₦airaland Forum

berem: someone should please tell me why Jonathan should contest in 2015. I need someone to prove to me that Nigeria should remain one nation after reading this horrific post.when the masses are suffering,graduates are roaming around the streets jobless because the government have failed on their own part to create jobs,the people in power are busy looting Nigeria's money.Average Nigerians cannot get good access to Health facilites while our "big men" travel abroad for a common cold.our roads are deplorable and a death trap for the average man meanwhile some of our governors and top shots are acquiring private jets.the list is endless!THIS COUNTRY IS DOOMED FOREVER

franchizy: OMG, how can foolish people here be commenting on wat they heard and not what they have read. GEJ is the corruption Nigerians should fight. The Ribadu Committee did there work according to the terms of referrence please

Ribadu’s Report Drama: Who Says Jonathan Wants To Fight Corruption? – By Chinedu Ekeke
Posted: November 8, 2012 - 13:53

By Chinedu Ekeke


Give President Goodluck Jonathan hundred years to rule Nigeria, he will not successfully prosecute even one person in his much vaunted fight against corruption. In fact, as a rule, there’ll be a sort of liberalization of corruption under his watch. The image of invincibility he creates about corruption helps him sustain his personal – but nauseatingly pedestrian – idea of corruption being a Nigerian thing that can never be tackled by anybody.

[b]This isn’t one simplistic assumption. I can stake anything for this claim. Mr Jonathan is a creation of the corruption he tells people that he’s fighting. In 2006, he was indicted for false declaration of assets by a Joint Task Force (JTF) on corruption that was set up by Obasanjo’s government. That powerful panel was headed by Nuhu Ribadu (yes, the same Ribadu you know) then as the chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

The Joint Task Force said Mr Jonathan was in possession of illegally-acquired property such as homes and exotic cars he could not explain within his legitimate income. While he was invited for hearing, he claimed he bought them from his “savings”. Meanwhile, he was a lecturer in the few years following his becoming a deputy governor. Now hear the worth of the properties which were brought from Mr Jonathan’s ‘savings’: a seven-bedroom duplex worth N18 million at Otuke Ogbia LGA acquired in2001; a four-bedroom duplex, valued at N15 million at Goodluck Jonathan Street, Yenegoa, acquired in 2003; and a five-bedroom duplex, at Citec Villas, Gwarimpa II – Abuja, valued at N25 million, also acquired in 2003. There were also two cars: a Lexus Jeep valued at N18 million; and a BMW 7351 Series worth N5.5 million. If you check the dates, the purchases were made starting from 2001, just two years after becoming a deputy to a criminal governor convicted for fleecing Bayelsa state.

So Mr President, a candidate for prison who had no business being in Aso Rock ab initio, became appointed the running mate of Late President Yar’Adua by Obasanjo, the same president whose powerful committee indicted him. This is the core of the matter with corruption under Jonathan. He’s a cheerleader for the corrupt, and he seems, I have observed with deep concern, to always be excited whenever there’s a stage-managed drama to ridicule the outcome of serious probes that indict key members of his government. [/b]

It is not that we all do not have a past that we may be ashamed of; it is about having a sad past we still live in and cherish. This president still resides in his past, a past he should not be proud of, but a past he desires, unfortunately, to have every public official under him share from. This is why Mr Jonathan is dangerous for Nigeria. Any country that values decency and is desirous of economic growth cannot afford to have as its leader a man who is an apostle of primitive acquisition of wealth.

In my previous essays, I have insisted, and with proofs, that Nigeria cannot step out of where we are economically if we don’t wage a true war against corruption and impunity. The war I mean isn’t Jonathan’s committee’s setting approach. The war I know is the type that’ll be led by the president himself.

It requires a certain depth of love for country by the head of the country’s government himself. Unfortunately, I haven’t seen any sign from Mr Jonathan that he loves Nigeria. If he lays any claim to ’love for country’, then I can wager the reason: enough free oil money to corner.

[b] I don’t know of any administration in either pre or post-independence Nigeria that has been rocked by the weight of financial scandals under Mr Jonathan’s gleeful watch. He simply sets up a committee, and have aides arrange how to mock its outcome.

Last year, the legislature approved for Nigeria N240b for fuel subsidy, and then before the year ran out, Mr Jonathan’s government had already spent over a trillion naira on that without batting an eyelid. Then when it appeared their recklessness had thrust illiquidity upon their faces, they pushed the cost of the roguery of their friends onto Nigerians and titled it subsidy removal. We vehemently refused that, and argued, as every average thinking person would, that the answer lied in prosecuting those who defrauded the Nation of trillions of its revenue, and recovering the funds from them. They pushed their way through. At a town-hall meeting to sell their untruths to Nigerians, Mrs Okonjo-Iweala even delved into the ridiculous when she alluded to the need for us to help them fish out those who sabotage the nation economically. Well, that comment ended up being one of the many jokes, albeit very unintelligent ones, that have been dropping out of her mouth since she joined this government.

The push of Nigerians for transparency in the management of their oil revenue led the responsive House of Representatives into setting up an adhoc committee that probed the management of the subsidy regime. Headed by Farouk Lawan, the committee doubled-down on government’s complicity in the subsidy fraud, and even the roles played by key government agencies and parastatals in destroying the country they were set up to serve. But as the committee was at work, Femi Otedola, one of the three closest businessmen to the president (the other two are Aliko Dangote and Aig Aigboje Imoukhuede of Access Bank) was out to rubbish the report and render it useless. He set Farouk up and bribed him with some dollar bills. When it was time to use the ploy in the achievement of its original purpose, Femi Otedola proudly informed Nigerians that he gave bribe to a legislator. There was joy in Jonathan’s presidency. As you read these, Otedola is the president’s Man-Friday, walking freely on the streets and even attending some important state functions with him. [/b]

The Jonathan camp changed the narrative. Farouk Lawan’s report was now labeled as lacking in credibility. It was shocking. Nobody talked about why it should be implemented while the culprits in the bribery saga get prosecuted for such massive economic sabotage. Don’t prosecute them since Femi was involved. Just rubbish Farouk and then kill the report.

