₦airaland Forum

The Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) has called on Boko Haram to lay down arms, and praised the efforts of the federal government to dialogue with the militants.  It also criticized those Nigerians who question Nigeria’s status as one united country.

In a strongly-worded communiqué, issued following a Board of Trustees (BOT) meeting chaired by Lt. Gen. Jeremiah Useni and a National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting chaired by Alhaji Aliko Mohammed, which SaharaReporters obtained in Abuja this afternoon, ACF told the militants: “Enough Is Enough.”

According to the statement, which was signed by ACF spokesperson, Anthony Sani, both meetings considered the festering security challenges posed by Boko Haram; ethno-religious crises in some states of the North; the spate of kidnappings and communal clashes across the South-East; the widespread armed robberies in the South-West; and the militant activism and oil bunkering in the South-South.

“The meetings agreed that the endorsement of dialogues by the federal government was praiseworthy,” the communiqué said, expressing appreciation of the efforts of Northern state governors in setting up a panel to help find a lasting solution to the country’s security challenges and calling on Nigerians to support the governments action.

“The meetings urged members of the Boko Haram to embrace the offer of dialogue by laying down their arms,” it further said.  “Enough is enough.”

Turning to those Nigerians who have called into question into question the “settled issue” of Nigeria as one united country, ACF said it considered expressions of ethnic nationalism as manifested by recent declaration of autonomy and hoisting of flags and anthems by some groups as unhelpful.   It noted that actions which promote cleavages along ethnic and religious lines are unlikely to inspire national solidarity that must go with our relative pluralism.

Given that background, ACF praised the actions of some religious leaders whom it said took it upon themselves to promote tolerance and accommodation between faiths through interdenominational breaking of fast as hoisted by Archbishop John Onaiyekan at Abuja; Archbishop Kaigama in Jos and many others who stood guard at places of worship while members of the opposite religion prayed. It therefore called on all religious, political as well as community leaders to follow suit for collective good.

On the debate over amending the constitution, ACF objected to the concern expressed by the presidency that further discussions of certain issues should stop.

“It was the considered view of the meetings that, given the fact that progress comes from change through robust debates, and the fact that democracy is a contest of ideas and reasons, the debates should continue provided it is conducted with decorum and sense of patriotism.”

“The meetings expressed concern with the current state of affairs in the New Nigerian Development Company, NNDC, and urged Northern state governments to look into it,” the statement said.  “The meetings regretted that oil exploration proceeds at snail speed in Northern Nigeria. In view of recent discoveries of crude oil in areas of similar geological character with Northern Nigeria, the meeting reiterates its call on federal government to expedite action on oil exploration.”


http://saharareporters.com/news-page/enough-enough-acf-tells-boko-haram-urges-sect-accept-dialogue

Nigerians dont talk on phone more than others, the truth is that calls are damn tooooooooooooooo expensive down here, I pay $30 for unlimited local calls,SMS and internet in Moscow...in naija we call it air time and money literally disappear into thin air when u make calls here!!

berem: World Class Burial? Na wa o! Nothing wey pesin no go hear. 50 million on burial alone! If they had used that money to take her to U.S for good medical treatment,the woman would have been alive! I smell a rotten egg somewhere!

When cancer knocks not even Obama can stand it if discovered late, Steve Jobs had all the money but he couldnt win it, the issue is not India or America bt early discovery, regular medcheck. I lost my mom to cancer, and lack of money and good doctors were not the reasons.

As for 50m, I hope they will spend double in building cancer sreening centre at least in their village....
may her soul rest in peace

I believe that every country hosting the Olympics always endeavors to out do its predecessor in a grandiose opening ceremony?

Do you think London succeeded in that quest?

Do you give it to the Brits or the Chinese?

London Olympics> https://www.nairaland.com/1002364/2012-olympics-opening-ceremony-pictures

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9xPO1bWkhk

Beijing Olympics > https://www.nairaland.com/158462/beijing-2008-olympics-opening-ceremony/2#2633753

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcqZfQ1f3J0

In all of this, has anybody asked if the so called BFI Group has the capacity to bring out Alscon out of ruins? At least rusal is well known same cannot be said of BFI group. What happens to Rusal scholarship students in People's Friendship University Russia??

