₦airaland Forum

As the February 14 elections draw nearer it becomes clearer that there
are two classes of Nigerians; the rich
who milk the country’s wealth and
set it ablaze and the poor whom they
see merely as milk cows and cannon
fodder. Recent media reports that politicians and bosses of big
businesses are moving their families
abroad (particularly to the United
States, United Kingdom and United
Arab Emirates) present a grave cause
for concern in this direction. It is equally a pointer to the palpable
possibility of severe national crisis in
the wake of the elections. United Action for Democracy
denounces this flight of the rich
whilst they contrive an inflammable
conundrum for the poor. UAD equally
finds it worrisome that thousands of
“non-indigenes” have also had to relocate back to their states and
zones of origin out of fear of the
possible aftermath of February 14.
These are evidently ominous signs.
This is the time for working people
and their organisations to stand up against the destructive manipulations
of the ruling elites. UAD was forged as the leading pan-
Nigeria coalition of radical civil
society organisations at a moment
like this in 1997, then against military
dictatorship. The civilian wing of the
ruling class has proven itself to be little more democratic than the
military that we fought tooth and nail
against to reinstate the republic.
Democracy goes beyond the right to
vote in one section of the bosses or
another. For it to have much meaning to the poor working masses,
it must entail the building of popular
structures of people’s power, through
which workers, farmers, artisans, the
urban poor, women, youth and all
other strata of the immense majority of the population are central to the
running of social life. None of the leading parties in
contention represents this concept of
working people’s democracy which
the UAD stands for. Their readiness
(across party lines) to relocate their
families out of harm’s way, while they stoke the embers of a
catastrophe also shows their oft
trumpeted “patriotism” for the ruse it
is. They are not worth dying for. The total lack of concern for the
tragic loss of possibly 2,000 lives in
Baga is a reflection of the politicians’
contempt for the lives of poor
Nigerians. While President Goodluck
Jonathan has remained shamefacedly mute, the APC Presidential Campaign
Organisation has merely called for
“soothing words of compassion and
empathy” for the people of Baga and
Borno state, in what appears
basically as partisan brickbat. UAD seeks a more cogent response
to the Baga massacre and the war
between Boko Haram and the
Federal Government. Reports from
affiliates and the State Chapter of the
UAD in Borno state indicate that the situation is getting worse by the day.
President Jonathan’s silence on the
abduction of the Chibok Girls
Secondary School pupils during his
first visit (and obviously one intended
to make electoral gains), since the abduction is for residents of Borno
and indeed all well meaning persons
a confirmation of the disdain of
Nigeria’s “big men” and rulers for the
poor. Enough is definitely enough! Baga
represents the prospects poor
working people face as the rich
gladiators battle for Aso Rock in a
few weeks time. We must refuse to
be deceived into lining up behind the backs of any of them to kill fellow
poor people irrespective of their
ethnicity, religion or partisan
affiliation. The most cogent response
to the drumbeats of war that
politicians are beating but will choose not to dance themselves can come
only from us; through our
independent, united self-activity
based as working people. UAD affiliates and State Chapters
across the country have been
mandated to work closely with trade
unions and other civil society
organisations to build this popular
response from below, against the machinations of the bosses and
politicians. We must have no
illusions, dark clouds lie ahead. But if
we, the masses, whose labour
creates the social wealth, stand
united, we will weather the storm and bring to birth a new Nigeria from
the ashes of the old. Indeed, a new
and better Nigeria is possible!

