OK, maybe I'm a bit naive, but I have been trying to figure out any pointer to northern agenda in the article but I keep missing it.

So tell me, are they going to exclude southern farmers and southern banks from participating ?

Ringim was a monumental failure in Abia state as the AIG. Abia state degenerated into a lawless and kidnapping fiefdom under his watch and Jonathan still made him the IGP even as his incompetence was on display for all to see.

Jonathan can huff and puff all he wants but Ringim's failure rests squarely on his shoulders. I wonder why people set themselves up to fail.

Desola:

Posted by: johnie

You sure about that? Half education is worse than none, you do realise that?


Education was clearly a waste on you if at all you had any.

deflect - turn from a straight course, fixed direction, or line of interest
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/deflect

Definition of DEFLECT
transitive verb
: to turn aside especially from a straight course or fixed direction
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/deflect

Definition of DEFECT
1a : an imperfection that impairs worth or utility : shortcoming <the grave defects in our foreign policy> b : an imperfection (as a vacancy or an unlike atom) in a crystal lattice
2[Latin defectus] : a lack of something necessary for completeness, adequacy, or perfection : deficiency <a hearing defect>
See defect defined for English-language learners »
See defect defined for kids

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/defect?show=0&t=1307998886

Sorry, but you don't deflect from one party, organisation or association to the other; what you do is defection to other groups/parties. However you could deflect from an original position or deflect other positions. "Deflect" was used wrongly by the original user and defect is more correct in that context.

oyb:

and guess who resides on the ground floor

UBA

Ground floor (back entrance) was a restaurant back in the days (10 yrs ago). That woman food na waya, it provided beta' option to Mr Biggs and Tantalizers down the road in those days. I hope say them never drive that woman comot.

Ibime:


From D-Line up to Chiba is all new buildings, showing how PH has spread north into Ikwerre lands, and don't be surprised if PH expands to reach Aba one day. In my childhood, even Elelenwo was considered outskirts until the building of oil mill market, now PH has extended through to Elele, Choba, Oyigbo etc. In my fathers day, PH did not extend past D-Line. Our family house in D-Line was virgin bush when it was purchased in the 50s, so I guess Rumuola, Rumuomasi, Artillery and the rest were still villages then.

Yeah, back in the days, Elelenwo used to be outskirts and there was a clear gap between there and Obigbo. From the other side, Rumuokwuta was towards the out skirts and  not many years ago FGC PH ( near MCC) was also in the outskirts and Igwurita was clearly not in PH. Even Choba was on its own.

Has it expanded to Elele these days ? Last time I knew, it was pushing towards Omagwa. You are right, one day, only the Imo River bridge would be able to define the boundary between metropolitan PH and Aba, afterall they are only 60km apart; center to center and less than 30 km apart outskirts to outskirts with some small towns filling in the gaps.

I also think that the original town must have started from "Town" i.e Aggrrey Road side and areas around there like Mile 1 Diobu judging from the types of buildings around there. My mum used to stay in Churchill Street with her uncle b4 the war, but he lost all his properties in Churchill after the war but he bounced back.

I used to rock PH badly when I was in school (sec and Uni) and my sec school hols always ended with spending 3 days in PH and boarding a reserved train to KD.

There was a cement factory in Okpella along Okene - Agbor Road. The factory was owned by Bendel state. I wonder if that factory still operates or if this new factory is a resuscitation of the old one. Either way, I hope they deliver quickly and come up with reasonable price for cement to enable poor people build their own homes.

lacidi:

Old boy, please don't spoil the Igbo language. If you do not know what Ikiri means you should just say so and not fabricate a response. Ikiri is not a slang!

Ikiri is the Igbo name for the small animal with big eyes popularly called 'Bush baby'. The animal is renowned for its ability to hold on to whatever it grips. Usually it stays on trees and grips the tree branches so tight that even when it is shot dead, it still holds on to the branch and the hunter will have to manually extricate the grip before it can detach the animal from the branch. The most difficult part is that if you catch Ikiri in a trap, it will grip the trap and you may be forced to cut off its fingers in order to detach it from the trap. That is why in Igbo we say "onya ji Ikiri, Ikiri ji kwa onya".

