train was even at the popular Ariaria International Market where traders left their shops and wares to cheer their hero who gave them Enyimba Football Club.     
 
If truly Kalu was not popular and widely accepted by the Igbo, then the street credibility on full display in Aba would not have been. And he wasn’t just making appearances, the APC stalwart said what no other South-East politician, except perhaps governors who are heavily protected, would have got away with. Everywhere he went during the campaign, Kalu sought to build acceptability for President Muhammadu Buhari. He never failed to tell the people that the President means well for the Igbo, citing appreciable works being done on the East-West Road, Second Niger Bridge, fixing the erosion menace in Ngwa land and several other major projects which he was able to get President Buhari to sign off on. The amazing thing is that as he said all of these, he was cheered on by the people instead of being jeered or thrown sachet waters as would have happened to most who dared to promote Buhari in Igboland.
 
At the Christ the King Cathedral in Aba, Kalu also spoke to douse the ill feelings and misconceptions people of his ethnic stock have of Buhari and congregants listened with rapt attention and heartily received his speech. This is because they can see in Dr. Orji Kalu, a man who means well for his people and would always defends their interests. It is also because they see the Abia North Senator as a compassionate leader who readily connects with the common man. They give him audience even in Churches because of his love for God and the mind of Christ that is in him.
   
Against the foregoing backcloth, APC must be appreciative of the massive goodwill Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu is building for her in the South-East, starting from his native Abia State. That his preferred candidate was not declared winner of last weekend’s election does not in any way diminish Kalu’s popularity. Conversely, it confirms and solidifies it. This is seen in the fact that the ruling party in Abia pulled all the stops just to stop Hon. Mascot Kalu’s victory. 

Time was in Abia State when the PDP primary was the actual election. Whoever wins the primaries merely awaits coronation at the general election because there was no major opposition. But all these have changed,  thanks to the political capital and dexterity of Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu. PDP’s victory in the election is at best pyrrhic. Orji Kalu actually carried the day by virtue of the people’s apparent acceptance of his APC gospel.  

Prof. Chinedu, who lectures in a private university, writes from Aba

By Ugonnabo Ngwu 

One of the beauties of off-season elections in Nigeria is that they parade pitfalls in our electoral laws which must be fixed for a better general election. Unfortunately, most Nigerians are no more concerned if the off-cycle is not for a gubernatorial seat. All lovers of democracy know that district bye-election such as the one in Aba North /South Federal Constituency presents better thermometer with which to gauge the health of elections in the country. This is because if there can be devil-may-care irregularities in such an isolated election, then the challenges bedeviling our country are bigger than we thought. 

That poll in Abia State last weekend threw up some issues that must not be glossed over. The lawlessness, thuggery and brigandage that marred the process call for concern. The poignance of the circumstance can be seen in the fact that while the election was called on the basis of the winner's 10,322 votes, his major opponent is alleging that over 10,000 thugs were used to scare voters from exercising their franchise and compromise the election. 

Little wonder only 16,017 votes were recorded in the 497,000 voting strength city. This means that the election witnessed a paltry 3.29 per cent turnout! Before you dismiss this as being another manifestation of the infamous political apathy and indifference of the Igbo, know that the people had been quite enthusiastic about the polls but stayed away to spare their lives and limb, just how political terrorists wanted it. 

And so it was that substance suspected to be a bomb, exploded at the Umuola Hall, Ward 8, Ogbor Hill, Aba North council in the heat of the polls. While voting was ongoing, gunmen abducted Engr. Mike Ozoemena, the collation officer and campaigner for one of the major candidates, Mascot Uzor Kalu. He was kidnapped from his ward, Industrial Ward 2, Aba North. The situation was so dire that even the Resident Electoral Commission, Prof Joseph Iloh was not spared. He was reportedly manhandled by thugs at the Aba Polytechnic. 

Traders were threatened with text messages to keep away from polling units or lose their lives. The able-bodied men made good their threat on the election day as they invaded voting centres where they reportedly chased away security officials and had a field day compromising the election. That law enforcement personnel on election duty joined the civil populace in scampering to safety when thugs invaded polling units shouldn't come as a surprise. No, the security operatives were not cowards. They only ran for dear life because our extant law rendered them handicap in the situation.

“On no account should personnel deployed to the inner ring of the venue of political events or voting centres/polling booth be assigned with any lethal weapon except baton”. This provision of the law is one that breeds the sort of brigandage that characterized the Aba North/South Federal Constituency election. It bears stating that this provision has at best outlived its usefulness. Laws are supposed to be organic and grow with trends in the society. The law cannot be static while societal realities are organic.

The act that prohibits security personnel from bearing fire arms at polling booth may have worked in the past when there was self restraint among political actors, not any longer when politicians seek to win at all costs and threaten voters with the onomatopoeic "tatatata" chant. As things stand currently, barring security operatives from bearing arms in the inner ring has failed to achieve the voter confidence that it was meant for. Instead, it has become a major reason voters stay away from the polls since they know that it will take more than a baton for security personnel to guarantee their safety when what is feared transpires. And politicians who are adept at exploiting loopholes go ahead to breed thugs who they deploy to violently shoo off the electorate and unarmed personnel during elections in order to do their master's bidding. 

The National Assembly must therefore rise to the occasion and end this Hobbesian disenfranchisement of the citizenry. Such travesty as witnessed in the election for the Aba North/South Federal Constituency seat must not be allowed to repeat itself for the sake of the nation's democracy. 

Nigeria is currently grappling with severe insecurity ostensibly orchestrated by erstwhile thugs who use the arms given to them by use-and-dump political overlords to perpetrate criminality and banditry. This trend can be checkmated when the Electoral Act allows the deployment of armed personnel to the inner cycle of polling unit. This deployment can come from the elite crop of security  agencies who would be courteous yet firm and strictly operate within the bounds of the rules of engagement.

The Candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the Aba North/South Federal Constituency, Hon Mascot Uzor Kalu has shed light on last weekend's byelection in the federal constituency, regretting that his opponents wanted to win at all costs and resorted to thuggery and brigandage.

According to him, "Our opponents flooded the city with thugs numbering over 20, 000. Traders were threatened with text messages to keep away or lose their lives."

He disclosed in a statement issued on Sunday that "we were winning in more than 400 polling units and they kept using thugs to harass the INEC officials and scare our voters."

It reads:

The March  27, 2021 Aba North  and Aba South Federal Constituency by-election  is over, and Peoples  Democratic Party (PDP)  has been declared winner by the Independent National Electoral Committee (INEC), we  appeal to our members to accept the outcome of the elections in good faith while appreciating them for making the Party stronger in Abia. 

While the opposition wanted the election at all cost , we chose life over blood shed and therefore won lives and lost the polls. To us, that was a greater victory . 

The level of  thuggery, violence and rigging that occurred in the election calls for a deeper review of  our electoral laws .  Every country is peculiar to it's people , all Nigerian  should support the electoral laws that is being amended  as it would assist us in getting our democracy strengthened. The electoral laws as it is renders the security agencies with arms weak in the face of violence at the polls  and therefore needs a revisit . Granted that the armless police should be inside the polling units, the armed should be within fifty meters away from the units.

My campaign officers  and our Party agents were kidnapped , even the Resident Electoral Commission (REC) , Prof Joseph  Iloh was manhandled by thugs  at  the Aba polytechnics. 

We campaigned vigorously and Aba people were expectant of improvement from what late Ossy Prestige of blessed memory did . My only concern is that Aba people lost.  They lost a quality representation and chance to have added infrastructures in Aba . 

We were winning in more than 400 polling units and they kept using thugs to harass the INEC officials and scare our voters . Our voters ran for their lives . In a city with over 497,000 voting strength, less than 15,000 votes were recorded in the entire election. 

I commend the INEC and  security agents who were overwhelmed and I congratulate them  for their services and the risk they took to protect the citizens. 


I also thank the  National Chairman of the Caretaker Extraordinary Committee,  His Excellency,  Gov.Mai Mala Buni , Aba North and South Party Chairmen and all our party faithfuls for their support in the election.


Even though we have enough evidence to reclaim our mandate , we won't be going to the court . This is to allow the declared winner to concentrate and provide good representation and infrastructure to the good people of Aba.



Once again I thank the Aba people for coming out en masse to vote for the APC and I congratulate the winner , Chimaobi Ebisike and the PDP,  not because they won but because it's gentleman to do so.

A vigil was recently held in London outside the Chinese Embassy against the atrocities inflicted by Beijing on the people residing in the region.