Any insight as to it's content? I just hope that the multinationals that held the old one hostage did not have their way ....

Buhari is being presented (especially by Saharareporters) as probably the only Nigerian leader dead or alive that is incorruptible. Is it a matter of choosing a lesser devil or is he as they want us to believe? I’ve read one or two articles about some US$2.8 billion Midland Bank fraud associated with him. Can anyone provide more info?

If he is as clean as presented, then he needs to be celebrated by all, if he is fake, his PR manager should be celebrated in any case for doing a good image laundering job!

free2ryhme: funny enuff Theirs not being any crash incident with chanchangi airline

God forbid sha, but if enter that plane you will know that its just a matter of time if nothing is done about it

niddamugu: It is God that grants journey mercies. Even a plane on first test drive from factory could crash....

This God and prayer factor is exactly the problem we have in Nigeria, my dear, why not dislodge your brake and drive on 3rd mainland bridge, God will definitely grant you journey mercies.

We always want God to do our job, they are people responsible for making sure that our airlines are not air traps, let them do their job first and not transfer it to God. I believe in God and I also believe is sanity and competence simple.

Which Airline Do U Consider The Most Dangerous In Nigeria? Narrate Ur Experience

I flew a Chanchangi Airline from Port Harcourt to Lagos in 2009, I have never seen a more dilapidated airline in my life, there was nothing to differentiate it from a standard molue buses you find on the streets of Lagos, but because I was to fly out of Nigeria the next day, and this Chanchangi Airline was the only available option for me to get to Lagos, I took the risk, after we finally landed safely, I knelt down and thanked God...I said never again, but in a country where options are few, situations make people risk their lives daily, flying these moving caskets.

1. Onyeka Anyene;

2. Maimuna Anyene;

3. Noah Anyene;

4. Kamsiyona Anyene;

5. Kaiyenotochi Anyene;

Hurria Lawal;

Bakisumiadi Yindadi;

Ebuka Enuma;

Oluchi Onyeyiri;

Sunday Enuma;

George Moses;

Ogechi Njoku;

Stanford Obrutse;

Okeke Hope;

Rev. Ayodeji Cole; Ngozi Cole;

Ailende Ehi;

Oluwasegun Funmi Abiodun;

and Shehu Sahad Usman.

Others were:

Alade Martins;

Onita Jennifer (Mrs);

Onita Josephine;

Ike Ochonogo; Joy Alison;

John Ahmadu;

Akowe Fatokun Anjola;

Fatokun Olaoluwa;

Fatokun Ibukun;

Buhari Maikudi;

Amina Idris Bugaje;

Ajani Adenle;

IkeAbugu;

Adijolola Abraham;

Obot Emmanuel;

Otegbeye Hadiza;

Ehioghae Sunny;

Onwuriri Celestine;

Abikalio Otatoru;

Noris Kim;

Eyo Bassey;

Njoku Charles;

Anibaba Tosin;

Okocha Christopher;

Sobowale Femi;

Phillip Chukwu Ebuka;

Sparagano Lawrence;

Somolu Oluwakemi;

Ariyibi Temitope;

Meche Eke;

Ojugbana Amaka;

Ojugbana Christopher;

Buna Walter;

Coker Olumide;

Lilian Lass;

Mutittir Itsifanus;

Yusuf Alli;

Lt. Col. Jumbo Ochigbo;

Eribake Wale; Zhai Shuta;

Also on the list:

Wang Yu;

P. Awani;

O. Awani;

N. Chidiac;

Rijoel Dhose;

Li Hizha;

Apochi Godwin;

Lang Yi;


Yinusa Ahmed;

Faysal Inusa;

Mojekwu Adaobi;

Ibrahim D;

Bamaiyi Adamu;

Ifekowa Jones;

Peter Nosike;

Anthony Nwaokocha;

Mahmud Aliyu;

Nnadi John;

Akweze Elizabeth;

Dorothy Adedunni;

Echeidu Ibe;