And then came the Petroleum Revenue Task Force headed by Nuhu Ribadu. It was set up by this same government to look into the affairs of the oil industry from 2002 – 2012. The committee’s report has long been ready. It was formally presented to the president on Friday where another comedy, in the manner of Otedola’s, played out. Mr. Steve Oronsaye, Nigeria’s former Head of Service and Vice Chairman of the Task Force played the spoiler. He was part of the committee but was not attending deliberations until it was time to discuss recovery of funds owed by some companies. He attended the meeting and then scuttled the Task Force’s efforts to recover $1.5billion from Addax Petroleum.

Justifying his well calculated attempt to make nonsense of the report, Mr Oronsaye claimed he was a believer in processes, and that the process that led to the compilation of the report was flawed and so ‘unimplementable’. Oronsaye did not have the courage to tell Nigerians that he accepted appointment into the board of NNPC even while still serving as a member of the Task Force, and that such was a necessary condition to erode his objectivity on the matter. Oronsaye did not have the decency to resign his membership of that Task Force when he took up the board membership appointment. That must be how ‘credible’ people act in the world Mr Oronsaye happened from.

Which leads to the next question: Who appointed Steve Oronsaye in the NNPC board while he was carrying out another task that entailed auditing the same NNPC? Was the presidency not aware of the conflict of interest in that regard? Was Steve the only Nigerian qualified to be a board member of NNPC such that he would need to serve in the committee that probes the corporation a board member of which he is? Mr Oronsaye must have been planted in that Task Force to discredit it.

And if the only issue Mr Oronsaye has with the recommendations is the process in their compilation, and not the recommendations themselves, why did he declare them ‘unimplementable’? One would have thought that the real issue is in whether the recommendations were outside what the Task Force members collectively agreed upon.

My understanding of how this corruption-building administration of Goodluck Jonathan works tells me this was designed to ensure corruption in the oil industry remains blossoming.

The report reveals that between 2008 and 2011, Nigerian oil ministers handed out no fewer than seven discretionary licences and claimed that a total of $183 million (about N28.7 billion in signature bonuses was missing from the deals. The report also claimed that three of the oil licences in question were awarded within the tenure of the present Petroleum Minister, Mrs Diezani Alison-Madueke. Diezani was indicted by the Task Force. This isn’t the first time she’s being indicted in a probe of this manner.

The whole drama is to rub it on our faces that Goodluck Jonathan is comfortable with corruption. He will neither sack Diezani nor give Nigerians any reason to assert that she is indeed corrupt even in the face of prima facie evidences. And there are always Oronsaye’s and Otedolas who are willing to help out.
Those who are surprised – I wonder who should still be by now, anyway – about the game of deceit in President Goodluck Jonathan’s government may need to take time to study more the man they expect good governance from. A man who desires everybody around him to share from the proceeds of sleaze will not stop the growth of sleaze. What you tolerate you cannot exterminate.

Any leader who doesn’t see as evil the mismanagement of public funds isn’t fit to lead even himself, let alone his household. This is the character that runs today’s Aso Rock. And this is unfortunate

You can follow @ekekeee on Twitter for more direct engagement.

The dominant characteristic of Nigeria’s human development profile is the gap in wealth between the north and south of the country. A 2009 visit by a UK House of Commons committee concluded that “some of the States in northern Nigeria have the worst human development indicators of any region in the world which is not affected by conflict.”

hercules07: Ndu is a rable rouser, he is a unitary man to the core, the regional integration should be done in such a way that it allows those who are ready to contribute the freedom to do so without minding their origin, SW needs ideas from others to grow, we should also carry Edo along.

Acceptance and Realism: Self-actualized people have realistic perceptions of themselves, others and the world around them.

What Is Self-Actualization?

What exactly is self-actualization? Located at the peak of Abraham Maslow's hierarchy, he described this high-level need in the following way:

"What a man can be, he must be. This need we may call self-actualization…It refers to the desire for self-fulfillment, namely, to the tendency for him to become actualized in what he is potentially. This tendency might be phrased as the desire to become more and more what one is, to become everything that one is capable of becoming."
While the theory is generally portrayed as a fairly rigid hierarchy, Maslow noted that the order in which these needs are fulfilled does not always follow this standard progression. For example, he notes that for some individuals, the need for self-esteem is more important than the need for love. For others, the need for creative fulfillment may supersede even the most basic needs.

Characteristics of Self-Actualized People

In addition to describing what is meant by self-actualization in his theory, Maslow also identified some of the key characteristics of self-actualized people:

Acceptance and Realism: Self-actualized people have realistic perceptions of themselves, others and the world around them.

Problem-centering: Self-actualized individuals are concerned with solving problems outside of themselves, including helping others and finding solutions to problems in the external world. These people are often motivated by a sense of personal responsibility and ethics.

Spontaneity: Self-actualized people are spontaneous in their internal thoughts and outward behavior. While they can conform to rules and social expectations, they also tend to be open and unconventional.

Autonomy and Solitude: Another characteristic of self-actualized people is the need for independence and privacy. While they enjoy the company of others, these individuals need time to focus on developing their own individual potential.

Continued Freshness of Appreciation: Self-actualized people tend to view the world with a continual sense of appreciation, wonder and awe. Even simple experiences continue to be a source of inspiration and pleasure.

Peak Experiences: Individuals who are self-actualized often have what Maslow termed peak experiences, or moments of intense joy, wonder, awe and ecstasy. After these experiences, people feel inspired, strengthened, renewed or transformed.

k2039: This just doesnt apply to me

k2039: This old men are just embarrassing the whole nation.

It's obvious from this news that they are still not ready to learn.


Until election is free and fair in this nation,I dont expect the opposition parties to accept defeat.

olodos are not supposed to use their heads like this na. There's not enough grass to feed these cattle nor enough grassing land to manage them. These cows will be confined in limited space and will essentially become extra fat, disease prone, and full of growth hormones. I hope Aregbesola is also investing in world class medical facilities because these cattle will support weird diseases like cancer and other exotic diseases which hitherto have been prevalent in the "first world".

There is no substitute for Fulani herded cattle or free range hens. Musclular cow legs will become brittle legs. SMH

take dat: This is disheartening. May God help us in this country.