People were seen carrying posters, “China lied, people died. CCP (Chinese Communist Party) shame on you,” according to Global Alliance for Tibet & Persecuted Minorities (GATPM).

Another placard read, “China stole; my land, my voice and my freedom.”
“The vigil also marked the final “#LhakarDay of Tibetan Royal Year – 2147. Tibetans celebrated Losar – Tibetan New Year – 2148 – on 12th February 2021,” wrote GATPM in a Facebook post.

According to another post by a New York-based Tibetan blogger, Ugyen Gyalpo: “It’s such a paradox to say Happy Independence Day when our country is still under colonization. But what is not paradoxical is when we don’t take ownership of our historical past which is the basis of our fight. We must own our past and not suppressed it. We have compromised enough.”

“We celebrate the 4th of July like it is our own. We celebrate the 15th of August like it is our own. We celebrate Canada Day like it is our own. But we are hesitant to celebrate and reclaim our historical proclamation of independence on this day in 1913 by the 13th Dalai Lama.

"Are we living and embracing the world of alternate distorted facts. The only thing that separates our fight with China is the truth and if we are trying to be politically correct by denouncing anything to do with Independence, we are stabbing yourselves to death,” the blogger added.

In another post shared by the organisation, Tenzin Tsundue, a Tibetan writer and activist based in India, is urging people “to sign his online petition asking the Government of India to repeal its One-China policy”.

He also hopes that his “campaign will converge with a global campaign asking governments to repeal their One-China Policy.”

Tsundue started his month-long 500 kilometres solo Peace March from Dharamsala on 12th February 2021 on Losar – Tibetan New Year, according to the post.
“To fully appreciate the complexities of the Sino-Indian border conflict, the people of India must understand the issue of Tibet.

The Indian government and its people must understand very clearly that India’s border will be permanently secure only when the Tibetan issue has been resolved,” the post read.

The 2018 International Religious Freedom report has categorized China as a country of particular concern regarding severe religious freedom violations, along with the likes of North Korea and Syria.

Since its forceful settlement of Tibet, the CCP has relentlessly pushed for the persecution of religion, especially Tibetan Buddhism. By employing its state machinery, it has executed campaign after campaign to meet its objective, each more brutal and oppressive than the last.

Sangmo reported that the Tibetan government in exile’s oft-repeated account of China’s political repression, economic marginalization, cultural assimilation, and environmental destruction hardly begins to encompass what goes on.

Today, Tibetans are degraded as to being second-class citizens in Tibet unless they toe the Chinese party line and disown Tibet’s sovereign history in favour of uniting with the Chinese motherland, which is a foreign and unpalatable concept for Tibetans.

The party’s nervousness about the growing clout of Tibetan Buddhism in the world and within China is reflected in the CCP’s recent actions.

According to Sangmo, in 2007, the State Religious Affairs Bureau’s Order No. 5 issued a decree requiring the reincarnation of Tibetan Lamas to be approved by the communist government.

The Senate of Pakistan recently passed a bill which, if finally approved as law, would make the teaching of Arabic compulsory in the state schools of the federal capital. There are several questions which need to be answered in this context: which variety of Arabic will it be? what is the purpose of teaching it to the children? Will the children be overburdened if they learn a new language or not? Will they really learn Arabic well or not? How many children will learn it and who will teach it?

Let us take the first question. Arabic has several varieties. Ordinary Arabs in all Arabic-speaking countries speak their local or demotic variety of Arabic. These varieties are used in speaking informally but are not considered standard. The standard variety of Arabic, called Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), is based on classical Arabic but uses new terms, created in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, to express the realities of modern life. It is based on classical Arabic which is the language of the Quran. MSA draws its vocabulary from Arabic roots (hatif, that is, caller, is used for telephone and sayyara is car) or borrows from European languages (internet and film pronounced as intarnit and feelm are borrowed from English). It is used in academia, schooling, printing, media, law and legislation. It does not vary according to the country and it is nobody’s mother tongue. Everybody has to learn it at school. In Arab sources the MSA is called al-lughat al-Arabiyyah al fusah al-Asr while the language of the Quran, classical Arabic proper, is called al-lughat al-Arabiyyah al-fusha al-turath. The short form is al-fusah. What is taught in Pakistan’s madrassas is mostly classical Arabic (al-fusah). Even the MSA is not taught much as the aim of the madrassas is simply to enable the students to read the foundational texts of Islam which are in classical Arabic. And, of course, nobody teaches demotic Arabic at all. I take it then that the type of Arabic which will be taught in schools will be classical Arabic.

Now we come to the purpose of teaching it. If the purpose is to equip the children with a skill which will enable them to converse with Arabs in the UAE or Saudi Arabia or wherever they go as adults, then they will have to learn two varieties of Arabic: the MSA and the variety of demotic Arabic spoken in the country of their sojourn. Our teachers of Arabic do not know demotic varieties of Arabic at all and they are not fully conversant with the MSA either. They know only the classical Arabic of the Quran. So, is the purpose then to enable them to understand the Quran in the original Arabic? If so, it will not be served fully. The interpretation of the Quran requires a degree of knowledge of Arabic which takes a very long time and effort. Unless one is studying only Arabic, one has to fall back on the interpretation of one’s teacher. How will the state ensure that the teacher will refrain from giving an interpretation that has a militant implication? Words like fitna, for instance, may be interpreted differently. One exegete calls unbelief fitna while another calls persecution fitna. So, if the child is told that unbelief, being fitna, must be fought till it is eradicated, how will the state prevent young people from joining groups at war with the world and even with Pakistan? Even if the children do not fall into the hands of a radical cleric, they will be exposed to much more religious controversy than they are at the moment.

Clerics, like all ideological thinkers with investment in their ways of thinking, are concerned with criticism of the beliefs of their competitors. Their concerns are with heterodoxy, error of judgment, the right beliefs, sin and heresy. We all know what happens when the concerns of the clerics are passed on to the public: focus on religious controversies takes on a new life, sectarianism increases, sub-sects and their differences become the subject matter of fresh debates, the ‘Other’ is perceived with reference to religion and sect making the lives of minorities difficult and increasing anti-India sentiment predisposing the public towards war rather than peace. Has anyone in the Senate looked at these possibilities?

Will the children be overburdened? Learning any language is an additional burden on the learners. It should only be imposed upon them if it has long-term dividends in the future. Arabic is a difficult language which takes a long time to learn and, if one does not use it and revise it constantly, one loses it in a short time. The time spent on it, or for that matter on other languages, will actually hamper the intellectual growth of children at a time when they need time and energy to study other subjects. Keeping in view the fact that school bags have been growing heavier and heavier every year and teachers give far more home-work than ever before, it would hardly be in the best interest of the children to burden them with another language to cram and forget after school.

Will teaching Arabic mean that it will actually be learned? The experience so far shows that no language the children are forced to learn is learned very well. After the language riots of Sindh in July 1972, the non-Sindhi-speaking students were asked to study Sindhi but even now they study it, if at all, only to pass the examination. This happens not only with compulsory languages the students do not really consider necessary but also with their chosen options. Even when they opt to take Persian, Arabic or some other language at the bachelor’s level, they only memorise a few passages and some words to pass the examinations.

The indigenous languages of Pakistan, which were introduced after much effort as optional subjects in schools and colleges, became means of getting easy marks. In the civil service examination too, they serve the same purpose. There is no doubt that the intention to enable students to learn the languages of this land was excellent but the execution did not match the intention. It quickly degenerated into a way out for teachers to gratify the students and ensure that their own jobs remained safe. And, for the students, as mentioned above, it was a way of improving their grades (CGPA). It is well-known that students with good marks in BA Arabic and Persian cannot read or write anything except what they crammed for their examination. And, of course, even their teachers cannot order food in an Iranian or an Arab restaurant because they are not taught modern Persian or demotic forms of Arabic.

This brings me to the last question: will all children study it or only the federal government school ones mentioned in the Senate bill? As it is, the Punjab already has a policy about teaching Arabic in government schools. As yet, KP, Sindh and Balochistan do not have a clear-cut policy in this regard. However, all seem to have agreed to the implementation of the Single National Curriculum which already imposes Arabic in some form on all schools. This means that a really large body of teachers of Arabic will be required. Where will they come from? Probably from the madrassas.

While I am all for giving employment to as many people as possible, the problem with this venture would be that all schools will have people who will regard the way of dressing up, speaking, behaving and worldview of many of our students, alien and offensive. Will the room for a lifestyle which is not dictated by conservative values decrease? Ask yourself and give an honest answer. I am sure a number of female students and young faculty will feel insecure under the frowning gaze of the quasi-clerical Arabic teachers on the campus. Moreover, this will cost a lot of money which, as we know, the education system needs in order to support better teachers of other subjects, books and up to date infrastructure.

