₦airaland Forum

What is Pat Utomi doing on the ticket? What states can he deliver? What is his support base?

None of this monkey dey work (ACN and CPC), baboon dey chop (Pat Utomi) stuff.

Getting the VP spot on the ACN ticket is extremely valuable right now. So either you are bringing something to the table (namely, votes) or you are a hardcore ACN man.

Buhari/Yorubaman is a winning ticket against Atiku/whoever, and is also very competitive against GEJ. SW + a large chunk of the the North is enough to get the job done. To be blunt, ACN doesn't really need SS or SE votes to win this election.

There might be some sentiment against the ticket if it was a Yoruba as the frontliner, but that is not the case.

Against Atiku/Igboman, there is no point in picking someone from SE anyway. Also unnecessary to pick a SS guy, since the ACN should be able to profit from a backlash if GEJ is defeated.

If Goodluck wins, obviously no point in picking a SS VP. And I don't know of any Igbo VPs who can actually deliver a state or more on an ACN ticket.

ACN/CPC should be looking at the Republican playbook (rally the heartland, the SW/North) rather than the Democratic playbook (choose candidates in vain to appeal to some demographic that intrinsically dislikes your political party anyway [in the case, the SE]). Do that and you'll defeat Atiku and have 50% odds against GEJ, in my opinion.

Beaf: Look at the problems in the ND, then count the 10 million almajiri's around you and you will realise that it is time for a permanent shift of power from the evil gangs that have held Nigeria backward, Atiku, Ciroma and co are just the arrowheads. That gang of bats and the ra'pe they represent must be broken.

Some of us are fanatical about creating a progressive country where every person can strive for fulfilment, where there is equity and hunger is banished; where all kids get an education and there are no more almajiri's; where govt is listening and responds to the aspirations of the people; where there is freedom of speech, equality of the sexes and human rights are guaranteed; where the state has an ideology that the people can key into; where all religions are tolerant of the other; where there is true representation of the citizen at every level. . . and we will succeed.

We have taken the first steps to creating a modern, sophisticated society.

All of these things you say sound amazing. But how/why is GEJ the man capable of delivering these things, when it appears that he is afraid to even deliver a quality debate of ideas with Atiku?

Can you give an example of such success ever happening under what is probably a weak leader in GEJ who seems of average intelligence and has a limited ability to express his ideas (or even ideas prepared by his advisors)?

I feel that corrupt leaders are very dangerous to Nigerian society, but one can argue that an incompetent leader is even more so.

If GEJ is what he claims to be, then he has no reason to run away from debating Atiku. Obama embraced debates as a way to convince the voting public of the quality of his ideas. If GEJ has quality ideas too, he would jump at the chance to communicate them to the masses. Otoh, if he knows that his candidacy is more fluff/glamour than substance, then he would be taking exactly the actions he is taking now.

This is the major reason why I'm a a bit concerned by his actions. Maybe GEJ is less Obama and more the Wizard of Oz. . .all show, no substance. Let him enter the debate and demonstrate that this is not true.

You also inherited the knowledge of drugs and drug pushing from YOUR FOREFATHERS. You are not sampling your own poo now huh?

Pray tell, which of my forefathers/kin are drug pushers? My ancestors were babalawos, jujumen, yam farmers and hunters. More recently we've switched into Christian ministry (great grandfather), teaching (my grandfather), engineering (father), and hopefully finance (me.)

Addiction to crack has nothing to do with my kin or forefathers. That is your sh1t, not mine.

[quote author=Mrs, Eve link=topic=570836.msg7417096#msg7417096 date=1293472541]If you are an American Citizen then I am Barack Obama.[/quote]Err, wtf? How would I even prove my citizenship? Or more importantly why would I need to prove citizenship to YOU?
Anyway, lots of posters here are dual citizens, isn't a big deal.

If Black American women so ghetto and low class, why didn't your father STAY IN NIGERIA and marry a Nigerian sister?

