₦airaland Forum

Why is it that it is other people's land that is tagged a no man's land

He don pick race disputing obvious facts known to every adult

[quote author=Dogalmighty17 post=140715390]

Your double talk confirmed the premise of the article.

Lagos is not Western Region, Cocoa Income Redistribution as Common Weatlh is not from Western Region, managers of their Incomes are not from Western

Compare that to Jonathan Administration "Our Oil Our Money We Spend It Anyway We Want"; leaving Niger Delta Environmental Degradation worse than they met it.

Dogalmighty17:
The psychosis afflicting the author of this garbage he calls an article is really concerning. Western Nigeria built up Nigeria how? Outside the administrative convenience Lagos and its proximal location provided the colonisers, what other contribution came from the Western region? Goods sourced from deep in northern and southern Nigeria were moved by rail to ports in Lagos for export. The ports were what triggered development in Lagos. On its own, Lagos had nothing of significance.

WESTERN REGION BUILT-UP NIGERIA WITH THEIR SWEAT BEFORE & AFTER 1960

What did Nigeria depend on before foreign Oil Income? Nigerians, especially the new generations have to be reminded that there has always been a country and its people before the discovery of Oil in the late 50s that became one of the foreign income earners in the late 60s. The curse of oil has rendered the country into the Poverty capital of the world. The euphoria of foreign Oil Income after the 1971 Arab Oil Embargo, turned ruling politicians into kleptomaniacs.

The Western Region of Nigeria was ruled by the Action Group which was not a member of the coalition of the NPC dominated by the Northern Region and NCNC dominated by the Eastern Region. Indeed, the Action Group remained as the Opposition Party while NPC and NCNC shared political appointments, budgets and contracts. Chief S. L. Akintola later bolted away from the A.G to join the coalition at the Federal but only for some months before the great chaos!

There is a limit to humility, endurance and cultured behavior towards your neighbors. It has now reached a stage where Nigerians have to be reminded who created the land of honey and Wara that turned Nigeria into a potential Regional Power which is being destroyed in this generation. This is not about politics or the fight for the key to the treasury; it is about telling it as it is and was before barbarians embark on born to rule mentality or turned to wanton destruction.

World attraction to Western Region in particular and Nigeria in general was never to develop it but for selfish prospects. They were welcomed with accommodation, tolerance and privileges unmatched anywhere else in Nigeria or the world. Some turned around to abuse unprecedented privileges unavailable anywhere else, must be called to order. Indeed, some of those welcomed have turned the table, usurping accomplishments and the rights of native in Western Nigeria.

It must be stated that most of those welcomed have been grateful, respectful of their hosts and contributed in no small way to the economic progress while respecting the culture, custom and social activities of their hosts. Why do we kneel and say God Bless Foreign lands but abuse and desecrate other African land that accommodate and tolerate us?

Source:

All these to prove that Yoruba had the oldest civilization attested and backed by their historical recognitions in the Bible, Koran and other written records.

But Igbo-Ukwu 900AD is older? All your Research rendered superfluous by blind ambition of always trying to snatch the golden flee standing on the shoulder of the Giant!

Check IWO ELERU

They have not STOPPED.

People who praised Structural Adjustment then that it is going to expand trade, those who paised Devaluation because they are "importers and exporters", are the same ones calling for stronger Naira today.

If Nigerians have long memory and lack short-term greed for long-term prosperity mentality, we will not be here.

Solution: Reject Treasury looters with impunity, no remorse whatsoever and now preaching to double down and come back to do the same. As if their records have not done enough damages.

Do you honestly think they will come back and repair the calamity they put Nigeria into or cone back to kill the Economy completely?

Politicians and Importers finally got their wishes after Naira went from a dollar and fifty cents to Zimbabwe dollars.

Nigeria were warned that there was nothing to gain from importing pins, pencils, used clothings, junks from high seas to spending freely on lobbyists.

How far Oxford trained economists and killers of the Poor?

