isimili:

though i know that i am not tribalistic and hate and comdemn tribalism completely, come to think about things, it is true that all inec chairmen many have been from the south east.

given this, it might be a good idea to try someone from the north, south or west of nigeria on the proviso that such a person is only being selected because they are intelligent, patriotic, credible and committed to taking forward our democracy without fear or favour. One person i must urge jonathan to stay away from is mrs Adejumo who conducted the ekiti elections and ran away for the reasons she claimed only to return and announce the same results she claimed that her conscience would not allow her to announce.
Next victim certainly will be Ogbulafor. Wonder what the 28 governors will do when this happens. Democracy in Nigeria will transcend to a new height with the departure of these men and a few others like them. We want change and change we must have. And now too!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

All INEC chair have been from the SE and the SS in almost equal number.

OgidiBoy:


Are you sure his not Nigerian ? all these time I thought the dude was a Nigerian

Read the quotes implying irony-opposite of what you mean? He is of course a bloody Yoruba

bk/babe99

How do you decipher ''Ibo'' accent from a video (even live) ''seeing that you are not Nigerian'' (note the quotes)??

INEC chair: No more Igbo
People & Politics Mar 25, 2010 By Ochereome Nnanna

THERE has been some excitement since the news broke that, after all, there might be a change of guards at the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). If this happens, it will further heighten the expectation that Acting President Goodluck Jonathan may have chosen to chart a course that is not business as usual. The INEC Board led by Professor Maurice Iwu was already looking forward to conducting the next general elections.

Vanguard Newspapers had on Monday, March 22, 2010 in its lead story, quoted a Presidency source as saying that six names had been short-listed for the INEC Chair. These were Professor Attahiru Jega, a former President of the Academic Staff Union of Universities; Dr Jibrin Ibrahim, an apparent dark horse; retired Major General Ishola Williams, the President of the Nigeria chapter of Transparency International; former Minister of Information and Communications, Professor Dora Akunyili; former Military Governor of Kaduna State, retired Col Abubakar Umar and former President of the Nigeria Bar Association, Mr Olisa Agbakoba.

All these are interesting names. Since we have less than three months to the time the next INEC Chair will assume office, it is safe to suppose that the Acting President will be making the appointment since it is unlikely that the electoral reforms would have been concluded. Therefore, it is absolutely essential to ensure that the next person to occupy that hot seat must be a person whose integrity is above suspicion. Such a person must be absolutely above partisan politics. Luckily, all the names listed are within this categorisation, even though some are more so than others.

Let me start by advocating that the next INEC Chair should not be of Igbo stock, neither should he/she come from the South-South. These two groups have exclusively produced all our electoral umpires till date since independence. We must do away with this quaint tradition of parcelling out some jobs exclusively to any part of the country, for whatever reasons. There is nothing that says only people of the South East and South-South must preside over our elections, just as nothing in our laws suggests that only Northerners and (when it is convenient) South Westerners must preside over the affairs of the nation. The next INEC Chair must, therefore, be a Yoruba or Northerner. I find it suspicious that these two sections of Nigeria that have swapped political power between them since the end of the civil war have never complained about not heading the Electoral Commission.

Apart from that, we don’t want any partisan politician as INEC Chair anymore. Professor Akunyili, as competent as she is for the job, is a politician, a very ambitious and power-hungry one at that. Members of her Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) have accused her of playing subterranean roles in ensuring that Professor Chukwuma Soludo, the party’s candidate in the last election in Anambra State, failed. It may not be true, but she has not debunked this allegation. If Akunyili is to be brought back to government, let her be given the challenging task of rebuilding our electric power infrastructure. She does exceptionally well in non-politically sensitive posts.

My number one nominee for the INEC Chair is Col. Umar. He is above politics and above suspicion. He is not a tribalist, regionalist or religious fundamentalist. He is a true patriot who can look anyone in the face and refuse to be used. This is the time in Nigeria’s history to bring the likes of Col. Umar back into the centre stage of our governance if we want to start moving forward.

My second nominee is Major General Ishola Williams. He is exactly the Yoruba copy of Abubakar Umar – totally above all primordial political mundanities. Unlike typical partisan candidates, I cannot imagine Umar or Williams descending so low as to work for the success or failure of any particular candidates. I am positive that even the appointing authorities will not be able to sway these two gentlemen.

Umar and Williams are strong enough to resign their appointment if the ruling party or president resorts to arm-twisting the Commission, possibly through the denial of adequate funding; or the many dirty tricks that former President Olusegun Obasanjo resorted to and Dr Abel Guobadia and Professor Iwu played along.