As at the close of business on
Monday 5th January, 2015, the price
of Brent Crude Oil stands at $50.04
per barrel. In fact, West Texas
Intermediate (WTI) Crude Oil dropped
below $50 a barrel for the first time since April 2009, as surging supply
continues to overwhelm demand. The
price of the Brent crude represent a
54.5% – 58.3% drop in crude oil
prices that ranged between $110 and
$120 several months preceding January 2012. Occupy Nigeria protests against
removal of gas subsidy You will find this interesting, “Brent
slumped 48 percent last year, the
most since the 2008 financial crisis,
as the Organization of Petroleum
Exporting Countries resisted calls to
cut output amid a battle with U.S. shale producers for market share.
The 12-member group pumped
above its target for a seventh
straight month in December,
according to a Bloomberg survey.” –
Bloomberg The climbing price of crude oil in
2011 and its attendant fraudulent
subsidy payments in Nigeria,
necessitated the government of His
Excellency, President Goodluck Ebele
Jonathan to unilaterally increase the retail price of Premium Motor Spirit
(PMS) popularly called petrol from
N65 to N140. From the 3rd till the 13th day of
January of that ‘subsidy’ year,
citizens all over the country
organised massive protests against
what they saw as injustice. In fact,
some aptly described the removal of the so-called subsidy on petrol as a
shortcut or lazy-man approach to
solving a problem that needed
meticulous planning and time to
resolve. Of course, several young people,
majority of whom are jobless took to
the streets to make their grievances
known, until soldiers were unleashed
on peaceful demonstrators in Ojota,
thus bringing to an end, agitation for the reversal of unnecessary hike in
price of petrol. Looking back today, one question
keeps popping up. What was
achieved with the protests? One thing is certain though; there
was NO logical conclusion to the
debacle. The union leaders got richer;
the government achieved its desire
of fuel pump price increase, and the
subsidy scam that necessitated its removal continued. By the way, three years after some
citizens lost their lives in that
struggle, not a single fuel subsidy
fraudster has been successfully
prosecuted. The lawmaker that was
found to have demanded and collected bribe from one of the
alleged oil subsidy thieves during the
probe of subsidy payments, evidence
of which abound in audio and video
tapes, is still gallivanting and
parading his shameless-self as a ‘lawmaker’ of the Federal Republic. Leaving these somewhat petty issues
aside, it’s January 2015, where are
we? How much progress have we
made as a nation in the upstream
and downstream sector of the
petroleum industry? We have had a three years window;
enough time to build at least four
new refineries for the country and
permanently remove the scourge of
‘subsidy payments’ from our books.
Yes, four brand new refineries would have been possible and I will explain
how we could have achieved it
shortly. Nigerian billionaire and Africa’s
richest man Alhaji Aliko Dangote, has
committed to building a $9 billion
refinery/petrochemical/fertiliser
complex in Nigeria. The refinery will
initially have a capacity of 400,000 bpd and is expected to be launched in
2016. Alhaji Dangote hopes to supply
half of Nigeria’s demand for PMS. The Nigerian oil industry has being
plagued with crude oil theft and the
government seems unable to curb it.
All its effort at finding a lasting
solution has also failed. Though one
of the saboteurs of Nigeria crude oil production capacity was given a
contract worth $103.4m in 2011 to
reduce crude oil theft, yet, Nigeria
continues to lose a conservative
figure of 400,000 bpd. Some analysts
put it at around 700,000 bpd. Following a layman’s mathematical
approach, 400,000bpd at a
conservative price of $100pb (note: a
barrel of crude oil was over $115
during the period under review), is a
whooping sum of $40 million lost to saboteurs daily. Multiplying these by
7days gives you $280 million weekly
and $1.12 billion in a month. What
this reflects is that in 2012 alone,
Nigeria lost $13.44 billion to crude oil
theft. Adding 2013 and 2014 figures will amount to $40.32 billion
deposited in the bank account of few
thieves. What is more saddening, as
we speak, the crude oil resources of
this nation is still being stolen. With the conservative figure of $
40.32 billion frittered in the past
three years alone, Nigeria would
have built four types of Alhaji
Dangote’s $9billion worth 400,000bpd
capacity Refinery, Petrochemical and Fertilizer Plant with a change of $4
billion. By the way, we can choose to
build lower capacity refineries for far
less. Rudimentary economics teaches us
that a nation should only export
finished goods and not raw materials.
The ‘Oyinbo’ people apparently
forgot to remove that from the
economics textbooks they sold to us, so we know their tricks, but have we
used it to our advantage? The answer
is NO. During the colonial period, the
invading forces plundered our land
and exported our raw materials to
their country, whose finished goods is
then imported back and sold to us at
more exorbitant prices. Interestingly, nothing has changed. We are now in
a period of neocolonialism. We sell
our crude (raw material) to them,
they process and produce several
products such as Liquefied Petroleum
Gas (LPG), Aviation Turbine Kero (ATK), Premium Motor Spirit (PMS),
Automotive Gas Oil (AGO), Grease,
Paraffin wax, Tar, and numerous
product too many to mention. Some
experts say at least, some 6,000
products are made from crude oil. After extracting all these byproducts,
foreigners then sell finished products
to us at exorbitant amount. At the moment, four refineries exist
in Nigeria. It may interest you to
know that Nigeria was once exporting
refined petroleum products. In fact,
the last refinery that was built was
for the purpose of exporting petroleum products refined in the
country. But alas, none of them is
working at optimal capacity. They
are said to function at an abysmal
25% of installed capacity. Interestingly, even at this sub-optimal
production level, we haven’t been
told the retail price of what we
produce locally. Two, they have refused to tell us who
consumes the locally refined
products. Is it exported or sold
locally? If sold locally, is it
subsidized? Three, at what price do we sell the
locally refined products? The Federal government has
budgeted the sum of N815.4 million
to fuel its power generating set and
vehicles. Will the government
purchase from our local refineries
and at what price? These are questions begging for
answers. In conclusion, I plead with the federal
government not to auction off these
priced refineries. It will only give
more power to a select cabal that
has consistently plundered the
nation’s resources by buying choice asset of the federation. A case in
point is the power sector, but that is
a topic for another day. If we refine our crude locally, we will
sell refined products at cheaper rate.
Private investors are not the answer,
they are out to make profit to the
detriment of the already poor citizens
(Nigeria has over 111 million desperately poor people). In fact,
Alhaji Dangote only agreed to invest
in the refinery project because a
contract assuring him of selling to
Nigerians at international benchmark
price was signed. I do hope for posterity sake, the
government has stopped paying
subsidy in view of the falling all
prices. Since a barrel of crude sells for less
than $50 today, the government has
no basis to keep the retail price of
Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) at N97
any longer. The price of PMS must
revert to N65 with immediate effect. Kikiowo Ileowo, a public affairs
analyst and the publisher of The
Paradigm Newspaper tweets at @
ileowokikiowo