Obsession with money and greed at any cost in pursuit of foreign tastes and finished products displaces local moral values, killing local initiatives and industries. Greed may be an incentive to be creative by Ivan Boesky standard but excessively destroys as in past centuries slave trades. When the chiefs had no more slaves to prey on, they turned on one another like Neanderthals. As ancient chiefs exchanged gold for mirrors, our money-miss-roads pay 48k for Brioche bread!

What is more alarming is the number of miseducated Africans defending Champagne market in Africa as peoples’ drink in a niche of nouveau riche of a poverty stricken community. There was a trend when some of them wash their hands with champagne they do not make in the country but that created more workers in France. While people raised alarm then, today’s generation are willing to defend it, if designer Akara or Rice in Abuja or Lagos cost more than Brioche bread.

Late Chief Stephen Fajemiroku advised that wealth must be created before you can distribute it to the masses, since you cannot distribute poverty. What he never envisaged is a country called Nigeria today where enormous wealth was created but distributed poverty instead. It is like a leaking basket in constant thirst for water. Nigeria was so overwhelmed with Oil Income, the Military declared that money was not their problem but how to spend it.

We cannot deny the usefulness of money. It can actually buy comfort, love and material items but it takes more than money to keep them going. It can also invite the attention of unsavory elements whose desire is to milk you dry. Apart from the motivation and delusion that comes with money; it also attracts countries looking for the loot of war, foes and friends for casualties. Everything melts like ice cream in our mouth as we lose money. Though sweet when it lasted.

Essentially, all we need for survival are basic needs for food, water, shelter and sex. Initially, humans got each of these without money. When we interact within and outside our communities we started trading by barter. We grew our own food, stored water for use, built shelter from the environment and married wives with dowry in order to start a family. Survival needs in terms of food, shelter and sex does not mean more of each gives pleasure after 2 cups of water for thirst.

The fear of losing what we have motivates us to acquire more so that we would not do without in the future. Beyond this, it is making sure we are in positions to provide for our family. Extended families also demand more from those they consider can afford to give or have more than they need. Watch those who flash money in the midst of poverty. There is a screw or something missing somehow or somewhere. Otherwise, why would one want to tempt or dare the poor?

Source:

This is the testimony that a business can charge any price they want regardless of the poverty in the communities.

How does a business survive in a community at home or abroad when competitors are selling their products at half or one third prices drawing much more customers at home in Nigeria or abroad?

We have so called educated Nigerians posing that there are more expensive restaurants in Lagos and Abuja! Even if you are wealthy, if you are eating three square meals a day at that price anywhere, a fool and his money will soon part. A business and it's expensive products will soon fold.

No wonder Chinese are making tin or canned joloof rice right here in your local communities and selling out. No wonder, for ages, fishes are caught right there in your local waters, shipped overseas, canned and sold at outrageous prices back into your communities.

While poor people in the same communities cry that they cannot afford food because Nigerian colo mentality and pure greed justify any outrageous price at home or abroad.

Meanwhile, the same products are exported out of Nigeria and sold cheaper in neighboring countries.

googi:
Read OP well, it is not about japa but about the average Nigetians and their businesses locally and abroad.

When we put profit above everything else, you are hurting yourself and the average Nigerians.

In a country where most ethnic restaurants sell below 10 dollars in USA and below 15 dollars in Canada, you are cutting your own throat as a business if you rely only on Nigerians who can afford 35k per meal. They can go to other ethnic restaurants for less, buy a meal with a drink at KFC, McDonald's, Burger King, Popeye etc for 10 dollars in the States or 10k naira.

When other restaurants are full, Nigerian restaurants are almost empty. Brothers, use some economic sense naow!

Read OP well, it is not about japa but about the average Nigetians and their businesses locally and abroad.

When we put profit above everything else, you are hurting yourself and the average Nigerians.

In a country where most ethnic restaurants sell below 10 dollars in USA and below 15 dollars in Canada, you are cutting your own throat as a business if you rely only on Nigerians who can afford 35k per meal. They can go to other ethnic restaurants for less, buy a meal with a drink at KFC, McDonald's, Burger King, Popeye etc for 10 dollars in the States or 10k naira.

When other restaurants are full, Nigerian restaurants are almost empty. Brothers, use some economic sense naow!

googi:
I am glad for this reaction.