With Umar or Williams in the INEC saddle, Nigeria can afford to take her time and reform the electoral processes. Both of them have been exposed to the highest level of intrigues in the Nigerian political terrain even in the blood-soaked military era and came out spotless. But because they are clean and straight with the truth, the system has found a way to sideline them because the Olusegun Obasanjo type of Nigeria does not like genuine and strong materials in the system for fear that they will rock their post-civil war boat.

Otherwise, how on earth can a Col. Umar be alive, strong and active and Obasanjo will search the whole North and only a terminally sick Umaru Yar’Adua will be found worthy to be given the affairs of Nigeria to govern? Conversely, how can people of proven integrity like Williams be there and only an Obasanjo, who was convicted for coup plotting, would be found by the North to be worthy of being given the presidency of Nigeria in preference to the murdered Chief Moshood Abiola?

Dr Goodluck Jonathan must continue to demonstrate that Nigeria is no longer interested in recycling proven deadwoods and political hypocrites just because it favours the interest of the equally discredited few who have ruined this country and are not tired of doing so.

I do not remember any INEC chairman who is not of SE or SS origin. INEC chair is not Igbo or SS''s birthright. Yoruba or the North should please take up the position and let's see how they run things there.

Guys easy. Those guys could as well be congolese or Haitians. At most they could be bk/babe99 and his fellow ghetto boy fighting over crumbs thrown at them by white pep. To begin with, there is no proof they are Nigerians, and if they are, they must both be Yoruba - as na Yoruba sabi dance owambe and na dem full London dey misbehave.

EzeUche:

Igbo leaders will not like this.

This Ijaw better not irritate the Ndi Igbo.

You kidding, right?

Another avenue to steal. Fasola (whatever that means) should first account for the stolen billions he is accused of, before engineering another strategy to steal even more. Oh! I see, I am not a Lagosian, and so I should not concern myself with Lagos matter. Hhaaahh!

Child traffickers. Should be in the GBRs

Name sounds familar?

Why I dragged my twins, aged 6, into drug trade’ 
Written by Shehu Abubakar, who was in Lagos     
Friday, 09 April 2010 21:16 
Not child’s play: Mulikat’s twins show their burdens
The parents of a set of six-year old twins (names withheld) found wrapped with 700 grams of cocaine while their mother, Mrs Mulikat Adebukola Jimoh concealed 3.350 kilograms of the same substance in her bosom, underwear and buttocks, may not be spared from the long arms of the law. Chairman and Chief Executive of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Mallam Ahmadu Giade, whose agency made the arrest, said Mulika and her husband will be prosecuted for drug trafficking and child abuse. He said the agency will sacrifice them to the long arms of the law for dragging innocent children into the illicit drug deal.
Mulikat and her set of twins who were both found with large quantities of cocaine, were nabbed along with her husband and father of the twins, 46-year-old Jimoh Oladega Bashir at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos, by operatives of the drug law enforcement agency when they were about boarding an Arik Air flight to London. When the family arrived the departure wing of the Lagos airport in readiness to depart the country, the twins who knew nothing about the contents of their napkins, were seen by officials loitering in the hall.

Though Jimoh was not found with any quantity of drugs at the time of his arrest, he however, told Weekly Trust that some people contacted him to carry the drugs for them but he refused before his wife accepted to carry the drugs and convinced him to accept the deal for a fee of 3,000 pounds sterling and a certain quantity of the drugs as their pay. Jimoh did not deny knowledge of the trafficking deal allegedly entered into by his wife.

“They were to pay us 3,000 pounds while some quantity of the drugs would have been given to us. Initially, I rejected the suggestion but they convinced my wife who persuaded me to do it. My son is at Fountain University, Oshogbo and I need to pay school fees,” Jimoh said.

Jimoh and his wife, Mulikat who spoke to Weekly Trust at separate interviews, said they got involved in the deal so as to be able to pay the school fees of their children including the senior one who is at Fountain University, Oshogbo. They said they were recently duped of N2.2 million which affected their economy and the supermarket they were operating at the Ajah area of Lagos. They said they agreed to traffic the illicit drugs to enable them get some money to pay their children’s school fees and re-stock the supermarket.

Mulikat who could not say what exactly was taking the family to London, said, “I have problem with my children’s school fees. I have six children and I intend to give them good education. I also have younger ones and an aged parent to take care of. They asked me to swallow the drugs but I was afraid, that was why I packed them on my body,” she stated.