Kenai:
https://www.elplural.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/charlie-hebdo.jpg

The above picture is a Charlie Hebdo cartoon mocking Christians.
Please, can anyone help tell me how many cartoonists were murdered by Christians afterwards?

what would u have done. Christians mocking Christians. I don't preach violent, and what does people did is not what Islam preaches

kay1one:
You are mad! You missed the word hypocrite! Islam is evil!

thank u very much, but is sweet thing is am much more better than u.

thorpido:
Indeed it is.We see that in Iraq,Syria,Afghanistan etc

the west brought the war der, because of hatred towards the people and their religion. tell them to leave our lands, the world will be a better place.

true2god:
The most offensive religion worldwide is Islam, read surah 9:29-30, where mohammed (aka alllah) asked muslims to humiliate christians and Jews and make them pay jizya.

Respect is reciprocal bro, you dont demand respect, it is earned.

the Jews and Christian living in our land most surely pay tax...jizya is refer in to tax *block head*. tax are been paid back them, when a country dominant another country. Muslim dominant does countries and der became under our protection. read our history very well

iamodenigbo1:
and Muslims don't practice homosexual?

priest are wedding man nd man, woman nd woman in churches. It is the same christains that are fightin for homosexuality to be legalize in the whole world..u people call it HUMAN RIGHTS.

Meel:
Xtianity is an offence in arab countries, y should xtian country should accept islam. Tolerance is what most xtian practice. I think being a xtian in saudi arabia is punishable by death.
What you cant accept dont do it to others.

.
We have christains all over the muslim world, pls do ur home work very well. Every country has her rule, u most abide by it.

thorpido:
You see the problem with you and many muslims.You start by saying there should be fairness and justice for muslims and then you get to the point of insults and ridicule.Show me a scripture in the bible that encourages homosexuality!
The greatest problem with the image of Islam is the hypocritical nature of many muslims.Now show me how your statement above has helped to have a better image of muslims.

haha...it was a question nd i never said it was so *mayb it is*. Been done by christains does not mean is what d bibble teaches..dat is what am sayin. Read through my replys. Lastly, muslims image is much more better than urs.

