seanet02: This is the height of stvpidity.
How do we confirm that Lagos told the man the law is not applicable in the state?
You only posted the letter written by the phantom doctor.
Where is the reply of the government?
You are du.m.b

Hmmmm! I get to love the feistiness sometimes.

Actually if you thought about it, you can make a reasoned argument that truly the FOI Act does not apply to the Lagos governemnt. We are supposed to be a federal democracy. An Act passed by the National Assembly (even salutary laws like the FOI) cannot have automatic application to compel the Lagos govt. to do something.

gratiaeo:
Do we have leaders @ all in the SE east?

Just self-serving bean-counters occupying the place where our leaders ought to be. Nature abhors a vacuum, you know!

Not surprising. The Brotherhood's brand of political islam is grassroot populism. Nothing could be more threatening to the medieval people that run Saudi Arabia than that. They will seek to destroy it the sme way they succeeded in destroying the socialist (Baathist) movement in the Arab world. And as against the socialists, they will line up with the same allies - the US and Isreal.

Unfortunately, the Ijaws accepted the "greek gift" of the Nigerian presidency. Saddening that a people that deserve so much would settle for a token. My thing is that no Emeka Offor, Mai Deribe or Adenuga has any right owning any of those fields. It is immoral that the Nigerian state will steal those fields from the owners and proceed to share it amongst the crooks that run it.

Ufeolorun: Thunderbolt-Magun !!!! I loved it . Segun employed teh story line to pass a sensible message across,very impressive article.It's probably time for a calculated move back from the fringe

These "de-tribalized" elites would do better and preach less of the "lets all hold hands and sing kumbaye", and listen more to those they dismiss as ignorant and bigoted internet warriors. They might not like it, but those newly enfranchised internet bigots are the true vioces of Nigeria. That voice is not fully formed now, because the moslem north is not fully represented, but that is coming soon, and then the house will come crashing.
The likes of Chika Ezeanya and Adeniyi and others should pause and think hard and ask questions about how we come to be where we are, and not pretend that the stuff they read on the internet is not truly representative.

During the last census, those data were supposed to be captured as well, but the Northern leaders threatened OBJ with a boycott of the exercise, and the gutless contractors and carpet-baggers that masquerade as SE leaders just caved in. It is a crime that just about eveything in Nigeria is doled out on the basis of state of origin and ethnic and religious classification, yet people will object to determining the true numbers of those classes. Just a fraud of a nation.

atlwireles:

The Nigeria state(government) is poor. This is quite different from Nigeria as a country. People look to the government for all their need, yet refuse to pay their fair share in tax. If Nigeria were able to collect just 50% of VAT on all goods and services in Nigeria. Our vat will be $50B or more. All we do today is wait for 2.5M barrels of crude oil and budget from there. Check the per capital taxes paid in Nigeria. The federal budget of $27B will make more sense then.

Yeah, people not paying taxes is a huge part of the problem. But the Nigerian economy is as poor as the state. Our productive base is just abysmal and that reflects in the high unemployment and poor state of of our social capital.

pro01:

Is it justifiable (or at least possible), then, that Nigeria has an unwieldy number of dollar billionaires with so much wealth and yet so little economic output? This is one reason why some cynics scoff at the likes of Dangote and other so-called billionaire entrepreneurs, not to mention pretenders like Folorunsho Alakija and countless other profiteers.. The economy does not seem to be broad and deep enough to make genuine Forbes-rated wealth possible -without underhand dealings. and shady business practices.

Since we're so poor, is it not ironic that there is a disproportionate number of stupendously wealthy individuals in the country? Relatively low earnings/budget/GDP, yet so many wealthy individuals, yet extremely low employment rate - what Pat Utomi referred to as a "jobless growth economy". Is there a valid explanation for this, other than that Nigeria is essentially a rentier state in which a few privileged and well placed parasites harvest the collective wealth while disguising as "entrepreneurs"? Questions, quesrions.

If our annual budget is indeed a mere $27b give or take , I find it difficult to understand why Nigeria's richest man (Dangote) should be worth up to $20b. America'sbudget is in the trillions, while its richest man (Gates) is worth $60something billion. Perhaps you guys could attempt a quick survey of the richest men in other countries and compare their networth with their countries' annual budgets.

You are absolutely very right. That kind of wealth those guys have been harvesting from our economy just does not add up. Imagine that according to Forbes Dangote went from something like $2bn plus in 2010 to over $11bn in 2011. Just try to wrap your mind around those figures bearing in mind that Dangote did not invent anything, and practically makes his money by a near monopoly on providing essential goods and commodities to Nigerians. The Nigerian economy ought to have been firing on 24 cylinders for Dangote to have extracted that much from it for himself alone!
You are absolutely right, "rentier state" says it all and all we have are public-enterpreneurs and crony capitalsts of the vulture variety.

ba7man: I get your point, they "invest" heavily in getting elected into positions......and reap the profit once they're voted in.

Their motive is to make a profit, not to Govern.