Confirming the arrest, Chairman and Chief Executive of the NDLEA, Mallam Ahmadu Giade, said the underage twins have since been released to the relations of their parents, adding, “the action of the couple is callous, morally depraved and unacceptable. Apart from charging them on the grounds of drug trafficking, they will also be charged for child abuse. It is unlawful for them to take advantage of the kid’s innocence and involve them in a serious criminal act. No society will overlook such act of debasement,” Giade warned.

He said investigations into the matter with a view to arrest all those involved is still going on. He assured that efforts are being made to ensure that all those involved within and outside the country are arrested, adding that the couple will soon be charged to court.

Okorodudu is either Delta state (70 % probability) or Edo state (30 % probability)

Is there any other way they can make Jonathan cease to be the acting president (except by bringing Yaradua back to his seat) or at least remaining the VP (except by annulling Yaradua's election)?

Is there anyone of them who does not claim university/polytech education? Even Fayose, Akala and Orji Kalu (not to talk of the myriad of northern governors) are ''graduates''. Make I hear word, biko!

Egusi: Mexico to apologise to Nigerian for illegal detention

Agency reporter


Mexican authorities are now under pressure to apologise to the family of a United States-based Nigerian, Okoronkwo Umeham, who was illegally detained for two days while crossing the American border into Mexico on a visit last week, Empowered Newswire reports.


US media reports said that Okoronkwo Umeham, 73, who is also a US citizen, spent two days in a Mexican jail in the town of Tijuana because Mexican border guards who are English illiterates mistook ingredients of an Igbo soup, Egusi, he was taking to his relative in Mexico for illegal drugs.

Although the Nigerian has now been released after the Mexicans discovered their error, his family is insisting on an apology.

His wife, Mrs Gail Umeham, said after his release from two days of detention that her husband had been humiliated by the experience. "It would have been nice if someone had said sorry," she was reported to have demanded, according to media reports in the US.

Umeham, who works as a social worker in San Diego, US, was detained while crossing the border from San Diego to Tijuana last week because overzealous Mexican border inspectors thought he was carrying a stimulant popular in East Africa but illegal in Mexico called khat.

But Umeham was also taking along dried fish, vegetables and spices, to be used to prepare a famous and spicy Igbo soup to a younger relative, Nnanna Nwafor, who lives in Tijuana, Mexico.

Curiously, Umeham had taken the same ingredients to Nnanna last September without any incident and turned them over to inspectors during his last visit, not knowing they were suspicious already.

Associated Press reports that the Mexican inspectors asked if the labeled packages contained marijuana, and Umeham replied in the negative. But the language difference did'nt allow Umeham to explain what they were and the Mexicans offered no interpreters, preferring instead to detain the 73-year old man.

According to his own accounts, Umeham said Mexican authorities put him in jail, telling him they needed to test the suspicious materials.

Local US media reports quoted a Mexican official, Javier Cossio, the head of the federal attorney general's office in Tijuana, having confirmed Umeham's arrest.





Cossio told the San Diego Union-Tribune, a US newspaper that contents of the bags that Umeham was carrying had to be tested and that Umeham had to be checked for drug use.


But afterwards, the Mexican authorities concluded "he was not carrying any drugs," nor did Umeham tested positive for any drug.


Nigerian diplomats in Mexico could not be reached as at press time to comment. But Umeham's American citizenship is expected to also enhance his right to redress if the Mexicans refuse to apologise for the infringement on his freedom of movement.


Umeham has lived in San Diego for 12 years, and the vegetables mistaken by the Mexicans were still in bags from San Diego's African Caribbean Food store when the Mexican guards mistook them for khat.


"The whole situation was really unnecessary," Umeham told another news agency, UPI. "It shouldn't happen to anybody."

Kenyan wife of Nigerian fraudster, Nigerian jailed in Britain
THE Kenyan wife of a Nigerian fugitive fraudster was jailed for four years in Britain, on Wednesday, for the role she played in mortgage fraud.

Ruth Ayinde-Azeez, 26, a care home assistant, who led a life of luxury thanks to an £8 million mortgage fraud, sobbed as she was sentenced, on Wednesday.

A Nigerian, Isaac Matthews, 42, of Chatham, Kent, was sentenced to six years in jail.

Ruth Ayinde-Azeez lived in a six-bedroom mansion containing 12 plasma TVs and drove around in a top-of-the range Bentley and Land Rover.

She took lavish holidays in Dubai and the south of France, kept £1.6 million in her bank accounts and blew huge sums at upmarket bars and restaurants.

But her lifestyle was funded by crime, Southwark Crown Court heard.

