₦airaland Forum

Operation Declare Your Assets Or Forfeit Your Surplus


Please let us stop chasing the ghost, cut the chase and go after the individual surplus. Every Nigerian knows where the money is. We know there is even more money outside the Country, foreign Governments have been sensitized to the source and they are now embarrassed as receiver of stolen properties. The problem is those conspicuous spenders who are spending the money in our face, living it in our face and no one can query them. Actually, Obasanjo had to negotiate with one to keep some stolen millions to avoid lengthened litigation, only to renege on the terms of his release.

Once upon a time, a Nigerian would take ten percent kickback from the central Government contract, but never from the local area where everybody knows everybody. Time has changed. Conspicuous spenders have taken over. They are encouraged by praise singers who eulogize them. There are two ways to dislodge their ill gotten surplus – 1. By revolution or 2. By due process.

There has to be due process. It has to be done with human face so that it does not become a class or an ethnic thing. I do not think Jerry Rawlings is better than those he killed in Ghana in the name of revolution.

Many of us are copy cats. If it is done in American and Europe, fine. If that is the only way to catch the fat cats, I will tag on. Well, the best way to catch a drug dealer, a spy, a terrorist and a rogue in these countries is to demand accountability for any conspicuous spending. Can you imagine a Nigerian oppressor without conspicuous consumption?

Conspicuous spending is a major part of our moral bankruptcy. It sends a powerful message to the have-nots to make money by any means possible. The armed robber, Oyenusi confession did not teach us any lesson. They always return to the crime scene.

Oppressor, for fear of dying, has to spend his money sooner than later. Watch out for his cars, his houses, political donations and funding of privileged organizations. We have a tax system in Nigeria but we have deliberately not used it to catch the oppressors. We are on the right path though. If anyone needs Government service, they ask for three years income tax receipts. Great! Let us move a step further. If you under-declare, explain how you are going to finance your proposals.

Buhari The Democrat Or Buhari The Dictator

It has been over six week since Buhari took over the new Government in Nigeria but looking at the criticism he has received, one would think he has been there for a year. Comparing this to the last time he took over as a dictator, when the impact was immediate after initial celebration that welcomed him and Idiagbon. What he lacks now is ruling by decree or fiat. While his voters may be patient for the next 100 days, the criticism by those that voted against him is startling.

All of us have to decide which Buhari we want. It has to be one that will let some criminals go scot free to our dismay, so that the right of most innocent people is not jeopardized or punish a few innocent people so that every previous government must be held accountable. It is easy to probe into ages in a kleptomaniac society as Nigeria but impractical even in western democracy.

Published: Friday, July 24, 2015

It is ironic, when the new administration in Nigeria delayed the appointment of ministers since there were permanent secretary working on the job anyway, people became suspicious. They were not concerned about the amount of money saved in terms of salary and support of these political appointees or recovery from looters. There was even one lawsuit to force the President to immediately appoint ministers. Are these agents of contractors looking for goodies?

Read more at: http://www.thenigerianvoice.com/news/183484/1/propagated-states-ethnic-champions-ministers-empty.html

Any government would welcome portable refinery as progress and embrace young men and women striving with their inventions. While Niger Delta has managed to build their portable refineries locally, other countries from Asia to Middle East are building and selling theirs to the highest bidders. The amount of money, time and set-up technicians needed could be produced at home with great saving to our economy and at the same time provide jobs for our youths.

PORTABLE PETROLEUM REFINERIES MANUFACTURED IN NIGER DELTA

What are all the universities in the Niger Delta specializing in if they cannot improve the so called illegal portable refineries changing crude oil into petrol? We have Federal University of Petroleum Resources in Effurun in Warri, Delta State. Yet they cannot tap the brains of Niger Delta youths improvising from scratch, the manufacture of portable refineries.

Each time entrepreneurs try to make money from their dedicated talents and backyard, they lose. During the reign of Abacha in Nigeria, the adulterated petrol imported into the Country was worse than those made by Niger Delta gifted talents that are crying out loud for more research and improvement through their “re- discovery”. We have to give our youths some credits if they try to make something out of themselves, not discourage them with handouts.