I did not want to mention that right around the unmentioned area and city, there are some Nigerians selling the same plate for 30, 25 and 20 k translated into naira.

You can even get their fried rice for 35k or so. The point here is how profit can kill people and businesses not only at home but abroad.

Nigerian restaurants compete with Japanese, Chinese, Thai and other ethnic restaurants abroad. In most, I say most of these ethnic restaurants, you can eat and get a drink for 20k naira.

Yet, they make more money than Nigerian restaurants. This is the same mentality we have in Nigeria until Mama Put E, Isiewu and Amala joints became popular.

The profit margin of Nigerian businesses, both foreign and local are outrageous! Mainly because there is a niche of people willing to pay, making life difficult for average Nigerian.

The same businesses that complained about importation of foreign rice, jacked up their the price after foreign rice was banned. Go to neighboring African countries, prices of Nigerian products are cheaper.

Some guys will come out quoting labor, taxes, transportation etc costs that are in fact cheaper in Nigeria, to justify outrageous prices.

In short, we are greedy and to much in a hurry too make money everywhere. We must learn how Chinese products capture the world while we ridicule our Okrika and Ijebu mades.

I am glad for this reaction.

I did not want to mention that right around the unmentioned area and city, there are some Nigerians selling the same plate for 30, 25 and 20 k translated into naira.

You can even get their fried rice for 35k or so. The point here is how profit can kill people and businesses not only at home but abroad.

Nigerian restaurants compete with Japanese, Chinese, Thai and other ethnic restaurants abroad. In most, I say most of these ethnic restaurants, you can eat and get a drink for 20k naira.

Yet, they make more money than Nigerian restaurants. This is the same mentality we have in Nigeria until Mama Put E, Isiewu and Amala joints became popular.

The profit margin of Nigerian businesses, both foreign and local are outrageous! Mainly because there is a niche of people willing to pay, making life difficult for average Nigerian.

The same businesses that complained about importation of foreign rice, jacked up their the price after foreign rice was banned. Go to neighboring African countries, prices of Nigerian products are cheaper.

Some guys will come out quoting labor, taxes, transportation etc costs that are in fact cheaper in Nigeria, to justify outrageous prices.

In short, we are greedy and to much in a hurry too make money everywhere. We must learn how Chinese products capture the world while we ridicule our Okrika and Ijebu mades.

HacheNoire:
When I tell people not everyone living abroad is brilliant, they use to think it’s an insult. As a matter of fact, the dumbest humans you can find on Earth reside in North America.

The team flat Earth, MAGA, and the league that kills each other for ownership to streetz that don’t belong to them.

Back to the topic, you bought a plate of rice for 35,000 Naira in CANADA right? Anyways, it is sold for less than $3 in NIGERA.

We all can sound stupid.

I visited a Nigerian restaurant in Canada and I was charged over 35,000 naira for just a plate of Jollof rice!

Who can I tell at home, certainly not my wife.

Nigerians will justify anything for profit. This is why foreigners say Nigeria is the easiest place to make profit despite that majority of the people are poor.

Foreign importers of products target minority of the Money Miss Road bigger than the population of small countries and make outrageous profit. Easy to justify as someone did. A chronic Importer like other killers of Nigeria

Yes, the price of Sangross bread or kulikuli is also expensive abroad, so much so that sensible people refuse to buy them. But the vestiges of colo-mentality is still strong in Africa.

Even Kingsway meatpie of those days that were baked on locations but promoted as being flown in everyday; was never that expensive!

More Nigerian parents, especially the exporters of foreign currencies, celebrate the graduation of their children in foreign universities than in local universities out of inferiority complex. We blamed our political leaders for laundering our earned income abroad but do not blame ourselves for laundering our training and talents abroad in the name of a better future and education for the children that will be lost as second class citizens abroad.

We all blame the bad leadership we elected and deserve. Instead of fighting back, we melt into the wall. Nigerians talk about the lack of an enabling environment but they go to other countries without the same infrastructure only to build a new plant for powering their industries, roads to transport their products out for sale. In some cases, they import materials produced in other countries back into Nigeria in order to earn foreign currencies.

