₦airaland Forum

Other points to note.

Thisday and Guardian sell more among corporate executives, because they have indepth business reportage. Most business CEOs prefer to read Thisday in addition to Businessday and other international journals.

Thisday is also the choice among high level political class. In fact, so influential are their editors that they dine with Top nocturnal meeting in Abuja with Dangote, Ribadu, Bukola Saraki et al, asking him to cast headline to smear Odili or Ibori(can't remember) with document to be supplied by EFCC's Ribadu, in the next day's edition of Thisday so as to sway public sentiments against Odili who Obj wanted to use before. This shows teh influence Thisday wields among the top political class.

Thisday and Punch sell more on weekends, because of their rich entertainment profile, but again Thisday doesn't go beyond beyond Abuja, Lagos, PH and a few other urbanized areas, so Punch has greater advantage here because of its wider reach.

LAGOS - ELITE
1, Thisday
2, Punch
3, Guardian

LAGOS - MASSES
1, Complete sports
2, Punch
3, Nation

SOUTH-WEST
1, Nation
2, Punch
3, Sun

NORTH
1, Daily Trust
2, Nation
3, Sun

EAST & NIGER DELTA
Never lived there, knows little about there, so go insufficient info to form opinion; but I remember having difficulty getting daily editions of Punch & Thisday in one of my trips to PH. I suspect Nation and Sun are popular there.

OVERALL
I may not get the order right but here is my best guess:

1, Punch
2, Nation
3, Sun

Daily Trust would have also gotten a place, but its heavy demand in the north is neutralized by its almost zero readership in the South, unlike others that are very strong in the South but also have more than decent showing in the North(Sun, Punch and The Nation in particular).

I'm highly surprised at CPC's performance in this Lagos LG elections, even though it didnt win any LG, it made decent showings in a no of places.

Kanu, for his on- and off-field personality.

Since Naija is not going, I will support CIV. They have done enough to win this tournament. They parade the most intimidating array of stars in Africa but they have been under-achieving since their resurgence some 6 years ago after their football experienced a lull for 10 years. They had been the favourites in the last 3 editions but disappointingly crashed out in Final, semi and Q/F in the 2006, 2008 and 2010 editions. If they don't win this one, maybe they still have another opportunity in 2013, after which they can forget about it, as they are currently in their peak.

Their players are also committed to their NT despite being bigger boys than our lack lustre boys. I will fully support the Elephants.

As for Ghana, I see them being another strong contender, but I will never support them for obvious reason.

Viva elephants!!!

Unfortunately, I never doubted it will turn out to be true. From the onset, I had the feelings that they will find something in him.

Studied Economics, but first got and still doing Accounting job. Now an Accountant.

daphil:
I'm in total support of lagerwhenindoubt comment above. Sincerely acn does not deserved to be voted for at council level in Lagos State. They are worse than pdp. Can you imagine that in Ikorodu, you hardly notice existence of that tier of government. It is really a shame.

PDP rules Ikorodu at that tier.

One can't help agreeing that this guy is trying, even if one sees most of his actions as populism and megalomania.

folakeojo:
Obafemi Awolowo University- Economics

Esprit de corps

SATURDAY:

Morning - 15 minutes soccer (felt like I spent 90 minutes on field!)
Evening - 2 (double) games of Table Tennis, done with much energy

SUNDAY
Morning - 4km walk
Evening - 6 (double) games of table tennis

http://www.dailytrust.com.ng/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=145991:how-long-is-long-enough&catid=6:daily-columns&Itemid=6

By Mahmud Jega

In the wake of the death last Thursday of Libya’s long-reigning ruler Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi, one question being asked all over Africa is, how long is long enough for an African ruler to rule over his country, with how much power, with what purpose, and all to what end?

One of the glaring contradictions of the Gaddafi episode is that, apart from longevity and some human rights abuse issues, many Africans don’t agree with the Libyan rebels about the vices of Gaddafi, and not too many Africans think that his vices outweigh his usefulness, to Libya and to Africa.

It is only with respect to longevity that Gaddafi’s alleged vices outweigh those of every other post-colonial African ruler. Trouble is, regarding sit-tightism as a vice is new to the African experience, where we are used to kings and local chiefs that rule for up to 60 years.

In the first three decades since Italian, German, British, French, Belgian, Spanish and Portuguese colonial rule ended in most African countries, sit tight rulers were the norm all over the continent. Except in Congo Kinshasa, Togo, Algeria, Nigeria and Ghana where the pioneer rulers were overthrown within 5 years of independence, many of the early African rulers went on to rule for two or even three decades.

