₦airaland Forum

Streetinvestor2:
I don't have time to waste with you as I did with you concerning beta malt
I have lived in 4 states in SW in my younger age and travelled to the remaining
Tell me the core northern states you have lived or travelled to so far.That will make it easy to argue with names.I Co founded the first major fast food in ife way back which later failed. And the market has a better coverage because majority of the people thr are single who don't have children that you are using in school. Whr is the majority of Nigeria population brackets range. That age brackets are mostly singles not married So how then do use use pupils in school.
And first answer my question concerning the core northern states you have lived or travelled to as an adult. Then tell me why the past Nigerian government have refused to make provisions for tribe in all the census it conducted. I don't care about the ones conducted by the British because I was not counted then.What facts whr they avoiding to find out based on tribes.
When you finish the research I asked you to conduct on igbo families you know.It is simple research. Ask each of those families. What number of thr families live in SE and the numbers that live outside SE..Thr is a saying thr is hard any corner of nigeria you will go today and won't see an igbo man.
During the days nigeria roads whr safe and we travel in luxury buses. Do you know the numbers that load every day from Kano to onitsha. I hope you are upto 25yrs first with all this time being wasted by me

I have been to the North and I don't have to go to the North before I can use my God given intelligence to solve a problem. This problem I solved is PhD level and I can get awarded a PhD for it. Most PhDs did not solve as big a problem

Then what you are saying only makes sense if people always relocate to their states of origin wben they want to marry and start having kids that will have to go to school if not then the demography of the schools in any community will reflect the demography of the community. I hope you understand. A minor disruptor will be small communities that have a tertiary institution but tertiary institutions are evenly spread so the disruption will not be significant.


Summary

Again if no school in any community in Northern Nigeria has up to five percent southerners, it is a clear proof that southerners in the North are not up to five percent of the population. As I am sure non Yoruba are not up to three percent of Osun residents despite Osun being very urbanized, I will be very surprised if Northern Nigeria outside Abuja have up to two percent southerners living there given it's low level of urbanization compared to Osun state. That is my submission which qualifies as a short PhD dissertation.

Isobug:
The unified is in no way favorable to the people. How can you continue what is impoverishing the people under the guide of being unified

I guess you have people at the top who can always get you dollars at the lower rate whenever you need it or rather you probably used to have a weekly quota

State creation in Nigeria- A constitutional sleight of hand


In the independence constitution, states were not supposed to be created to be peers of other states but as a consequence of agitations for autonomy. The independence constitution was designed to let miniature states exist alongside mammoth states. That was why the Midwest could have its own government and institutions alongside others but would not have been able to demand for equal representation or parity at the federal level.

States in Nigeria as agreed upon at independence are to be granted upon demand and common sense says representation at the center should be determined by the GDP which is determined by the population if other parameters like revenue drive and etc are the same. Look at Western Europe, the government revenue of similarly organized nations with similar per Capita income varies directly with the population. The GDP is therefore the right indicator of the population size and it is from the GDP that government revenue is gotten. Oil income is irrelevant because oil in its entirety is less than three percent of the GDP of Nigeria and places that have oil don't have cattle or cocoa or coffee or groundnut or tourism potential and etc. There is no land without it's advantages

The illegal 1999 constitution of Nigeria gives parity to states at the Senate, in siting federal projects, for federal appointments and for determining the winner of a Presidential election among other things. This is wrong and also unfair.

If parity is going to be given to states then a people like the Berom who are up to 4 million in population or who have 4:million people on their land should have two percent of states in Nigeria. The Igala should have a similar percentage, the Urhobo too and etc etc meaning if there are one hundred states they should have four each

However the original constitution of Nigeria offered state creation to satisfy demands for autonomy and not parity.

As a people, say the Berom, if people on your land are 4 million people and the per Capita income of Nigeria is 1,200 dollars per annum, then the money spent on your land everyday is over 16;billion naira and by common practice in serious and working nations, your government can practically take more than thirty percent of that every day. That is less than the OECD standard and it will be over five billion naira every day with which production can be intensified and the standard of living increased. Any body saying the Berom should not have any autonomy or become a state should be ignored because Berom is more than ten times the population of some sovereign nations. The same is true for many other ethnic nations in the country. The oil money is less than three percent of the country's GDP and if your calculations rest on it as a people, then you are not ready for freedom and entry into prosperity in the modern world

DeLaRue:
He deserves re-election.

Without his bold reforms,the economy would have collapsed.

The level of major transformative road constructions going on in the country is unprecedented in the history of Nigeria.

We don't want Mr Obi or Mr Atiku to come and stop them.

If your relative has died by being killed by Boko Haram while convicted Boko Haram are being rehabilitated on a large scale and the ones arrested by locals were set free by the NSA who said they are vigilantes your opinion will be different

So you prefer two forex rates?. One for the masses and one for the President's friends to become billionaires?