Babs Ajayi Sunday, November 4, 2012
Babsajayi@yahoo.com
Gatineau, Quebec, Canada


THE RIBADU REPORT AND A HOPELESS NATION




We are on a path to destruction and anarchy. The resources of Nigeria is being looted by the same people who have a duty to protect and preserve it; the leaders who are tasked with ensuring that our resources are well managed, our economy built to meet the yearnings and aspirations of our people, and ensure that development does not elude our nation while taking good advantage of our resources to create opportunities for our youths and the unborn generation of Nigerians. We cannot continue like this. We are onlookers in the world today and are so irrelevant being mere spectators who are just coasting along and never in the mainstream of development. The World Bank actually warned Nigeria recently to focus on managing its resources very well and plan ahead. But our leaders - most of them self-appointed and selected - have no respect for our system and state. They abuse, exploit, disrespect and manipulate our processes, policies, systems, laws and procedures to maximize their own gains and to take undue advantage of the nation and the people.

Thieves run our nation and control our resources while the majority of our people wallow in abject poverty; many are hopeless while some hope for the day they, too, will have access to the common treasury and loot it. Does the sight of a homeless, helpless and jobless youth not worry those who lead us? The leaders who travel overseas for medical treatment, do they have consideration for the well being of the rest of the nation who have to make do with a failed health care system? Did the conscience of Patience Jonathan prick her during her medical trip to Germany that there are thousands of Nigerians who will die from the same medical condition that took her to seek help in Germany but who will not be able to travel overseas for treatment? Is impoverishing our people and looting the nation right? Is short-changing our nation to the tune of billions of oil and gas dollars a good way to repay a nation that gave a government representative an opportunity to serve or is service an opportunity to loot and collude with foreign companies?

The Ribadu Report discovered that Nigeria lost N16 trillion to oil and gas scams. The report pointed to the dirty deals of Nigeria's oil ministers between 2008 and 2011 and of giving out discretionary oil licences while $183 million in signature bonuses is missing. N10 trillion was lost to crude oil theft from a yearly loss of 250, 000 barrels per day or N1 trillion yearly. Three international oil and gas companies made huge profits from cut-price gas at the expense of our national treasury and the minister of petroleum sat on the report? A few among us are short-changing their fatherland and our people by fixing crude oil and gas prices to the disadvantage of the nation. But can Goodluck Jonathan fix this recurring and endemic criminality? [b]Not many think Jonathan is sincere, honest, able and willing to change anything. He is part of the problem and his petroleum minister, Alison-Madueke is also part of the problem. Alison-madueke saw just a "draft" report where the rest of the world saw monumental corruption, complicity, criminal negligence, collusion with intent to steal from the Nigerian people, falsification of documents, solicitation and obtaining funds by crooked means, racketeering, aiding and abetting corrupt practices, and cooking the books with the intent to commit multiple frauds. The report has been with Alison-Madueke for at least a month and she did not bother and was not anxious to do anything with it. She may be gloating that Next newspaper that did a good job of monitoring her ministry and activities is temporarily out of circulation, but she can be assured that she has nowhere to hide and the recurring corruption taking place in her ministry will not go unexposed. She has failed repeatedly to give account and provide a true picture of her ministry. She has harassed journalists and been uncooperative with the National Assembly.[/b]

[b]Lacking decorum and mores, Alison-Madueke is holding on to her job even when her performance is so woeful and disturbing! How can a minister who has failed so miserably and who has also been found culpable in the same Ribadu Report be so bold to suggest the whole nation should go and sit down and shut up? It is because she has the backing of Goodluck Jonathan, her master, the very one whose script she is following at the petroleum ministry. Did Jonathan say he will deal with the people behind the N16 trillion assortments of scams? Jonathan is yet to deal with the fuel subsidy thieves. He is yet to prosecute them despite the huge documentary evidence against all of them. Most of them are enjoying their loots having been granted bail by the courts. The oil subsidy thieves are predominantly members of Jonathan's Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who financed his election. Of course, there are other reports sitting in the bookshelf of Jonathan and gathering dust. Will these reports ever be implemented? The dust is gathering so fast on these reports and they all now have their titles fully covered and shielded from sight. With Jonathan, your best bet is to believe what you see and never the words coming out of his mouth because he speaks into a basket. His order that the report be submitted to him "by next week" is an open show that is full of sound and fury but will yield nothing. Thunder never barks - it strikes and moves menacingly on its chosen path, and Jonathan has nothing more than words to offer the nation. How can the nation lose 250, 000 barrels of crude oil to the dubious computations made by government officials and the international oil companies each year (and for ten years) and the report of such criminal act and scam is thrown aside by the oil minister?[/b]

I do not want to believe that Jonathan has not seen this report until now, and that he will only be seeing it "next Friday." It is a joke. It appears the plan was to bury the report. It is not a good report and not what Jonathan and Alison-Madueke expected to get, and it was not by accident that Stephen Orosanye and Bernard Otti tried to take the shine off the report. There is also no accident in the appointment of Orosanye and Otti into the board of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC). The two men should have resigned from the Ribadu Task Force on Oil Revenue the very moment they were appointed into the board of the NNPC, so as to avoid serving on the board of a company they were investigating. It is still true that most Nigerians have their price and are easily bought with an appointment or contract, but that the two men would act out their scripts the way they did is condemnable. It is a report that is likely to cause mayhem and lead to national crisis, demonstrations by concerned Nigerians, students, labour unions, university teachers and the Nigerian Union of Teachers, and Jonathan and Alison-Madueke are not prepared to make it public. It was learned that this report was shown to Jonathan the very week Alison-Madueke received it. It was still fresh from the printer but Jonathan assured his oil mermaid not to worry; he promised to kill the report and bury it. So they put the report away and this did not go down well with people who knew about the report and who wish to see something done to restore what has been stolen from the nation by government officials and the international oil companies. The report was leaked to expose Alison-Madueke and what Jonathan is offering right now is a pseudo-presidential promise to act on the report. What action do you expect from the same man who was determined to bury a report and others like it?