WTF? I am a full-blooded Yoruba man, both of my parents are Ekiti. We just immigrated to the US when I was little kid and became (naturalized) citizens there.
You do realize that it is possible to acquire American citizenship w/o being born there, right? Or did you fail out the mandatory history/civics courses in middle and high school but your teacher kicked you up a level to get rid of you?
And I have no beef with all AA women, or AA males. Me having a problem with you doesn't mean I dislike anyone else. As I said earlier, my current boo is AA. A good number of my girlfriends have been AA. But they have their heads on straight and aren't batsh1t insane like you.
Finally, even if your crazy hypothesis that the only way I could be a US citizen is because my daddy married an AA woman. . . well, in most African cultures, ethnicity is patrilineal. So even if my mother were AA, I'd consider myself primarily Yoruba, not AA. And thus I'd still be calling you out on our lies and bullsh1t.

What the white man took over your father's village too? Sad huh?

Err, wtf? I'm in my father's village right now still on Christmas break. Ain't no white man oppressing us here. Our oba is not white. Our senators and governor is not white.
Look, just because the white/hispanic/asian man is kicking your ass in the US doesn't mean the white/hispanic/asian man is rubbishing us here
With that said, some of Nigeria's problems are to varying degrees due to foreign influence. But I feel fairly confident that they'll be solved, at least in my region of naija.

[quote author=Mrs, Eve link=topic=570836.msg7416558#msg7416558 date=1293464718]Couldn't find a sucker to purchase your ticket out of Nigeria huh?  [/quote]@Mrs Eve: In case it isn't clear, I'm an American citizen, and have lived here since I was 4 years old (I'm 25 now.) This is part of the reason why it was so easy for me to expose your lies.

A few words found on www.dictionary.com doesn't make you intelligent.

Indeed. Very likely a bumbler like yourself, even with an infinite amount of time on dictionary.com would not be able to fool anyone into thinking you are intelligent.

An intelligent person would know the different between an insult and an argument.  If I am only insulting you how can I give "weaksauce" arguments according to you?

You have/had no arguments whatsoever. I dismantled your poor attempts, exposed your lies, and called you out on your ad hominem attacks. Up until now you STILL have not addressed any of the issues I raised. No attempts to back up your crackpot ideas (e.g., more Nigerians on welfare than African Americans!) As usual, a person with low-quality ideas will want to divert attention away from them

Cyber cafe time running low use it to score a job.

ROFL. Perhaps I should respond with some sort of crack cocaine jibe in response, but probably not worth the effort. No doubt you'll claim that the crackheads in the US are not AAs, but Nigerians    

Oh! Here a job for you, go tell your HIV/AIDS infected brothers that having sex with virgins does not cure their disease.

You do realize you have the wrong country, yes? Like, Nigeria and the nations of Southern Africa are not the same. Like, Africa is not one country, just in case you were not aware. Then again, maybe I should excuse your ignorance. After all, the education system in the urban ghetto you grew up in probably wasn't very good. You are probably one of those D or E level troublemaker students who were allowed to progress to the next grade just to save the teacher trouble

Tell them to accept their fate and make room for new humans.

Eh, literally millions of AA kids been aborted over the past few years, in part due to the vigorous efforts of Planned Parenthood. Hispanics are kicking your @sses, taking away your menial jobs and dominating you in the few good jobs you are allowed to get through affirmative action.
AAs, a people figuratively starving in the land of milk and honey! Destined to be at the bottom of American society forever. Even in politics, within fifty years once Hispanics have thoroughly swamped you numerically, you'll be kicked down to the 3rd tier.
AAs, the poorest, least healthy, shortest-lived, worst-educated, most violent ethnicity in all of America. A group of people simply unable to compete in the modern society in which we live.
The Americans even tried to throw you a bone by giving some of you Liberia where you were lords and masters over the indigineous African ethnic groups there. Of course, even given this bunny by the US, you frikking blew it! The Africans rose up, kicked you out of power, slaughtered your leaders, and raped your women    
How incompetent can a people be to blow an entire fiefdom giftwrapped to them by the US? New Orleans you guys of course fcked up. Detroit is a mess. Los Angeles, Hispanics and Asians have kicked you down to 3rd or 4th politically.

Anyway, I've blathered on too long. The point is, I don't want to hear any AAs talk crap about Africans, especially given the numerous wonderful opportunities they've been given by the US and have of course fvcked up. And if you keep telling lies I'll keep exposing them. I know ya'll like the back of my hand.

Cyber cafe computer?