What we don't have enough of, like skilled tradesmen, technical and professionals in sciences save, garner money and relocate to so called greener pastures where they become second class citizens and lose their children to miseducation. When you convert their apparent foreign salaries to African local currencies, it looks large. What most Africans do not realize is that their salary after expenses, is not enough to live large abroad as they would with it in Africa.

Is it not unfortunate when Nigerians brag about a lucky or token few or desperado that crosses the desert and makes it “big" in a foreign land? We forget about many that perish on the journey for “all that glitter is not gold”. What this does is to encourage more Africans to keep on trying to be filthy rich or die trying like a gambler waiting for the next number. Meanwhile, they could spend saved money like a steady horse that wins the race to open a business employing others.

Those Africans living a so-called comfortable life abroad work twice as hard on two or three jobs as their colleagues working on one job. Families hardly have time to spend with one another, especially with the children. They call them “latchkey children" because they return to empty houses. Money, no matter how much, can only be productive if spent prudently, not foolishly like a drunken sailor in a family, country or continent.

If we only return to our African Values that It Takes A Village To Raise A Child, we would be better off than we are today

The difference between OMOBORIOWO and OWOBORIOMO, simply put, is the loss of our values to greed. Credit must be given to Tai Solari who made the distinction during the political power play between the then Governor of Ondo State, Chief Michael Ajasin and his Deputy Governor, Chief Akin Omoboriowo. The competition between governor and the deputy has not changed till now especially in these days of grabbing any allocation and who snatches it first.

All the money, gold or oil income cannot restore the dignity Africans or Nigerians once enjoyed outside their borders. The effect of money wears off unless you keep on injecting it like a drug until temporary, some relief or a cure is found. The more money you embezzle and outrageously display, the more that is expected until you run dry and out. Ask some Nigerian millionaires and billionaires in any country other than their own. Most have overstayed their welcome.

Nigerians look for schools, hospitals and jobs they could have built in their own country. They
even go outside the countries donating endowments to foreign universities where their children graduate while local schools lack basic needs. Local talents and those that were trained with earned meagre income as investments; are the ones that sold (family) properties, borrow or loot to find a better country after destroying theirs.

When you neglect what you are good at and pursue what others are better at, Africa loses. We import what we have and produce: like textile, oil and food. We export what we do not have, like printing foreign currencies. We went from exporting Peace Keeping Forces all over Africa and the world to the point where Nigerians cannot help ourselves against insecurity at home. Terrorists were warned in other African countries: there is no place for them except in Nigeria!

Indeed Nigeria imported terrorists from Libya and Fulani from anywhere, guaranteeing them citizenship on entry to perpetrate mayhem for political reasons disguised as religious zealots. As if we do not have enough criminals at home to deal with. Either way local people are killed, displaced and their land mined for minerals for export with the cooperation of local chiefs, retired military leaders and international corporations. What a country!

MONEY IS NOT AFRICA’s PROBLEM IT IS THE LOSS OF VALUES

Africa must learn from the Curse of Oil Foreign Income brought upon Nigeria. The country went from a land that flowed with milk and honey where Africans at home and in Diaspora took relief and refuge at that time, to the present one that cannot save itself, not to talk of saving other Africans. If behavior is covered or intoxicated by a flush of money (miss road), it attracts some followers. Stomach infrastructure reduces some hustlers to tolerating unbecoming characters.

Nigeria survived and strived despite the yoke of colonialism to a Potential Regional Power with meagre Cocoa, Groundnuts and Palm Oil incomes. The country even survived a terrible Civil War without borrowing a kobo from the World Bank, International Monetary Fund; defying all odds until Structural Adjustment finally brought Nigeria down to its knees. Reduced purchasing power created the rush to loot mercilessly in order to buy all that glitters in western countries.

How? African Values, patriotic Activists and the culture of It Takes A Village to Raise A Child kept Nigeria going. We lost all to greed longing for foreign goods and services we could have gradually mastered at home, through trial and error like the Asians: call it Ijebu-made or Okrika-made. Asians used to come to Nigeria to earn money in order to feed their starving families at home during their famine.