Her husband, Victor, a fraudster who is on the run overseas, led a mortgage con gang which plundered nearly £6 million from high street banks in just six weeks using a network of front companies and crooked solicitors.

The court heard that Ruth Ayinde-Azeez was sucked into the criminal world of her husband and came to enjoy the trappings of excessive wealth.

The Kenyan national laundered £1.25 million and was jailed, on Wednesday, for four years for her part in the fraud.

‘We have on our hands a very serious social, cultural and security problems due to the invasion of the herdsmen some of whom are from Chad, Niger and Mali. Unfortunately they are all armed with guns and machetes. They forcefully live in our ancestral lands which they now seize by force,’ Olatunde stated adding that cases of violent robbery and despoil of minors are constantly associated with the herdsmen.

Yoruba cowards are being overun by Fulani right in the middle of ngbatiland? Na wao Where is Awo?

Herdsmen strike in Ekiti, kill police corporal, two villagers wounded
By Adewale AdeoyePublished TodayNewsRating: Unrated

Fulani herdsmen have killed a police Corporal identified as Shuaib, a native of Edo State who until his death was the head of a little community police station located at Irele, North East of Ekiti State. The dawn attack on Wednesday left two peasants critically wounded.

The incidence happened barely a week after the Northern city of Jos witnessed violent attacks by herdsmen on locals. The Jos incidence claimed hundreds of deaths, including but not limited to women and children.

Police sources at Ikole Ekiti, the chief town in the area, claimed that a ‘bush-hunt’ for the murderers lasted for two days but did not yield results until last Friday when three of the herdsmen were arrested. Another suspect was arrested at Ogbe, on the community’s market day. Ogbe is a nuclear settlement on the fringe, between Kogi and Ekiti States.

Eyewitnesses claimed that in the early hours of Wednesday, two natives had complained to the local police authority after several cows owned by the herdsmen had invaded subsistent farms, eating much of the cash crops. Yam tubers destroyed or eaten were said to be in hundreds. The killing of the police man, locals claimed, marked the odd peak of frequent skirmishes that had characterized the relationship between natives and the herdsmen for close to half a decade.

‘The herdsmen come to our farms all the time. We are at their mercy. In this latest case, they invaded the farms cockcrow last Wednesday after which they wounded several of the farm owners. The owners reported the incidence to the police station from where a corporal was sent to arrest the herdsmen. When they sighted the policeman, they viciously attacked and killed him,’ an old farmer whose family of five spends most of their days working and sleeping on their farmland told The Nation. He said since the recent attack, his family has relocated into his ancestral home in the centre of the small, peaceful community.

He said the tow attacked peasants were Tiv, natives of Benue State, who recently migrated into the area in large numbers for farming. Many of the Tiv were said to be victims of past ethnic clashes in Taraba state where many of them were displaced due to the year-long fighting with their Junkun neighbours in 2004.

Mr Sola Olatunde, an indigene of Ekiti State and member of the Ekiti Development Association, EDA said the past one decade has seen what he called the invasion of Ekiti and many states in the South West by ‘herdsmen that have no respect nor understanding of the customs, tradition and ownership of land by families and communities.’ He said the grazing activities of the cattles owned by the herdsmen have led to the depletion of forestland in Ekiti while raising the specter of serious ethnic conflict in the entire South West region.

‘We have on our hands a very serious social, cultural and security problems due to the invasion of the herdsmen some of whom are from Chad, Niger and Mali. Unfortunately they are all armed with guns and machetes. They forcefully live in our ancestral lands which they now seize by force,’ Olatunde stated adding that cases of violent robbery and despoil of minors are constantly associated with the herdsmen.

A community leader in Irele, Dr Niyi Oluwafemi, who is a medical doctor, told The Nation that herdsmen in the area occasionally block the new trunk-B road that runs from Ikole to the surrounding towns and villages with their cattles, leading to untold hardship for commuters. He said he has confidence in the ability of the police to tackle the menace.
http://thenationonlineng.net/web2/articles/40364/1/Herdsmen-strike-in-Ekiti-kill-police-corporal-two-villagers-wounded/Page1.html

FCMB manager fleeces bank with 35 fake accounts
By Toyosi Ogunseye, Published: Sunday, 21 Mar 2010

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has arrested a former bank manager with First City Monument Bank, in Katsina State, Mrs. Zainab Rufai Yusuf, for allegedly using fake accounts to fleece the bank of millions of naira.



Yusuf, SUNDAY PUNCH gathered, allegedly opened 35 fake accounts, granted bogus loans, forged security documents, signed fake overdrafts, as well as issued dud cheques for fraudulent purposes.