They include Malawi’s Hastings Kamuzu Banda [1964-94], Niger’s Diori Hammani [1960-74], Cameroun’s Ahmadou Ahidjo [1960-82], Senegal’s Leopold Senghor [1960-80], Ivory Coast’s Felix Houphouet-Boigny [1960-93], Zambia’s Kenneth Kaunda [1964-91], Gambia’s Sir Dauda Jawara [1962-94], Tunisia’s Habib Bourguiba [1960-87], Tanzania’s Julius Nyerere [1962-85] and Djibouti’s Hassan Gouled Aptidon [1977-1999].

In many African countries, the second or third generation post-independence rulers also stayed on for many decades. They include Sierra Leone’s Siaka Stevens [1967-85], Togo’s Gnassingbe Eyadema [1967-2005], Benin’s Mathieu Kerekou [1972-91, 1996-2006], Algeria’s Hoari Boumediene [1965-78], Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe [1980-date], Egypt’s Anwar Sadat [1970-81] and Hosni Mubarak [1981-2011], Burkina Faso’s Blaise Compaore [since 1987], Ethiopia’s Mengistu Haile Mariam [1976-91], Guinea’s Ahmadou Sekou Toure [1958-84], Zaire’s Mobutu Sese Sekou [1965-97], Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni [since 1986], Angola’s Eduardo Dos Santos [since 1979], Comoro’s Albert Rene [1977-2004], Nigeria’s Ibrahim Babangida [1985-93] and Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi, 1969-2011.

Longevity however is the only quality that lumps all of these African rulers together. Some proved to be much more useful to their countries and to Africa than others. Some of the sit-tight rulers were benign dictators. Some others combined sit-tightism with corruption only, while a third category of them combined sit-tightism with corruption and despotism. All three categories however bore no automatic correlation to socio-economic transformation, Africans’ traditional measure of tenure success.

While many sit-tight African rulers ruined their countries, some such as Botswana’s Sir Seretse Khama [who ruled 1966-80] and Cote D’Ivoire’s Felix Houphouet-Boigny developed their countries’ economies admirably. Julius Nyerere sat tight for 25 years, but he is widely regarded in Africa as saintly, given his wisdom, his austere lifestyle and his commitment to African unity, give or take conspicuous errors such as recognising Biafran independence.

Among the second generation sit-tight rulers too, performance in office differed markedly. Dos Santos transformed Angola in the decade since the end of UNITA’s rebellion. Gaddafi too greatly developed key infrastructure in Libya, as did Hosni Mubarak in Egypt.

It is not impossible to be sit-tight, authoritarian or even despotic, and yet transform your country socio-economically. The great Asian sit-tight rulers such as Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew [1959-90], Indonesia’s Suharto [1968-98], South Korea’s Park Chung-hee [1963-79], Malaysia’s Mahathir Mohamed [1981-2003], Taiwan’s Chiang Kai-shek [1950-75], and maybe also North Korea’s Kim Il-Sung [1948-94] and Pakistan’s Zulfikar Ali Bhutto [1971-77] all achieved great socio-economic expansion of the kind Africans rate as successful.

In Latin America, the sternly authoritarian Generals who ruled Brazil in the 1960s to 1980s were recording an average annual economic growth rate of more than 10%. A lot of Turkey’s economic transformation was achieved under the rule of authoritarian Generals. In the 1970s, Iran under the Shah was recording the world’s fastest economic growth rate, 15% annually. So, it’s not like dictatorships or even monarchies do not pay some dividends.

The greatest socio-economic miracle of the late 20th Century, namely the transformation of China, was accomplished by Deng Xiao-Ping and the Chinese Communist Party in conditions that were [are] both sit-tightish and authoritarian. This is not to mention the rapid industrialisation of the Soviet Union in the years 1924-1952 by Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Communist Party in conditions often summarised as despotic.

Since the Cold War ended in 1989, Westerners have forced Africans, as well as Asians and Latin Americans, to evaluate all rulers principally with respect to democracy and human rights. These new parameters are disorienting to Africans. Many Nigerians, for example, regard General Murtala Mohamed as our best ruler ever, and not because he ruled for only six months. Murtala was not democratic by any means. He wasn’t despotic, but he certainly breached the rights of some people, especially the thousands of sacked public servants. Yet he is widely seen as Nigeria’s best ruler.