The flush of money does intoxicate a man like a drunken sailor. It is like many drugs that take the worst control of your senses, becoming imprudent by lavish and conspicuous waste of otherwise resourceful income for the masses' comfort. Usually values are superego that override our egotistical characters and greed. We called some of these values: home training. The lack of which turns a loose boy into a street urchin, hooligan or motor park thug.

Source:

How We Lost Our Country Our Culture & Become 2nd Class Citizens

When people discuss retirement, they focus on money.
They talk about pensions.
They talk about investments.
They talk about medical insurance.
Nobody talks about what happens when the children grow up and leave.
Not leave home and settle in the next town.
Leave properly.
One ends up in Texas.
Another settles in Minnesota.
A daughter moves to Canada.
A son relocates to Australia.
The youngest is somewhere in Europe.

Every family gathering now requires a world map and a calculator for time zones.
This is usually the point at which a wife discovers a new purpose in life.
She becomes a travelling grandmother.
A global consultant on childcare.
An international specialist in grandchildren affairs.

At first the husband is supportive.
After all, these are their children.
These are their grandchildren.
He drives her to the airport.
He carries the suitcase.
He reminds her to call when she arrives.
He waves goodbye.

Then he returns home.
Alone.
The first few days are pleasant.
The house is quiet.
The television belongs entirely to him.
Nobody complains about the volume.
Nobody asks why he has left his shoes in the middle of the sitting room.
For a brief moment, retirement feels magnificent.
Then reality arrives.

The house becomes too quiet.
The meals become suspiciously repetitive.
The conversations become one-sided.
Even the dog starts looking at him as if asking whether everybody else has relocated.

Meanwhile the wife is thriving.
Photographs begin arriving from different countries.
Today she is holding a newborn in Texas.
Next month she is attending a school concert in Toronto.
A few weeks later she is somewhere in Melbourne teaching grandchildren how to pronounce family names correctly.

The husband remains exactly where she left him.
At home.
Guarding the family compound.
Monitoring trees planted twenty years ago.
Inspecting fences nobody intends to steal.
Checking water tanks whose water consumption has dropped dramatically.

Phone calls become predictable.
“How are you?”
“I am fine.”
“What did you eat?”
“Tea.”
“What else?”
“Bread.”
“What else?”
“More bread.”

The wife immediately sounds concerned.
Instructions begin arriving from overseas.
Cook this.
Eat that.
Reduce salt.
Increase vegetables.
Drink more water.

At this point the husband starts wondering whether he is a spouse or a remote agricultural project being supervised from another continent.
Occasionally she announces that she will be returning home next month.
The husband becomes excited.
He starts counting days.
The house receives a general cleaning.
Plans are made.

Then a new development occurs.
A grandchild is born.
A daughter needs assistance.
A son has a work commitment.
A school closes for holidays.
A family emergency appears.
The return date quietly migrates to another season.

The husband learns not to ask too many questions.
He simply waits.
Patiently.
Like government projects.
Months become years.
The wife accumulates airline miles.
The husband accumulates stories.

One becomes an expert on international airports.
The other becomes an expert on village weather patterns.
One knows immigration procedures in three countries.
The other knows exactly which monkey has been stealing mangoes from the compound.
Eventually a strange realization settles in.
The children inherited the mother.
The homestead inherited the father.

And somewhere between America, Canada, Australia, Europe and home, a modern marriage quietly evolves into a long-distance relationship despite both people still being legally married and deeply attached to each other.

Retirement, many men eventually discover, is not spending every day with your wife.
It is watching your wife become a citizen of airports while you remain behind as the official caretaker of the family home, the family memories, and a television that nobody now argues about.
Therefore, make good friends now,join clubs and societies where you can spend time for surely this is the new reality .
To be forewarned is to be fore armed.

*Copied*

Tinubu must take the counseling seriously, back off and rest on the praises of its economic reform.

A mix blessing of advice. Tinubu's enemies may not like the approval in the report.

https://thenews-chronicle.com/poverty-reduction-gain-more-voters-than-mercenaries/?noamp=available

POVERTY REDUCTION GAIN MORE VOTERS THAN MERCENARIES

There is no other way to look at the Poverty Report and not confirm that Nigeria is the undisputed Poverty capital of the world. Whoever is advising this Administration must recalibrate their strategy and focus on Poverty Reduction. There are too many Nigerians complaining of their inability to care for their spouses and children. Men leaving homes in the morning without coming back with sustenance are disrespected in their houses.