[b]The first action Jonathan should take if he is serious about implementing this report - forget words and promises - is to sack Alison-Madueke, who has been found culpable in the same report. Alison-Madueke has a history of being consistently inconsistent; always short on facts and very unwilling to be accountable. She should be sacked and arrested by the police for prosecution. Nigeria's petroleum ministers since 2001 should join her in police custody and be made to write statements and be charged to court. People waited and waited for Jonathan to act but when the government refused to make the report public and act on it, it became imperative to put the report in the public domain. I guess Nigerians are no longer in doubt that Alison-Madueke is just an errand girl for Goodluck Jonathan and she is not likely to be removed or prosecuted. We must all look on closely and follow the action Jonathan will take in this matter. The Nigerian people cannot afford to sit back and be spectators in a major national issue like this. It may be too late if the current band of thieves are allowed to go unpunished and that is why the civil society must be active and take the front seat in ensuring that every penny stolen is recovered, the thieves punished severely, and the funds used to make the nation better.[/b]

cjrane: Yeye people can't find better thing to yearn about. Na to always tok useless tok.

Regional economic integration and national transformation: Implications for domestic security and the role of stakeholders (2)
THURSDAY, 02 AUGUST 2012 00:00 CHIEF T. A. ORJI FEATURES - FOCUS
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Being concluding part of the text of a lecture delivered by His Excellency, Chief T. A. Orji (Ochendo), Governor of Abia State, on the occasion of a public policy forum event, organised by the Business Hallmark Publishers, at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), Lagos, on Wednesday, July 4, 2011.(The first part was published on Wednesday, August 1, 2012).

OUR view is that new inter-governmental integrations in Nigeria should focus on promoting collective, sound and stable macro-economic policies within member States,that will on their own induce growth and better utilization of resources. Where these conditions exist, they will on their own attract direct foreign investment. But the success will invariably depend on the stable security of the integrated environment.

The modality of an ideal regional integration proposed here, will need to focus on two broad issues of cooperation activities (See Oyejide, T.A, ADB Economic Research Paper,No. 62, 2000), viz:-

• Policy harmonization across integrating States, on investment and common standards.

• Regional Cooperation arrangements to implement joint infrastructure projects in key areas as Transport, communication development, development of regional water resources, power projects, and educational development.

The emphasis here is the facilitating of critical infrastructure with high cost out-lay and huge indivisible Investments, which end up generating lower cost unit for the group. It is expected that this model of integration will provide both a practical and pragmatic approach to our regional integration questions, and also focus less on intra trade and market expansion arrangements.

When regional integrations and cooperation focus on factors that directly stimulate growth, they have the greater chances of achieving the stated goals of wealth creation and have visible impact on National Transformation. They become an extension of the domestic reform of the larger Nation, by challenging its re-orientation, basic strategies, and restructuring, if possible, - and through that, achieve the transformation of the larger Nation.

WHY THERE IS THE NEED TO INTEGRATE THE NATIONAL REGIONS OF NIGERIA, SPECIFIC EXAMPLES

Virtually all the regions of the Nigerian Federation, including the South-South, the South-West, the South-East and the Northern geopolitical region, have expressed inclinations to form a regional Integration of their people. These moves arose from compelling needs to harness economic development of the regions, and as a reaction to the growing economic stagnation, poverty and growing unemployment of the Nigerian Nation.

The conclusion has also come from the belief that from a structural and resource point of view, only few Nigerian States will be capable of going it alone to reverse its present economic trends. Therefore, the need to seek integration of contiguous States, especially those already bonded together by cultural and historical affiliations, has become imperative, for States to be in a position to harness and accelerate their economic development.

Such ideas are not just a challenge to the operations of the Nigerian Federalism, they constitute a look at the past, and how this compares with the present.

In Nigeria at the point of Independence, it was clear to both Colonial Britain and Nigerian Nationalists, that they would prefer to live under a truly Federal system of Government. Both at the Ibadan General Conference of 1950, the Constitutional Conference of 1953, and Lagos Conference of 1954, Nigerians accepted a Federal System of Government.

This arrangement challenged the founding father of the modern Nigeria - Nnamdi Azikiwe, Obafemi Awolowo and Ahmadu Bello, to develop their regions along an integrated unit of many tribes with shared links.

Each of the three regions, - later four, in postcolonial Nigeria sought to exploit their potentials to develop, and we could hear of the groundnut pyramids in the North, the cocoa merchants in the South West, the palm oil Barons of the Eastern Region, and the rubber merchants of the Mid-Western region.

Each of the regions found a reason to prosper through collaborations with the contiguous localities, and the Federal Government was the beneficiary in its transformed economy. This was the reason that made the leaders of the various regions, to prefer to stay back in the regions, rather than operate from the centre.

[b]Nigeria lost its innocence with the discovery of oil as the mainstay of the Nigerian economy, and was further worsened by military intervention, which foisted a lop-sided, but powerful centre and distorted federalism on the political sphere. By imposing a unitary garb on Nigeria’s federalism, especially in the area of revenue allocation and resource ownership, the Federal Government made the Nigerian Federation unworkable and bereft of development initiatives beyond oil rents.

Nigeria’s potentials have since been stifled and there is a failure to transform the National economy. This has led to the assumption that a return to true federalism – the foundation of Nigeria, will reignite the engine of development and national transformation of the economy.

This is perhaps the strongest support for the promotion of intra governmental regional integration, along previous regional trends. It is expected that this will lead to a healthy rivalry among the political zones, and with the harmonized policies of the regions, economic development and National transformation will follow.

Perhaps, it is believable that effective economic development and transformation will occur, if there is harmonization of policies of the many unviable States of the Federation through regional integration and restructuring of the Nation, beginning from constitutional changes.[/b] This will give vent to regional integration, through transfer of resources, and the harnessing of effective regional leadership to produce results.

This should be the driving force of the new regional integrations discussed here.

SOUTH-WEST STATES REGIONAL INTEGRATION

In the South-West of Nigeria where the Governors have come up with a bold idea f regional integration, the program is designed to assist the States in tapping from the resources of the member States with comparative advantage.

While it is essential that these States take cognizance of their economic situations and the infrastructural needs of their citizens, the success of this integration will depend on the existing structure on the ground to drive the process.

Also, while the contiguity of States with similar culture and ideological framework may provide the strong basis for integrating the region, participation need not be initially based on political affiliations and alignments as a controlling factor. Instead, the presence of some pressing needs, which can be shared by integrating States, such as agricultural viability and the funding of shared high capital intensive infrastructure- such as railway network, shared power project, and security imperatives, should form the basis of a formidable integration scheme.