This may not be good news for multi-national oil companies and oil marketers. If those youths in Niger Delta succeed in perfecting portable oil refineries, imagine what the impact would be in the world market of petroleum products and fine spirits. If these young entrepreneurs can make petrol out of crude oil, they may be able to eke out fine petrol from the polluted waters which the whole world still struggle with. This is a big market that can compete in the world.

Man has been to the moon but still lacks an efficient way to clean up environmental disaster as a result of oil spills around the globe. If Niger Delta youths can turn crude oil to petrol in their portable refineries, our universities should step up to used polluted area the same way crude is used. Those portable refineries will not only be useful in the polluted water of the Southsouth but there will be market for such portable refineries all over the world for oil spills disasters.

Would rather suffer through the last petrol shortage? We have a colo-mentality in Africa: if it is Okrika or Ijebu made, it cannot be good or improved. There is more zealousness in destroying counterfeits products that are not up to standard than enthusiasm for nursing products that can be improved by our universities. For ages Africa has developed so many inventions, others have come to study it, improve them in their own countries and cried out EUREKA!

Any government would welcome portable refinery as progress and embrace young men and women striving with their inventions. While Niger Delta has managed to build their portable refineries locally, other countries from Asia to Middle East are building and selling theirs to the highest bidders. The amount of money, time and set-up technicians needed could be produced at home with great saving to our economy and at the same time provide jobs for our youths.
This is by no means an attempt to diminish the damage done to vehicles by improvising young men and women of Niger Delta, it is more a recognition of what should have been done a long time ago. After all, the adulterated petrol of Abacha also damaged some cars and we have since moved on. Even if the petrol from the portable refineries of Niger Delta is as bad for cars as that ogogoro for us, one would think since days of Tai Solarin protest, ogogoro would be perfect na!

We fight counterfeit products with the same zeal and attitude we inherited from past colonial masters. Their intention was clear since they do not want us to perfect any of our discoveries. They imprisoned us under the guise that our products are dangerous, harmful for human consumption and bad for the economy. Since these are selective reasons because they are right in some cases, it has also discouraged us, even when they are wrong.

Again the case of ogogoro and bush meat consumption bear out their point when they are right but after all these centuries we cannot say Africans cannot practice what is good for them and ban what is not in their interest. The problem is instead of focusing on making out the right from wrong, we use a sledge hammer to kill and ban everything. This is the case of throwing out the baby with the bath water.

God has blessed this Continent of Africa so much with natural resources, strong and intelligent people and SUN all year round. Unfortunately, we have many friends outside our Continent that have helped us turn each blessing into a curse. It started with Gold Coast, Ivory Coast, Diamond Coast, Uranium Coast, Agriculture Coast all year round. Yet we can neither feed ourselves nor make money out of Cocoa Coast, nor use uranium to defend Africa shrewdly!

The latest curse is that of petroleum. As soon as Nature realized it is going to be the main source of energy, some countries were blessed abundantly with it in Africa with the hope that they will lift up their brothers and sisters in the Continent. If God is Nature or Nature is God, he may never forgive Nigeria. There is no need to repeat the oil curse here, but what has made other countries rich has become a liability for Nigeria.

We produce so much oil, we do not have the capacity in all of our plants to refine enough for local use. We built refineries but they have never worked at full capacity and if they do, they have never worked long enough to satisfy local needs. There are stories importers of generators intentionally sabotage our efforts to produce electricity and petrol. We begged and asked for more plants but if we cannot maintain the ones we already have, how can we maintain more?

Somehow, other African countries have not learned. One would think that Ghana would learn from Nigeria’s missteps and curses from oil. No, they are falling into the same mistakes of euphoria and individual corruption. President of Equatorial Guinea Obiang's son Teodorin, as a government minister spent lavishly all over the world and was forced to forfeit more than 30 million dollars of assets in the United States, from the poor people’s resources in October 2014.

Africa wake up!

Buhari: Alternate Power Generation For Homes And Industries


We cannot afford to fail again on generation of electricity to homes and industries in Nigeria. But we certainly need a new approach without dislocating the enormous investments made by previous governments. A good example is how affordable cell phones are in Nigeria these days, compared to petty traders that acquired them in Benin Republic well before us. If we were still waiting for Abiola to complete disruption of roads for land lines, we would still be waiting.