The EFCC Head of Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Babafemi, who spoke to our correspondent on Saturday, confirmed the arrest.



According to him, the ex-bank manager was arrested after she allegedly connived with a customer to arbitrarily grant N1m loan to each of the 35 accounts using fraudulent documents



A top official of the bank, who craved anonymity, told our correspondent that the bank was the one that reported the matter to the EFCC, adding, “We don‘t condone illegal practices. She has been shown her way out.”



Curiously, however, the bank refused to issue an official reaction when our correspondent contacted it.



But Babafemi, who described Yusuf‘s alleged offence as a ‘mega fraud,’ added that the anti-graft agency would continue to go after fraudulent characters in the banking industry.



He said, “If you remember, some of the ousted bank chiefs were given the booth because they granted bogus loans to individuals. Now this has rubbed off on other categories of staff in the sector. It was what the former managing directors did that led to their prosecution that we arrested Yusuf for.”



It was learnt that the ex-manager‘s journey to EFCC‘s detention started with the loans she approved for two salary accounts owned by the Managing Director of Maslaha Motors and Safalma Oil, Mr. Mansur Ali Mash, in Katsina State.



According to Babafemi, the commission‘s investigations showed that Yusuf benefited from the loans to the extent that they became unserviceable by Mash.



Babafemi explained, “Various large amounts were pushed into the accounts and this attracted a query from the bank‘s regional office in Kano for their non-performance.



“When the heat became too much for Yusuf to bear, she decided to deceive the regional office by allegedly creating 35 new accounts and granting all the accounts an overdraft facility of N1m each with the hope that she will service Mash‘s accounts with the N35m from all the new accounts. But she needed external help to do this. So she contacted Mash, who agreed to the plan.



“With pressure from the head office, Yusuf decided to fill one hole by digging new ones. She once again conspired with Mash, the owner of the two non-performing accounts, to open 35 new ones and secured temporary overdraft facility of N1m each to the accounts thus bringing the overdraft sum to N35m.”



The EFCC spokesman, who said Mash allegedly provided 35 persons to act as the owners of the account, added that Yusuf abused her office by waiving all banking procedures for opening of accounts.



The banker, he added, accepted fake documents in opening the accounts.



The spokesman said, “It was important for the suspects to make the 35 accounts look genuine as possible, so they had to submit some documents. Unfortunately, they couldn‘t even get authentic documents to perpetrate the fraud.



“Yusuf approved the production and acceptance of all the forged security documents needed for opening an account especially the Certificate of Occupancy, which is necessary when a bank is granting a customer an overdraft.



“Despite the fact that Mash had allegedly sourced for 35 persons to front as owners of the accounts, it was learnt that Yusuf still allowed him to sign all the documents submitted for the processing of the overdrafts.”



Babafemi said, “In addition to the forgery that had been perpetrated, Yusuf granted Mash another N2.5m loan and allowed him to personally sign all the documents submitted for the processing of the overdrafts.”



After allegedly signing all the documents for the temporary loans, Mash withdrew all the money from the 35 accounts himself. The spokesman said, “In order to make withdrawal easy, Yusuf issued cheques and counter-cheques from her office to Mash.



“All the transactions in this fraud were between these two principal suspects. We figured that the reason why they went to look for 35 people in the first place was because they needed 35 different passport photographs for the accounts because these people were not involved in the transactions.”



SUNDAY PUNCH learnt that in her statement, Yusuf admitted that she got N8.5m from the deal, while Mash got N21.5m and they have promised to refund the money to the bank.



Babafemi, however, said their promise to refund the money to the bank would not deter the anti-graft agency from prosecuting them.



Meanwhile, the bank was not forthcoming with an official reaction when our correspondent got in touch with it last Thursday.



The bank‘s head, Corporate Affairs, Mr. Tunde Sofowora, and his colleague, Mr. Remi Njoku, promised to send the bank‘s reaction to the story on Friday.



On Friday, Njoku kept calling the newsroom that he had sent the bank‘s reaction to the electronic mail addresses of THE PUNCH, the Editor of the SUNDAY PUNCH and our correspondent.



But nothing was found in these e-mail boxes even after our correspondent told Njoku that the mails he claimed that he sent were not delivered.

Ibime:

Typical Yoruba man.

Na their way. They reason with their amala mouth. South Africa is by far smaller than Nigeria but they get far more international respect than Nigeria What has size got to do with this when the most basic of things elude even the more-than-average person in Nigeria?

bk/babe97:

Ibos are known to use other names or Nationalities to commit crimes.

Just show one documented example as I have done. I will definitely congratulate you.