So Ohakim called himself Ikiri in order to show that he has a grip on the Govt house and only at death or by his own choice will he detach from it.

Bros take am easy, I be proper Owerri guy. What you said is not far from what I said "
Fox or a guileful person. "no dey shake when pushed", "back no dey touch ground" "Strong man".

You just defined the xters of Ikiri and called it bush baby, but I called it a fox for lack of word for the animal. Now in practical terms, when ikiri is applied to a human, it becomes a slang which refers to a strong man or guileful person depending on who is using it and when .

bababuff:

I beg my Igbo brethren, what is the meaning of 'Ikiri" in english?

Fox or a guileful person. "no dey shake when pushed", "back no dey touch ground" "Strong man"

It's an Owerri slang mainly reserved for a dubious persons.

@ Topic, we don't need completely free education in Imo state. What we need is affordable education as people are already going to school without much persuasion in Imo. Rochas should channel most of our money to capital projects and resuscitation of our moribund industries in Imo.

HTML5:

All of you at talking about what you don't know.

Have you ever asked yourselves how Biafra fell?

Ibibios (Efiks are Ibibios) did not support Biafra from day one, but some greedy elements like Barr. Udoaffia, and Phillip Effiong gave Ojukwu the impression that hIs cause was supported by the Ibibios.

After the lost of Port Harcourt, Onitsha, and Enugu to the Nigerian armies, the Biafran rebels became strong and even stonger within.

The only way the Nigerian army could penetrate their strongholds was to break in via Sub-marines, and without the co-operation of the Ibibios, Oron and Calabar wouldn't have fallen into the hands of Nigerian amries which forced Ojukwu to run to Ivory Coast.
Hunger was also the most vital weapon used against the rebels.

Go and check accurate memiors.

In your own thinking, Enugu , Nsukka etc also fell because the Igbo people there cooperated with the Nigerian forces. Laffing at Nigeria using submarines to penetrate Oron and Calabar.

Calabar fell as a result of tactical error, less hardware and the support Gowon received from Ahidjo, which Biafra did not envisage.

As per Ibibio people, all I can say is that many of them stood side by side in the trenches with their Biafran counterparts, giving as much as they were getting and even more.

Ndi Igbo have shouldered the consequences of the war alone and survival instincts made their natural allies to keep their distance. The Ibibios have intermingled with and married Ndi Igbo from God knows when. My grand dad married an Ibibio woman as far back as 1917 and her own parents also lived in Umuahia within the same period.

My Uncle was in Calabar sector when Calabar fell. He was a 2nd Lt in Biafran army and his section covered retreating Biafran forces. One of their last stand points was at SPC Calabar, where De Martin stood fighting for more than three days before pulling out. He had nothing negative to say about his Ibibio colleagues.

Your assertions about PH do not deserve any response.

Even with the 35% levy, I can make a nice killing selling at N750/bag retail or N600/bag wholesale. They know what to do to crash the price of cement; just deregulate the market and approve outstanding license applications without making demands for huge bribes and a lot of us will play and partake in this bonanza. Affordable housing for all should take priority over protecting the business interests of a few people.

blink182:

You don't seem to be in debt, a family friend of ours is in a N300m naira debt, after importing bagging equipments, the good for nothing whoever refused him license. Dangote is a rogue, cement can be sold in this country for very little when it is imported. If producing doesn't favour dangote, then he should turn his factories into bagging plants

That's what you get when market is semi-deregulated and skewed in favour of a few bodies, leading to near monopoly. Dangote and co are not going to do less than 700% profit margin as long as all the players are comfortable with their slices and patches of the market. I also think that they are involved in price fixing as well and the prices are not going to come down as a result of competition but maybe as "goodwill" gesture from the players or by executive fiat.

Take fuel importation as another example where import licenses are held by a select few with govt subsidy to back them up, why wont they be wealthy beyond imaginations ?