In short, evidence suggests that making Arabic compulsory will not be in the interest of our students and country. Such solutions are kneejerk attempts by our rulers to hide behind the façade of religiosity to conceal their lack of any real vision for the people who voted them in. What we need is not a new compulsory language but better teaching in the languages we have always taught but always so badly that our children cannot express themselves in any of them with ability.

Written by Dr Tariq Rahman, an occasional columnist.

Indian-Nigerian restaurant owner Hamisha Daryani Ahuja gave up her long-running business to pursue her dream of making movies.

Two years later, the 36-year-old will see her first feature film, the cross-cultural love story Namaste Wahala, debut on Valentine’s Day on Netflix.

The film, whose title translates in Hindi and Nigerian pidgin as Hello trouble, tells the tale of a Nigerian woman who falls in love with an Indian investment banker living in Lagos. The young couple face a series of challenges - including their families - to be together.

“I wanted to do something that will be more relatable so it is a full-on Nollywood movie, but I brought in some Indian actors to make it a little bit more fun,” Daryani Ahuja, who directed, executive produced and acted in the movie, told Reuters.

“What I tried to do is the ‘90s style Bollywood ... the singing and dancing around trees. We have all of that. It is a very cheesy, mushy romantic drama.”

Born of Indian parents, Daryani Ahuja has lived most of her life in Nigeria.

“I have lived in an Indian house, I know the Nigerian culture, the pidgin, the food and it is so interesting how even though everybody thinks with ‘Namaste Wahala’ the cultures are different, we are actually so similar,” she said.

“We are actually all one, and that’s the whole theme of the movie.”

The 110-minute film stars Indian actor Ruslaan Mumtaz and Nigerian actress Ini Dima-Okojie in the lead roles. “It is very important to make films like this when you show cross-cultural love stories, because in every country ... people just separate each other as far as religion is concerned,” Mumtaz said. “Especially in India, you can’t marry somebody if they are from a different religion or from a different caste.”

Mainly shot in English, the movie had a production team of more than 60 people across India and Nigeria. Production was completed before lockdowns made making movies difficult; the original release date was April.

“The thing I love the most are the underlying messages which is the beauty in embracing your similarities, the beauty in embracing love even if you are from different backgrounds,” Dima-Okojie said.

Putting out hundreds of movies and television episodes a month, Nollywood is the world’s second most prolific film industry after India’s Bollywood.

Nigeria has a growing base of Bollywood fans, who watch its sitcoms subtitled in English, and Namaste Wahala is creating a buzz online.

Daryani Ahuja says she hopes to make a sequel in the coming months.

Much like the mainlanders, it seems China is hell-bent on desisting Hongkongers from enjoying any basic fundamental freedoms. Some new restrictions on how schools in Hong Kong should function and operate have been issued in the forms of guidelines by the government aiming to keep the citizens more sensitized to the new security laws.

Predicting the obvious hostility towards it, the guideline was issued with an advisory that teachers should refrain from regarding this change as a controversial topic up for debate as the National Security Law is of great significance.

The guideline includes elaborative provisions with regards to the school curriculum and talks about ‘improvement’ in existing courses. Issues of national security will be taught through a variety of subjects like music, history, general studies etc.

As young as six-year-old children are now supposed to learn about the huge importance of the national security law and differentiation between friendliness and over interference by foreign territories. Kindergartners will be learning about Chinese history and culture which officials believe will help in their upbringing as Chinese.

Children in primary schools are now expected to learn all about terrorism, collusion subversion and secession- four main crimes under the new security law. The motive behind this unpleasant step is plain evident – to put down its most valiant territory in obedience and under control of communist China.

As much as the National Security Law is vague about what constitutes a ‘political crime’ so is the guideline which does not clearly define what activity and action might be seen as a potential threat to national security. The guidelines also include continuous monitoring and surveillance of teachers and staff and removing any materials or books which is damaging to the new law.

The National Security Law was brought in last year in June because of the mass pro-democracy and anti-China protests in 2019. In this protest, a huge number of teenagers participated and hence Chinese figurehead has decided to make Hong Kong’s youth obedient and loyal to China.

Within the teaching material, there is an educational animated cartoon video of an owl teaching students about Hong Kong’s political establishment and duty of the city towards the mainland.

Any activity in schools such as raising certain slogans, wearing certain items, that might be considered as political will attract sanctions. Teachers are advised to inform and call the police if they suspect any violations.
These teachers will also be monitoring and recording children’s behaviour and they are required to report any sighting of actions of pro-democracy.

This new change will also hit the position of Hong Kong which serves as a popular place in Asia for international academic exchange. Last year in October, more than 100 signatories raised concerns about extraterritorial interference of China that could affect academic freedom globally. For any academic work which might be considered as a renegade by China, any scholar or academician passing through Hong Kong fears imprisonment under the new law.

Beijing had also previously attempted to infuse Hong Kong’s education system with China’s ideology but its efforts were crumbled by mass protests in 2012. Recently when the UK initiated a resettlement program for British National (overseas) Passport holders, China notified
that it will no longer realise BN(o) as a valid document. This step was taken as more than 3 million people holds a BN(o) passport.

This change in the education system is the last nail in the coffin for many families who were planning to move abroad. A large diaspora has already begun. Approximately 3 Lacs people are expected to relocate to the UK while many to Canada and Australia.

The owl video in the new curriculum instills in the minds of the young people that Hong Kong is an inalienable part of our country.

Hongkongers enjoy a far greater level of freedoms and rights than people in the mainland. The new guidelines have made it simpler for the communist party led China to reduce Hong Kong’s independence and cull down any protests thereby snatching their right of free speech.
This new change is aimed at extinguishing any political dissent in the and confining critical inquiry.

Facing economic distress and rising prices of essential commodities, government employees and farmers have launched their separate protests, forcing police to conduct arrests and fire teargas shells.

The woes of the federal government increased as employees of Balochistan and Punjab provincial governments also joined the stir.

This adds to the agitation by 11 opposition parties, forming Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) that staged yet another protest rally in Hyderabad last Monday, demanding removal of Prime Minister Imran Khan who they say is a ‘puppet’ of the military.

In Islamabad, police resorted to tear gas shelling near the Pakistan Secretariat on February 10 as they tried to push back government employees who were protesting for a pay rise.

Several employees were arrested and those stuck in the Secretariat Block broke the door to escape.

Protests were being held at several different point of the city, including Constitution Avenue, outside Secretariat Block and Cabinet Block, Dawn.com newspaper site reported.

A protest held outside the National Press Club was joined by employees posted in Balochistan and Punjab. The protesters then moved towards the Parliament House.
Police placed containers on the roads, sealing off D-Chowk.

"The morale of the police is high [and] the situation is completely under control," the police said in a statement as protests increased.

The government responded by dispatching four federal ministers to hold talks. Information Minister Shibli Faraz said that the prime minister was "very concerned" about the issues being faced by government employees.

He stated that the premier has directed the ministries concerned to resolve the employees' issues immediately. "He is very serious about this and wants the issues to be resolved."

 Defence Minister Pervez Khattak, who is part of the government’s 3-member committee holding talks with the protesters, said that the government wanted to give the employees a special allowance for the months before June.

"When [talks] started, we said we will give 24 per cent but they demanded [much more]. Calculations are being done [and] we are ready to talk."

However, Khattak warned that the "government has limits" and it was ready to give increments according to what was suitable keeping in view the condition of the country and the treasury but "if they want it [on their own terms], it will be difficult".

The minister said the government was "still ready to talk" to the protesters if they brought their demands within limits.
He said federal government would not take up complaints of employees from provinces. The Centre could only do something if it was related to its own employees.

"Provincial problems are solved by provincial governments because, after the 18th Amendment, we cannot order them to increase salaries."

In Lahore, farmers’ agitation took a different turn as Raiwind police took into custody Chaudhary Anwar, who leads a faction of the Pakistan Kissan Ittehad (PKI) from his residence on Monday.

The farmers’ leader had led a protest around three months ago (November 2020) in the provincial capital, demanding Rs2,000 per 40kg wheat support price and Rs300 per kg for sugarcane, besides flat power rate of Rs5 per unit for the farm tubewells.

However, in the ensuing clash with police one of the protesters, Ashfaq Langrial, had died. The opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz alleged the police action is aimed at forcing Mr Anwar to withdraw the petition he had filed for registration of a murder case against police over the protester’s death.