BlackTechnology:
Since you have prayed, let God fight his battle.

surely..he will. In sha Allah

true2god:
@ OP, I think you should advise all your lazy Islamist who are migrating to the west (or have migrated to the west) to go back to their Islamic hell holes. The same muslims who are fleeing their countries, in millions, to europe wants to dictate how the host countries should feel about Islam and 'profet' mohammed. Thats ridiculous!

If muslims cant stand their prophet being ridiculed, drawn in a cartoon, offended, they should remain in muslim countries where it is a capital offense of insult islam or mohammed.
Muslims are the highest hypocrites known to mankind, they will be demanding for respect, demanding to build mosques (from where they daily cursed the christian and Jews and instigate violence) in europe and america but will not allow churches built in arab countries. Thats nonsense!

If muslims are not happy that their pedophilee profet is insulted in europe, they should leave europe and move back to morroco, somalia, pakistan, saudi arabia, sudan, yemen, qatar, libya where they are religiosly killing each others daily.

just to correct one statement.. The west are the ones running to arab for better employement like qatar and saudi.
If the west will only leave our lands/countries alone, we wil leave ders too.
France has the highest population of muslims in west.

BlackTechnology:
My question to you which you have not answered

Have you prayed for this particular offender.?

the question has been answer, unless u have no eyes to see it

BlackTechnology:
My Muslim brother

"Pray for those who insult your faith." Jesus


Have you prayed for the person.? Yes or No

I pray that God should give the people who insult my faith what der truely deserve

BlackTechnology:
Now you agree with this post below


Thanks

saudi condems d ugly incident dat happen in france, and so do all right thinkin muslims.

kay1one:
Hypocrites! Bet your parents practice homosexuality! Dunce!

i kn dat bible don't teach homesexuality my dear friend, but the fact is that christains in west nd all over d world are mainly the ones doing it. Does it mean that is what christainity stand for? I dont believe so, likewise those using islam to do evil is not what d religion stands for.

BlackTechnology:
OK

Give me an example

A French court injunction banned a
Jesus based clothing advert
mimicking Da Vinci’s Last Supper.
The display was ruled “a gratuitous
and aggressive act of intrusion on
people’s innermost beliefs”, by the French judge. In 2005, ‘Aides Haute-
Garonne’ organized an informative
evening about the prevention of the
HIV-AIDS. The prospectus contained a
head-and-shoulders image of a
woman wearing a nun’s bonnet and two pink condoms. Because the
prospectus insulted a group because
of its religion, a court convicted Aides
Haute Garonne.
Pls read through very well, before commentin

BlackTechnology:
Then there is no point for this write up

Now tell the writer to go and pray.

The point is that, similar incidents has happen in france, the government condem it nd acted on it. Why is the muslim own always different

kay1one:
Islam is a curse!

and christainity is a mercy?. The misconception that u people have abt islam is clear to every1 that has eyes. Christains pratice homosexuality in every part of the world, is it what the bible incourages? Mayb it is.

BlackTechnology:
Op

A true religion will never react to insults


If it truly believes it is connected to God


Who has the power to fight for himself


Rather than protest, pray for the person


" Pray for those who persecute you" Jesus

A problem with christain is that...u only look at the order side of a story. A true muslim will never incourage fightin of any such. They are so many incident that our prophet was insulted, laugh at and many more. He never fought back and neither did his companion. A true muslim never participated in violent. Islam is peace.