The fact is that where the integration of a political zone is based on the exchange of policies that promote better living of the people of the zone, it stands the chance of succeeding, especially as stakeholders in policy formulation and implementation, begin to see the benefits of leveraging on the ideas and expertise of one another.

SOUTH-SOUTH STATE REGIONAL INTEGRATION

The South-South Region is equally set for regional integration through the auspices of the BRACED Commission. The aim being to launch the region made up of: Bayelsa, Rivers, Akwa-Ibom, Cross River, Edo and Delta States, into a socio-political integration. It is hoped that this will create a prosperous region, with nationally and globally competitive economy.

By working closer together, the integrating States hope to utilize opportunities for cooperation and growth, to strengthen their economies, and for the benefit of their region and their States.

It is just as good that the BRACED Commission has seen the need to call on the Federal Government to review its policies on regulation on Power and Gas Production – all mega and costly projects, to enable the integrated Commission to generate, transmit and distribute electricity to their members with lower cost per unit, and as a compliment to the efforts of the Federal Government. This is tantamount to calling for constitutional review and restructuring.

The BRACED Commission will also focus on security and safety of the region to encourage collective Food and Job security, as well as protect the collective investments made in the region. There is no doubt that if the region is successfully integrated, and benefits derived from implementation of agricultural production and its value chains, employment will be created for the teeming youths of the region, and conflicts and criminality curtailed. These are equally the goals of the Federal Government’s economic transformation, which would be further accelerated.

But the Commission should boldly address the security situation of the region to improve the environment of its activities, This suggests that it should be in the vanguard of the advocacy for reforms and restructuring of the Nigerian Federation, especially in areas of State policing, resource control and fiscal federalism. Without these, the Region will make little progress in its integration.

INTEGRATION OF THE SOUTH-EAST AND THE NORTHERN POLITICAL ZONES.

Regional Integration in the South-East and the Northern Regions of Nigeria has been the slowest in gathering steam, even though for different reasons. However, there is no doubting the question that successful regional integration of these regions ‘can help them attain greater economies of scale, rationalize location of industries, and encourage specialization of production’, while tackling the funding issue involved in high cost projects that can provide shared value ( cit. Business Hallmark, May 2012).

While the quest for South-East integration commenced a few years ago through the formation of the South-Eastern Nigeria Economic Commission (SENEC), the idea has not been seriously advanced further.

The truth is that the South-East region has been the most misunderstood region in the Nation, to the extent that even such an innocuous economic initiative as regional integration, can gain the misinterpretation of some hawkish Nigerians.

However, there are other issues that have dictated the pace of the regional integration idea in the South-East, and these include the perceived structure of the market supporting businesses in the region, which are dominated by external linkages and less of internal expansion, the balkanization of the region which exorcised the most affluent States with resource endowment such as Rivers, Bayelsa, Cross River and Akwa-Ibom – all through the painful experience of conflict which will take time to heal.

South-East region is therefore left with the core linguistic group of Abia, Imo, Enugu Ebonyi and Anambra – whose economic outlook is external-dominated, as a result of low infrastructural development and poorly developed internal market structures.

While these situations may appear peculiar and limiting in vision, the homogeneity of the region, the virtual absence of Federal Government presence and its poor infrastructure, make the region a good case for regional integration, if only for the purpose of building collective approach to dealing with its development problems. This is necessary to support the aggressive foray of the Igbos, who developed extensive business empires outside their region.

One major impediment for this will remain the problem of collectively, managing the security challenges of the region internally, and the recent security threat imposed on the region through the threat of Boko-Haram insurgency. This is now affecting the business of South-Easterners residing in the Northern Region, and created the issue building the confidence structure to accommodate the returnees and their business with- in the South-East region.

The other problem relates to the idiosyncratic variables of South-Eastern leader, especially the individualistic dispositions of both the leaders and citizens alike, which do not encourage collective adventure or enterprise, with everyone wanting to go it alone.

But ideally, by its lean public financial muscle, the South-East Region has a very good reason to support the restructuring of Nigeria’s politics to enthrone true regionalism, resource control, State policing, and other demands, which today connotes regional integration. Besides, the recent idea of regional integration appears to have come of age in Nigeria and is unstoppable. The South-East region can only ignore this at its own perils.

On the other hand, a review of REGIONAL INTEGRATION IN NORTHERN REGION appear less definitive than in any of the other regions of Nigeria. Despite the size of the region, and its balkanization through States creation, it remains the most homogenous of the regions of Nigeria.

The Northern region is riding on the crest of an equally homogenous religion of Islam and traditional culture, as well as on a cohesive political leadership structure, that has gained its strength from decades of dominance of Nigeria’s distorted federalism, and its many noticeable benefits.

This is perhaps why the Northern regional base, has threaded with more care in following the path of regional integration, which is so exciting to many other regions. This perhaps, presumes the inevitable consequences of restructuring, and devolution of Federal powers, especially on the issues of resource control and fiscal federalism.

But a major issue that will determine the prospects of regional integration in the Northern region and perhaps create the need for the integration of - many Nothern regions, - will depend on the success of the Nation in dealing with the Boko-Haram terrorism.

But like all other regions prospecting for regional integration, the North stands to benefit from the sustainability of the economic development inherent in regional integration, especially in the tackling of major joint projects and infrastructure such as dams, regional water schemes, and the structuring of improved exchange markets for agricultural products and livestock, to other regions.

The implication we draw from the above, show that the various prospective regional integration schemes in the Nation, if pursued with prudence and peacefully, have the capacity to provide the much needed hope of accelerated economic development and transformation in the National economies. Intra-State Integration in the Nation also stand to provide the much needed life-line for the sustainability of Nigeria as a united country under one overreaching umbrella as a Nation.

Under such condition, the fairly autonomous regional units, become the balanced and stable engine of development to drive the infrastructure, including railway networks, inter-state highways, waterways network, etc while collaborating with the Federal Government.

Such conditions however, depend on the capability of the leadership, in addressing the issues of Nigeria’s lop-sided federalism and restructuring. Only then will the integrated regions be expected to have the funding capacity to initiate and drive expected responsibilities of integration.

But primarily, the impact of existing domestic threat to the regional integration enterprise and the role of stakeholders, must be addressed as a priority.