“The Punjab government had been pressing Chaudhry Anwar to withdraw his application for registration of the murder case. On his persistent refusal, the Raiwind police arrested him from his residence,” Punjab PML-N President Rana Sanaullah Khan alleged.

The ‘puppet government’ which had been claiming to champion the cause of farmers’ rights, is harassing farmers’ leadership through arrests, he said, a police source told Dawn.com that Chaudhry Anwar was arrested from Multan by the Raiwind police on a complaint of an overseas Pakistani, who alleged he had given Rs32 million in cash besides some machinery for an agriculture project to the farmer leader.

The complainant, whose name was withheld by the police, alleged life threats were hurled at him when he demanded his money back.

Reinforcing the belief that China has no religion as a state, and atheism is the way forward, Jinping’s government has strongly objected to party officials found practicing ‘feng shui’, a traditional practice that finds its origin from ancient China, that harnesses energy to synchronize believers with their surrounding environment.

Supremacy of socialist thought in China has taken a dangerous turn for those seeking to peacefully practice their religion within the country borders. Jinping’s administration has waged a severe crackdown on CCP party members who are found professing feng shui or anything in connection to religion and spirituality.

China interestingly connotates all such ‘”superstitious” activities to be “corruption”. Accusing such delinquent CCP members of ‘corruption’, the CCDI (Central Commission for Discipline Inspection) denounces such members and eventually expels them.

For the party, anything that endangers the party speak and Marxist thought is sacrilege and instant grounds of expulsion. Such “corruption” expands to expressing not just religious thought, but dissenting opinions against the party as well. One such former member of the CCP was expelled solely on grounds of using feng shui to rearrange his ancestral grave, office and residence, along with participating in feng shui classes.

The CCDI has stepped up efforts towards catching CCP members seeking advice from feng shui masters to solve a range of personal problems such as issues at workplace, health issues, etc. The CCDI strongly advocates that party members restrict themselves to the teachings of Marxism-Leninism, and not seek counsel by means of “superstitious” beliefs.

Although China officially guarantees the freedom to profess major religions such as Christianity, Buddhism and Islam, CCP members are held to a higher standard of restricting themselves to atheism only. They are banned from participating alleged “superstitious activities”.

In the past few years, officials have been increasingly taken down for professing in what China calls “feudalistic superstitious activities”. Any practice that poses a threat from adherence to socialist thought and by extension the big brother, is a sure ground for admonition from the party. Mao Zedong’s style of crackdown on practices of fortune telling and superstition has made a comeback in Jinping’s China since he assumed power in 2012.

To arrest any threat to the party’s ideology, in 2015 the party introduced a term “sinicization” into the official glossary of the government, that calls upon religious leaders of various faith to merge their religions with Chinese socialist thought. For the CCP, any mention of the word religion is taboo and the CCDI prioritizes on cracking down on such organizations that further spread religious beliefs influencing party members.

However the crackdown has not been restricted to just party members. China has increased persecution of Uighur Muslims, and has been targeting Tibetan Buddhists, Jews, Christians and all those who follow local folk religions of China.

Religious thought and practice directly threatens the communist hegemony in China. Despite severe crackdowns, religiosity is rising in China. As per studies, more than 50%qetuo of Chinese nationals are affiliated to some religion. Portions of this religious explosion has seemingly seeped into party quarters, and CCDI is losing patience. And unfortunately in China whenever an activity is characterized as “feudal superstition”, the crackdown extends beyond CCP party members.

Reinforcing the belief that China has no religion as a state, and atheism is the way forward, Jinping’s government has strongly objected to party officials found practicing ‘feng shui’, a traditional practice that finds its origin from ancient China, that harnesses energy to synchronize believers with their surrounding environment.

Supremacy of socialist thought in China has taken a dangerous turn for those seeking to peacefully practice their religion within the country borders. Jinping’s administration has waged a severe crackdown on CCP party members who are found professing feng shui or anything in connection to religion and spirituality.

China interestingly connotates all such ‘”superstitious” activities to be “corruption”. Accusing such delinquent CCP members of ‘corruption’, the CCDI (Central Commission for Discipline Inspection) denounces such members and eventually expels them.

For the party, anything that endangers the party speak and Marxist thought is sacrilege and instant grounds of expulsion. Such “corruption” expands to expressing not just religious thought, but dissenting opinions against the party as well. One such former member of the CCP was expelled solely on grounds of using feng shui to rearrange his ancestral grave, office and residence, along with participating in feng shui classes.

The CCDI has stepped up efforts towards catching CCP members seeking advice from feng shui masters to solve a range of personal problems such as issues at workplace, health issues, etc. The CCDI strongly advocates that party members restrict themselves to the teachings of Marxism-Leninism, and not seek counsel by means of “superstitious” beliefs.

Although China officially guarantees the freedom to profess major religions such as Christianity, Buddhism and Islam, CCP members are held to a higher standard of restricting themselves to atheism only. They are banned from participating alleged “superstitious activities”.

In the past few years, officials have been increasingly taken down for professing in what China calls “feudalistic superstitious activities”. Any practice that poses a threat from adherence to socialist thought and by extension the big brother, is a sure ground for admonition from the party. Mao Zedong’s style of crackdown on practices of fortune telling and superstition has made a comeback in Jinping’s China since he assumed power in 2012.

To arrest any threat to the party’s ideology, in 2015 the party introduced a term “sinicization” into the official glossary of the government, that calls upon religious leaders of various faith to merge their religions with Chinese socialist thought. For the CCP, any mention of the word religion is taboo and the CCDI prioritizes on cracking down on such organizations that further spread religious beliefs influencing party members.

However the crackdown has not been restricted to just party members. China has increased persecution of Uighur Muslims, and has been targeting Tibetan Buddhists, Jews, Christians and all those who follow local folk religions of China.

Religious thought and practice directly threatens the communist hegemony in China. Despite severe crackdowns, religiosity is rising in China. As per studies, more than 50%qetuo of Chinese nationals are affiliated to some religion. Portions of this religious explosion has seemingly seeped into party quarters, and CCDI is losing patience. And unfortunately in China whenever an activity is characterized as “feudal superstition”, the crackdown extends beyond CCP party members.

Prophet John Ikenna Ofodile, the general overseer of City of Salvation International Ministries (COSIM), an interdenominational church, said he had been directed by God to host an international convention to put an end to insecurity and other challenges bedevilling Nigeria

Speaking to newsmen in Onitsha, Anambra State, Prophet Ofordile explained that the convention scheduled by the Holy Spirit to hold from February 18 to 21st 2021 is open to people from all parts of the world including Moslems, traditionalists and others.

“ It is themed Authority and power. We are expecting people from different parts of the world. We are expecting Moslems and Christians, traditionalists and others. Our members from America, Asia continent and others shall attend the event. It is a three day of Grace.

“We are going to pray for peace and progress of Nigeria because if Nigeria is in peace, we shall rejoice. We are expecting the power of God at its might at the convention. People shall he healed and delivered from bondages. People shall be set free. Broken homes shall be rebuilt by Christ. In this generation, if you fail to understand that there are power that keep people in bondage, you are making a mistake“ he stated.

Continuing, Prophet Ofodile said they would strictly observe COVID-19 safety protocols at the event as directed by government.

He, however, maintained that “the convention was inspired and instructed by God. We are not here in our own. What we are doing here is in accordance to dictate of Christ. We can’t do anything without waiting for His directions. If the spirit directs me to shut the ministry, I do that immediately. If He says I should speak or open it, I will equally do that.”

He further admonished youth to eschew violence and vices as well as pray fervently as God would direct them appropriately to become successful.

The prophet strongly expressed concern on the spate of killings, destruction of property and the incidence of banditry and terrorism in the country, assuring that God would intervane and show mercy to Nigeria.

"The church will pray against the various criminal activities committed against Nigerians including wanton killings, maiming, destruction of property, armed robbery and corrupt practices in high places.

"We will also pray for churches in the country, ...churches are experiencing persecutions where pastors, priests and members were kidnapped for ransom or even killed by their abductors", he noted.

He added, "It will be days of grace where people would experience power of God to heal, deliverance and set captives free from bondage".

Chief Whip of the Senate and former Governor of Abia State, Senator Orji Uzor Kalu on Thursday beckoned the Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, to join the ruling All Progressive's Congress (APC).

Senator Kalu made this call on Thursday while addressing the press after a project inspection tour around the state capital led the state Governor himself.