Maria Okulehi;

Jennifer Ibe;

Okoko junjip;

Sarah Mshelia;

Ahmed Mbana;

Okonji Patrick;


Oyosoro Rajuli;

Oyosoro Ugbabio;

Kaikai Farida;

David Kolawole Fortune;

Eyinoluwa David Kolawole;

Kaltum Abubakar;

Dakawa Mahmud;

Patience Sunday Udoh;

Asuquo Iniebong;

Onemonelese Aimeihi;

Onyeagocha Chidinma;

Onyeagocha Ogechi;

Ike Okoye;

Amaka Raphael;

Ijeoma Onyinjuke;

Garba Abdul;

Aisha Abdul;

Benson Oluwayomi;

Anthony Opara;

Taiwo Lamidi;

Awodogan Olusanmi;

Obi Chinwe;

Shaibu Memuna;

Major I.G Mohammed;

Nagidi Ibrahim;

Attah Anthonia;

Shaibu Sam;

Ifeanyi Orakwe;

Obinna Akubueze;

Li Rui;

Xie Zhenfeng;

Oko Eseoghene;

Chukwuemeka Okere;

Adetunbi Adebiyi;

Ibrahim Mantakari;

Was Ruth;

Wasa Awiyetu;

Ojukwu Alvana;

Lawal Anakobe;

Nabil Garba;

Mohammed Falmata;

Ibrahim Jangana;

Okikiolu Olukayode;

Komolafe Olugbenga;

Dike Chinwe;

Dike Chike Ezugo;

Olusola Arokoyo;

Adetola Ayoola;

Akinola Olumodeji;

Olukoya Banji Saka Otaru;

Adeleke Oluwadamilare;

Yusuf Ibrahim;

Ikpohi Obiola; Aikhomu Ehimen;

Levi Ajuonuma;

Mbong Eventus.

http://www.businessdayonline.com/NG/index.php/news/284-breaking-news/38922-full-list-of-victims-in-dana-air-crash

A terrible day for the Anyene family, my heart is broken

All reasonable ppl love Chelsea!!!!

hrhobi1: they asked you for money , you say u no get , ok where the gold, no gold , so bear with them stingy woman

What a waste of spermatozoa... (got this from a diff thread, but i think it best describes this poster)

Conner44: okpa, ofe owerri, fiyor-fiyor, ofe onubu and pounded yam e.t.c

okpa fiyor-fiyor ))) I bet u are from ENUGU ))

shymmex: ^^^Why can't you change them to past tense?

When you see "are", change it to "were" - and change "is" to "was", clown.

transgendered, you are the biggest clown, if you didn't get the idea behind the post why not keep quiet instead of exposing how encyclopedic your ignorance can be!

IDENTIFY YOURSELF

I arrived Nigeria after being away for 4yrs studying in Europe, the next day I decided to visit a friend using a cab, 5mnts after, the cops stopped us, I was sitting comfortably at the back, not badly dressed and wearing black sunglasses, with the hope they were coming for the driver..to my surprise, they completely ignored the driver, asked me to come down and in the MOST RUDE WAY screamed "identify yourself", I tried giving them oyibo lecture on how he should have firstly identified himself politely and all those blablabla you can find in Europe,..shocking enough no police has ever stopped me in where I spent the last 4yrs, but just a day after I arrived, I received a wonderful welcome............ To cut the long story short, we spent nothing less than 30mnts, they wanted to know what I had in my wallet, pants, bag etc, they even wanted me to explain what I was doing with a CONDOM in my wallet, I swore not to give them 1 kobo, we screamed, we dialoged,, by that time spectators had already gathered,...Finally when they let me go, one of them SHAMELESSLY SAID "OGA, MAKE YOU HELP US FUEL OUR CAR NAW", ....

Seated in the taxi,the driver said that the only question they asked him was weda I be yahoo boy or abi my dad na rich man, according them, I dressed so flashy and expensive like yahoo or rich kid...

PS: Now my best friend is ASP so i reserve my comment but I believe that only the type of radical reform like the one done in Georgia will clean up the system.