This is how communities break down without fathers at home just like political prostitutes with or without a party looking for Any Party In Power. Many are mercenaries without followers or members to vote for them. Buying them instead of using the money to alleviate poverty at the grassroots is unwise and may be counter productive. As stated a long time ago, too many heavyweight without followers will sink the boat.

How for do?

If you cannot get into politics to loot, they start and become bandits.

It is more respectable than stealing in the market where you could be lynched for taking a bag of sugar.

https://www.bbc.com/sport/articles/clyq3plyp4lo

On a school playground in Lagos four decades ago, a new Nigerian sport was born. Today, its players believe it has the potential to gain interest across the world.

Abula, a fast-paced four-a-side court game named after a popular delicacy enjoyed by the Yoruba people, was invented in 1984 by Elias Yusuf.

It is similar to volleyball, although players use a rectangular bat instead of their hands to hit the ball over a central net.

"I was a teacher of physical education when the idea of Abula occurred to me," Yusuf told BBC Sport Africa.

"Abula combines four classes of food in one meal. This game is a conjunction of four by four."

The dish Abula is primarily made from yam flour with assorted beef, vegetable soup from jute leaf, gbegiri soup made from peeled beans, and stew made from a mix of tomatoes and pepper.

For Yusuf, the inspiration for his game was simple - to engage students in an activity that was both fun and challenging.

The first match in February 1984 saw four teachers take on four students, with the latter winning a contest which set the tone for a sport that blends speed, skill and strategy.

The rules of Abula
Abula is played on a hard court measuring 16 metres by eight metres with a net which is 2.44m from the ground. It demands both teamwork and individual flair.

Players use a special rectangular bat made of wood and rubber, weighing between half and three quarters of a kilogram, to hit a tennis ball.

Download CSV (GDP per capita, constant international-$ PPP, World Bank series, 1970–2026 for Nigeria & China):
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-per-capita-worldbank.csv?v=1&csvType=full&useColumnShortNames=false
Concise summary (constant international-$, PPP, World Bank / Our World in Data series; values rounded to nearest dollar; ratio = Nigeria / China):
1970 — Nigeria: 1,260; China: 540; Ratio: 2.33
1980 — Nigeria: 2,260; China: 790; Ratio: 2.86
1990 — Nigeria: 2,360; China: 1,040; Ratio: 2.27
2000 — Nigeria: 1,960; China: 1,840; Ratio: 1.06
2010 — Nigeria: 3,200; China: 7,520; Ratio: 0.43
2015 — Nigeria: 5,020; China: 12,130; Ratio: 0.41
2020 — Nigeria: 4,220; China: 12,980; Ratio: 0.33
2024 — Nigeria: 4,480; China: 14,200; Ratio: 0.32
2026 (latest OWID/WB projection series) — Nigeria: 4,650; China: 15,000; Ratio: 0.31

Spent, they did like drunken sailors. Instead of investing in manufacturing, building and fabrication of goods and materials; we were buying ready-made goods and services all over the world. Killed local industries and entrepreneur spirits. Apart from toothpicks and pencils usually cited as examples of outrageous spending, Nigerians preferred used carparts, clothes shoes discarded abroad. It got to a point as Nigerians were importing garbage from the high Seas.

Nigeria has been building bridges with foreign experts for ages, yet none of our universities, technical or trade schools have been able to produce world renown engineers capable of building bridges locally, not to mention overseas. We killed our textile industries when it became a status symbol to import cotton and lace materials. A few that were made in Nigeria had to be taken across the border and imported back home in order to be marketable!

Political rivalry between these regular officers as Yakubu Gowon v. "book soldiers" Emeka Ojukwu. Olufemi Olutoye (Cambridge University) Ojukwu (Oxford University), Victor Banjo (Mechanical Engineer), and a few had university degrees. Victor Banjo and Emeka Ojukwu ended up on opposite sides of a tragic execution. Ironically, their political thinking and sharp intelligence eventually led them to command large armies against one other during the War.