While speaking to the press after inspecting the; Rumuokoro Flyover bridge, 2nd Artillery flyover bridge, Real Madrid football Academy and the Mother and Child Hospital, Rumuomasi in Port-Harcourt, Senator Kalu commended Gov. Wike for his efforts in investments in critical infrastructure; Kalu told the Rivers Governor to join the APC in order to consolidate on the rewards of belonging to the party at the centre.

"I encourage and appeal to other Governors to emulate Governor Wike in terms of his infrastructural drive in the state , because this is what democracy is all about which is making the people happy by meeting up with their expectations. You see how visibly happy the people were when they sighted the Governor, I am impressed by the quality and quantity of infrastructures I have seen so far. The Governor has confirmed that there are about five flyovers in construction and three more have been approved for construction, said Kalu.

Stressing the need to partner with the APC; Senator Kalu appealed to Governor Wike to soft pedal on his continuous criticisms of the party, he called on the Rivers Governor to work harmoniously with the APC led Federal Government of Nigeria.

In his words" I urge the Governor to partner with the APC, I discussed with him all through the night to find a common ground with the APC, I believe that very soon it shall come to reality. I commend him for the tour; he is a man needed by us in the APC, it is my belief that a messiah can come from anywhere. So I urge Governor Wike to soft pedal on our party, humans can switch from one party to another which is human behavior in Africa. I appeal to him to partner with us so that the good people of Rivers can benefit more from the Federal Government of Nigeria.

In his reaction; Wike noted that his party the People's Democratic Party is committed to the welfare of the people, he disclosed that his grievance with the APC is the custom of making appointments based on political interest rather than competence.

He said "I can only partner with a party that is open to partnership, there's so much insecurity in Nigeria today and there have been a lot of killings so his party (APC ) should solve the problem but the problem has remained unresolved.

Speaking further he said "His party appoints commissioners of police based on patronage, a politician from my state pays a visit to the Inspector General (IG) of Police and makes request for a New Commissioner; but the IG ends of making the appointment without considering the competence of such person to fight crime, he makes the appointment based on the choice of the ruling party.

In that case the person is deployed but is unable to tackle crime that is the major problem we are having today in the country. So how can I partner with such a Government that makes appointments on the interest of a politician. Senator Kalu remains my friend that is why I invited him to come and see what we're doing in Rivers state.

The Human Rights Watch, in its 2021 iteration of annual publication ‘World Report’, began its observation on China as ‘the Chinese government’s authoritarianism was on full display in 2020’. According to the report, the human rights movement in China suffered through its ‘darkest period’ since the ‘1989 massacre which marked the end of Tiananmen Square democracy movement’.

It also enumerated fourteen categories to judge the status of Human rights in China, including Hong Kong protests, suppression of Tibet and Xinjiang, freedom of speech and faith, disability rights, etc. It has also attempted to contextualize them (in part) with respect to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The contents of the report were also echoed by the Congressional Executive Commission on China (CECC) 2020 annual report, which went on to describe Chinese Government as having a “long arm of authoritarianism.” In Hong Kong, the report remarks, over a million people had come on streets a start of the year 2020 to march peacefully for democracy.

However several actions by Chinese government, such as the appointment of Luo Huining (who allegedly had no experience with Hong Kong) as its Chief representative in Hong Kong by virtue being an ‘enforcer’ of the Chinese Communist Party, interference in political processes of the autonomous territory of Hong Kong, systematic removal of pro-democracy legislators from important committees, bypassing the Legislative Council of Hong Kong to pass National Security Law (NSL), etc. have been great cause of alarm.

NSL especially had gained notoriety, as it provided for sweeping power to police and denial of freedom to civil society and media, that was used against people who were pro-democracy.

The press also was battered by Hong Kong police; in May 2020 several journalists were forced to kneel and had pepper sprayed on them. In similar vein, several pro-democracy protestors like Professor Benny Tai, newspaper editor Jimmy Lai (and his sons) were either removed from their jobs, or arrested without trial.
In Xinjiang and Tibet, restriction on religious freedoms and suppression on minorities had reportedly persisted throughout the year.

The Chinese government continued to stamp down on cultural identity of the ethnic minorities, using ‘re-education camps’ in Xinjiang and “Nationality Unity Model Areas” in Tibet.

These re-education camps in Xinjiang are masqueraded as ‘vocational schools’, where Uyghurs are forcefully kept with prison-like conditions. In NgawaTibetian region of Sichuan province, Yonten became 156th Tibetan to immolate himself in protest of Chinese suppression.

2020 also marked release of Karakax and Aksu list, which enumerated database of names and crimes of Uyghur, Kazakh and other Turkic minorities, for which they had been detained. These crimes included calling a family member living abroad, having four children instead of mandated three, etc.

Aksu list gained further notoriety since it included arbitrary detentions based on Integrated Joint Operations Platform (IJOP), which uses big data and artificial intelligence to do ‘predictive policing’.

This means that several people detained using IJOP had never committed a crime, but were taken into indefinite custody because they ‘did not socialize enough’ or ‘read Quran in mid-80s’.

Many family members of the detained Uyghur do not come to know what happened to them for several years. Alarmingly, during the COVID – 19 pandemic, the Uyghur were forced to take only Chinese traditional medicine, chained those who violated lockdown measures, and relocated some of them to other provinces to work in factories as the Han Chinese therein had been evacuated.

The World Report 2021 also pointed out how China curtailed Human rights activism, freedom of expression and subverted freedom of religion. This is indicated to by arrest of Human rights lawyer Ding Jiaxi, and a nine-year prison sentence Christian pastor Wang Yi (who had been pastor to an ‘unregistered church’).

In August 2020, authorities shut down Bainu, a Mongolian-language social networking site when several people posted complaints about Mongolian being replaced by Mandarin as a medium of instruction.

According to CECC report, authorities are slowly bringing in policies to restrict Islam (of the likes implemented in Xinjiang) to Ningxia autonomous region, which is home to the Hui muslims of China.

Authorities also detained and prosecuted citizens who had criticized the government or its individual leaders on social media, even if it were in private messages, using IT-based mass surveillance. According to the Canadian research group Citizen Lab, China’s prominent messaging app WeChat monitors content of users outside China as well.

The arrests included prominent law professor Xu Zhangrun, and entrepreneur Ren Zhiqiang, latter of whom was given prison sentence for eighteen years. Zhiqiang had been one of the many critics of the way COVID - 19 crisis had been handled in China.

China had initially curtailed information on the virus, thereafter telling its own people as well as the world that the virus did not have human transmission. When the pandemic started spreading in Wuhan, a complete lockdown was enforced without taking into account the impact it would have on people’s livelihood and well-being. People who tried to report on Wuhan, such as activist Zhang Zan and businessman Fang Bin, had also been detained.

The year 2020 had not been too optimistic for rights of women either. While National People’s Congress did introduce a Civil code that defined sexual harassment and stated that perpetrators can be held liable, it had not specified the execution mechanism for the code.

Additionally, the law made it harder to get divorce, mandating a 30 day ‘cooling off’ period before finalizing divorce in case of couples who apply for divorce-through-agreement.

Considering the fact that the law came close at heels of the COVID – 19 lockdown in China, which saw a multi-fold increase in domestic violence against women, this provision disproportionately endangers the women who file for divorce.

The #MeToo movement saw similar silver linings; on one hand Bao Yuming, accused for rape of a minor, had been acquitted, while on other the activist Xianzi’s case had reached the top court.

Chinese disability rights and refugee issues also garnered attention. Only five students had access to Braille version of China’s university entrances, an exam attended by millions.

Several disability rights activists were also tried by the Hunan court on ‘subversion charge’. China also continued to violate its obligations to the 1951 Refugee Convention, as it returned fleeing refugees from North Korea, despite the fact that they are brutally persecuted therein.

The significant violations of human rights carried by Chinese government, highlighted and even exacerbated by the COVID - 19 pandemic, is a great cause for alarm in the International community.

With exception of sexual minorities and gender affirmation, where Chinese authorities did make some headway for better social environment, the Human Rights Watch report has revealed a glum picture, one of censorship, harassment, exploitation and restriction for sake of maintaining image of China that the Chinese Government wishes.

By Pushkar Sinha

CCP has always been eager to consolidate the varied identities of Chinese people under one National identity, even if it means waging a racial war against it's own citizens. This is exactly why the CCP is systematically destroying the cultural roots of Uighurs, Mongols and even Tibetans.

In its long list of sins, the CCP has added another one recently. It has been developing facial recognition software in collaboration with tech giants with the aim of racial segregation. This is a very alarming situation and a prelude for a genocide.