How about the GSM companies that recouped their investments within 3 years by providing services. If you invest billions, you are expected to make operational profits every year, but to recoup your billions including capital expenditure within 3 years is taking the mick.

Sometimes, govt needs to protect consumers by weighing in on excessive pricing of commodities, expecially when such pricing are reflected on your profits.

I once made arrangements to bring cement into the country, but had to back track due to exclusivity of licenses and the cost. I still have my contacts and I can land a bag of good portland cement to PH at a cost of N350. Add extra N50/ bag to take care of transport and logistics from PH + and another N100 forrelevant duties, 

I am confident that in a truely free market economy, that I will make a killing by selling at N800/bag unless already established titans are ready to go to a price war with me in which case, they would only win by dipping below N550. The level of protection without regulation offered to a few entities in Nigeria, has encouraged hyper inflation indused by over prising e.g cement and telecoms.

Totally deregulate the cement industry or apply stringent control and stiff penalties. This is why I think that govt should have rival  non-subsidised profit oriented bodies in key sectors to provide stiff challenges to companies with a tendency to monopolise the market.

ndu_chucks:

I agree with you once again. I also believe that we need a law in Nigeria which will mandate Primary school education and provide jail terms for parents who do not send their children to school. Those who want their children to become Almajiris should provide after school training for them. The archaic culture of enslaving millions of youths and rendering them a menace to the society, in the name of senseless implementation of an aspect of religion, must be eradicated from our mist.

I wonder why we don't have Almajiris roaming the streets of Saudi Arabia, Quatar, or even Indonesia, in great numbers (millions). Note that, the children of the Sultan of Sokoto, IBB, Atiku, Ciroma, Yerima, and other so-called leaders of the North will never be found in the streets of Nigeria roaming around as Almajiris.

I agree that education should be made compulsory up to sec school level, but it should also be free in order to enforce it, and there should be punitive consequences for defaulting parents/guardians. In addition to being free, school dinners should also be provided for the means challenged; this will encourage "beg for food" children to look forward to school.

You see, some people feel that government should not get very involved with the funding of education, because they believe in capitalism and the private sector. I also believe in capitalism and private sector but I disagree with this view point because govt is the only body with the financial muscle to fund education and govt is the ultimate beneficiary of a good education system in the form of taxes we will reap from this investment i.e people who benefitted from good education, less social miscreants (like almajiri and area boys) to worry about etc.

Those people fail to understand that the capitalist western govts they want to emulate provided the original infrastructure like dams, rail roads, airports, telecoms, schools, hospitals etc before selling them off to people who took them to the next level. The level of our infrastructural development demands active involvement of the government as well as the private sector to take us to the next level. I once made the observation below and I stand by it.

I would definitely propose more funding from the government, but I also realise that the task has gone beyond normal allocation from the budget as the funds aren't just there. Therefore, I would propose two sources of funds for the sector bearing in mind who the beneficiaries of education are; companies/employers, Nigerians and employees.

1. Education development tax (employee): For a start, this would be 0.5% tax on income 15K - 30K (N75 - N150). 1% on income N30001 - N70K and 2% on N70001 and above. (that's a revenue of at least N30 billion p/a assuming that 20 million people were at work and earned btw 15 and 30K)

2. Corporate Education development tax: 2% tax on profit of all corporate bodies.

The money from both sources would be lodged in a special account and would be used for funding infrastructural development in primary, secondary and tertiary institutions. Govt should also continue to increase allocation to the sector as if the the funds did not exist. The harsh reality is that we need an enormous amount in the education sector and there is no way we can rely on budget allocation alone to remedy the situation.

In addition to the above, universities should be given a level of independence to source funds and I am sure they would be able to secure corporate funding for some chairs and research activities in schools.

ndu_chucks:

FACE, mai gida, I was going to comment on this topic until I read your post. I wholeheartedly agree with your analysis.

Having said that, we cannot forget that literally millions of kids are wasting away without primary education, much more secondary, particularly from Northern Nigeria. We hope the Feds and the states' ministries of education with a combined budget of over $5.7billion per year, will do something tangible about the problem in the next 4 years.

