[size=18pt]14th  January 2003 - BBC News
IMF warns West African Nations against creating a single currency, it says that Nigerian economic corruption would make it unfeasible[/size]

Officials at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned West African nations against creating a single currency, over fears that Nigerian involvement would undermine its credibility.
Monetary union would leave most participating countries worse-off than if they had retained their own currencies, the IMF warned.

Members of West African franc

Mali

Burkina Faso

Ivory Coast

Guinea-Bissau

Senegal

Niger

Benin

Togo 

The Fund warned over the inclusion of Nigeria, which has a troubled history of economic management.

Eight French-speaking countries in West Africa already use a common money, the CFA Franc, as members of the Communaute Financiere Africaine.

These countries are proposing to form by 2004 a single monetary union with English speaking countries including Ghana, Sierra Leone and Nigeria.

'Unsuitable'

The report said the size of the Nigerian economy meant any monetary union would be dominated by Nigeria.

Ecowas members

Ghana

Nigeria

Liberia

Sierra Leone

Gambia

Guinea


Yet the corruption in Nigeria, together with the country's tendency to engage in uncontrolled government spending, would make it an unsuitable partner, IMF researchers said.

Nigeria's dependence on oil - an unstable source of revenues due to volatile crude prices - was also highlighted as a cause for concern.

Several areas of the world have been considering the formation of a single currency following the successful launch of the euro across 12 European countries.

Supporters say a single currency can boost intra-regional trade by minimising transaction costs, and is likely to be more stable than individual currencies.

But it would also leave the countries' economies ruled by one central bank, making them vulnerable should emergency action - such as devaluation - be required.

^^ These are the same IMF that is enslaving us with loans that we do not need and insisting on the impoverishment of the masses, and recently praising our corrupt and clueless government.

incredible   !!

Foolishness of Obasanjo knows no bounds

The man is definitely an enemy of Nigeria

News story inserted 15th October 1965 (page 1)

[size=18pt]1st April 2003   -  The NY Times
Niger Delta Militants shut down Nigeria's Mighty Oil Wells[/size]

ESCRAVOS, Nigeria, March 29— Across the river from a freshly razed village, the ChevronTexaco Oil Export Terminal sits like a ghost town at the edge of the vast Niger Delta.

The oil wellheads planted all along these rivers stand idle, like so many stiff, shadeless trees. The riverine villages are mostly deserted, the waterways mostly empty.

The technicolor oil spills that gloss miles of river and creek are one of the only reminders of the sweet, rich crude beneath these riverbeds that has made Nigeria the world's sixth-largest oil producer and the fifth-ranking supplier to the United States.

For two weeks, an intense spasm of political violence has shut down oil production here in the western Delta. Normally tenacious multinational companies like ChevronTexaco and Shell have evacuated all staff members and shut their facilities, even those more than 30 miles offshore.

All told, the uprising by a well-armed ethnic militia seeking to wrest power from the local government has stanched the flow of 800,000 barrels of crude oil a day, or 40 percent of this country's daily yield.

With stocks of crude oil and gasoline in the United States at their lowest in years, the shutdown could hardly come at a worse moment for Washington, which has increasingly turned to West Africa to diversify its oil supply beyond the Persian Gulf.

The disruption has set off already twitchy global oil markets, which jumped 12 percent last week on the prospect of having to absorb the shock from Nigeria as war roils Iraq and strikes and political tensions have hobbled another major supplier, Venezuela. It also explains why, for the oil industry, offshore oil exploration has become increasingly alluring, far from the glare of deprived Africans.

The oil installations here sit next door to some of the most destitute patches of this country, where villagers with no running water bathe, fish and defecate in rivers polluted by oil spills, either from the wellheads or the widespread illegal siphoning that enriches local gangsters.

Such vast wealth being drained from so poor a region has long been a volatile source of resentment for local people, who have occupied platforms and forced negotiations for profit-sharing in the past.

But this time, the conflict is between two local tribes, the Ijaw and the Itsekiri -- one fishermen, the others farmers, who had lived peaceably for generations.

Neither disputes that the people of the Delta should profit from the wealth of this land. Rather, barely a month before elections, they are locked in a violent struggle over who should control the local government and the millions of dollars in patronage -- and returned oil profits -- that accrue from such dominion.

Even an Itsekiri partisan acknowledged the obvious. ''Maybe if there had been no oil, these tensions would not have been created,'' said S. A. Ajuyah, 78, a retired state court judge.