A recent patent application by Chinese firm Huawei in collaboration with the CCP included software covertly had Uighur detection analytics. According to recent reports, other Chinese firms are too involved in building technology to improve minority detection. Even the trend is alarming as this can be used by other countries to cleanse its population the Nazi way.

Artificial Intelligence or AI and facial recognition software is already used extensively in China for security purposes. These camera systems can classify if a person is an Uighur, Han or other minorities.

Considering the softwares specifically recognise Uighurs while grouping rest of the minorities into "other", it is clear the CCP is developing racist technology to track and segregate Uighurs.

Just last month, the Chinese facial recognition startup - Megvii, was caught red handed testing software with "Uighur Alarm". This is also the exact reason why famed footballer Griezmann cut off his ties with Huawei. In fact, many leading China security camera firms offer ' Uighur analytics', including the country's three largest: Hikvision, Dahua, and Uniview.

Facing massive backlash, Huawei has decided to take back the patent and issued an apology. Clearly, this isn't enough. An apology after getting caught red handed means nothing. Racial recognition features shouldn't have been a part of the software in the first place.

Additionally, Huawei backtracking doesn't mean that CCP will abandon its aim to ethnically cleanse Uighurs. Many alternative firms would be vying for the same contract. Other Chinese firms like SenseTime, Alibaba, and Baidu are still in the line to develop such softwares.

Even Megvii, after getting caught claimed that it's software wasn't designed to recognize and label ethnic groups. A simple reading of the patent application tells us that this is an outright lie.

This also sets a very dangerous precedent. China is a textbook case of racial discrimination and profiling.

Additionally, these events show us that for businesses, ethics don't matter in the least and are ready to provide governments with any demand even if it goes against basic human rights.

The systematic oppression of Uyghurs and other Turkic people in the occupied East Turkistan region, now known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), is a blatant disregard for human rights by the Chinese Communist Party. Ever since Chen Quanguo, the architect of Tibetan genocide, took over the reins of XUAR, a series of draconian policies under the guise of curbing extremist activities and promotion of economic interests have plagued the lives of Uyghur and other Turkic families in the region.

Millions of Uyghurs have been illegally detained in ‘re-education’ camps over trivial allegations such as praying in a mosque, possessing an Islamic name or fasting during Ramadan. The re-education camps bear witness to cruel tortures like forced sterilizations, late-term abortions, sexual assault, physical and mental harassment as well as sleep and food deprivation. Authorities have used digital surveillance and algorithmic policing to track all Uyghur movements.

A new report by the Center for Global Policy outlines details of another form of systemic injustice- forced labor camps- that employ more than 500,000 people who are forced to pick cotton. This is a part of China’s ‘poverty alleviation’ program. The Chinese government has stated, multiple times, that Uyghurs have ‘deep-rooted, lazy thinking’ and need to be pushed to work, echoing China’s views of Uyghur culture being a barrier to modernization, whilst denying all forms of legitimate employment to them. Uyghurs and other Turkic people have been systematically excluded from entrepreneurial opportunities that have allowed Han Chinese to battle poverty more effectively.

The region produces 84% of China’s and 20% of the world’s cotton. Areas in the south, which produce the largest share, are heavily reliant on manual picking. Aksu, Hotan and Kashgar alone provide close to 570,000 people to the industry. Apart from these three areas, prison labor from detention centers in other regions will add thousands of unaccounted laborers to the aforementioned figure.
The ‘poverty alleviation’ program was initiated by the CCP in 2014 with the goal of ending poverty and unemployment by the end of 2020.

Party cadres which faced critical shortage in achieving the ‘poverty alleviation quotas’ used forced labor transfers of Uyghurs outside of re-education camps to deal with the manpower shortage on cotton plantations. Transferred workers are subjected to ideological training and made to live on site in factories. Uyghur children and elderly persons are put in centralized institutions while working-age adults are sent to state-assigned cotton-picking work.

The state’s propaganda mechanisms have been working steadily to paint a rosy picture of the labor programs as glowing examples of their government’s initiatives to curb poverty. A similar strategy is at play in occupied Tibet as well where quotas are being set to move thousands of Tibetans off their lands and onto military-style work training facilities. China continues to deny reports and allegations of forced labor being employed in both regions.

USA has imposed sanctions and import restrictions on cotton suppliers controlled by the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps (XPCC) over reports of widespread human rights violations. The XPCC is a paramilitary production entity which produces one third of the region’s cotton. The European Parliament also passed a resolution condemning China’s actions in the region.

The Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), renamed after the annexation of East Turkistan by Chinese forces in 1949, is synonymous with widespread human rights abuses and genocide. Uyghurs, Kazakhs and other Turkic people in the region have been subjected to systemic oppression from Chinese authorities who seek to alter the ethnic composition of the region through Nazi-style conniving measures such as forced sterilizations, abortions, arbitrary arrests and mass detention as well as mixed marriage programs between Uyghurs and Hans.

China has used refined technology to keep a constant surveillance system in place to detect all movements of Uyghurs and other Turkic people of the region and are subjected to forced medical check-ups that collect several types of biometric data including DNA, blood type, fingerprints, voice recordings and face scans, which is then converted into a data bank. There have been reports that China may use such data to specifically target Uyghurs with tailor-made biological weapons according to a leaked 2017 PLA textbook.

Millions of Uyghurs and other Turkic people are stuffed into crammed detention centers, that mirror Nazi concentration camps, with an added advantage of hi-tech systems. Most of these people serve long prison sentences of indefinite captivity in ‘re-education camps’ that supposedly provide ‘vocational training’ to the unemployed or ‘ideological training’ to extremists. With a growing network of internment camps and forced labor facilities, CCP is actively trying to destroy and decapitate Uyghur culture and way of life.

The web of surveillance is not limited to cameras on buildings but extends to chips inside mobile devices as well as on face scanners and biometric checkpoints scattered across the region. China uses the Integrated Joint Operations Platform (IJOP), a regional data system that is powered by AI, to monitor the unending checkpoints across all XUAR cities. The IJOP contains an alarm that rings each time a blacklisted person’s profile shows up.

Other programs scan digital footprints through powerful AI that detects patterns, flags religious speech and even raises an alarm on the lack of use of Mandarin. Other suspicious behavior can include sporting a beard and failing to attend flag-raising ceremonies.

Chinese authorities have claimed that the ‘sophisticated predictive’ technology in use targets ‘criminals’ with ‘precision’. The people of East Turkistan, according to the system are presumed guilty until proven innocent.

A list published by Human Rights Watch from the Aksu prefecture links the arbitrary imprisonment of thousands of Uyghur detainees through IJOP. This list points out how trivial details are used to sentence innocent Uyghurs to detention camps. Behaviors as innocuous as missing a rent payment, traveling to Beijing, and even being ‘born after 1980s’ can lead to flagging by IJOP. The Aksu List provides much needed evidence to hold Chinese authorities culpable for their actions in occupied East Turkistan.

An investigation by the New York Times revealed how China used technology companies such as Intel and Nvidia, for the mass incarceration of the Uyghurs through computer chips that powered supercomputers that facilitated real-time surveillance.

Another report stated a ‘Uyghur alarm’ in a facial recognition program created by Chinese tech giants Huawei and Megvii. Barcelona’s Antoine Griezmann ended his Huawei sponsorship contract over the allegation in December. He also urged Huawei to implement measures to respect the rights of men and women throughout society.

China has maintained that the heavily guarded centers are for educational and vocational training aimed at erasing terrorism and providing employment opportunities. All the people who have attended these centers have "graduated" and gone home. Detainees are held in the illegal concentration camps until their loyalties can be ascertained or their spirits are broken completely.

Leaders of the South-East geopolitical zone of Nigeria drawn from various political divides, met on Tuesday, and resolved to pressure the major political parties in the country to zone their presidential ticket for the 2023 general elections to the South-East.

This demand was made in a communique signed by Senator Orji Uzor Kalu and Senator Ike Ekweremadu, and issued at the end of the bipartisan meeting of South-East leaders held on January 5, 2021 at Camp Neya, Igbere, Abia state.

The leaders held that the South-East zone is united and indivisible in advancing the cause of the region and Ndigbo, stressing that they are not in support of secession or any secessionist group(s).

While maintaining their stance for a united, indivisible and prosperous Nigeria, the South East leaders commended President Muhammadu Buhari for his infrastructure regeneration drive across the five states in the South-East.

The leaders, who called for the emergence of a president of Igbo extraction in 2023, said, “The South East as a major geopolitical zone and Ndigbo, being one of the three predominant tribes in Nigeria, must take its rightful position in national polity. The Presidency has rotated between Northern and Southern Nigeria and among the various geopolitical zones.