Why will anyone be against a unified foreign exchange market? Please explain

SecretofDNA:
Interesting. I understand that Africans hold solid to Ancestral reincarnation and they believe next lives and previous lives are simply a matter of personal choice or ancestral guide. Either way it doesn't conflict too much with Genetics except the reduction of origin or parents in your system. All trajectories are origin based. What a trajectory begins has alot to do with its end point or rather where it will end.

Let's take the hypersonic missile which has unpredictable trajectory it eventually has an option or launch point and it will probably have an end point. Everyone has a conception point and a death no matter the course their livres take . Genetics focuses only upon the sequencing of the hypersonic life not its origin. If I'm making sense. I will think about your views because I find it interesting. Its good to know how other cultures view these technologies.

According to my personal research, incarnation is not always by personal choice. If I kill someone, the person will incarnate in my Earth family immediately, it will dislodge the spirit incarnated in the foetus in my pregnant wife if I have one or go to another pregnancy in the Earth family that I am a member of and etc. If a pregnant woman is frustrating unnecessarily a man then a spirit from the man's line will incarnate in her pregnancy as of right and etc. So two interacting cultures will have numerous cross incarnations but cross incarnation will not be possible if there is no interaction at all. Then any spirit you give birth to from whatever origin becomes a part of your Earth family and you can reincarnate in the line during subsequent incarnations. A spirit belongs to two different types of family. Earth and spiritual family. A spirit can actually belong to many Earth families

New Odus of ifa May 27 2026

Ifa divination is just an advanced divination system developed by Orunmila over five thousand years ago. It is not the only one even among the Yoruba and there is no human culture on Earth without divination system or systems. Orunmila met 16 signs on Earth and he developed it into 256 and then designed a system of a corpus to be training people.

Other priesthoods do not learn the Orunmila system. They continue using their own system with their own number of signs and if they are very good then they will obtain the same results as an Awo Orunmila.
The quality of a diviner or priest is ultimately decided by the quality of the spirit of the diviner followed by the expertise



Iwori Irosun (Iwori warawara or Iwori Ijesa)

Your problem. My problem. Our problem. Their problem

This was the IFA cast for Orunmila the one that offers advise like a next of kin who would become the go to person for many people with problems of life to solve

He was advised to sacrifice
He listened and complied

Onlooking people of Po and Offa!
Orunmila is always busy with plans of how to make ebo for his clients. No downtimes

Oturupon Irete

The soft white yam had no idea the mortar and pestle would turn it into a paste

It was the IFA cast for Jesus Christ of Nazareth the itinerant Jewish preacher and nationalist who became the God of Christians as a result of the machinations of Apostle Paul that he never physically met.

Onlooking people of Po and Offa!
We many times become something because of factors outside our control


Ose Meji

When there are two belligerent camps, a third force that is a peace enforcer may be the only way the tripod of peace can stand

It was the IFA cast for the Yoruba when during their nineteenth century civil war, their stakeholders called upon the British to move in and enforce peace.

It is cast for the state of Israel and the alliance of Arab militant groups fighting them over Palestine who can't achieve peace unless brokered by force by the rest of the world that is more powerful than both

Odi Ofun

It is giving and sharing that leads to prosperity

This was the IFA cast for the Scandinavian nations whose number of billionaires per Capita became among the highest in the world despite having a very high tax to GDP ratio on average

They were advised to sacrifice. They listened and complied
Onlooking people of Po and Offa!
The more billionaires a country has, the more leadership resources that is independent of the government and the more varied the opportunity for progress


Osa Owonrin

A man now eats solids, forgetting that he could not have survived for long after birth without taking only breast milk for a long time

This was the IFA cast for the billions of religious people on Earth who left the perfect spirituality bestowed on them by the creator as a component of their culture because they lost the knowledge of it overtime as a result of exposure to and intimidation by religion

They were advised to sacrifice
They listened but did not comply
They offered no sacrifice. They did no propitiations. Onlooking people of Po and Offa! See how this IFA became a reality!

Oyeku Ofun

Unbelief will cost the unbelievers like going to a battlefield unarmed will cost a soldier

This was the IFA cast for the unbelievers who live in a community dominated by Muslims and who had to pay jizyah in order to be allowed to live as human beings
They were advised to sacrifice
They listened and complied
Onlooking people of Po and Offa!
When you are outnumbered by Muslims, you must pay jizyah to not be killed

Okanran meji

Boxers who are not in the same weight grade can not be paired in a boxing bout

This was the ifa cast for the cost of living variance that was the biggest obstacle on the path of uniform progress on Earth
Onlooking people of Po and Offa!
If what costs ten dollars in one country costs two hundred dollars in another country, it will not be possible for the two nations to move forward together seamlessly


Obara Odi

It is what we labored for in the mornings of our lives that makes things easy for us at dusk

This was the IFA cast for the parent who raised children to be successful and established an enviable legacy as well who will therefore be reincarnated on their own terms through successful descendants

They were advised to sacrifice
They listened and complied
Onlooking people of Po and Offa!
When we invest in and train our children, we are softening the ground for our next incarnation

Otura Ogunda

Sometimes, only madness can cure madness

This was the IFA cast for the Yoruba elders of the early twentieth century who split their people equally as believers and adherents between the two religions claiming the right of way and the status of absolute truth on their land so that they will fight themselves and exhaust themselves until they realize they are both wrong

They were advised to sacrifice
They listened and complied
Onlooking people of Po and Offa!
If falsehood gets a twenty year head start, the truth will catch up with it on the day it sets out, it just needs to be nudged

Ela boru Ela boye Ela bo sise



Irete OSE (Irete Alaje) Iru Ekun)

The desire that was realized because you have already made it.