This writer first instinct was to gather most of the solar builders in Nigeria and brain storm with them wishing we could accelerate this technology faster cheaper for the small business traders and the common man in cooperation with average home builders and industries. At the same time, get in contact personally with maker of Tesla cars in United States who is in the budding stage of creating batteries that can be backups and more efficient for homes and industries.

This is no doubt an enormous task for a poor man that has contributed his share in Nigeria as a younger man. We all as individuals, have a God-given task on earth. No one is too poor, young or old to contribute and it is never too late. While some of us can be better teachers, plumbers, writers and instigators, others can take our ideas and run with it. Until ideas, even in budding stages finally get to propagation on a large scale, it is still an idea. There are talents untapped.

Neither solar power not battery power is new in Nigeria. Indeed, there are some homes that are solely powered by either or both. The problem is you have to be rich to afford them. Our capitalist mentality to get rich instantly has created a few billionaires, no doubt. But even in capitalist countries, internet and railway were enabling inventions made possible by the government that propelled commerce for all at a reasonable cost.

On second thought, what technology is Elon Musk, the leader of technology firm Tesla have under the sun that cannot be replicated by Nigerians? The amount of money we have wasted on power generation and steel industries can never be recovered. Our mistake has always been that we are willing to buy these technologies at any cost and import them into Nigeria. The fact is we could have assembled our own scientists like Iran’s nuclear project and worked in “caves”.

In addition to these, are Nigerians in every aspect of sciences, African Europeans and African Americans willing to come home and work with their counterparts the same way they did after the waves of “Back To Africa” Pan Africanism. Some of them help write our constitution under the supervision of local African Youth Movements.

If we could achieve it in politics but fail to do the same in economics, it means there are loose screws somewhere we need to tighten up. This is where adaptation of world sciences comes in. It is not enough to teach science, it must be practical to produce results that can create new telecommunication system, generate electricity and curb our greed for instant gratification.

This instant gratification has led us into false sense of security. The Ebola fatality is an example of what Africans can achieve, even after false start. Nigerians were ready to buy Nano Silver at any cost and even imported some in a country where we have abundant medical scientists that must have known it was nothing but snake oil. Yet politicians did not take advice from their most precious resource before importing READY MADE Solution for Ebola.

It is irrelevant how Africa obtain these technologies: from local or foreign schools, stolen from foreign industries, buy their experts to contribute according to our wishes in the “caves” or ask people of goodwill to come and share their knowledge. There is nothing strange here since most other countries do the same. We have colleges right here in Africa modeled after foreign universities but have never produced a single technology marketable or beneficial to Africa.

We have a bred of leaders whose only pride is how many children they have outside Africa and can afford to skip the Country if Buhari won. This is why Africa is still on its knees. Implication of such statement is huge, though seen as trivial. A man that invested Nigeria’s resources outside so that he could flee with his family to countries where he and his children can be slaughtered legally by police like a lynch mob during the slavery, never had thinking faculty as our leader.

If they are completely detached from home, they will always export whatever they can steal to make themselves comfortable in countries where there are constant flow of electricity for small and big businesses that produce jobs, good roads, comfort inside their homes and cars. Most of the countries that have these comforts can produce additional gadgets and toys for others to buy at their own prices, no matter what they cost to produce them.

As much as this writer believes in individual initiatives without government handouts such as in the Nollywood where young people built on old industry and made billions for themselves, power generation that must touch the average people is a community effort that has dividends in returns for the government in form of taxes and provision of jobs for many.

Indeed, the government has no business in endeavors that individuals can adequately perform. Crowding out individual initiatives, kill entrepreneurial spirits. One of the advantages of solar power is that once it is encouraged on a broader scale, individuals may join and produce their homemade types. Electric companies in Europe and America are so worried about individuals harnessing the power of the sun that they are working arduously for some form of royalties.