REGIONAL INTEGRATION, NATIONAL TRANSFORMATION VS CONFLICTS AND DOMESTIC INSECURITY

Just like the emergence of numerous democratic regimes in the last 50 years of Africa’s independence, which soon revealed the quality of the new governments through the incessant conflicts and security challenges that rocked their stability, the nascent drive to regional integration in Nigeria, may already have within them, domestic security issues, capable of stifling the progress of this Enterprise.

It is therefore necessary to begin early to track the emerging regional Integrations from existing hostile domestic security complex of their environments, in order to fully understand what security strategy must be employed to ensure better success.

Whilst we acknowledge the potential roles of economic factors in stimulating cooperation in a region, it could be argued that a focus on security difficulties within the integrating States, ought to precede economic regional integration.

Economic growth and national transformation will certainly hinge on the creation of stable economic and political environment that promote business confidence, especially amongst external governments. This has made the centrifugal forces of domestic security, greater than the political and economic forces in the integrating regions (see,Grey Mills, South Africa and Africa: Regional Integration and Security Cooperation, 1995).

We need to recognize that there is a growing trend in the domestic insecurity of Nigeria today, which is closer to the situation that preceded the devastating Nigerian Civil war. Almost all the regions now positioning for regional integration, are locked in one form of debilitating domestic security threat or the other, notably kidnapping, accelerated violent criminality and terrorism. These certainly have serious implications to the successful implementation of the ideals of regional integration.

Domestic insecurity affects regional integration in two parallel lines, but of different directions:

It has the capacity to prevent consensual implementation of the ideals of regional integration, making the project cumbersome from the initial take-off.

It has the capacity to even accelerate regional integration on a different perceived direction of a crisis note, where the integrating region ends up in isolation from the entire Nation, thus preventing the initial desire of National Economic Transformation.

In both the South-South, the South-East and the Northern Regions of Nigeria, the domestic threats from kidnapping and the boko- haram insurgency, portend serious consequences that may achieve the opposite goals of isolation, or entire break down of law and order, capable of leading to disintegration of our unity as a Nation .

In such a situation, the genuine needs of regional integration, now under a conflict and domestic threat environment, may also come under obtrusive and challenging scrutiny that become misinterpreted in terms of national security violations.

It therefore requires the concerned role of stakeholders in addressing this question, in order to guarantee future negotiated regional integration model.

THE ROLE OF STAKEHOLDERS IN THE SECURITY MODEL OF IDEAL REGIONAL INTEGRATION

It is the regional and national stakeholders that stand to gain in the emerging regional integration models, now being canvassed in the Nation, and they should therefore be at the fore in addressing the security issues that can impede it.

The required model of security must therefore be collective, collaborative and must involve the followings:

• All levels of Government, Federal, State and Local, including their agents.

• Citizens – ordinary active people, including traditional rulers, religious organizations and private security agents.

Effective involvement of these stakeholders, only begin with the moment of acceptance, that prevailing domestic threat in the regions have the capacity to affect future peaceful integration, and economic transformation of the regions. This is the first principle in dealing with all forms of domestic threat, such as kidnapping and terrorism now evident in our regions. Without this primary assertion, stakeholders will not be able to maximize their roles in regional security.

Stakeholders need not see their involvement in domestic security as only a question of protection of lives and property, but as a question of the preservation of the expected values of their region and National Unity. This is the first principle in the creation of a peaceful environment, required for the advancement of the goals of regional integration.

The focus of stakeholders in the domestic security of the region, become effective when it improves effectiveness in the gathering of credible intelligence information that is usable in checking threats, such as kidnapping, terrorism and other forms of violent crime. This becomes possible where there is tolerable cooperation between government agencies and other relevant stakeholders- including traditional rulers, in the building of relevant data on human intelligence and surveillance to support activities of security agencies.

In spite of all pretensions, the security of our regions and our Nation cannot be guaranteed by Governments alone. It is only Nigerians and our community of citizens, including all active stakeholders that can provide the necessary intelligence and support to achieve a coherent domestic security that stabilizes all our regions, and this must precede all the clamors of regional integration and national economic transformation.

CONCLUSIONS

To conclude this lecture, I will state unequivocally that the broad basis and protest movement leading to the general clamor for regional integration is for lives and properties of citizens to be protected, including their cherished ways of life, their economic well-being, and the general transformation of the National economy.

It is the dream of all well-meaning Nigerians to have our children inheriting the same free, safe and a more prosperous Nigeria that our founding fathers wished for, worked for, and we even fought for. Our children expect their lives to be improving and not worsening, and if the structure of our federalism bears the seed of our stagnation, then it is time to revisit it, and enthrone the appropriate model of federalism and regional integration model that can develop and transform the Nation.

Our growing population of unemployed youths, certainly encourage the flagrant abuses that create evident security threats in our regions. A population of either ill-trained or highly educated but un-employed youths, is a veritable recruiting ground for crude and violent activities that impact on our domestic security.

Getting our active population back to gainful employment has therefore, become a critical issue in re-invigorating our economy, our social values and our unity as a Nation.

The urgency of these required solutions, demand a systemic restructuring of the Nation to enthrone a structural and fiscal federalism, including resource control, revenue sharing formula, and State policing, all of which intensify collaboration between the Federal, the State and the regions, in dealing with the economic and security needs of Nigerians.

But most important in this process, is that our Governments need to ensure an elective democratic system that is honest, accountable, accurate, free and with reduced corruption. It is within this context that a peaceful and negotiated regional economic integration of willing States can emerge, to further drive and promote the well-beings of its members, while promoting the economic transformation of our Nation.

luvinhubby: Politicians will cook up any meaningless idea to remain relevant......only in Nigeria.

SOUTH-WEST REGIONAL INTEGRATION AS A WAY OUT OF THE
NIGERIAN SOCIO-ECONOMIC MORASS BY
DR FEMI OREBE


Presentation at the 2011 Ekiti Economic and Development Summit
October 14-15, 2011
The question that first comes to mind concerning this topic is why Regional Integration?
Why has it suddenly assumed this importance and became the refrain, especially
amongst a significant section of the South-West intelligentsia? Indeed, one Dr Sani,
from you know where, just sent me a text message in reaction to my last Sunday article
in THE NATION, asking why we in the South-West would not just quietly pack bag and
baggage and check out of Nigeria. Well, you can trust me to have answered him back
saying we no longer wish to be unequally yoked with do-nothings who merely play the
stomach, gobbling everything in our national life.