You don't need a multitude to join your cause for it to be successful
.
This was the IFA cast for the Zionist movement whose desire for the establishment of the state of Israel became a reality because of the reach of the fledgling British empire

They were advised to sacrifice
They listened and complied
Onlooking people of Po and Offa!
The right people on your side is a free pass!

Ofun Okanran

Money is often not easy to extract from people, it often needs to be taken by force.

It was the ifa cast for the ambitious government in need of revenue and shared to the Christian churches who are the only institutions that claim to have a right to a portion of everyone's income

They were advised to sacrifice
They listened and complied
Onlooking people of Po and Offa!

This is why the government threaten you over tax and the churches threatens you over tithe and other entities have to sell you something or beg you for money before expecting any money from you.

SecretofDNA:
African Americans love to promote Egypt, I know I was one of them myself. Like all people we follow our elders whom we thought knew better than us but it isn't true at times. History shows lots of people ruled over Egypt like the Nubians,, Assyrians, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs then the British. The original Egyptians didn't regain power back until the 20th century. The original Egyptians are the E2b1b which are Egyptian, Algerians, Moroccan bloodlines. And these people are originally African with lighter skin. The E2B1B are not Middle Eastern who are the J and J2 haplagroups. The Nubians are the oldest Sub Saharan Africans, the largest and the Yorubas are their cousins whom created their own distinct civilization, both are E1B1BA haplagroup. Similar topology does not mean the same shared sovereignty, both Nubian men and Yoruba men resent the implied that they're the same. Respect male esteem.


We are talking male bloodlines . Majority of African American men are paternally R1B haplagroup from massive slave rape by Anglos. The second largest male bloodline amongst African Americans are the E1B1BA descendants of male slaves brought from West and Central Africa. Creole men are the only other male bloodlines among African Americans but small percentage, J2 haplagroup and G haplagroup. There are some very rare native American male bloodline amongst African American but very tiny, Q and C. Then there's another small R1B North African male bloodline. Science destroys the Race Box.

If you understand that DNA is just clothes that spirits wear to reincarnate then you will know DNA does not mean much. You incarnate where you have right and into the circumstances that you want. You can have right in your next incarnation in a line that does not match your current DNA because an ancestor will incarnate in your kid no matter who impregnated your wife and your child can come from the line of your wife too. What makes you who you are is your past incarnation experiences more than any other thing and according to my research most people in the western hemisphere carry native Indian origin spirit and not African or European that dominate their DNA

When is a country owing too much?

There are several metrics that can be used to determine if a country is owing too much.

One is what percentage of it's revenue is it using to service the debt?

Another is how much investments does it have? For example, Norway is celebrated for being a small country that has a large sovereign wealth fund but Norway also has debt. The debt however is negligible compared to the sovereign wealth fund. I do not think the national debt is up to ten percent of the value of the sovereign wealth fund.

If the US today has a sovereign wealth fund of 100 trillion dollars which is possible if they had the same drive as Norway then the national debt of 39 trillion dollars would not be a big deal

The US is using less than twenty percent of it's revenue to service debt and the UK is not using up to fifteen percent. There were times when the US used up to twenty five percent. South Africa is using around fifteen percent.

President Tinubu said the money to be used for debt servicing this year 2026 is 11 billion dollars. As a percentage of federal revenue, it will not be much because federal revenue is rapidly increasing but as a percentage of federal budget, it will be significant.

Debts can not be avoided altogether and infact a country can go into debt to invest in it's sovereign wealth fund. Nothing is more convenient for a government tier than that but all governments should endeavor to be like Norway where the sovereign wealth fund is several orders of magnitude larger than the national debt.

DoTheNeedful:
Russia was ranked as the most corrupt country in the world like a decade ago. Putin himself is considered to be worth over $50bn, and he has never done any business in his life. Many of the Russian oligarchs made their money from the government.

That said, the central point of my argument is that even without corruption, Nigeria is a very poor country that is incapable of providing quality life for her citizens. All you need to do is to consider our total revenue and our population, then you will realize that Ghana, Kenya, Ivory Coast, Tanzania, South Africa, Egypt and others are way ahead.

We have a great potential if we have a good leadership and restructure our system.