Hey, yaya dei ? We really need to invest more agressively in education (at least basic). What would work for northern Nigeria in my opinion is more small sized schools and more qualified teachers to run them.

Let me explain; a state like Imo might require 30 large schools to satisfy their needs, while a state like Niger would require not less than 200 small schools to meet their needs because Niger state is at least 15 times larger than Imo state. That is the disadvantage of your large land mass in the north unfortunately. This means that it would cost considerably more in the north to deliver the same spread and quality of schools as you have in the south.

However, if not for the kleptomania across the nation, there would have been a different outlook by now. E.g, less than $1.5B of the $5.7 B you mentioned will make it to their intended target.

The NCEE is for entrance into unity schools (FGCs+ Kings College and FGGCs + Queens College) which are less than 80 in number out of more than 12000 Sec schools nationwide. Various states have their own entrance exams/admission criteria into their own school in addition to the private schools. There are also Command Sec Schools, Navy Schools + AFMS and NMS and they conduct their own entrance exams, so why would the writer expect 10 millions applications to < 0.7% of available schools ?

The writer's analysis is flawed on many counts.

1. Not everyone is interested in going to unity schools.

2. Majority of those in unity schools need to travel a considerable distance from home in order to attend a unity school (I attended a unity school so I know)and not everyone is interested in travelling a considerable distance to attend school when the local secondary school is near the corner and when there is a state school that rocks for them.

3. Gone are the days when unity schools flew the highest flags as there are now many private and church schools giving the a good run for their money.

4. There are more than 12000 secondary schools in Nigeria and if people show the same level of interest in all the schools as they do to unity schools, it means that more than nine million people are showing interest in secondary schools.

Put another way, unity schools represent less than 0.7% of total sec schools in Nigeria but attract  more than 1.3% (at 5 million/year which is more reasonable than the the 10M postulated by the writer which implies that he expects at least 60M Nigerians in Sec Sch and at least another 60M in Primary school) of potential secondary school students, which is already more than their fair share of attraction.

People should take time and cross check their analysis before they go to town with them.

PhysicsMHD:


@ the part in bold, where are you getting these numbers? And like I said, the article was talking about percentages and in terms of the percentage of revenue that was internally generated, Lagos and Sokoto do lead the way. If the heading was really all that misleading, somebody (like me) who read the article would have pointed it out. Jigawa is noted as one of the states with a relatively high IGR in that same article, yet everybody knows Jigawa is a poor state and cannot really have a large IGR in terms of total amount. There was no confusion about the article or the heading - it talked about percentages all throughout, and nobody questioned why Jigawa came before Delta because it was clear (and the OP even bolded some parts) that it was about percentages.

Anyway, another thing to consider is whether other states have other sources of income/funding that those states could use to develop their state so as to obtain a higher IGR. I think Rivers falls into that category of states, while Sokoto does not.

Where are these limestone factories in Nigeria outside of the North?

I got the figures from the chart posted in the fisrt page and the figures do correspond with the article. Internal revenue is very different from percentage of internal revenue in relation to total revenue accruing to the state.

I take it that as the article you are also referring to the % of internal revenue of a state to the total revenue (IGR + revenue from federation account) of that state.

Rivers state has very high IGR and fed allocation, but the fed allocation is higher than the IGR by a long shot (not their fault that they are sitting on all that gold). Sokoto has 34B while Rivers has 71B IGR, which means that Rivers generates more money internally than Sokoto and Rivers has a higher % of total IGR by federating units. As an entity, Sokoto's IGR as a % of their total revenue is second to Lagos.

The heading says: Nigeria: Igr (internally Generated Revenue) - Lagos, Sokoto Lead The Way. This is false especially as the data quoted clearly says that Rivers has 71B IGR while Sokoto has 34B IGR. A better heading would be : Relative to total revenue accruing to each state, Lagos and Sokoto lead the way in IGR.

edoyad:

Sokoto cement is actually a private company. It used to be owned by the FG before it was privatised by OBJ. Most cement companies in Nigeria are private.