Of course, we cannot fake ignorance and claim we do not know those amongst the
Yoruba who would rather die, queuing for handouts from their Abuja lords, especially
now that boards of federal corporations are about being appointed by President
Jonathan. Forget in the meantime that their total emasculation in their party, the PDP,
as eminently attested to in the present federal set-up, both in the executive and the
legislative, not to talk of the judiciary where non-Pharaohs are acting like
Nebuchadnezzar, our brethren are still tying themselves to the apron strings of those
Papa Awo said we would never have cause to prostrate for.

But in spite of our chorusing Regional Integration, I often wonder how many of us here
in the South-West are really as perceptive as to know, like governor Kayode Fayemi, that
Boko Haram, and the post-election crises in the North are not the ramblings of a
Northern ‘hoi poloi’ but incendiary reactions to a perceived loss of power by an elite
stratum that is predominantly “Northern” and also “Moslem” even if religious piety,
simpli cita, counts the least with their leading lights. After all, I have the words of one of
their most distinguished blue bloods, the same Malam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, our dear
CBN governor, to the effect that, and I quote him: ‘Our elite use the Sharia debate to
divert attention from their own corruption, nepotism, abuse of office and un-Islamic
conduct’, That was in a paper he gave way back in 1999 on ‘ISSUES IN
RESTRUCTURING CORPORATE NIGERIA’, and was published by the Urhobo Historical Society.

Boko Haram, and its attendant dislocations, especially through
suicide bombings, killings and arson, are clearly signs of a clandestine contest over raw
political power and as Fayemi put it: who lost power, who won power, and who wants
power back?

The processes that threw up President Jonathan have worsened everything. Why do I
say that? Simple. The fact of a Southern minority president completely unmakes the
Sardauna’s everlasting ambition, and I quote him in a speech he delivered, 12 October,
1960, a mere eleven days after we got our flag independence:
“This new country called Nigeria should be an extension of the estate of
our great-grand-father, Othman Dan Fodio. We must ruthlessly prevent a
change of power. We must use the peoples of the Middle Belt as willing
tools, and the South as conquered peoples; and never let them rule over
us, and never let them control their own future.'


That, indeed, has been the history of this country ever since.
What that means essentially, but which many of us cannot verbalise is the fact that we as
Yoruba are wasting away in an unworkable federation, at least, as presently constituted.
No, far be it that proponents of Regional Integration are calling for a separation. We are
only asking to be given the opportunity to be able to develop at our own pace without
the suffocating stranglehold of a inequitable federal apparatus. Which is why, right
down from the late legal guru, Alao Aka Bashorun, through the one they ‘killed’, the
immortal Gani Fawehinmi, Beko Ransome Kuti and the likes of our own dear governor,
the Yoruba have suffered all manner of deprivations, even, including loss of dear lives,
fighting a justified cause for a restructuring of the country.

Failure to achieve that to date is the reason that at the mere mention of Boko, even yet
without its Haram, students of the University of Ibadan writing a semester examination
elected to quickly vote with their legs just as their University of Benin counterparts did
not as much as wait to hear the school authorities announce closure before they locked
up shop and vamoosed from campus. And as SNOOPER loves to put it in THE
NATION, there are many more Harams than Boko.

So what to do?
Again I allow the Ekiti state governor, Dr Kayode Fayemi, to speak:
“What then is the connection between regionalism and the crisis of governance that
Nigeria is currently experiencing? The connection, in his opinion lies in the search for
the most appropriate institutional mechanism for promoting consensus, mediating
conflict and managing diversities in a multi-ethnic, multi-religious country, all of which
were greatly attenuated under jackboot military regimes”, and during the
indistinguishable Obasanjo civilian regime where what passed muster as governance
was rule of man, devoid of God and Laws.(that portion in italics are my words please)
He then continues: ‘‘although the challenges we face maybe internal and ethnic in
nature, oftentimes the interlocking nature of these challenges underscore the artificiality
of state boundaries and call for a broader response driven by social consensus.”


[b]For the South-West therefore Regional integration must be seen as our ‘deu ex
machina.’ Leveraging therefore on our communalities, Regional Integration, even
where it is not exactly a silver bullet, will allow us escape the stranglehold to which an
unprofitable union has shackled us for close to a century.
As I put it in a recent article on the subject in my syndicated columns in both THE
NATION and NATIONAL LIFE newspapers, the following are the reasons why regional
integration as a developmental paradigm in the South-West has become an inescapable
desideratum: In a multi-ethnic country like ours, differences in economic development across
regional/ethnic divides are common place.

This has been accentuated in our own case by the differences in our varying exposure to,
and engagement with western education which has created varying levels of appreciation of what
real development and growth are, amongst the various nationalities. Also the concentration of
legislative power and fiscal muscle at the centre has made regional integration a smart option given
that the lopsidedness of Nigerian politics has succeeded beyond description in reducing the
dominant groups in government to no more than ethnic champions; a situation which in
turn has rendered others not so powerful immensely vulnerable.

Equally it is an open secret that in many instances, development in the South-West, for instance in
education, has been deliberately arrested as a ploy to play catch up by the so-called
‘educationally dis-advantaged’ areas. I recall that once at the AGBAJO YORUBA
AGBAYE, under the lead of a sterling leader, LT. Gen Alani Akinrinade, we were forced
to set up a 5-man Rapid Response media team to react to Obasanjo government’s
egregious neglect of the South-West in its award of contracts for dams literally all of
which, in their billions, were going to the North. Of course, a Shagari was the incumbent
Minister of Water Resources.

Additionally, rapid economic development in the South-West as a way of creating
employment opportunities for our huge and ever increasing army of unemployed youth,
without a glass ceiling, is absolutely contingent upon our frontally and seriously
mobilizing capital for economic activities in Yoruba land to accentuate competitiveness.
This has become the case since revenue allocation is, and will always be insufficient to
create the volume of economic activities we require to provide the required level of
economic activity to absorb them substantially. [/b]

Finally, Your Excellencies, distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen, the increasing
marginalization of the Yoruba from the commanding heights of the economy, especially
in the regulatory agencies and in banks, finance and telecoms where we used to
predominate but which deliberate federal policies, being driven by elements from the
other nationalities, had rendered otiose, means that we have to either start out ‘de novo’
or fashion out cooperative ways in which our various states can leverage on their
commonalities for a rounded economic development.