Now, the fact that thousands of Libyans who were not even trained soldiers took up arms against Gaddafi clearly means that they have very deep-seated grievances against his rule. Their grievances are hardly visible to other Africans, who instead see the key infrastructure and elaborate welfare system that Gaddafi built up in Libya.

Certainly he was a megalomaniac; everyone could see that. That’s not a character trait that endears you to people. In Nigeria here, while Olusegun Obasanjo’s 8-year rule as civilian president outpoints the tenures of Umaru Yar’adua and Goodluck Jonathan in terms of socio-economic initiatives, not many Nigerians will rank him as a better ruler than either Yar’adua or Jonathan. This is most probably because the latter two are much less arrogant fellows.

How I wish, personally, that General Yakubu Gowon had been a General Park Chung-hee when he ruled Nigeria in 1966-75, or that General Ibrahim Babangida had been a Suharto in 1985-93. Nigeria would have been a very different place by now.

Right now, while the Libyan rebels are celebrating the death of Muammar Gaddafi and they are promising to democratise their country within a few months---the same promise that Field Marshal Tantawi and the Egyptian Generals have made--- it is important for all Africans to ponder on three issues.

Number one: where sit-tight rulers have to be chased out, what method should be used and what is the acceptable price to pay in terms of human lives and infrastructural destruction? The Tunisian revolution that drove out Ibn Ali and the one in Egypt that drove out Mubarak were accomplished with minimal bloodshed and minimal destruction. They look okay to me.

That’s probably because the Tunisians and Egyptians were somehow lucky that their sit-tight rulers were not completely megalomaniacal and were not willing to destroy the whole country in order to rule it. But, faced with a stubborn dictator such as Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi, Yemen’s Ali Abdallah Saleh or Syria’s Bashar al-Assad is it wise to take up arms and risk the destruction of thousands of lives and of decades of infrastructural achievement, as happened in Iraq and now Libya? Number two: would you want to encourage the UN Security Council to adopt hypocritical resolutions to “protect civilians” in a hapless country such as Libya, when the people that need protection the most, such as Afghan and Palestinian civilians, are left to their own devices?

Number three: is it clever to invite foreign military intervention, especially a cowardly one like NATO, to rain bombs and cruise missiles at your country from high up in the air and far out at sea? Let us think about those issues before another “National Transitional Council” steps up to ruin another African country.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

EFULEFU1:
1. Victor Agali

2. obinna nwanerri

3. george abbey

4. peter rufai
5. yusif ayila

6. john mikel obi

Honestly, people need to be screened before being allowed to discuss sports on NL.

Stephen Joseph:
All of u guyz re voting 4 d yorubas, bt let me tell u d truth. I was born nd brought up in yoruba land, lagos precisely. D yorubas gv respect 2 their fellow yorubas alone while disdainin other tribes common. Statistically, a yoruba person wil call his fellow yoruba elder "BROTHER" bt wen he/she sees oda tribe of d same age, he/she wil call him/her by his/her name. Dis is fraustratn! So respect is reciprocal. Other tribes accord respect as well nd not just d yorubas.

This is true, but we are only following your tradition. If Uche's kid brother calls him by name, Uche, it makes no sense for me to call him Boda Uche, even though I am his kid brother's mate. It will be absurd to say 'boda Uche', since that's not in your tradition.

Also for Hausa, we usually add Mallam to it. Mallam Audu, Mallam Bako if the hausaman is mate to a person we will call boda in Yoruba.

[quote author=Okija_juju link=topic=785746.msg9389866#msg9389866 date=1319208437]No contest it is the yoruba,

It is embarassing to see them even on the streets of Yankee and Jand prostrate fully to greet an elder.


Last-- Ndi Igbo[/quote]I have to agree. Is it true that Ibo children kick their father/mother to wake him/her up?

I give this to teh Yorubas.

Alima2, salam alaikum. otoojo meta

Barka jum'ah. Being long I posted here.

Chakula, kwana biu

Peter Ijeh was also not given enough chance. He was banging goals in Sweden and got a call to SE for a friendly against, I think, Egypt. Nigerians expected him to score 10 goals in his debut just he scored goals in Sweden but had a bad game. He wasn't given second chance. So I think it's not fair enough to put him here.

jay bee:
Loma doing us proud at oxford

Yeah, that's Loma to Fashola's right.