God has been so good to us around the equator with abundant energy from the sun and more arable land throughout the year for agriculture, we fail to take advantage of them

King Of Zulu & Oba Eko: Salvation Begins At Home

Should we blame Kings, Oba, Emir or Obi diversionary scapegoating as members of oppressors’ class? The poor abscond desperately across 7 seas and 7 deserts for greener pasture as looters squander our seed money to better other communities in luxury while most folks are in anguish. Young people are confused on whether to stay at home and fight oppressors or parachute into unfriendly territories where they strive on worse adversities than they do in their communities.

When we are well fed, housed, occupied by art and science; humans can be decent, kind and graceful. As soon as we are threatened for our very existence by deprivation of one or more sustenance, we become a different animal. The most uncivilized part of us creeps in and we begin to show undesirable color. Blame South Africans as much as you want, you are no more of a human brute than they are. If we mess up our own communities, they must protect theirs.

Xenophobia in South Africa is the latest in the list of fatal consequences facing the young, poor and their oppressors outside their own community. Migrants’ intolerance is not new in and out of Africa. There is a false memory that believes Africans will not commit atrocities against one another despite Rwanda, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria. Why is South Africa different?

They complained that they are gradually watching their unskilled immigrant workers becoming majority while they become minority in their own communities. The pictures of killing and maiming of other Africans, their own brothers, sisters and children are repulsive and repugnant. These pictures are all over the world, as they watch African inflict mayhem on one another. We saw it in Rwanda wondering whether to leave Africans to themselves or step in and get caught.

Another false sense of security that it is time to reap dividends invested by Kwame Nkrumah is grossly misplaced. Other Africans around South Africa and Nigeria feel South Africa owes them their living after they failed to demand the same from their own countries. The leaders in South Africa that failed their people are not different from the leaders that failed Nigeria and other African countries. The case of Nigeria, a failed regional power is even more pathetic.

Nkrumah did not spend so much of Ghana’s money on freedom fighters so that children of Africa from other countries can invade and overwhelm South Africans in their own communities. He did it so that any African, anywhere in the world can stand on his own and be respected as any other human from Europe to America. Before we can attain economic freedom, we must obtain human dignity that defies greed so that our children can breathe and survive at home.

As long as our new crop of leaders dehumanize us at home, in our countries and communities, many of us will continue to die in the seas crossing the deserts, mauled in and out of Africa by those that do not have enough jobs at home as we will continue to blame our hosts. When the king of Zulu or the Oba Eko speaks, they are reflecting the wish of their angry people. If hosts are not comfortable, can the guests claim rights? In South Africa, we demand payback for what?

Where did Nyerere, Kenyatta, Banda, Tafawa Balewa, Zik, Awo and Nkrumah stand and tell you that there is economic reward for all Africans at the expense of unskilled South Africans? There used to be a time when new independent African countries asked you to send your teachers, lawyers, doctors, soldiers and police over to help them with shortages after the British and the French packed up and left. Those days are over and if they need more of us, they will ask.

What we have now are surplus skilled people and unskilled individuals going to countries where they are not welcomed looking for economic gains. Indeed, South Africa and other countries made entry visa so stringent, we still find our way inside. The worst of all, are those that have failed and looted their countries mercilessly creating heaven for themselves where they are not wanted, not welcomed and in some cases thrown into jail. No country throws its borders open!

Of all countries in Africa, why are the children of Nigeria becoming economic refugees in other countries? Instead of us to hold our head in shame because not only did we fail this generation at home, we failed to live up to our potential as a regional power that should have saved Africa. Poorer or smaller countries can cry and blame South Africa not Nigeria. No wonder Buhari cried.

We have been warned many times that there is no country in the world that can absorb our population of almost 200 million refugees if the Country breaks into pieces. Even if we do and become more efficient as some claim, we should not be running away from our enabling environment if we can help develop. Stay in your own community and fight for the rights you want in others’ community. If our community is attractive, others would to come and did.

The King of Zulu and Oba Eko are in privileged class with messages from their communities; as we become more intolerable of our brothers. South African and Nigeria leaders have stepped into the shoes of our oppressors but with a different skin color. Most of these leaders indulge in the worst form of hedonism while their subjects fight and kill one another for their crumps.