I don't know if anyone has noticed that most times what we read is FG to build, FG to prosecute, FG, SG or LG to do this and that..almost every Wednesday we read of what FG is going to do..? Does it mean that the press ignores FG did or does it mean that on the long run FG,SG and LG never does?

Nigeriaaaaaaaaaaaaa is a wonder land...Just imagine, you know that bastard that rapped your mother, then you come to your community and say, I just want to mention his name, while can go ahead and rape your sister)))))))))funny government!!!

Ok, in case they have completely lost it in Aso villa, let me help them, you ARREST, PROSECUTE and GIVE CAP PUNISHMENT to terrorists and their sponsors.. not publishing their names )))

Nigeria I give up) ah ah!

But on a serious note DO PEOPLE ATTEND THESE CHURCHES OR PROGRAMMES as in jokes apart.

Mcdugull: @Mekky2010: so you rather hear your enemy tale how em hammer your sister than your friend ?Anyway 4ouk she most be 4ouked either way, onless other wise.....Lesbian

Either way I wouldn't want to hear frm anyone and my enemy cannot even nurse the idea of coming close to my sis, becos th consequences could be damning 2 hm. Anyway, hav one sis and sh is happily married, therefore I cruise with confidence )

As Radio Biafra resumes broadcast in London today, there’s palpable excitement in the South East.
Broadcasting from London, Radio Biafra would hit the airwave at 8pm today on 11870 kHz frequencies on the shortwave band. It will broadcast twice weekly for now.

According to the editorial board of the station, listeners in the Greater London area can tune into 94.3FM at the same time while those outside London and elsewhere in the world can follow the programme online by visiting www.radiobiafralondon.com and clicking on the daily broadcast play button.

According to Nnamdi Kanu, Director of Radio Biafra, in London, the reason for the resuscitation of the station is to “set a largely misinformed public free from the twin evil of tyrannical rule of a cabal of ill-educated and institutionally corrupt men and women and the sponsored sectarian killings directed against Christian southerners living in Northern Nigeria.”

He said that the station will also serve to articulate a solution to the plight of “impoverished and confused Igbo families abandoned by their leaders in Northern Nigeria to a fate worse than those endured by black slaves in plantations in the Americas,” adding: “Radio Biafra London will use and deploy every available resource to campaign for the rights of all oppressed indigenous peoples of Southern Nigeria to determine how they wish to structure their societies and live their lives. Radio Biafra London would broadcast debates on issues of national and international importance affecting the lives and rights of the indigenous peoples of Biafra and indeed indigenous people of all ethnic persuasions in Nigeria.”
Kanu warned those he called “looters, embezzlers, kidnappers, sponsors of terrorism, child traffickers, corrupt judges, crooked university lecturers, murderous Nigerian security forces and all thieving individuals masquerading as public officials who steal public funds,” adding: “These looters and workers of iniquity will be named and shamed.”

With the news of the return of Radio Biafra, most South easterners appear excited. Some of them told our reporters that they are looking forward to the broadcast of the station.
According to Mr. Chike Amadi, who lives in Aba, the return of Radio Biafra will keep the memory of the failed republic alive.
“I have heard that Radio Biafra is coming back. I am happy about it. Although Biafra failed, some of us in the South East will never forget it. With the radio station, the memory of Biafra will be alive.”

He advised those operating the station to concentrate in propagation things that would help the Igbo.
Also speaking on the return of the station, Emeka, a resident of Onitsha, said that Radio Biafra is coming at an auspicious time. According to him, “now that Igbo are being marginalized and killed such station would let the world know what is happening in Nigeria.”
He however regretted that the station was not broadcasting before the burial of former Biafran leader, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu. He said: “I am happy that the station is coming back. How I wish that it came back before Ojukwu was buried. If it had been broadcasting, Ojukwu’s Biafran feat could have been well amplified.”

From Enugu, Osita Igbokwe said that the return of Radio Biafra is one of the greatest news he has heard this year. He would want the station to always highlight the plights of the Igbo and help in the agitation for the 2015 presidency.
“In three years time, there will be another election. I believe that it’s time for an Igbo man to be president. Radio Biafra should help in the campaign for Igbo presidency,” he said.

http://www.sunnewsonline.com/webpages/news/national/2012/apr/21/national-21-04-2011-03.html

[quote author=Okija_juju]Guy!!