I agree with you but you should know that if Nigeria increases its revenue drive then the cost of living will slightly increase because the average cost of production will increase due to taxes. Calculate by yourself how much income is needed to be earned for a family of five by two income earners in Nigeria that you will consider ok for them. Then divide that income by five and that will be an ideal per Capita income for the country, then you can multiply it by 0.15 or so to account for the HNIs in the country

Streetinvestor2:
I don't do AI search. Why use school. Use major markets in North and in lagos and come up with results. What is the population of lagos. And after Yorubas .which tribe has the next highest population in lagos. Why whr igbos being forced not to vote in 2023 in lagos by Obama pronouncement and attacks on igbos not to vote.Have you been to major markets across Nigeria. I don't argue with someone who sits and generate things from AI
And Ai has been wrong several times in answer Have you been to salon garri in Kano.
Which states have u visited in the North for us to continue this argument. So that I will be calling names for you to respond. Not AI generated because thr is no true data base for such in nigeria. All this yrs the tribe was excluded in census to keep igbo population low that leaves outside SE.This is used to increase the population of those states whr igbos lives for political purposes.
Whose votes do you really think made obi win lagos if the igbos in lagos are just 2 million. Why was people like mc bother if it was just 2 million against thr 20 million SW people

Between schools and owners of shops in markets, which is a better representation of the demography of a community? Do you find professionals or artisans inside markets? Schools where all kids are sent is the best if not the only place to get the data you need and not a market but there will be some disruption because of the Hausa that don't have a high school enrollment rate. A market of 50,000 traders is serving like 23 million people in Lagos and majority of them don't base on trading. Nobody in my nuclear family has any shop in any market currently.. If you want the right data then you go to the schools, it will give you the same thing you will get if you conduct a census

However the majority of traders in the combination of all markets in Lagos state still remain the Yoruba.

After Yoruba in Lagos, I think Hausa is more in sheer numbers followed by Igbos but they will be close.

I have explained the methodology I used to arrive at my conclusion and I wonder why you say I am relying on AI.

If it was only Igbos that voted LP during the Presidential elections in Lagos, then the party would have gotten less than ten percent of the votes it got there. I wonder why you are bringing this up when the same voters that willingly voted LP for Presidency turned round to vote APC for the governorship.
Then the two million estimate I gave as population of Igbos in the west is not Lagos alone but the whole of the SW. I don't think it can exceed that.

If ethnic group was included in the census then what I am saying here would have been crystal clear to all Nigerians. Who stopped it from being included does not want the truth to be known. The truth is in plain sight. Before independence there was no Hausa city up to Ilesa in population apart from Kano, so where is the Hausa population in Nigeria that makes them higher than the Yoruba in population?. The Yoruba clearly have more cities and towns than the Hausa and those cities and towns are far bigger than their counterparts in Hausa land. So are the Hausa majority living in villages? I am willing to bet that the Yoruba have more villages than the Hausa and if not so, the difference would not be much. The Ijesa alone which is half of a senatorial district in Osun have more than 200 villages. Osun alone will have a minimum of 700 cities, towns and villages. So Nigeria's census is a total fraud and the number one casualty is the Yoruba nation. The truth is apparent in the revenue generation since it is people that spend money and revenue can not be faked consistently.

Don't base your conviction on a colonial census that put Igbos at a higher population than the Yoruba and Fulani at fifty percent of the Hausa. That is obviously a manipulated census.

In 1960 western Nigeria's budget was 55 million pounds, Eastern Nigeria's was 12 million pounds and Northern Nigeria's was 7;million pounds.

Streetinvestor2:
Whr did you get the statistics because past census in nigeria has no provision for tribe in the form.And that was for a purpose. So how did you come up with this rubbish. In lagos alone you have over 2 million igbos. In Kano and kaduna I know very well has over 2 million igbos in each state.Do you ever go outside delta state which you claim as your state though you are from SW.Try and leave the comfort of your parents house and go hustle in different region of nigeria. I have lived in all region in nigeria and have visited 34 states.The only state I have not been is Bayelsa and Ebonyi state

Publish the pupil manifest of ten random schools in Northern Nigeria and I have no doubt there will be less than three percent southerners in the list out of which there will be more Yoruba than Igbo. If there are ten southern students there will be four Yoruba at least and the rest will be shared between Igbos and other southerners. There will also be Yoruba that are not southerners. If North is 110 million then Southerners are not up to 3 million in the North. Igbos can't be more than one million out of that and if we consider that the North is very rural then it will be more like two percent or less, so Igbos in the North outside Abuja are around 700k. Disprove this by spending money on the research. Ten random public schools in the North

Streetinvestor2:
You keep talking off point How much is vat. Ask the SW governors what they are doing with thr IGR.You keep shouting about consumption tax which vat.
Can you give the estimate of igbos living in SE and the numbers living outside SE who contribute to this so call vat in those state
Tell me the amount the igbos in lagos contribute to the vat received in that state bearing in mind they contribute largely to the servicing of lagos economy. When you have a useless governor like the case of abia state of many yrs ago ,you won't see anything. The present governor is doing alot without borrowing .It is so because he is prudent in his management of resources.
The SW governors believe once they settle SW president who determines who becomes governor in that region. They owe nobody good performance again. In SE the governors know the people will keep asking questions and thr is no one single individual who is god father