On the topic, let's give it to this Fashola, the guy deserves all the commendations. He is really trying. Apart from working and visibly seen so, he is also very sound, not the next door politician. I have listened to his interviews many times and he really impressed me. He is also on top on his job; when this man is discussing Lagos, he demonstartes knowledge of virtually every street in Lagos. He is a model of good leadership in Nigeria.

24 hours , or even 72 hours, after the Libya incident is not too long a time to talk. I am with him on this. No need to hurrily join the fray of commenting leaders.

el-Rufai's name has come up in too many dirty controversies that I doubt he still has my respect.

I still rate Ribadu above him in terms of genuine passion for Nigeria.

Igbe inu oora

Happy birthday, amazon of NL.

pro01:
Oh common @poster! There are far too many of them, it's impossible to select a single 'worst' player of all time. Too too many. E.g. Furo Iyenemi, Gbenga Okunowo, Wilson Agbonivare (a, k.a. 'agbonibasket'), Ayo Makinwa, Kingsley something (the woeful dude that Onigbinde took to Korea/Japan '02 just because of a single 'sangalo' in a friendly match), Christian Obodo, Efe Sodje, and countless others. The 'honour' of worst player of all time is just too big for any single player to 'enjoy' all alone.

I agree with everyone on your list except Obodo. Obodo wasn't that bad. He had a no of good games for Nigeria that cannot be totally discounted to make him make this list.

Don't count number of floors of a highrise.

Dombraye and most members of Nigeria 99 squad.

What is the thickness of this aluminum and the colour?.

Colour is cream. I wanted to use blue before, but I was convinced that I should use cream, that blue is not only too common, but also fades quickly. I reasoned with them.

I don't know the thickness. I don't know all those technical things. He must have told me but I've forgotten. I can always ask. The only technical thing I know is that it's German floor we used.

dayokanu:
Good one Jarus.

I see you are building a home for Jarusat and the little Jaruses

Atiada, ore. K'olohun ma se wa ni baba eko l'aasan. K'olohun je ka ko ere oko dele o.

sholasys:
Wonderful project you have there. My advice for you in case of next time you "projectized" your project. Sorry my fellow kwarans from your analysis i observed that you dont have a define project plan, definite project scope. You scope creep which increase your project cost, the materials cost analysys was not based on measurement and size but based on estimate and price negotiation. I am happy for u bc u are not complaining and its always like this when your are sending money down for a project. henceforth any material you r buying request for bill of quantity of any project phase eg plastering or painting get like 2 diff type, involve external expert on it to ask question. U will be suprised on how much cost you will reduced. I pray i will start my own soonest like you, jst bought 1 plot at 300k in ilorin few month ago. which area is your site. God bless U

You're spot on. Projectizing it would have saved me more money, I'm just doing it haphazardly. No analysis, no defined plan, even the initial plan was changed many times.
Well, I'm still learning. When I do future ones by God's grace.

@Jarus we're also building a house in Ilorin.

I will advise you get 2 or 3 quote before parting with your money for any part of the project. We've been able to save huge sum of money up to 40%!

Check out as many architectural design as possible, use the net, check built up properties until you are comfortable with your design/budget. This is a caveat if you do not want to be redesigning/ changing the rule of the game when you're already on the field playing. This sometimes result into additional/ unplanned expenses.

Use a bill of quantity that is prepared by a professional who knows his onions and is sincere.

Never use contractor recommended by friends or family members without a 2nd and 3rd opinion.

Our initial building contractor wanted to fleece 1.6M off us on just the BQ. My gut feeling $ experience in repairs told me the highly recommended Contractor is Pricey but my Hubby felt what does a woman knows about building until a close friend of his who recently built a house using direct labour also convinced him.

Most quote they will give you will be layered with extra material that you may not need. Even though the contractor will cheat you; aim at reducing the fleecing!

Unfortunately, whether due to naivety or desire to avoid all those formality or distance or even trust I had in the handler(supervisor/architect), I wasn't this organized. But I think the supervisor does all those things

maninmood:
My broda, nice quote there. However, building a house is like bringing a baby up, you can never estimate the exact amount you are going to spend on it, but you can always guess almost right. My brother, you're doing something great and may God see you through. I will pat you on the back if you can successfully build a 3 bedroom flat with 2 self-contained bqs with 8mil. My brother, you have a great taste, abeg be looking at 13 million .

I have come to realize that is very true. My initial plan has been tripled and bringing everything to final shape may actually cross the 10m border. It may not be up to 13 but I'm seeing it crossing 10. However, at 8, it should be habitable(i.e painting concluded), but other continuous things will keep swelling up the total cost.