Professor Ekeh told that story of African Chief, King and Oba that sold their people into slavery. Politicians, kings and Oba of today fly on their own in 707 planes into host countries offering gold and silver like their forefathers in exchange for mirrors. When the ordinary slaves saw their King, Obi and Oba that ran out of slaves to sell, arrived in chains, some wanted to bow. Many pulled them back crying: but for their atrocities, most of us would not leave out communities.

The young and the poor are very patient, otherwise it is the head of their leaders that should be rolling on the floor, not their fellow men. Nigeria has just chosen a new leader in whom much is expected just as much was expected of South African leaders. Buhari, may God help you deliver.

Story from Modern Ghana News:
http://www.modernghana.com/news/612929/1/king-of-zulu-oba-eko-salvation-begins-at-home.html

Published: Wednesday, April 22, 2015

whitecat2:
Yoruba will not kiss and make up this time, only to give the clowns more time to plan out their next step. Ibo aren't playing this off script, they believe Yoruba are weak and can be subdued, and Lagos is theirs for the taking if they try hard.

There is a difference between accommodation, tolerance and hostility. Yoruba have no problem with different ethnic groups. Actually, many Africans accommodate strangers within them as long as it is not abused. One of the biggest and the richest cities in Africa, Ibadan, was founded by different groups of Yoruba that revered loyalty, hard work and cultural progress. Indeed, it is where a king can become a commoner and a commoner can become a king.

Lagos like other Yoruba cities was founded on these qualities of accommodation and tolerance. However, accommodation must not become complacency and abuse of the hosts, if you want to assimilate. Africans have progressed around the world because we adhere to the general principle of hosts cultures and road to assimilation. Even then, we have been rejected times without number. It is when intolerance of other people or ethnic groups turns into hostility.

Many families of African Americans have been in United States before Columbus. Yet, some are not accommodated in their Country. Those that were tolerated exceed beyond expectations. In order to understand accommodation, we have to learn how different ethnic groups are treated in their own country. In Asia and Europe, there are the Gypsies treated worse than most humans by hosts and even by new comers into the area.

Accommodation means more than the dictionary definition. It allows new comers to stretch their arms and legs and yawn as they like. When complacency sets in, they complain that they are tired of their hosts that warn them not to abuse their generosity. They claim rights that infringe on their hosts and challenge them to demonstrate their worst.

The Oba of Lagos went beyond decorum and voiced, out of anger what some of his subjects have been complaining of. When Nigerians started relocation of other people, it did not begin in the Yoruba land. As more states were created, one of the disadvantages is that people feel they belong to certain quarters more than others. Reallocation of people finally got to Yoruba land for the same reason other states did. There are not enough resources to care for all.

Before all these, for the first time in history, Nigerians started deporting other Africans. Yes, Ghana deported Nigerians at one point. But Nigeria in general and Lagos in particular were the melting points for all Africans. The days Ghanaians were deported, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe warned of a bad precedence and the audacity that any African would dare deport the children of Nkrumah. We started with fellow Africans, it has got to fellow Nigerians.

While Nigerians deported other Africans and later started reallocating other Nigerians, we saw a sad trend necessitated by harsh economic reality. Needless to say, South Africa became attractive after the end of Apartheid. Nigerians and other Africans flooded there hoping to make it and many of them did make it. Others abused the generosity of their hosts that wanted them in Zimbabwe, Tanzania and Zambia to South Africa. Hostilities reared ugly heads.

Nigerian teachers, lawyers and doctors that were accommodated and held in high esteem in this Southern part of Africa frowned at their countrymen that are new comers. The new comers claimed their country helped liberate Southern Africa and spent generously on their guerrilla fighters. It was not a license to abuse your hosts’ accommodation. May Kwame Nkrumah rest in peace for his selfless contribution to Africa’s freedom fighters.

The Yoruba say: no matter which part of your body is related to mine, even if you donated body part, you cannot tear it off my body. There is a limit to human tolerance. When we become sick and tired of our host accommodation, disrespect their culture and demand their land as ours, we have abused our privileges. The only good Nigerian, European or American is the one that has host interest and remain loyal. If we prove otherwise, we are either banished or deported.