You want my estimate of Igbo population across the world?
Here is it

23 million at home in SE and SS as well as NC
2 million in Yoruba land
700k in Northern Nigeria
700k in Abuja
200k in the US
200K in Europe
Around 1 million or less in Africa and the rest of the world

ariesbull:
Remember that over 60% of Lagos population are non Yoruba going by that also

What proof do you have that sixty percent of Lagos is non Yoruba? There is no survey that puts the Yoruba at less than seventy percent and it may be eighty percent. Then Lagos is not the most cosmopolitan city in Nigeria. PH, Kaduna, Jos and Abuja are more cosmopolitan. Yorubas as well can be making claims about PH Jos, Abuja, Awka and etc because they are well entrenched there too. Please if you choose to stay in Yoruba land then your output is counted as part of Yoruba output. Yoruba should not be expected to gift their ancestral heritage to others. Why are the Chinese Lebanese or Indians not making all these claims? I hope you know they have contributed more to Lagos than Igbos?

ariesbull:
Population of SW and SW are same almost but the debts are not ...so how come round the capita theory

What proof do you have they have the same population? Colonial census? Lagos is 120 percent of the SE if we go by NIN registration while Oyo and Ogun together are almost the same as.the whole SE. Registered sim cards, voters registration numbers, number of UME candidates and many other stats say the same thing. Are all those stats forged?

Armaggedon:
it's only in southwest that
there exist the warped logic that borrowing is a sign of good fiscal performance. It's really unfortunate their politicians have a way messing up their minds and getting away with anything they want. It is a known fact only economies with terrible fiscal condition that engage in borrowing. If Lagos generate such fund, why does it need borrowing for recurrent expenditure? They'll point to USA, forgetting USA is the sole issuer of the most used currency.
Borrowing in Nigeria is corruption and that what it is.

SW and SE have around the same debt per Capita if you consider the population. Don't just think on the surface. Think deep

MadPolitician:
Face the report and leave those who make "Lagos turn into a ghost town whenever they travel for Christmas"! They are not the reason the whole South West is an eyesore and impoverished. Neither are they the topic here. Take Lagos away and the whole of the South West is alarmingly lacking behind. Everyone knows this except you..

This tendency to deflect and run away from taking responsibility when things go awry, has always been a hallmark of the South West for eons. Most northern state capitals are far developed than their counterparts in the South West. Do something about it and stop beating your chest about a Lagos that was totally built by every Nigerian.

And I think this is a cultural flaw; a perennial unwillingness to confront realities and take hard decisions essential to move the society forward. Again, you seldom criticize your leaders. Criticising a leader is seen culturally as the behaviour of "outcasts'. That's how folks like Dapo Abiodun and Akala looted down Ogun and Oyo without being called out for that..

As long as you don't press inefficient and ineffective leaders to be productive, you would continue to deal with rusty villages and squalid "cities".
Every action and every inaction, have consequences.
Such is life.

The whole of the SW is not an eye sore. Osun has more developments in hotels, factories, banks etc than any SE states apart from Anambra. It also has more internet subscribers and voice than them. What then are you measuring? Explain what you are measuring. Ogun and Oyo alone more or less cancels out the SE in population and hence GDP. Lagos, Osun, Ondo and Ekiti are just bonus. Yoruba and Igbo are not mates in population and hence in any other thing. I don't blame you though. It is all caused by Nigeria

Compare on a per Capita basis as well because SW and NW are three times the population of the SE. You can't just be comparing 19 million to 60 million like that

Then the more your revenue the more your access to loans. Lagos revenue gives them access to loans just like Ehugu revenue now also gives them access to loans

SE also needs less loans because they collect by far a higher allocations per Capita as they have a higher number of states per Capita than any zone. They therefore have more money than others to spend on infrastructure and HDI. This is shown clearly by the fact they collect five times the VAT they pay in

CharliGo:
Many people don’t realize that Nigeria’s economy has depended heavily on oil revenue for decades, while population growth, infrastructure demands, and global market fluctuations kept increasing pressure on the system. Being an oil-producing country does not automatically make a nation “oil rich” when revenue is stretched across millions of people and major economic challenges.

Nigeria federal budget is presently funded 25 percent by oil. It is no longer what it used to be courtesy Tinubu. In world history the shift that occurred under Tinubu is perhaps unparalleled. What Enugu state too did last year is also in the same category. The state is no longer dependent on allocations. So things are happening but people are not paying attention. Reno Omokri is right in that the oil revenue isn't much considering our population but he is wrong in that we are not oil rich. I myself must have made similar statements in the past but in reality you are rich in whatever you produce in excess which includes oil in the case of Nigeria and many other things.
If any of the other contestants for President had won instead of Tinubu, it is safe to say the country would have been in a mess by now because 96 percent of federal revenue was being used to service debt before Tinubu and states did not have enough funds to pay salaries and all these contestants definitely do not have the ingenuity of Tinubu to generate revenue. They don't even believe there is a need to pursue taxes. They would have resorted to printing money as is usual and Naira today would be up to 4k to the dollar as Buhari left it at around 2k as a result of him printing over 30 trillion naira. As at the beginning of this year the current administration had not printed any naira note. I don't know of now

So Nigeria in reality has metamorphosed out of oil dependence and so far economic development and fiscal policies are concerned, it is relatively on the right path

DoTheNeedful:
I understand what you wrote perfectly, but for an import dependent country like Nigeria, it is more nuanced. Besides, we don't need to drag this issue too long. If we made more dollars in Nigeria, we would have more road, more power and other infrastructure.