“Thus, the South West and South South geopolitical zones in the southern part of the country have produced the President of Nigeria in the persons of His Excellency Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, GCFR, and His Excellency, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, GCFR. Hence as power is expected to rotate to the South in 2023, the leaders noted that the South East is the only zone in the South that is yet to produce a President of Nigeria in the current democratic dispensation. 

“With the support of other geopolitical zones and ethnic groups, the position of Nigerian President in the 2023 general elections in all political parties should be zoned to the South East for the sake of justice, fairness and equity.”

Ndigbo however called for a change in the security architecture of the country to curtail the menace of banditry, kidnapping and killings across the country.

Chinese government gifts debt and threat to the African Continent on the twentieth anniversary of founding Forum of China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC). Since the establishment of FOCAC in October 2000, trade between China and Africa has increased by 700%, leaving US-China trade behind. The overall continent is now dependent on the Chinese communist government with a debt of approximately $200 billion. China is not Africa’s largest doner rather, it is Africa’s largest exploiter who with the debt strategy, one by one is taking over the giant-resourceful continent.
 
Since the independence of the African nation in the 1960’s, both Taiwan and China showed considerable interest and sought to establish diplomatic ties across the continent to win support of the African nations for the ultimate United Nation Resolution for recognition of either Taiwan or China. With the US backed financial assistance, Taiwan focuses on helping African farmers by providing agricultural aid programs, technology sharing and large-scale training programme. Whereas the China Communist state focused on massive infrastructure investments based on billion-dollar loans reducing Taiwan support. Ultimately 1971 voting in UN General Assembly passed a resolution denying Taiwan a role and affirmed China a place.
 
China promises partnership on the face but backstabs with less interest rate loans and traps, to capture strategically important areas to spread diplomatic influence in world. Under Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), China has excessively increase commercial activities also referred as the “Yuan Diplomacy”. In the last two decades, China had not only taken over Asia, South-East China, Central and West Europe, Central Asian Republic but has also cemented its position and dependence in Latin American Countries and the entire African continent.
 
Chinese invest in two forms. One is through loans and second by foreign direct investments. According to China-Africa Initiative at Johns Hopkins University, China loaned $152billion to 49 African countries out of 54 between 2000 to 2018. And nearly 30% of the total African loan is given to the oil rich country Angola that is $43 billion. From 2003 to 2018, Foreign direct investment increased from US $17 million to US $5.4 billion and till date, Chinese Companies have invested $46 billion through foreign exchange. Africa owes approximately $200 billion to China. Over40% loans are for power projects and other 30% for modernising transport infrastructure that include ports, railway, road and other connectivity projects. BRI also include Maritime Silk Road and port in Mombasa is being developed under it.
 
Most important projects include 472km Mombasa-Nairobi railway, the largest infrastructure project since Kenya’s independence in 1963 with 80% Chinese funding. 2nd is the 756km Ethiopian Addis Ababa- Djibouti Railway project connecting capital Addis Ababa to Djibouti where China have a military base. The visionary thought to connect railway to its military base was long planned and is being achieved by billion-dollar loans.
 
Other projects include Desertic: Sola power project, Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, Lake Turkana Wind Power Project, 03b Networks: next generation satellite network, BRICS Cable, Square Kilometre Array Telescope.
 
As of 2020, the countries in Africa with the largest Chinese debt are Angola ($25 billion), Ethiopia ($13.5 billion), Zambia ($7.4 billion), the Republic of Congo ($7.3 billion), and Sudan ($6.4 billion). Peter Nolan correctly said “China is buying the world and damaging international relations.” Africa must learn from other countries like Pakistan, Sri Lank, Djibouti, Laos, Maldives, Tajikistan and other before it’s too late.
 
China took opportunity of Djibouti heavy debt and establishes its overseas military base which geo politically has strategic importance as its few miles from a US naval base the only permanent American military facility in Africa. Djibouti had no choice but to lease land to China for $20 million per year. Laos is also struggling to payback China and had to handover majority control of its National Electric Grid at a time when its state-own electric company’s debt has spiralled to 26% of its gross domestic products.
 
Tajikistan borrowing began form 2006 and were unable to pay debt leading Tajikistan government to pass a bill handing over 1,122 square Kilometre of mountainous land in the remote Pamir Mountains and granted Chinese companies rights of mine gold, silver and other mineral ores. Kyrgyzstan also under debt trap. Maldives gave couple of islets cheaply in Indian ocean archipelago.
 
Needless to say, the African economies are being tormented by Chinese sharks. If the countries do not pull their plug from Chinese funds, it may become too dependent too soon. If that happens, there is no way out from egregious exploitation of the rich resources, including people and nature.

Following the recent murder of Karima Baloch, a human rights activist from Balochistan, Pakistan, in Toronto, Canada, a group has tasked Prime Minister Trudeau to immediately hold an impartial inquiry into the murder of Baloch activist, stressing that the Canadian government must also probe possible complicity of Pakistani
intelligence agencies in her murder.

Karima Baloch was a prominent student leader of Balochistan, who escaped Pakistan in 2016 to take refuge in Canada, was abducted and later found dead in Harbourfront near Toronto’s lakeshore. Karima Baloch had gone missing on Sunday around 3pm. Toronto Police had requested public assistance in locating her.

The police found Karima Baloch’s body off an island just near Canadian city Toronto’s lakeshore.

In 2016, BBC had included Baloch in their ‘BBC 100 Women 2016’ list for her work involving “campaigns for independence for Balochistan from Pakistan.” She had used her social media profile to highlight abductions, torture, forced disappearances and other human rights violations that people in Balochistan were being subjected to by the Pakistan government and the army.

In her activism, she had placed emphasis on fighting for the rights of Balochi women, and had highlighted how the legal system and religious groups in Pakistan would use state and social machinery to intentionally target women, particularly from vulnerable groups.
Karima was murdered in a mysterious way. It is widely thought in Pakistan and particularly in Balochistan that she was murdered by the network of intelligence agencies in the same way as in the case of one Baloch journalist, Mr. Sajid Baloch in Sweden.

Miss Karima Baloch, had been sentenced to three years in prison and fined Rs 150,000 (US$ 1,875) after she and several other women demonstrated in August 2006 against disappearances. The charges were made in her absence. The case was based mainly upon the removal of a flag from a government building without authorization (under section 123 B of Pakistan penal code). She has been charged with defiling the flag and with sedition, which under section 124 A of PPC means ‘whoever by words or by sign or by visible representation excite(s) disaffection towards the federal or provincial government. The sentence was given by the Anti-Terrorist Court (ATC) in Turbat, Balochistan province on June 2, 2009.

The issue of disappearance was very close to Karima’s heart, she campaigned against the enforced disappearance of one of her uncles, Mr. Abdul Wahid Qamber Baloch, who was arrested in March 2007, tortured and kept incommunicado in secret military cells for nine months. He was handed over to police on April 21, 2008 and acquitted of nine out of ten changes, but remains in custody and charged with anti-state activities.

Another of her uncles, Dr. Khalid Baloch, was killed in August 2007 in an alleged encounter, in which the Frontier Corps (FC), a paramilitary organization, claimed to have been ambushed. According to reports by journalists and rights groups, encounter killings are often staged in Balochistan as a way of ridding the authorities of unwanted detainees.

In 2014, one leader of BSO Awami, Mr. Zahid Baloch was arrested by the military when students were having a secret meeting to chalk out a plan of action against the continuous disappearances of students. It was then that Karima Baloch was asked to head and take charge of BSO.

Consequently, the intelligence agencies and Frontier Corp (FC) began searching for her and raided houses of her relative to arrest her. Fearing for her life Karima escaped to Canada in 2016. However herself exile did not stop her from activism and fight for the rights of the Baloch people. Karima also represented the case of disappearances of more than 20 thousand Balochs in the United Nation Human Rights Council.

Following her mysterious death the Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs, Mir Muhammad Ali Khan shared the target list of state institutions when he tweeted that Karima’s death is good riddance. Expressing sadistic nature he wished the same fate to other activist and opponent of state’s narrative and hegemony such as Mr. Tarek Fateh, and bloggers Mr. Goraya and Taha Siddiqui.

This is not the first time that state officials have been found hand in glove with the security establishment target and kill operations General Pervaiz Musharaf- the ex-military dictator of Pakistan in one of his interviews and clearly stated that the activists and those daring to raise their voice against state’s oppression should be targeted wherever they are.