Igbo have contributed a great deal to Lagos. The Igbo from the old school are still cherished and highly respected in Lagos. Streets and monuments are still named after them. Their children that are born in Lagos cannot be differentiated from their hosts. Indeed, many Igbo melted into Lagos family compounds. They have achieved success, not by confrontation and abuse of their hosts but by their hard work and loyalty to the interest of their hosts.

Their Igbo elders are embarrassed by their behavior. In most circles, clubs and areas the new comers would not be accommodated. We have to understand that many Ghanaians, Togolese and those from Benin Republic have melted into Lagos just like other Yoruba, Ibibio, and Tapa etc. without confrontation or overbearing attitudes towards their hosts. Igbo came after them.

It is unfortunate that some Igbo exaggerated their hold on Lagos when in fact they are losing what they have achieved for many years. City Council used to be governed by the Yoruba and Igbo mixed in parties. The high circles, clubs and schools accommodated Igbo before many of them fell into disrepair for lack of maintenance, were abandoned by Yoruba. These days, the Yoruba have started private clubs, circles, joints and schools beyond the reach of new Igbo.

Actually, only a few Igbo live in proper Lagos. But many others think they live in Lagos when in fact they live in old Western Region where they are easily outnumbered by other Nigerians and Africans. In the areas they are mostly concentrated and are able to gain political seats, they are far less than the areas their elders control in the days of glory in proper Lagos. So if anything, they have lost a great deal, not gain as the new comers think.

Peace must reign with the help of elders on all sides to restore and rebuild accommodation and tolerance in the land of Lagos. ! Eko O Gba Gbere Rara O

Voters Must Realize PDP In Lagos And APC In Abuja

http://abujavoice.com/voters-must-realize-pdp-in-lagos-and-apc-in-abuja/

Boko Haram started with the Igbo, Churches and Southern infidels in Borno. The worst mayhem was reserved for Hausa and the rest of Northerners. Even their own families suffered. President Jonathan is not to blame solely for this. Indeed his hesitation came from fear of those that want the Country ungovernable because he won the election clean and fair. Compare his hesitation to Abacha indifference to Danzuki or Obasanjo firmness to change service chiefs and militricians.

Another election is due this February and the propaganda machines are at work, not on dire needs and substance but on qualifications, fear, burial or business as usual. Well, qualifications matters, some would argue otherwise we might as well install an illiterate in government that is well schooled in Biblical/Koranic studies. It is still debatable if more education or qualifications can produce a better President. It must be noted that the President of Nigeria has a PhD.

All our qualifications from Oxford and Harvard never cured Africans of endemic corruption. It is not your qualification but what you have achieved with it that matters.
- See more at: http://abujavoice.com/qualification-for-president-honesty-or-hypocrisy/#sthash.x6ykuUWx.dpuf

Once more, it is France that has awakened the world conscience, not Baga Massacre in the Northern part of Nigeria where Boko Haram had a free reign of terror. We must all realize that massacre anywhere encourages massacre everywhere. It is no more a country or regional issue; it is a worldwide terror that requires all hands on deck. Bathily a Muslim from Mali; saved lives.

While Russia and China revolted, Yoruba’s tolerance for any religion within the same family can be understood if we dig into their philosophy that explains the culture. Yoruba say: Olorun maje k’a gba were mo esin.

This has become a compulsive pathological behavior without limit or bound. We need colo-mental hospitals.

USA: ENCOURAGE LOCAL FOOD & WATER TO STOP THE SPREAD OF EBOLA

Why has Ebola epidemic overwhelmed Doctors-Without-Borders? There is a contradiction even with the best of intention that food and water must be sourced from donors. The United States Military deployed to Liberia with its capacity for humanitarian aid can learn from it. Local food production and water (ORS) must be freely available in health centers to encourage and attract people to stay before Ebola epidemic is contained. It is one of the reasons Nigeria succeeded.

How can any government or organization quarantine suspected Ebola cases without adequate supply of food, clean water and shelter even schools converted to clinics and hospital in an epidemic? People that are supposed to be in quarantine are fleeing to look for food and water in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Those infected and hungry, with some energy left, not adequately provided for deserted in search of food and water elsewhere. No force can hold them back.