Notice how Mrs Eve never  responds to the points I raised, but instead resorts to ad hominem attacks.

OK, let's pretend that your hypothesis is true, that I'm indeeed typing from a cyber cafe. Does that mean my arguments (which you've quite carefully AVOIDED dissecting!) are without merit? Where I'm typing is irrelevant for the purposes of this dicussion.

And as is quite obvious to anyone reading this thread, even if I were an illiterate okada boy, I clearly understand America and the issues in that country better than you do.

Long story short, don't expect your weaksauce arguments, reasoning, and logic to fly here just because you are American. Afterall, many of us here are too, and quite a bit more successsful Americans than AAs are  

Someone here said something about 2 weeks not being enough time to prepare. I strongly disgree. You could have debates comfortably once a week, even.

Also, it isn't as if GEJ or Atiku would be the one doing most of the heavy lifting anyway. Their aides would do most of the work. Then the aides would prepare a summary for each candidate, which the person then spends possibly up to a day or so mastering (though of course the more talented you are, the less time you need to spend preparing.)

I don't see how GEJ is comparable to Obama. Obama is one of the most personable and eloquent politicians in American history.

GEJ on the other hand doesn't come across well in interviews. He was flustered quite easily in the CNN interview with that Sesay woman. So unless he has received extensive coaching on public speaking since then (and also learned somehow how to think more quickly in high-pressure situations), then he really needs to avoid debating Atiku.

Whether Atiku is a thief or not is irrelevant for the purposes of who will win the debate. If you are watching a debate and one person looks calm, collected, presidential, and answers the questions asked clearly without stumbling all over the place, then on a gut, instinctual level you'll prefer that person to his bumbling opponent.

Heck, me myself I don't like Atiku at all or what he represents, and much prefer GEJ over him (though would prefer Buhari/Yorubaman on an ACN ticket over either.) But if GEJ looks incompetent in the debate and Atiku presidential, can I in good conscience support GEJ?

GEJ at all costs must avoid the debate, in my opinion. There is too much to lose and very little to be gained from it. And it isn't as if he some sort of Obama-like oratory juggernaut. When it comes to public speaking, he is much closer to a bumbler than a smooth professional.

Absolutely indefensible. How on earth does property become "abandoned" in only a 2 year period? Was there no documentation of who owned it? I still do not understand under what pretext the federal government justified taking away property, assuming the ownership of it was documented.

Excellent move by Atiku, since to some extent he is the underdog. He has more to gain from a debate than GEJ.

GEJs response should be to decline, in part because of the above issue (also because Atiku is probably a much more eloquent public speaker than he is.)

Maple:
For instance, there are tens of thousands of Chinese immigrants who have been living here in Canada for the past 20 yrs ,and dont even know 20 words of English; sounds almost unbelievable, but it is true.

Wow. Even young folks? That is amazing. So I guess these Chinatowns in Canada are self-sustaining economically? Otherwise the kids would be forced to go elsewhere to earn incomes (and thus master English)?

[quote author=Mrs, Eve link=topic=570836.msg7413513#msg7413513 date=1293403696]And when you finish adding, subtracting, dividing, and multiplying. Africans in USA in the White man's eyes are nothing but NIGGAS IN DIASHKIES and flip flops.

You are no different than Black Americans, when you drive your car at night and the police pull you over. They are not going to ask you what part of Africa you immigrated from. They see A NIGGA and will treat you as such.

You are no different than Black Americans, when you hit a woman especially a white woman you will be encountered by SWAT TEAMS AND FBI Extraction Teams. They are not going to ask you what part of Africa you immigrated from. They see a NIGGA and will treat you as such.

You are no different than Black Americans, when you go apply for a job and you looking as black as WD40. They are not going to ask you what part of Africa you immigrated from. They see a NIGGA and will treat you as such.

You are no different than Black Americans, when you go to your chick's family reunion who happens to look opposite of you and the parents were raised in Jim Crow Era. They will not ask you what part of Africa you immigrated from. They see a NIGGA and will treat you as such.

So again how can an African make more than a Black American if THEY ARE SEEN BOTH AS NIGGAS?[/quote]ROFL. OK, I didn't realize you were one of those paranoid Black Panther types who believe that the white man is out to get them

SWAT teams indeed!