OK, but do these private people pay royalty to FG or state gov for the natural resources ? I know that the aluminum smelting coy in Inyishi - Imo is/was owned by Imo state and Nigercem by Imo-Anambra (East Central State). Did they just corner all the money form the limestone and aluminum or did they pay royalty + tax to FG ?

PhysicsMHD:


The comparisons made in the article seem to have been about the percentage of total revenue that was internally generated, in which case, Sokoto would beat Rivers.

Which means that the heading is wrong. Rivers' IGR is far greater than Sokoto's IGR.
3 out of 5 is 60% while 40 out 80 is 50%, doesn't mean that 3 > 40 in real figures. That is not to take any thing away from Sokoto which has done well. Abia did well as well with fourth highest IGR at over 21B even with poor tax collection. With proper tax/accountability, Rivers, KD, Kano, Lagos, Anambra, Delta and Abia being the major commercial and industrial areas in the country will explode at the back pockets.

Now, someone mentioned the cement factory owned by Sokoto and the fact that they are taking advantage of the limestone deposits there. There are other cement factories in Nigeria using local limestones. The question is; does it mean that the specific minerals that the FG owns are coal, oil and gas ? Do these companies/states pay royalties to FG for tapping limestone, bauxite, aluminum etc ? If they don't, how is limestone for example different from oil/gas/coal ? Why are states not allowed to tap into oil/gas/coal but allowed to tap other resources ?

Dis Guy:

the thread started in 2009, the chart is for 2011 or as he said ' the latest' from cbn website

Nope, the figures quoted in the article are the same figures on the chart, unless you are saying that Lagos and Sokoto have managed to remain same over a two year period. More over, 2011 figures are not yet out as we are barely half way through 2011.

Just wanted to point out that the IGR of Rivers State (71B) is far greater than Sokoto's (34 B) and only second to Lagos. People should make an effort to look at the chart they are quoting.

ezeagu:

Some Igbo town names have been corrupted, and some have even been changed completely because of colonialsm. Some of the meanings of town names are harder to interpret because of this. Some Igbo towns are spelt like nothing they are pronounced because of the colonisers tongue (Onitsha, Owerri, etc), yet the natives of these towns see no reason to change this. Anyway, to help with the proper pronunciation of Igbo town names, post some of their origins, even if they are not of Igbo origin.

Owerri
'Owerri' is 'Owere'. I'm not sure of this town name, but I think it either means 'free, liberty' or 'outside quarters'.

Ogwashi-Ukwu

The origin of this name is with the Nshi (Nri) people who founded this town. The name has been slightly corrupted. It is actually 'Ogwa Nshi Ukwu', meaning 'the great Nri palace' in Igbo.

Agbor
Agbor is from Agbon which is the Bini name for land.

Enugu
Enugwu means 'hill top' (Enu Ugwu) because of the hills of Ngwo, which the original village of Enugwu was part of.

Aguleri
Aguleri is from the descendant of Eri, Agulu Eri of the Nri-Igbo.

Port Harcourt
Port Harcourt was named after Viscount Lewis Harcourt by Frederick Lugard, the town was renamed from what Lugard noted as 'Iguocha' which is 'Ugwu Ocha', 'white cliffs'. The sad thing is that Harcourt killed himself after it was found that he molested boys. If there was one town needing a name change, it's this one.

Igbuzor
For some reason, Igbuzor is still being spelt Ibusa, making it the most corrupted town name in Igbo land. Igbuzor is 'Igbo bi na uzor', the 'Igbo on the road, or roadside'.

Owerri : "E were la m oke ruru la m" (I have taken my deserved inheritance). A long story about Ekwema Arugo; their ancestor who made the statement and asked to be called Owere following a dispute with his brother.

ekt_bear:

This is a pretty simple concept. Gas is distributed from Shell's pipeline to your site (you pay a fee for them to set this up.) On your site, you have a natural gas generator. This generates electricity for your business.