Journalists have therefore called on the Canadian government to enhance the security of all political asylum seekers in the country as they are increasingly at risk of being disappeared and murdered.

Former Local Government Chairman of Aro-Chukwu, Hon. Ike Jones, has extolled the Senate Chief Whip and Senator representing Abia-North at the National Assembly, Senator Orji Uzor Kalu for widespread delivery of milestone projects and unprecedented development to the people of Abia North.

Jones, after embarking on a personal tour of the entire Abia North, said he was wowed by the quality of projects that have been attracted and executed by Orji, a former governor of Abia State, stressing that the entire senatorial district has become one huge construction site.

While disclosing that he embarked on a personal tour of the entire Abia-North to have a first hand assessment of projects, Jones attested that he was awed by the quantum of on-going projects within Abia-North stating the zone had been converted to a construction site. According to Jones what he saw was an attestation that Senator is committed to the delivery of democratic dividends to his people.

He wrote on social media, "As the year draws to a, close. It is a time for stock taking.I took time out to traverse the entire Abia North with the discerning eye of a writer and journalist over the past one month with a view to assessing the impact of your tenure on the zone.

"I was amazed at what I discovered.The entire zone has become a huge construction site.Your tenure has brought unprecedented development to the zone and a big blessing to the people of the area.

"I have to tell you all this in line with the adage that says if you praise a healer,he will heal more.And as the other saying goes silver and gold neither do i have but words of encouragement I have for you.”

In less than a year since he's assumption into office , Senator Kalu has embarked on the delivery programmes to empower his constituents, the Senate Chief Whip and a former Governor of Abia State, Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu recently distributed another 350 motorcycles, 200 sewing machines and other empowerment kits to Isuikwuato Local Government Area, barely one month after he distributed 400 motorcycles and 150 electricity generating sets to his Umunneochi Local Government Area constituents. In addition, the Abia North Senator has extended several empowerment items to his constituents ranging from financial grants to motorcycles and sewing machines.

Asides rehabilitation and construction of 19 roads , electricity and water projects attracted by the Senate Chief Whip and Senator representing Abia North, Dr Orji Uzor Kalu, for the people of Abia North, the direct touch empowerment has accentuated the narrative of representation in the district.

The Chief Whip also recently led a high-powered delegation from the Federal Government to inspect abandoned power transmission projects in Abia-North Senatorial zone.

Ten years after the death of the late Chief Johnson Uzor Nesiegbe Kalu, his son, Chief Whip of the Senate and former Governor of Abia, Senator Orji Uzor Kalu is remembering the strong man who raised him.

The coordinator of the planned event, former Member House of Representatives,  Rt. Hon  Nnana Uzor Kalu told journalists in Umuahia that Uzor Kalu's family has finalized arrangements to honour their father who they lost ten years ago.

He said the grand occasion scheduled  for December 27th at Camp Neya, Igbere would kick off at 12 noon.

Kalu who pledged to hold a well packaged and hospitable event said that dignitaries within and across the country are expected at the anniversary as they honour their late father

Former Abia State Governor and Senate Chief Whip, Dr Orji Kalu, has called on Nigerians in the Diaspora to invest in the Nigerian economy in order to stimulate local economy and ultimately drive sustainable development.

Kalu, who showered praises on Mr Nnamdi Imo, a Nigerian resident in Canada, for investing in the hospitality industry in Nigeria, stressed that it is only Nigerians both home and abroad that can build a prosperous nation.

Ths business magnate cum-politician, who was special guest of honour at the commissioning of a beautiful Lounge located in Lagos, enjoined other Nigerians abroad to emulate the investment drive of Imo, who he described as a successful businessman and patriotic Nigerian.

Kalu said: "Imo, I want to thank you for remembering to invest in Nigeria. Most people in Canada, America, Britain, Milan and what have, do not even want to come back home.

"I also want to thank your wife and children for supporting you to build this beautiful edifice and boasting the home economy."

Before the Senate Chip went ahead to cut the ceremonial tape and officially declared the Lounge open, he acknowledged the presence of a community of hospitality operators who have created a paradise of services in Aba, Owerri, Onitsha, Oort Harcourt, Enugu and other major cities in Nigeria.

Kalu pointed out that the hospitality giants have all done what is proper as patriotic Nigerians. 

His words: "All those people who own hotels in Owerri, Aba, Onitsha and seated here today to witness the official opening of Blujay Lounge, are my brothers. They have all done what you have done and they are up and doing. That is what it supposed to be, because when wealth is brought back home, it says where it began from. You have done what I expected you to do, because if you don't invest well you cannot rip well."

Speaking as a mentor to several younger entrepreneurs, Kalu recalled that  when he started, he had invested well. "If I had squandered my initial money living reckless life, I wouldn't be where I am today. But I invested well with my conscientious, my whole self and with my everything. I can never go back.

"You have equally invested well, but that is not the end. You have to build a franchise like these your brothers have done. I want to see you establish branches in Aba, Port Harvout, Enugu, Owerri, Abuja, Jos etc.

"Don't side track your wife and children; they are the biggest investment you have. The best investment I have is my wife and children, every other investment is secondary. Friends can fail, enemies can fail but family will never fail you," the Senate Chip Whip counselled.

He continued: "This edifice stands out.  Manage it with partnership; people who have stake in your investment. Pay your workers good salaries, you cannot invest millions of naira here and pay your workers N25,000. They will mismanage this edifice. So be wise, learn the secret of the business. That is why these your brothers who are gurus of hospitality business in Aba, Owerri, Onitsha and other parts of the country are succeeding."

The United Nations General Assembly recently re-elected members of the Human Rights Council. China, which has a notorious human rights record was also re-elected into the Council. Issues of human rights persecution in China such as oppression of religious freedom in Tibet, Uyghur concentration camps in Xinjiang, the prohibition of local language in Inner Mongolia, and implementation of the "National Security Law" in Hong Kong have triggered discussions on crimes against humanity in the UN General Assembly.

The human rights situation in China has been a focus of debate among democratic countries in international organizations including the UNHRC. There are increasing calls for China to stop human rights violations against Muslims in Xinjiang.

In the past week, Germany issued a statement at the United Nations on behalf of 39 countries showing concerns about the human rights situation in Xinjiang and the latest developments in Hong Kong after the implementation of the new version of the National Security Law. The statement was opposed by Pakistan and Cuba, the other bad actors of human rights and dubbed Germany’s statement as an interference in China’s internal affairs and expressed support for China’s Xinjiang policy.

An important feature of the United Nations Human Rights Council is to ensure a fair assessment of the human rights situation in each country and try to resolve human rights violations that occur anywhere. The ultimate goal is to improve the human rights situation in all countries. The re-election of China, which is notorious for its human rights situation, runs counter to the Council's goal of promoting and improving human rights. It will be difficult to achieve fair and just expectations when the United Nations Human Rights Council meets next time to consider human rights cases in China.

In the past, when human rights groups have questioned China's persecution of Uyghurs in Xinjiang at the Human Rights Council, Chinese representatives not only hindered these questions by manipulating council rules, but also thumped the tables to show their aggressive protest.

China's arrogant show was apparent in these actions.
In recent years, China has taken advantage of its economic strength and the support of the "Belt and Road" and the "Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank" to buy off many weak and small countries. If some smaller nations do not support China, they receive threats of discontinuation of economic incentives.

China has placed personnel in international organizations such as the United Nations Human Rights Council, the World Health Organization, and the International Civil Aviation Organization, and its manipulation of deliberations on relevant resolutions or personnel arrangements within these organizations have been rampant.

In 2018, the election of some countries with poor human rights record as member of the United Nations Human Rights Council aroused dissatisfaction among many countries, as a result the United States withdrew from the United Nations Human Rights Council.

In May this year, President Trump dissatisfied with China's hiding of the Wuhan epidemic, criticized the "World Health Organization" as a "Chinese puppet", announcing that he would withdraw from the World Health Organization and suspend funding to the World Health Organization, highlighting the seriousness of China's manipulation of international organizations.

The election as a member of the "United Nations Human Rights Council" once again demonstrates China's arrogance and the decline of the "United Nations Human Rights Council", becoming a "Chinese puppet" following in the footsteps of “World Health Organization". Although U.S. President Trump announced his withdrawal from some of these international organizations, the U.S. withdrawal will not prevent China from bullying on the international stage.

On the contrary, it will reduce the resistance to China's hegemony. Hence, democracies such as US and India should push for reforms of UN and its affiliated bodies to stop China and other bad actors such as Pakistan from acting contrary to the basic principles and roles of these international organizations.