Beside God, only we, can save ourselves. The story is told of a delegation of senior
Yoruba citizens which visited with a president of Northern extraction to complain about
marginalisation. Mr. President was said to have looked his visitors straight in the face
and asked what exactly the Yoruba want again. He was reported to have then reeled out
a list of the things which, of course not government, but mostly private capital and
entrepreneurship had brought about in the South-West, and asked his visitors to name
comparable institutions or infrastructure, in his own part of the country. His petrified
visitors returned home with their tails behind their backs.


Such is the total misconception of the place of the South-West in the Nigerian economy
today, that a friend of mine, a very top official of the ACF, could still write to me only
this past week to say he believes, even in our beleaguered economic status, that the
Yoruba are, and I quote, ‘the most educationally and economically empowered’ in the
land and so should, in his considered view, use these advantages and act as a lodestar or
bellwether for the rest of the country. My friend was certainly not making a cruel cut.
However, if eminently enlightened citizens of other parts of the country will dress us,
knowingly or unknowingly, in these borrowed robes, the Yoruba who knows he is no
longer where on the economic plane he/she used to be, had better learn to rethink his
place.

These and more, especially the excruciating unemployment situation in a highly
educated South-West makes it imperative that our governments must co-operate and
birth a developmental paradigm that will ensure immediate employment of huge
numbers of this army of highly educated but jobless young men and women who are the
future of our race.
Collectively, therefore, the governors, our genuine mandate keepers, as opposed to
rigged-in, mandate-less pretender governors of the ‘ancien’ regimes in Yoruba
land, must work hard together to make poverty history in our land.

I thank you all.

Demdem: With due respect, me think the president is either foolish or conciously destroying his own govt .

Monday, November 5, 2012
Planned S/West integration awaits legislatures' nod

By Abiodun Fanoro

INDICATIONS emerged at the weekend that the planned South-West regional integration scheme is awaiting legal backing by the various state legislatures in the region.


Christened Development Agenda for Western Nigeria (DAWN), the scheme is put together by the Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere Renewal Group (ARG).


ARG's General-Secretary, Mr. Ayo Afolabi, who disclosed this to The Guardian in Ibadan at the weekend, said DAWN had already started to record grant strides and that it had passed the primary and the teething stage as it had now successfully established its operational structure and some of the institutions required to function on a sustainable basis and implement the content of the DAWN document.


According to him, among the operational structure already in place are; DAWN Corporate Office, office of the Implementation Committee (OIC) and office of the Executive Secretary (OES). The OIC, he said, was made up of three members each from the member-states, the OES was manned by a technocrat, Mr. Dipo Famakin.


The three, according to him, worked together to guide and drive the operation and the implementation of DAWN document.
Afolabi further disclosed that they were also working in concert with the various Houses of Assembly to get the DAWN Act.


The DAWN Act, he said, would kick-start the next phase of the scheme, which would involve identifying, establishment and development of common structures, projects, programmes and institution.


The ARG scribe assured that notwithstanding the outcome of the Ondo polls, DAWN's next phase would kick off.
According to the scribe, though DAWN was non-partisan, it would however move to the next stage with or without Ondo State.


Afolabi explained that DAWN was purely about the economic, human capacity enhancement, educational, health and infrastructural development of the region for the overall benefit of all the indigenes and residents.


Afolabi said that the idea, the spirit and the implementation of DAWN had no partisan consideration and could accommodate Ondo State if and any time the political decision-makers in the state decided to key into it.


He, however, noted that having a common political platform for all the states' decision-makers could only be an added advantage that would quicken the implementation of the scheme.


Afolabi however revealed that Ondo State under Governor Mimiko had been part of a number of processes that culminated in the birth of the scheme.

anintia: why would you pray for such

ALMUSTAQIM: THERE IS NO DOUBT THIS PDP GOVT IS INSINCERE. RIBADU SHOULD RESIGN FROM THE COMMITTEE WITHOUT DELAY. LONG LIVE NIGERIA.

But in an update on his Facebook Page Sunday evening, Mr. Ribadu said he resisted all attempts to be compromised because he had taken a position to always be on the side of the Nigerian people.

He said as far as he is concerned a good name is better than monumental wealth.

“I have made my choice to stand with the Nigerian people, to place national interest before any other knowing that a good name is better than silver and gold,” the former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission told his followers.


Mr. Ribadu, in his reaction, expressed disappointment at attempts to discredit the report, saying Mr. Oronsaye and Mr. Otti hardly participated in the deliberations of the committee, as they were busy lobbying to be given plum jobs at the NNPC.

“Mr President, I wasn’t expecting this development, so please do excuse me if I may say a few things,” he said. “This Task Force was set up in February. We started work effectively in March. Most of the members that you have seen here abandoned what they were doing and came here and we worked every single day. We gave everything to it.

“For about three months, Chief Oronsanye never participated one day in the deliberations of this committee. Not even a single day, never. The first time we saw Chief was when at the end of the work when we were talking about recoveries from companies that he jumped in. All the members are here, they can bear me witness. He never participated in this work.

“While others, who were appointed from outside the industry to look at it critically and give you an honest opinion, and ensure the independence of that committee, Chief Oronsanye got himself appointed into the Board of the NNPC.

“The other gentleman, Otti, who spoke became the director of Finance, NNPC, and they decided to, more or less, bully everybody and take over.

“And they wanted us to write for them. Committee members refused. By the time they were appointed (into NNPC) the most honourable thing they could have done could have been to resign from the committee. They refused to resign. Chief (Oronsanye) has not been in this country for a while. He flew in this morning to come and do this before Mr. President. And I think the President deserves more respect than you have done now.”

Clerverly: We all saw it coming....

GenBuhari: Tribalism is Nigeria biggest problem and it needs a visionary leader to deal with it.

I believe tribalism should be made taboo and illegal the same way being openly racist is now taboo in the UK.