We already know that many of the manufacturers in Ota are taking advantage of it to power their businesses more cheaply than using diesel/petrol.

There is no reason (at least, assuming you are consuming enough gas for it to be cost-effective) you cannot generate electricity for other purposes.

Focusing on the home aspect is irrelevant. . . whether the gas is being burned to generate electricity for a business, home, church, mosque, whatever, the question is, "Am I consuming enough electricity for it to be worth my while to pay Shell to connect me to their grid?"

Most industrial processes rely on boilers and gas fired boilers remain the most cost effective way of powering the industries. Industries are also heavy consumers of gas, so Shell will be able to recoup the money the spent delivering gas to Aba and Otta industrial areas.

Gas doesn't become electricity in your house without a thermal station utilizing gas fired turbines, so you wont get a 24/7 electricity just because you have gas supply to your house.

As a home owner, you are planning to consume £2400 worth of gas per annum and you think Shell will get involved with delivering to you ? We are a long way from domestic supply of gas as it involves a lot of planning and organisation to ensure the safe delivery and consumption of the gas supplied. Domestic supply will not happen in a piece meal manner so stop being naive.

Abagworo:

@ezeuche.I am still marveled at your level of delusion.It is either you did not vote or you did not visit some polling units after election or you are deliberately lying.I voted Buhari in Port Harcourt even when they used hammer to break some peoples hand for thumbing CPC and [b]I went round several polling units to have a first hand glance at the results.Jonathan won with up to 90% but the voter turn out was roughly 28 to 32%.

In a polling unit with an average of 2000 voters,the turnout was roughly 400 across Obio/Akpo,Port Harcourt,Oyigbo,Eleme and Ikwerre LGAs.I mentioned these places I have full knowledge of.[/b]There might be 100% turn out in other places but more than half of Rivers State live in those 5 areas.

You must be related to kobojunkie who is always in an all knowing situation. Were you an INEC official ? If you were able to leave your polling unit after voting to go inspect other units and LGA's (Classic Kobojunkie lie), what makes you think that others did not leave for home or were they expected to wait for your parade review ?

The average turnout in SE/SS was 67%. States like Kaduna and Bauchi had higher turn out than all SE states bar Imo State, so why do some people want to kill themselves over what they can't prove ?

In the absence of the statistics of the dead and indisposed, 100% turnout is possible. If an individual could decide to vote, what makes that individual to imagine that other people would decide to not participate in the election ?

All those crying should take the defeat of the candidates on the chin and move on.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13156508


The video from the link above (BBC) looks like a natural disaster or carpet bombing zone.

I saw your post and the Rap "Made Nig-gaz" by Pac and the OutLawz came to mind when E.D.I Mean (Idi Amin) rapped:

"picture the scenery cos now u gonna have to imagine; CALL ME A PROPHET COS I PREDICTED WHAT'S GON' HAPPEN --"

Spot on Prophet Zone.

sbeezy8:

Nonsense 40,000+ 1 local govt voters in akwa ibom but not even that many in lagos or kaduna or edo lol

Some basic maths would do you some good. The average number of registered voters /LG in Lagos is nearly 300,000 and nearly 120,000 for Kano state.

Orikinla:

[size=28pt]Dame Patience Jonathan, is from Ohuhu in Umuahia North Local Government Area of the state.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/social/Orikinla
[/size]


[size=18pt]IGNORANCE KILLS.[/size]

Make we pour champagne ?

I hutubeghi ebe nwanne kporo nwanne ya ashi mbu, ka I che na I bu mbu ?

ndu_chucks:

lafia kalao, kai fa?

In all honesty, nothing you wrote up there shows that Buhari is not the best candidate to fight corruption/theft/looting in Nigeria. Do you honestly believe that GEJ would out do Buhari in that area? Don't you agree that corruption is our number one problem?

Given all the benefits you've enjoyed in the North, including excellent education, one would have thought by now, you would have been detribalized/deregionalized.

Although I know that corruption is a problem, it has gone on far too long to be eradicated with a magic wand and it would take time and a strong judiciary to stamp out.