African countries that could hardly feed their hungry before Ebola have the audacity to pack poor people like sardines in an area without basic food for sustenance and beds and we expect those coming to help not to get frustrated and leave as infections increased. Their skill is public health and specialty in infectious diseases. Some have experience since the Ebola outbreak in 1976 in East Africa. This time we are facing greater populations that defy normal control.

Experience always shows that no matter how prepared the international organizations are, there are little inconveniences and surprises they were not prepared for even when they are trained to expect them. Medical teams do not usually bring local food and water. Temporarily, their military may need to supply humanitarian supplies just as if they are in the war zones.

This is where the help of African countries, with Nigeria in the lead, comes in. It means enough food and clean water must be prioritized for those suspected of Ebola infection. It becomes a policy decision to feed those quarantined first so that they can remain where they are and not escape to infect others. The focus must be on prevention to reduce the amount of people that need treatment. Even vaccines are for prevention not a cure, population control is needed.

Nigeria was lucky that the zero infection happened in Lagos State where the medical team and others in contact with Ebola virus were skillfully managed without experimental drugs but with old fashioned established treatment by volunteer local and international experts in virology and public health. Shelters available were upgraded or replaced with better ones with adequate supply of food for those that could eat and freely available oral rehydration salts (ORS).

Yes, we may say if food becomes the attraction, those that are not suspected of Ebola infection would line up just to get food. Sure, the cost of feeding one hungry person must be weighed against the cost of one that was not fed infecting many others. Policy in this case may not be taught in medical schools but physicians can learn administrative and financial skills. In the case of epidemic one has to balance many factors, Africans are not short of the administrative skills.

Nobody needs to lecture us on the importance of balanced diet to keep up our immune system strong, and help during the period we cannot eat very well while sick. During sickness especially when accompanied by diarrhea and vomiting as in cholera and Ebola, six teaspoon of sugar and half a teaspoon of salt in one liter of water can be a miracle saver. Oral rehydration therapy or salt are commonly sold in corner store pharmacies as they contain other ingredients like zinc.

Nigeria’s survivals praised the medical treatment they received, the kindness of attending staff and medical colleagues but also their own faith in whatever God they worship. Even when the body is diseased (weak) and the spirit is strong, the immune system is boosted from positive thinking. We may rely on our Incantations, Psalms from Bible or Koran. Each of them strengthens belief in Orisha, Ogun, Mohamed or Jesus, whichever works for individuals.

United States has rightly decided to launch the fight against Ebola in Liberia before it gets near. There are different organizations from Africa and outside that are already making it to Liberia and Sierra Leone. No matter what their good intensions are, they must learn from Doctors-Without-Borders. No one can build public health or medical treatment on empty stomach and unclean water. Just as these are basic to life so are they basic to public health and treatment.

We have a problem if Doctors-Without-Borders are overwhelmed in Africa. It boils down to the subtle difference to us between Public Health practitioners and medical practitioners. While public health treats a community; physicians, pharmacists and nurses treat individuals. Diseases that are beyond community health workers fall on the shoulders of physicians. In short public health is prevention. We cannot get enough physicians to cure overwhelming Ebola infections.

Many of these organizations are aware that some of these logistics are not readily available in the countries they are going. But a few of them are surprised that basic necessities taken for granted, are needed where they want to provide medical services. The further they are to the cities, the greater their needs for essential commodities. One of the examples is the conversion of schools to clinics and hospitals, when it gets to the point where schools cannot remain open.

Logistics are very critical. It is very important to make available a secure area for medical and social team to stay. In cases where they have to travel long distances, some of them bring ambulances and Sport Utility vehicles with them. Whatever the case, people cannot be dying in a country where vehicles needed by medical staff can be temporarily loaned from ministers with two or three cars. Those rich enough must also lend their cars or donate it for medical use.


Source: Farouk Martins Aresa
Story from The Nigerian Voice News:
http://www.thenigerianvoice.com/news/157514/1/usa-encourage-local-food-water-to-stop-the-spread-.html