Imagine us gathered, sitted at a bar or pub talking about our sexcapades and the friend dating my sister starts talking about his. . . Imagine the trauma!!

Biko I cant. . . My sister or our friendship. . He cant have both!! NEVER!!![/quote]This is where the problem lies))) just imagine ur friend telling u ..meeehn last night eh, i delt with ur sis, tht ur sis is strong ohh )))) chei reall heart attack )))

sorry ohh, what is NAFDAC doing with 500 new staff or they sacked all their workers and are planning to replace them with new ones?

A Presidential panel has recommended the scrapping of both the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related Offenses Commission.
It said the two key anti-corruption agencies were performing the functions of the Nigeria Police Force.

http://www.punchng.com/news/fg-may-scrap-efcc-icpc-frsc-others/



Is it not better to scrap Nigerian police and ICPC and leave EFCC?

By Wole Soyinka

Culled from "Book of Tributes-life and times of Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu"[b][/b]

"Having mandated me to proclaim on your behalf and in your name, that Eastern Nigeria be a sovereign Independent Republic, now therefore, I Lieutenant Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, Military Governor of Eastern Nigeria, by virtue of the authority, and pursuant to the principles recited above, do hereby solemnly proclaim that the territory and region known as and called EASTERN Nigeria, together with her continental shelf and territorial waters shall henceforth be an independent sovereign state, of the name and title Republic of Biafra"

With these words, on May 30 of the year 1967, a young bearded man, thirty-four years of age in a fledgling nation that was barely seven years old, plunged that nation into hitherto uncharted waters, and inserted a battalion of question marks into the presumptions of nation-being on more levels than one. That declaration was not merely historic, it re-wrote the more familiar trajectories of colonialism, even as it implicitly served notice on the sacrosanct order of imperial givens. It moved the unarticulated question, when is a nation? away from simplistic political parameters-away from mere nomenclature and habitude – to the more critical area of morality and internal obligations.

It served notice on the conscience of the world, ripped apart the hollow claims of inheritance and replaced them with the hitherto subordinate yet logical assertiveness of a people’s will. Young and old, the literate and the uneducated; urban sophisticates and rural dwellers, citizen and soldier-all were compelled to re-examine their own situating in a world of close inter-relations and distant ideological blocs, bringing many to that basic question :Just when is a nation?

Throughout world history, many have died for, but without an awareness of the existential centrality of that question. The Biafran act of secession was one that could claim that its people had direct and absolute intimacy with the negative corollary of that question. Their brutal, immediately antecedent circumstances ensured that they could provide one of more truthful and urgent answers to the obverse of that question, which would then read: when is a nation not?

Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, thrown by Destiny onto that critical moment of truth as a leader, became the voice, the actualising agent of their overwhelming recognition. He heard the answers given by the interrogatory that proceeded from gross human violation, and he responded as became a leader. In so doing, he challenged the pietisms of former colonial masters and the sanctimonoussness of much of the world. He challenged an opportunistic contruct of nationhood mostly externally imposed, and sought to replace it under the most harrowing circumstances with a vital purpose that answered the purpose of humanity-which is not merely to survive, but to exist in dignity. The world might cavil; the ideologues of undialectical unity might shake their head in dubious appraisal and denounce it as reckless adventurism. This however was his reading, and even the most implacable enemy would hardly deny that his position transcended individual judgment that it rested firmly on the collective will of a people, while they awaited the decisiveness of a responsive leadership.

Even today, many will admit that, in this very nation, that question remains unresolved; that more and more people are probing that question; that all over the world, certainly in our own continent, multitudes are braving impossible odds, conceding immense sacrifice to contest the facile and complacent answer that whatever is, is divinely ordained, thus conferring the mantle of divinity to those whose spatial contrivances called nations continue to creak at the seams and consume human lives in millions.