Our major problems could be divided into three categories:

1. Size of government: we spend at least 80% of our budget on recurrent expenditure; with the NASS taking at least 30% share in legitimate allocation. The amount that we lose to corruption is a fraction of the remaining 20%. In my opinion, we do not need a two tier NASS and we don’t need more than 80 lawmakers to drive us forward. I have similar views for LG and State governments and they should be stripped of some statutory allowances e.g. constituency allowance.                    

The bottom line is that Nigeria is not as rich as we think if we are only going to devote less than 20% of our budget to capital projects.

The way out for us is Privatisation and I trust GEJ more than I trust Buhari or Ribadu. However, privatization would be of minimal effect with the current electricity problems, but I am impressed with GEJ and Ribadu’s plan but can’t say the same for Buhari.

GEJ also has a clear energy blue print and I would like to believe that he would follow through on the blue print, but Buhari and Ribadu have presented nothing tangible so why should I vote for them? I may like pay as you go phones, but I am not going to go for a “decide as you go president”

2. Lack of commitment: we lack commitment and continuity and do not follow through on projects and this gives room for substandard jobs and project abandonment even when the project has been paid for.

3. Weak judiciary/enforcement bodies: we have laws but the executive still interferes with the judiciary and the enforcement arm is weakened as a result of a weak judiciary.

If I were a legislator, I would pursue things like:

1.Public Contract Liability Act: This act would strengthen contracts and force contractors to work to a standard and making them responsible for durability of job with a time frame specified in the contract documents. Penalties to include heavy fines in addition to re-execution of the contracts, liquidation and jail term for directors and exclusion from running any companies.

2. Private Citizen Enforcement Act: this act would aim to give rights to private citizen to drag contractors and FG/SG to court for substandard public works, but there would be penalties for the abuse of the privilege.

When Buhari wielded absolute power, the NASS were not there to take 30% of our budget, so what did he achieve with a smaller govt and more money in his pocket? Sorry, but it is now too late act goody two shoes.

ndu_chucks:

In the past 10years, which of the major candidates can you not pin any accusation of corruption on? I submit to you that the answer is Buhari and not GEJ. Which of the major candidates would you say can do the most to reduce corruption in Nigeria? Buhari again.

Yaya dei alhaji. Ka na lahia ko ? N na geshua.

Very smart take there, but it doesn't wash. Why the past 10 years ? Buhari hasn't been in power in the last 10 years has he ? The point is that he was corrupt (overthrew a legitimate govt), caused artificial inflation, rode roughshod over the populace and they all gloated while referring to us as bloody civilians and he was brash and unrepentant about the past.

It is true that he might be a strict person same as Abacha waswitch hunting bank directors and looting us dry. His only regret may be that he was out-looted by Abacha and IBB and we are not going to give him the chance to equalize.

So we are to believe that Patience is your sister just because you said so ? In any case, have you never heard of a man killing his sibblings or parents or sons setting up their families for robbery attacks ? It's in order to have disagreements with your family, so give us other reasons why we should not vote for them other than Orikinla does not like them.

My stand is clear as to why Buhari is not the man.

He was in cahoots with fellow gangstars to turn the barrel of their guns on those who paid their wages. He continued to roll with the same people who out-muscled him in the power game and served in their government. He pretends to be disciplined, but is highly undisciplined (coup) and an ethnic bigot who saw nothing wrong in jailing 2ICs but not the head.

He even jailed the highly reverred De Sam Mbakwe, who with little resources was developing and industrializing 5 cities simultaneously.

A man who caused artificial scarcity by his policies and forced business men to sell below cost price (insensitivity and robbery). He failed then and I see no reason why he should be allowed to equalize IBB and Abacha in "lootery".

As for Ribadu, he is not the person we need and even he does not have a strong conviction about his own presidency. A man who considered stepping down for the leader of a weaker party is not fit to tie my football boot laces.

GEJ has marshalled out his policies and programmes and I am willing to give it a shot as the other two have not proferred better policies and I wont believe them if they did anyway.