The oil companies take pains to point out that, as far as they are concerned, they have no role to play in the dispute. ''It's not community versus Shell,'' said Frank Efeduma, the spokesman for Shell Petroleum Development Company in Warri. ''It's community versus community.''

But the Ijaw see the oil companies as working hand in glove with their ethnic rivals, and vow to continue disrupting their operations. They decry the Itsekiri as part of a ''triumvirate conspiracy'' -- along with the government and the oil multinationals -- who have siphoned off a disproportionate share of oil company largesse.

''The Itsekiris enjoy employment more, they enjoy projects more,'' said Samson Y. Mamamu, a contractor by trade and a feisty Ijaw chief. ''Why? They are the minority.''

The Itsekiri, for their part, call themselves indigenes and accuse marauding Ijaw of trying to exterminate them as a way to gain control of the oil country.

''You cannot push us out of this homeland of ours,'' said Isaac Jemide, a lawyer and an Itsekiri chief. ''If a percentage of the resources should come back to the owners of the area, the Itsekiris should be the beneficiaries, not the Ijaws.''

News story inserted 4th June 1989 (page 6)

experimenting with new style of posting changing subject heading with each post.

To try and attract more new people to open the thread

[size=18pt]24th April , 2003  - The NY Times
General Buhari Calls for New Elections, after flawed presidential elections that declared Obasanjo the winner[/size]

. .ABUJA, Nigeria, April 23— Calling last Saturday's presidential elections ''the most fraudulent'' in Nigeria's 40-year history, the chief opposition candidate called today for fresh elections, rejected redress through legal action and called on other nations to refuse to recognize a government that he said had rigged its return to rule.

''Such shortcuts to achieving power have never lasted in Nigeria,'' said Muhammadu Buhari, a former Army general who took power in a military coup in 1983, the last time a civilian government held elections here.

In a short victory speech on Tuesday night, President Olusegun Obasanjo, who won a second term, praised the elections as free and fair and commended the high turnout. Results announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission declared him the winner with 62 percent of the votes. Mr. Buhari was said to have received 32 percent, with the rest going to 18 marginal rivals.

As is common in Nigeria, which has long been plagued by military coups, ethnic strife and rigged polls, the elections were not over the day the results were announced.

It was impossible to tell what the post-election jousting might bode for the future, only that the opposition groups appeared to be trying to recover from losses in elections that they and many international observers have described as flawed in parts of the country. Nor did Mr. Buhari say what he was prepared to do if the government did not heed his calls.

Shedding his military uniforms for white kaftans, Mr. Buhari ran for the presidency under the banner of the All Nigeria People's Party. In his first comments since Saturday's presidential and gubernatorial elections, he said fraud and intimidation had made elections impossible in a number of Nigeria's 30 states. His party spokesman, Sam Nda-Isaiah, said later that the party had a list of 15 states in which Mr. Buhari was calling for new elections in the coming weeks.

''Wherever there were no elections, there must be a repeat,'' Mr. Buhari said to resounding applause at a news conference packed with his supporters. ''Otherwise there will be no government by 30 May.'' Other officials appearing with him, representing all 29 opposition parties, warned vaguely of ''consequences.''

The result will depend largely on how far Mr. Buhari and his backers are prepared to go, and on how President Obasanjo can temper their anger: including the award of important government posts to members of the opposition. It would be highly unlikely for the government to call for new elections nationwide. Mr. Obasanjo took office in 1999 in elections conducted by the military rulers.

International monitoring groups, including two from the United States and others representing the European Union and the Commonwealth, have cited instances of ballot-stuffing, theft, intimidation and fraudulent tallying of votes in parts of the country. Both Nigerian and international monitors urged opposition groups to pursue complaints through electoral tribunals and called on the government to build confidence in the impartial nonpartisan adjudication of cases.

The European Union team recommended that the government consider extra steps, including new elections, in six states where they found the most severe irregularities. The African Union was less critical in its assessment.

Today, there seemed to be some confusion in exactly what the opposition parties were calling for. Speaking on behalf of the opposition coalition, the presidential candidate with the National Action Council, Olagbade Agoro, urged Nigerians to boycott state legislative races coming up in two weeks.

When Mr. Buhari appeared, he said he had urged his supporters to take part. His party spokesman, Mr. Nda Isaiah, said afterward that Mr. Buhari would give the elections agency a chance to correct any mistakes between now and the May 3 state races.