These new generations of leaders still rest on the laurels of their fathers’ accomplishments boasting and spending hard earned income from mineral resources and slave labor without thinking about how to leverage or invest the enormous wealth after the political Independence of the sixties. Most of the African new generation leaders were actually consuming the seeds that should have been invested to grow into fruits and future returns.

If you are not well informed, you might accept recent statistics after poor Asian countries overtook Nigeria by prudent management. Since Independence Activists ruled with the African basic tenet that it takes a village to raise a child; when our wealth was judiciously managed, with better policies and dedication in the sixties after Independence. Hoping Nigeria would become a Regional Power today, even predicted outside Africa.

However, the children of the Freedom fighters and some senile leaders controlled by younger cronies became looters raised Nepo-Children that never overgrew their feeding bottle. While their fathers and mothers had to go to school and work to send themselves to school in foreign countries, some even sending money home for their poor parents and siblings; these new leaders implemented the policy to drain the Central Bank for foreign school fees as a right.

Dr. Harold Shodipo and Fela Anikulapo Kuti, among others were jailed for exceeding the One hundred pounds foreign currencies allowed. Nigeria went from there to liberal foreign exchange market no country in the world allowed. Here we are today wrestling to keep up with foreign currencies we have absolutely no control over: either to print or dictate terms of trade. Yet, miseducated Africans at Oxford and Harvard keep preaching the benefits of liberal market.

NIGERIA IS NOT A RICH COUNTRY

Every once in a while, misguided leaders and their cronies try to justify their deliberate indifference and complacency towards gullible supporters or the naive Africans. Simply put, they justify and cover up their kleptomaniac tendencies by claiming the population of Nigeria is so overwhelming, even if you divide all the incomes coming in, Nigerians are still poorer than other African countries. So, stealing is not corruption and should be differentiated!

Jonathan was proud of the fact that he created more millionaires than previous Administrations. Their way of creating wealth is for a few privileged politicians, senior civil servants and their relatives to spend ostentatiously around the world. It is their way of attracting investments from foreign countries, they claim. Regardless of the percentage paid to lawyers and financial experts to launder money abroad. Who is fooling whom?

General Abacha who commanded the Treasure as his personal vault, had helpers within and abroad. Chief Antony Ani, a reputable Partner at Peat Marwick was Abacha Finance Minister from 1994 to 1998 claiming major reform while opening the Central Bank foreign currencies at Abacha’s pleasure. There was a selfish interest of course, because he got some of the loot into his own private pocket as most financiers at home and abroad.

The Asian countries that were starving in the 60s and 70s, struggling to kickstart their economy invaded Nigeria in order to send money back to relatives at home. Many were railway workers, teachers in high schools and universities. Africans that qualified in foreign countries could not wait to return home and countries like Nigeria actually sent recruitment teams abroad to bring back educated Nigerians in particular and Diaspora Africans in general.

While countries like China implemented drastic action to limit their population and stipulated a deterrence for embezzlement or any kind of corruption in order to build their economic base and improve the Gross Domestic Products; Nigeria GDP was higher then! It is the same GDP that our politicians are using to justify poverty in Africa today. China and India with higher populations were able to reduce the number of poor while Nigeria became the Poverty Capital of the world!

All the Asian countries that came to Nigeria in order to send money home to feed their families are now major economic powers like China or India. As they send their students abroad to study, universities and technical schools were established locally that can compete with any Western university. Compared to Nigeria, the privileged class impoverished the educational system at every level while funding universities overseas for their children as status symbols.

The military that took over had ridiculed “book soldiers” within them. Those without the training, skill or education to manage even a community, dominated leadership. Just as other countries were being shaped and built by well informed folks in their respective fields. Overwhelmed with oil income during the Arab Oil Embargo of the early seventies, Nigerian military leaders were boosting that money was not their problem but how to spend it.

Source -

This reminds me of stories or history that each of these ethnic groups çame or descended from Egypt. On their way to Egypt or on their way from Egypt, they never met ?

Suzerainty has caused so much dislocation within us, we are willing to claim heritage with others far from our country than within.