Your Iran missile example is very wrong. The technology and the idea behind the $20k Iran drone is different from America's. The US drone are designed to be intelligent and more discriminative with their target. Currently, the US is deploying drones with similar philosophy with Iran's and it costs around $35k. You may check out LUCAS (Low-cost Uncrewed Combat Attack System) drones. In fact, they are testing even drones that are significantly cheaper than the LUCAS drones.

I think the drone is called the Shahed drone or so. It was reverse engineered by US manufacturers and quoted to be worth over 200k if produced in the USA according to someone on Quora who is obviously knowledgeable on the matter. Per Capita income in Iran is less than 5k dollars while US is over 60k dollars. These things however are obvious and ordinarily should not be debated. Take a senior medical consultant in Nigeria earning less than ten thousand dollars per annum living in a nice duplex, training three kids in good private schools and etc in a place like Akure, Kano, Onitsha, Ibadan or Ilesa, how much do you think he will need to earn in the USA to be able to afford the same standard of living? I believe more than 150k dollars per annum. I think that is a good enough example of the anomaly we are dealing with. It reflects in the GDP, government expenditure and everything

DoTheNeedful:
I largely disagree with you. The manual (and largely unskilled) labor we provide represent a tiny fraction of the cost of building a world class infrastructure, even if you ask China to build it. Perhaps, the Dangote refinery would not have cost him $20bn if it is all about manual labor.

I don't want you to lose sight of my previous argument, which is enough dollars to build world-class infrastructure we need. Procurement, engineering and logistics take the most part of the fund. These are largely paid for in dollars, since we don't have the structure in place.

Anyway, like I previously stated, we have a real revenue problem in Nigeria. As a result, it is difficult to finance certain projects that can take us out of the woods.

Yes equipments can only be gotten from those who have the tech. However what percentage of any budget is used to buy such equipments? Not much. And not often. So when you add everything together, a 100 million dollar defense budget in China will be worth close to 400 million dollars in the US and at most 50 million dollars in Nigeria. If you now go to education budget and etc, the disparity will even be more. A drone that costs 20k dollars in Iran is being quoted to be worth over 200k dollars by US defense manufacturers and etc. That is the real world we have today

DoTheNeedful:
Your comparison of cost of the differing value of money across countries does not always cut it at the macro level. Projects such as roads, power generation and other large scale infrastructures are usually contracted out to foreign countries who would charge you in dollars. If a country is not making enough money in dollar, it becomes difficult to execute world class infrastructures. This is one of the reasons Nigeria is lacking in real development.

It cuts it to a large extent and that is why Europe and the US are losing business to the Chinese and it is why Dangote used Indians to build his refinery etc etc. Then any company can train and use some local people for many of their tasks so as to reduce costs. All the manual labor will of course be local at less than a tenth of the cost in high income countries. For workers from their own countries you will need to pay the dollars. However the bulk of any budget in any country will be local personnel costs which is very cheap in low income countries

DoTheNeedful:
Regardless of how you slice it, Nigeria is a poor country even without corruption. Besides, I think you have a comprehension problem. The only reason I used Saudi is because we are talking about oil. All the countries we consider oil-rich explore far more than Nigeria and their entire population are not up to a state in some cases.

Qatar is the largest gas-producing country in the world, but their population is less than Anambra state. The earlier we know that Nigeria has a revenue problem the better. $45bn annual revenue is very low for a country of 250 million people. There is no way to justify it. We need to be honest with ourselves.

Yes Nigeria has a revenue problem which has been massively reduced by the current government but what one dollar can do in Nigeria, twenty dollars may not be able to do it in some high income countries

DoTheNeedful:
Funny thing is that you are likely a graduate. Comments like this make question the quality of youths we have in Nigeria. We have youths who are shallow in information and context. They have little idea of numbers and weak understanding of macro and micro economic numbers.

Let's assume our leaders don't steal, Nigeria is still a very poor country. That is the fact many of you don't realize or are poorly equipped to understand.

Reno's assertion is very correct. Nigeria is not an oil-rich country but an oil-poor country.

First, our entire oil reserves is nothing compare to countries like Kuwait, Saudi, Qatar, UAE, Iran and Russia. These are examples of oil-rich countries. What's more, our country has more population than these countries. Iran and Russia which are the largest of these countries have less than half our population.

A country like Saudi produced 10 million barrels of oil per day before the Iran war. Nigeria in contrast, produces around 1.6 million. Whereas, the population of Saudi is 35 million, ours is 250 million. There is also a strong correlation between the amount of oil a country can produce and quantity of oil reserves in that country. For an average Nigerian to have the same oil production per capita as an average Saudi citizen, Nigeria would need to produce around 70 million barrels of oil per day, which is impossible. For context, the entire world produced around 100 million barrels per day before the Iran war.