Yup! Governance is actually boring,tiring, hardwork. Those Nigerian prima donnas are too flamboyant and too lazy to do that.

ba7man: Poor Country with the highest paid Govt Officials in the World.

They are really not governement officials - you cannot have government officials where there is no government. Those are public enterpreneurs - businessmen and women whose industry just happens to be the public space where our government ought to be.

Sunny_bobo: Apt IKENGA, very apt. It's very amusing when you argue with some Nigerians and they bellow the phrase 'imagine a rich country like Nigeria....'

It is out of that "rich country" mindset that everyone thinks all our problem is how to share the national cake. It is that mentality that feed stuff like the "Igbo president" whine. Sickening!!

Sunny_bobo: Apt IKENGA, very apt. It's very amusing when you argue with some Nigerians and they bellow the phrase 'imagine a rich country like Nigeria....'

I think ignorance and superstition has really produced a new specie of humans in Nigerians. I wish someone would conduct a huge study of our mass psychology - the world will be shocked what they will find!

I am shocked that people are finding this kind of statistics soooo shocking. Guys, we are a very poor country. This budget statistis does not even start to paint the whole picture. Just go check out our per capita GDP (PPP) as compared to other countries. Even more tellingly as a better indicator of the tragedy that we have been living, compare Nigeria and South Korea in 1980 and the same two countries in 2010!
It is only the ignorant and those that dwell in the Nigerian make-belief alternate universe that think Nigeria is a rich country. Even the notion that we have potential becuse of our manpower is another farce. A barely educated and unhealthy people will only be an economic drag in the 21st century.

Hahaha! I hope your other 3 predictions are not based on the same analysis or instinct that produced the goal line technology prediction!!

kel4soft: Yesterday night, i watched a documentary on MTV Base (South Africa) on a street party. I noticed the beauty and serenity of their streets. This got me thinking, if we had allow Britain to stay with us a little to developed us before sending them packing. I believe the whites lay the foundation for South Africa and even did enough. Apart, from the aparthy. I don't think their whites did harm to them. Beside one man hero is another man's terrorist.

Another 10 years (1970) would have done it

! am sorry, but anyone who claims to be "proudly Nigerian" must either be a scoundrel, a holy fool or a masochist!!

Afam4eva:
I'm not against the OP exposing the incompetence of the Abia state government but the title of the post does not do justice to that. She's giving us the impression that the pictures are from her visit to Abia and i find it strange that those images are the only images she saw in Abia. It would have made more sese if the title of the thread was "Pictures of the bad leadership in Abia".

Gosh, why are you guys so reflexively defensive? the OP sees a very bad situation (which you can see in every state in Nigeria) and decides to post it here, why does her motive count for so much? Is there really a need to circle the wagon? Obviously Gov. Orji has not been doing a heck of a job, but so was OUK and so is every governor in Nigeria. Any person that believes that any government or governor in Nigeria is doing a good job is on a debilitating drink called "mediocre"
You young folks need to shed the groupthink and herd instinct and learn to think for yourselves or we cannot snap out of this zombiedom that Nigeria has become

Eko Atlantic:

I don't pray for that in SW. Creation of states 'll only interrupt the unity of a group and less economic power.
How I wish we have just two states in SW: Lagos+Ogun+Oyo as a state and Ekit+Ondo+Osun the other.
Then you'll see the meaning of unity and economic growth.
Not creating mushroom states allover.

Dont understand - why do you want to divvie up the old Oyo state (Oyo and Osun) between the two proposed states? Why two states in SW instead of one?
I agree with you, clamor for creation of states is just a fool's pursuit. Just Nigerians playing the naija game.

OPC.NAIRALAND:
This is the death trap for MASSOB.

Conflict of interest:

do i support an additional state for ndigbos in Nigeria, whih would dilute the fight for Biafra independence,, or do i reject the offer and consolidate effort for an independent state?

We are watching.

See you? Instead of considering what is being discussed and coming to the logical conclusion, (like others on the thread have), that these fools are being sold a brooklyn bridge, you allow your instinct to see just another "Igbo-baiting" opportunity.
You really need to get a life.

St.Ola:


"People like you" is why there can never be order in Nigeria, why bribery will never die, and why corruption would continue to be celebrated.
You have the effrontery to celebrate that you cheat your way to make deposits faster than those you meet on the queue. Are those who follow the due process stupid for being adults?

"People like you" create a situation where files pile up on the desk of a government officer because he/she is yet to receive a tip to do his/her assigned duty, while busy processing jobs for those who "hate to queue up for something".
You create a situation where an officer of the law turns a blind eye to offences commited in exchange for a token of N200 or N500, and when "people like you" become far fetched on a certain day, the already compromised officers harass such monies off law abiding citizens.

"People like you" are a shame to the nation, and worse shame is that you learnt no better even while at school.

My brother, I see you have migrated away from the political section to business and religion. Smart move, hope you are finding those areas more congenital than the politics section. But I doubt it, Nigerians are the same no matter what they are talking about. Do please come back to the political section, it definitely needs the few honest and objective men like you in this forum