This is how Yoruba heritage is being lost in Bini and those whose lingua fraca and names are Yoruba including Oba of Benin and their descendants are forced to choose between Yoruba or Edo.

Now, the Itsekiri, the recent cousins of Yoruba in language and culture are looking for way out to claim or disown suzerainty?

It doesn't make a difference because outsiders trace their history to Yorubaland. The Yoruba have no territorial pursuit. Someone just wrote the affiliation of white South Americans to Yoruba, leaving Black South Americans in wonder.

Liberal Western Nigerians. Yet, every region wants equal representation without the population or land.

Whatever the case, there is no dispute here that Nnaji is a very brilliant professional, comfortable in this Power production field.

But so are many Nigerians abroad that would not steal a dime in order to prove their competency. These same Nigerians become looters or award contracts to themselves which they would not do anywhere else. This is how Nigeria has been going down!

How can we justify competence and fraud without encouraging more fraud you are trying to excuse just because foreigners do it to us?

This was how Nigeria Airways fell apart when Nigerians awarding the contract to British partner demanded kickback higher or more than their British partner? Nnaji had the expertise but wanted both the contract and the job which he would not dare anywhere else.

It boils down to: if our African professors that left their comfort abroad to come and teach at home wanted the same, African countries would still be without African professionals.

If our Independence Activists remained abroad, where would we be today? Their children may be something else like Nepo kids but these Professors and Activists gave us a good start.

Your solution of competency despite fraud is our problem today. Jonathan had no choice but to let him go. He cannot do the same thing he tried under Jonathan in Abia. His success there is more patriotic.

chimex38:
I know this... But it doesn't still negate what I said.

Do you think Prof. Nnaji doesn't benefit from the Aba Power projects both rightly and indirectly..
But who cares on a larger scale and pursuing the conflicting details If you can f**king deliver.
Do Abia residents care?
Or the State Govt care?




Do you think Wike didn't or doesn't still benefit from various projects with "conflict of interest" in River state and also in on-going projects in FCT?
Why his good ratings online in both RIVERS and FCT projects despite his shenanigans?

People with expertise, political will, highly motivated as well as influential by being connected to people that matter both national and international stage should be brought into the system one way or another.- they are scarce commodity.

Conflict of interest, taking kick-backs, though bad, but its a little price we can pay for now for the overall benefit to the nation especially to ordinary citizens for their survival until we stabilizes.
The Chinese and Lebanese we invite are even short changing us the worst. But because they deliver, we don't complain... It's fair and square. How much more our own naija blood?

Did you bother you also ask AI if the others who didn't have "conflict of interest" and have not been biased on contract award and not stolen from the privatization process, how they have delivered? Or how the "non- conflict of interest" by the privatized awardees has saved the country's power system and impacted the ordinary citizens positively?

Do you justify removal of a "bad" person because you have proof and allow worst persons cuz you don't have proof? but you know he isn't as good enough as the "bad person".
Even though you know you can tolerate the excesses of the bad person compared to what the "bad" person can deliver.?

Is this not a classic case of, the enemy you know is better than that angel you don't know? What has this angels done so far since 2015?

If he remained a Minister and thus will rightly give-up on his company bidding processes due to conflict of interest,
Why is It that when he resigned as Minister, his company wasnt even awarded any of the Discos or Gencos from the FG or at least multiple of them?.
Especially knowing his competence with his academic and industrial achievement as well as his Leadership in his short sting as Minister?
He lost both Ministerial position and contract to his firm at the same time...

He seem to only get a private job in Abia which he pursued passionately with Vigor and free will despite the so called "conflict of interest". and proved his competence.


Competence, expertise, political will, self motivation and international & local influence are scarce and hard to find in a person in this country.

We shouldn't quickly toss such persons away entirely who tick these boxes for the greater good on a national scale for just mere "conflict of interest".
There should always be ways to still bring them in on board. They are human capital assets we are just treating as liabilities due to a rule of law that in this specialized case, doesn't favour the greater good.
Laws are made for man, not man for the law. Exceptions can be given where necessary.
It's the Spirit of the law that matters.