For you Nigerians reading this, I hope you see why African Americans are at the bottom of society. The United States is the proverbial land of milk and honey. If you are reasonably hard working, intelligent and plan properly, you can succeed here (even as an illegal!). One of my best friends, his father is some illegal Mexican imigrant. But his father worked very hard (repairing pianos and various other odd jobs) in order to send his son to college. This son (my friend) went to law school after college and is now an assistant district attorney.
Now, African Americans rather than rolling up their sleeves and working HARD like the various groups who were below them in society but later surpassed them (Mexicans, the Chinese coolies who were imported to build the railroads in California, Nigerian-Americans, Irish, etc), instead they want to complain about the "white man" holding them down.

Keep holding onto that victim mentality!

Now, with all that said, is it certainly not true that all AAs think in this same twisted way. Fortunately this victim mentality I think is slowly dying out. In certain places like PG County, Maryland AAs there are fairly wealthy and hard-working (or at least, relatively speaking.) And of course my lil boosky (who's mother is a dentist and is herself a teacher) doesn't have the Fed up way of thinking.

What the hell does whatever the F this guy was doing with this Jamo chick have to do with anything?

You said the following bold-faced lie:

By the way UNGENIUS, there are more OF YOUR PEOPLE on the welfare system than BLACK AMERICANS. Next time do LIVE RESEARCH before googling and listening to CNN with Spanish subtitles.

And I called you out on it. You yourself KNOW it was a lie when you said it!

Look, you don't have to like Nigerians; that is your right. But you should be at least honest enough with yourself to admit that Nigerians in America are FAR richer than AAs. I'm not saying we are better or anything, but we certainly have more money, are disproportionately represented in medicine, law, engineering, the best universities, etc.

Hell, even the best students at HBCUs tend to NOT be African American. Usually some sort of African or Carribean.

Long story short, let's try to stick to facts rather than pretty obviously wrong fictions.

[quote author=Mrs, Eve link=topic=570836.msg7412605#msg7412605 date=1293393685]By the way UNGENIUS, there are more OF YOUR PEOPLE on the welfare system than BLACK AMERICANS. Next time do LIVE RESEARCH before googling and listening to CNN with Spanish subtitles.[/quote]OK, so before I was giving Mrs Eve the benefit of the doubt, but now I am starting to suspect she has an agenda.

Can you offer some evidence for this hypothesis of yours, Mrs Eve? Given that Black Americans are one of poorest and least education major ethnic groups in the US? Even Hispanics are surpassing AAs (which is a bit sad, given that it is only recently we've been having large-scale immigration from Mexico into this country)?

So somehow one of the richest and best educated groups in the US (Nigerians) has more people on welfare than one of the poorest (AAs)? Keep in mind that the AA population in the country is 30+ million, while that of Nigerians is probably well south of  million.

Next you'll tell me all those guys in jail for crack are Nigerian too   Or the dude at my gym who is on parole and plays basketball with a big ankle bracelet so his parole officer knows where he is at all times

The only group of people in the US who can try to look down on Nigerians in America are Jews, Indians, and Asians. Even ordinary white Americans is not on our level, not to talk of African Americans.

^-- Not true at all. Ekiti State is an ACN state, but there are certain towns which were PDP there.

Personally, I don't want the PDP to die out in the SW. I'd like them to be a vocal opposition party to check the ACN and give the people an alternative if the ACN stumbles.

In ordinary democracies, the opposition party can win slots even in the heartland of their enemy.

Something like this reflects very well on the ACN, that they are not interfering with democracy.

@Gbawe: I enjoyed reading your posts. Very informative.

It isn't really as if Nigerian guys are superior to guys from other African countries or whatever. We probably just have higher education levels on average in Nigeria (or at least the south) compared to those countries, are somewhat wealthier, and quite a bit more populous.

Basically educated, moneyed, handsome and tall black guys tend to be the type that women go "gaga" over.

Nigeria has more of these than probably most other countries in the world (aside from possibly African American blacks.)

Really isn't that complicated. More education levels on average + more average wealth + more population (150 million) means you'll produce a lot of males that women like.