Their mission is to conserve a sacrosanct order that was ever given human legitimacy as if it is not the very humanity that grants authority to the cohesion of any inert piece of real estate and thus, only such humanity contains, and can exercise a moral will in designating it a habitable and productive entity that truly deserves the designation of nation-being.

Humanity must be allowed to make its errors. Indeed errors are the unregistered provisions in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. There are however degrees and qualities of errors, and the most lamentable are those that proceed from the lack of courage to interrogate whatever humanity has merely happened upon, or has been imposed upon us as thinking humans, and failure to accept the resultant clamour and the antecedents of this clamour for change. This is what constitutes a primal error, a deficiency in responsive capabilities, a condition of mental enslavement.

Change is not an absolute however, but I acknowledged it to be the product of human curiosity, observation, creativity and transformative intelligence. Nor should change imply ,of necessity, the destruction of what is viable, what amplifies the value that already make us human, or bind us in the common pursuit of the amelioration of existence. Where stagnation, retrogression, or diminution of those very virtues, those very progressive qualities that make even self-fulfilment possible stare a people in the face however then, surely the iterative of change becomes irresistible and its horizons exert the pressure of inevitability. That immense call fell on the shoulders of our comrade Chukwuemeka, and he responded in the manner we all know, for better or for ill, but he was not found wanting in the hour of decision.

The error of Biafra is what we hear plenty of. Only rarely with dismissive condescension, are rightly attributed, those achievements against overwhelming odds that gave rise to that ancient adage: Necessity is the mother of invention, or even, Sweet are the uses of adversity. There were indeed cruelties here also, on Biafran soil, as on her opposing side, and there were needless prolongation of human suffering. Biafra became a byword for paranoia. There were politics that dug Biafra deeper and deeper into its self-dug bunker, from where the world became a blank surrounding, closing in despite apertures that were clearly visible to many, even from within.

A leader must accept responsibility for all such failings, with perhaps the meagre consolation that throughout the history of conflicts and especially of conflicts based on the righteous perception of wrongs; such has been the fate of the beleaguered. But it would be a greater injustice from all of us if we fail in the apportionment of the positive ,such as an inspirational leadership that held a people together and aroused an unprecedented level of creative adjustments, of practical inventiveness ,the like of which has yet to be recorded on our continent. What a pity that policy and suspicion has led to the squandering of such bequests!

The regrets, individual and collective, the triumph of the dominance of human spirit, no longer matter to the man whose passage among us we are gathered here to commemorate any more than the very questioning structures of human co-habitation. He who lived to embrace, to share bread and salt with his once implacable enemies, is no longer with us, yet he remains among us. In his lifetime, bitterness did turn so many pages towards the chapter of reconciliation, but has it truly brought mutual understanding?

Let us reflect on that question carefully today-yes a full half century later- as we bid farewell to one who did not flinch from the burden of choice, but boldly answered the summons of history.

As the saying goes the rest is also history.


http://saharareporters.com/article/wole-soyinkas-tribute-dim-odumegwu-ojukwu

careytommy: Why u dey fes?
You really expecting russia to support a developing country?

They should not just bring that woman out and abandon her half way, Russia's Business News Channels РБК just reported that other BRICS countries are equally supporting Kim but will chose not to do so openly.
These are the same countries screaming against US domination and why emerging markets should be given a chance.. we all know Kim will win, but if you chose to fight then why not go all out

One had wished that BRICS will take a common position queuing behind our own Iweala, however, at the end of a meeting between Russia's finance minister and Kim, Russia threw its weight behind Obama's choice.

Russia will back Jim Yong Kim, the U.S. nominee for the next World Bank head, Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said on Friday after meeting the candidate, who is in Moscow on his world tour to drum up support.

“Taking into account Mr. Kim’s considerable professional qualities as well as his experience and knowledge, the Russian Federation will support the candidacy of Jim Yong Kim during the voting by the bank’s board of directors,” the Russian Finance Ministry said in a statement.
The statement added that Mr. Kim had gained extensive experience working in Russia when he served in the World Health Organization (WHO).

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/international-news/russia-backs-us-nominee-to-head-world-bank/article2401780/?