I, like most Nigerians, believe that corruption is our biggest problem. But, we need to educate ourselves that even without corruption, our country is very poor, given our population. Unfortunately, many Nigerians believe we are rich.

The entire revenue of Nigeria before politicians start stealing from it is around $45bn. $45bn cannot deliver real goods for a country like Nigeria. For your information, California state budgeted $140bn just for education this year. Compare us to other African countries, then you would realize how poor we are are. South Africa, with a population 65 million, had a revenue of $127bn last year. Egypt with half of our population made $55bn last year.

The fact is that we need more private investments in our economy, more efficient tax collection, sustainable power supply to trigger SMEs and security for us to boost our revenue. There is a level of revenue a country could make that would make the living standard of citizens of such country resistant to corruption.

Most of these oil-rich countries are very corrupt, but their citizens still lead better quality of lives than Nigerians. Putin and many Russian officials are very corrupt. The Emirs in the Middle East treat their countries' oil wealth almost as their personal wealth, which is worse that the stealing we have in Nigeria. However, their citizens enjoy far better high quality of lives. The politicians in Lagos State are probably the most corrupt in Nigeria, but Lagos State still delivers more top notch projects than other states in Nigeria because they have more revenue.

You are guilty of the same thing you are accusing him of

You can't just be comparing nominal figures without considering the cost of living. A single person earning 1200 dollars per annum in Nigeria isn't necessarily poor while someone earning 20k dollars per annum in Saudi Arabia or the USA is poor. 1.6 million barrels per day of oil in Nigeria is more than sixteen million bpd in Saudi Arabia unless when you are buying Tesla cars, iphones and etc which Nigerians generally don't buy. Nigeria isn't poor but it has a challenge of good management. A country where the average couple fully own their own home before their fifties isn't a poor country.
Nigeria can be described as oil rich since the oil is there. It is also coal rich, cocoa rich, cassava rich, groundnut rich and etc. It has all these things in excess

If the question is was General Gowon right to renege on the Aburi Accord.

Let it be clear that he was right. Nigeria was founded via a constitution, the independence constitution and a note signed by two military officers is not above that constitution and the agreement therein The constitution says autonomy should be granted to any group on request and that was how the Midwest became a state before the military adventure into politics. To start a war over any minority group being given a state can not be justified by any means because they have a right to the state regardless of whatever was agreed upon by anybody or group of people

The reform on direct primary is a good development but the recognition of only financial members that pay annual dues is also important. Only financial members should be able to vote in direct primaries

On General Gowon and the civil war

Was General Gowon right to renege on the agreement signed in Aburi?

He was a soldier and not the owner of Nigeria. He was a civil servant and not even an elected leader. He had no right to sign any agreement at all on behalf of Nigeria and definitely not without consulting stakeholders back home. He was wrong to unilaterally sign any agreement with Colonel Ojukwu.

Was Colonel Ojukwu right to go to war over state creation for the Eastern minorities? Nobody wants their territory to be reduced and that is understandable but Colonel Ojukwu was wrong to go to war because a new state was created for the Eastern minorities as other states were created for others across the nation too. It is simply not a sufficient reason to go to war.

What Colonel Ojukwu should have done that would have been applauded by onlookers was to ask for a referendum before state creation. He should have insisted that he would not accept a state creation by fiat or military decree. It would have created a precedent. He could also have insisted on a return to democracy. If the Federal side had insisted on war after that, then they would have lost the war. Providence would have ensured that. God would have ensured they lost.

General Gowon saying shots were hitting palm trees can be hurtful but in reality the number of people that died from firearms would not be very high on both sides over the three years. There were no deliberate killings of civilians by the federal forces except the incident at Asaba. When the federal side take over a city, the Biafran forces would move out and vice versa. Casualties were mainly combatants during shoot outs but the main tragedy of the war were the around five hundred thousand civilians including children that died of starvation during the blockade imposed by the federal troops. The Biafran forces that refused to surrender when they only controlled insignificant territory and the federal troops that imposed the blockade ought to share in the blame. While apportioning blame, also remember that if not for the blockade, the war can or will probably still be going on today. There are examples of such wars that went on for a very long time. Boko Haram is still going on even in Nigeria. There is therefore a bright side to every story

If somebody is going to be blamed or criticized for anything, then it should also be pointed out what they should have done better. Should the whole country have agreed with Colonel Ojukwu that the Eastern minorities must not have autonomy? If you were the federal government would you have preferred to continue fighting the war for decades rather than force the Biafran forces to surrender?

I can list many instances even in Yoruba history not to talk of world history where a blockade was used to force a surrender. There are such examples even in the Bible. It is a part of war and interesting things don't happen during wars. Biafra would have blockaded Nigeria under the same circumstances. You don't blame anyone for something you yourself would have done

Therefore if there are other things done wrong by General Gowon, they should be clearly stated but if the things he is being accused of are things that any fair minded person in his position would have done then it would be unfair to brand him as the villain of the Biafran war. The way he was later relieved of his position by his subordinates show that they did not see him as a bad person but they just felt he ought to retire.