@Ileke-Idi: Naw I've been to Ekiti several times before, but only once as an adult during the Christmas holidays. I didn't know my village got so poppin during this time. My parents and older relatives used to say how they had "fun" in the village when they went back home during the holidays.

I thought fun = "sit around at home and do boring stuff together", not dance parties with food and copious amounts of (free!) alcohol.

BTW, palm wine is the sh1t! Never had it before, it is amazing stuff

strangerf:
On a side note, I heard the going rate for a one night stand is around 1000 naira for college girls (OAU and Lag). how much do you pay those in Ekiti?
Just wanna know!

Lol I wouldn't know, never inquired. Thus far in my life my game has been good enough to get poon for free. And so far it looks like my game is translating to naija

I would imagine that it should be cheaper than OAU or Lagos though, labor is generally cheaper in rural naija.

Learning more languages is always useful. But there are always opportunity costs in life. Time spent learning Chinese is time that could be used to learn math/physics/engineering/economics/business. And the latter is more important than the former, imo.

And might French not be more immediately useful for Nigerians? What fraction of our international trade is with China vs. French speaking countries, and what are the projections for 30 years from now?

I've been aware of this for some time. While interesting, it doesn't change the realities on the ground in Nigeria.

Oh, so by "intellectual fraud" I mean making a bunch of different user accounts and maintaining them as separate identities which then post to back up up on arguments

Wasnt really a commentary on the quality of his posts one way or another, just this particular tactic he uses

Hmm, but maybe there is a better term to describe Andre Uweh's fraudulent behavior.

Is it me, or is this true?

I went to a dancy party yesterday in my village in Ekiti. It seemed to me that the average "hotness" levels of the girls at this party was noticably higher than that of your typical naija party in the US. Most of these girls live in Lagos, Ibadan, Akure, cities like that in the SW.

So is this just some sort of coincidence, or actually something you guys have noticed too?

Hopefully I can do new year's eve in Lagos and find out more, lol 

ROFL @ Andre Uweh. Do you not have a job or something to do in the real world? Maintaining multiple Nairaland personas must be quite tiring and time-consuming, no?

Such dishonesty defeats the purpose of an online forum like this, does it not?

Mods, how about you reveal the IP of each post when made? Or if for security reasons, you are unwilling to do this, why not reveal a hashed version of each IP (i.e., apply a hash function to the IP and post that)?

If Seun does this, most of the intellectual fraudsters here likely will be more easily exposed (though of course a persistent and slightly more clever fraudster can get around this.)

Good article.

I wonder, is the North's only goal to cling to political power while neglecting economic development of their land? This to me would be a tremendous mistake. Yet to me it seems a mistake they've made for the many years they've held power.

@oyinda: Pretty much just scraping dirt out of the river bottom (and I guess sides) to widen and deepen the river. Allows you to safely bring larger ships up the river, which are more profitable. At least this is my inference from the articles I've read.

Just google around a bit. There is a powerpoint presentation online by "Opuiyo Oforiokuma" that describes the financing of the project. Public knowledge, at this point.

Nope, Lagos State is only loaning 5 billion naira to LCC. 20 year loan. I'm not sure what the interest rate is though.

Remember that after 30 years, Lagos State inherits the road, too.

I don't understand how anyone can be complaining about this project.

Even the people who live nearby and are complaining about how they'll have to pay to go to their homes. . . well, they don't seem to be voicing any complaints about their increased property values, are they?

The Igbo and Hausa versions are the two best ones, imo. I don't like Fuji music very much, sort of annoying that he chose it for the Yoruba version

Those fares seem pretty reasonable, at least to me.

For those who oppose the Lekki Road fees, how are we supposed to put up infrastructure? The federal government doesn't want to spend money. There is only a limited amount that can be raised from taxation within Lagos. If we want to attract capital from outside the country to help us build infrastructure in Lagos, then there will be a price to pay.

I know it sucks to pay money to use a road, but nothing good in life comes cheap.

Anyway, I really hope this project succeeds so that foreign investors are encouraged to bring their money to Lagos.

@Dede1's point is a good one. Yes to state police, no to state police being controlled by governors (or possibly any part of the executive branch.)

Perhaps they should be under the state legislature? Or a separate branch of government, with the state police commisioner some sort of elected office? I'm not sure what the best way to organize things is. . .