News story inserted 5th July 1984 (page4 - for news story that has headline in subject heading of thread)

[size=18pt]22nd May 2003  - BBC News
Bank fraud rises by 40% as President Obasanjo commences his second term[/size]

Nigeria's banks have seen almost $10m disappear through employee fraud in 2002, a rise of more than 40% on the year before, a survey by the country's banking regulator has found.
The total amount stolen was 1.29bn naira, up from 906.3m in 2001, the Nigerian Deposit Insurance Corporation reported.

Ten times that amount - 12.91bn naira - was recorded in attempted fraud, up from 11.24bn for a rise of 15%.

Most of the thefts, NDIC said, were the result of either forgeries or illegal withdrawals from customers' accounts.

The figures may well be an understatement, though, as NDIC said it believes financial institutions routinely underreport fraud losses for fear of negative publicity.

Bad name

Fraud and corruption have become an unfortunate staple in Nigeria's international reputation.

The country regularly features at the top of international surveys measuring the part played by graft in different economies.

Successive dictatorships have extracted billions from the exchequer, denuding the public purse of revenues from Nigeria's rich oil reserves.

Outside the country, Nigeria has become synonymous with fraud as some of its citizens use the boom in internet cafes to send "spam" e-mails, promising millions in exchange for the gullible recipient's bank details.

News story inserted 11th November 1965 (page 1 - for story on subject heading of the thread today)

GenBuhari, great job man.

Thanks, I appreciate your comment .

I want to post economic indicators every 6 months to a year  from independence till .

Can I get some help with the research

Inflation rate

Foreign debt

Domestic debt

Oil prices

Fuel prices

Life expectancy

Infant Mortality

Corruption Rating/ Index

Number of privatisations

Can I get volunteers to do research on any of these indicators

Thanks

[size=18pt]26th June 2003 - BBC News
Obasanjo raises fuel prices 65% - claims he needs to remove fuel subsidy for savings to be spent on health and education. However experts say that fuel has never been subsidised.[/size]

The governor of Nigeria's central bank has defended a government decision to slash fuel subsidies which has angered trade unions into calling a general strike from next week.
Ending the subsidy was "the right thing to do," Dr Joseph Oladele Sanusi told BBC World Service Radio.

Propping up fuel prices "has been creating a lot of problems for the Nigerian economy," he said.

Nigeria's President Olusegun Obasanjo wants to raise fuel prices by 65% as he believes the subsidy would be better spent on improvements in health and education.

New finance minister

Riot police were ordered to spread around Lagos on Wednesday to maintain order after the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) called an indefinite general strike from Monday 30 June, the news agency Agence France Presse reported.

The NLC said: "Patriotic Nigerians including our revered religious and community leaders should identify with our protests and prevail on government to bring down the prices."

However, President Obasanjo may have moved a step closer to restoring Nigeria's relationship with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) despite domestic tensions.

Any volunteers for researching performance indicators?

You do not have to do it very quickly just take your time with it.

Thanks in advance

GenBuhari:

I want to post economic indicators every 6 months to a year from independence till .

Can I get some help with the research

Inflation rate

Foreign debt

Domestic debt

Oil prices

Fuel prices

Life expectancy

Infant Mortality

Corruption Rating/ Index

Number of privatisations

Can I get volunteers to do research on any of these indicators

Thanks

I am still awaiting first volunteers to help out with researching the key performace indicators for governments in our country's history.

don't be shy na!!

me

Thanks lucenzo

Please let me know which performance indicator(s) you wish to research


More volunteers needed please

calling volunteers !!

News video inserted 9th January 1984 (page 3 - for thread subject heading)

still awaiting volunteers for researching performance indicators

IBB, OBJ and now JONATHAN destroyed Nigeria,

Abacha wasn't as bad as they made him look smh,

^^Gbam!

Good work, General. Condolences. Hope your year is getting better.

Thanks isale_gan2

Still looking for volunteers to research these key performance indicators for all governments since independence.

GenBuhari:

I want to post economic indicators every 6 months to a year from independence till .

Can I get some help with the research

Inflation rate

Foreign debt

Domestic debt

Oil prices

Fuel prices

Life expectancy

Infant Mortality

Corruption Rating/ Index

Number of privatisations

Can I get volunteers to do research on any of these indicators

Thanks

calling volunteers to research performance indicators of all governments since 1960