The corporate Affairs commission can be a top source of revenue

According to AI, there are over three hundred million active bank accounts in the country and at least five percent of them are active current accounts many of which are corporate accounts.

Five percent of three hundred million is fifteen million and we can assume at least five million of these accounts are owned by corporate bodies duly registered at the CAC

Also there is another statistics saying there are forty one million informal SMEs in the country which means the number of bank accounts used by businesses can be as much as twenty million but many of them use savings account informally instead of current

If the CAC asks for just five thousand naira a year for registry maintenance services from all businesses using a CAC registration number then the income will be fifty billion naira per annum if they capture ten million businesses. They just need to tell banks to freeze any bank account that does not pay. Then there can be a law to track any bank account that has a high turnover and compel the owners to register business names. If that happens it can be possible to capture forty million businesses and the CAC will be generating 200 billion naira per annum for the federal government and that is around one percent of the income from oil and gas.

Then after paying the proposed annual registry maintenance fees, the companies would be statutorily expected to file PAYE, VAT and CIT returns to the States and federal government as the case maybe. That will be a minimum of forty million mostly new people in the personal income tax net.

In a well organized country, if you have a business and you can't pay yourself a minimum wage, then government will feel obliged to find you a job that can pay more than minimum wage so that you can pay personal income tax

These monies are in the country but the main institutions tapping into it like straw into a bottle of coca cola are the churches. They collect money in ways which should be legal only for government.

Should it be legal for a registered company to have no tax paying worker?

One would think it should not be legal especially if the minimum wage in the country is taxable and if there is no policy that says poor people must not be taxed. Why would you register a company if you do not have even one worker? And why would you say poor people must not be taxed if the agreed upon minimum wage in the country is high enough?. The tax should always already be added to the minimum wage before fixing it. So when a minimum wage is fixed, poor people are not paying tax because the tax to be paid was added to the wage

Also, there should be an annual registration fee for registered companies. This fee should be a very small amount paid to the Corporate Affairs Commission annually because they are maintaining your venture in their register. It should not be more than a few thousand naira per annum. It should be low and insignificant. The fact that you pay this amount every year is proof that you are in business and it is also proof that you value the business. It is proof too that you have at least one worker that should be paid at least the minimum wage and you therefore have no excuse not to file PAYE returns and also VAT returns if you are a company that add value before you sell.

Then since the traditional rulers in the country are idle and are complaining of not being given constitutional roles, they can talk to the government and ask to be given the role of helping to collect PAYE and VAT for the state and federal government respectively for a small percentage of the revenue collected in their domains which they can then use for their domains and not for personal use. A small city of fifty thousand people spends at least 100 million naira every day.

Since the FG has doubled down on VAT and CIT collection they need to make all states meet their potential and traditional rulers and their councils can help within their domain while they are paid a part of what they help collect as cost of collection

Is President Tinubu to be blamed for the insecurity in the country?

When you are deliberately and consciously not doing your best, then you are to be blamed for any adverse outcome. If you did your best and failed then no right thinking person will blame you President Tinubu knows the people responsible for the insecurity in the country and he has chosen consciously to not move against them possibly because they are his political allies and he is expecting them to commandeer reelection votes for him. Meanwhile Nigerians are killed regularly.

However there is a reason he does not carry all the blame which is that he is in full support of the creation of state police which will mean a decentralization of security in the country. State police is not enough though as what is needed is a full decentralization of security which will mean private individuals that use government security will no longer use the government security institutions but the private sector. There is a market for armed private security in the country that can easily employ fifty thousand people.

What is needed are operating licenses to be given to any properly registered for profit security outfit in addition to the outfits owned by government tiers. The private companies will be involved in security while the government outfits will be involved in security and law enforcement. This is the only arrangement that can end the killings going on in the country. Anybody not in support of it that wants to be President should explain to Nigerians how they intend to tackle the challenge of insecurity.

The current President is to be blamed for the insecurity in the country because of his conscious inaction while he can not be blamed fully because he is in full support of the only viable solution

Implications of the spread of UME candidates

Under the assumption that a UME candidate will only register in a city or within a state where he or she lives then from the data in the link below if correct because it is not directly from JAMB

Kaduna and Abuja have a population similar to Lagos currently. They are each up to ninety percent of Lagos population

Osun state has more population than Anambra state under the assumption that the residents of both states go to university at the same or similar rates.



No matter how educationally backward Kano state is, it can hardly be possible for Kano state's total population to be much more than the population of Kaduna state and if Kano and say Katsina have the same rate of university attendance then Kano is just above double the population of Katsina state. This is probably true because digital data like active sim cards put Kano at more than Oyo state but far below Lagos than is believed by Nigerians

However a disruptor might be students relocating from their home states to go and write UME in a state other than their state of residence which often are states that host popular universities where the students of those universities tutor them or even help them cheat






https://myschool.ng/news/jamb-2026-utme-registered-candidates-in-each-state