The attacks on Charlie Hebdo last
week has generated many reactions
from all concerned. But if one
critically look at the event, one will
see the exposed hypocrite of the
West and deliberate double standard that is aimed at continuing their well-
planned attack on Muslims across the
world. France’s (and the West’s)
claim that free expression is a
‘fundamental principle’ is a myth, an
opiate of the masses, explicitly invoked for anti-Semitic purposes in
the years leading up to the holocaust,
and has recently been used to whip
up hatred of immigrants, ethnic
minorities and Muslims. Like
everywhere else in the ‘Free World’, in France, free expression is for some
but not others. Charlie Hebdo has facilitated the
growth of a form of politicized anti-
Muslim sentiment that bears a
disturbing resemblance to the
politicized anti-Semitism that
emerged as a mass movement in France in the 1890s in its use of
crude and vulgar caricatures that
purvey a sinister and stereotyped
image of Muslims. A French court injunction banned a
Jesus based clothing advert
mimicking Da Vinci’s Last Supper.
The display was ruled “a gratuitous
and aggressive act of intrusion on
people’s innermost beliefs”, by the French judge. In 2005, ‘Aides Haute-
Garonne’ organized an informative
evening about the prevention of the
HIV-AIDS. The prospectus contained a
head-and-shoulders image of a
woman wearing a nun’s bonnet and two pink condoms. Because the
prospectus insulted a group because
of its religion, a court convicted Aides
Haute Garonne. In 1994, Le Quotidien
de Paris published the article
L’obscurité de l’erreur by journalist, sociologist, and historian Paul
Giniewski. The article criticises the
Pope and states that Catholic
doctrine abetted the conception and
the realisation of Auschwitz. A court
upheld proceedings on the ground that the article was an insult to a
group because of its religion and
convicted the newspaper. ‘Charlie Hebdo Magazine’ itself
censored, apologised and then fired
longtime cartoonist Siné for a
caricature insulting the son of former
president Nicholas Sarkozy and his
wife Jessica Sebaoun-Darty, while staunchly standing on their ‘right’ to
repeatedly troll Muslims, minorities
and immigrants e.g. by showing a
caricature of a stereotypical Arab
whom they imply to be the Prophet
Muḥammad (sall Allāhu ʿalayhi wa Sallam) naked and bending over –
which tells you something about the
brand of satire they practice and that
they would rather be aiming
downward than upward. Dieudonné
M’Bala, a French comedian and satirist – was convicted and fined in
France for describing Holocaust
remembrance as “memorial
pornography”. The ‘Quennele’ hand sign has been
described as anti-establishment and
anti-Zionist by French youth and
famous football players (e.g Anelka).
It stoked serious controversy in
France since first being used by an anti-establishment comedian
Dieudonné M’Bala M’Bala in 2005.
M’Bala has been barred from many
theatres and convicted many times
for his ‘freedom of speech. As part of
“internal security” enactments passed in 2003, it is an offense to
insult the national flag or anthem,
with a penalty of a maximum 9,000
euro or up to six months’
imprisonment. Restrictions on
“offending the dignity of the Republic”, on the other hand, include
“insulting” anyone who serves the
public. French Rap Star Facing Prison for
Insulting the French State, insulting
Napoleon and Charles de Gaulle. It is
illegal to insult the French state, and
it seems historical characters like
Napoleon and Charles De Gaulle are sacred. But it is Ok to lampoon the
prophet of Islam, Muḥammad (salla
lāhu ʿalayhi wa sallam), the leading
light and ideal of divine justice for 1.5
billion people
is open to criticism? Nicolas Sarkozy, then-Interior
Minister and former President of the
Republic until 2012, ordered the
firing of the director of Paris Match —
because he had published photos of
Cécilia Sarkozy (his wife) with another man in New York. In 2006,
rapper ‘Joestarr’ had his rap song
against President Sarkozy censored. The following films have been
censored in France for provoking
violence: L’Essayeuse (1976)
Romance (1999) Le Mur (2011). With all these, it surprises the way
France and its Western allies have
allowed the continuous blasphemous
acts of that magazine all in the name
of bogus "freedom of speech. We say
no to freedom to kill and at the same time, no to freedom to insult. Double
standard won't solve the problems of
the world. (Comrade Abdul Lateef Usman
Abiodun, a journalist/political analyst,
contribute from Lagos via
07037657426/comradecestcesse@
gmail.com)

if u go fit sale d phone 30k, make we talk

Next month, Nigerians will be voting to decide who becomes their next
president. I think that General Buhari’s
soaring popularity is a reflection of
how disenfranchised some of President
Jonathan’s supporter have become with
his performance in government over the last 6 years, and very little to do
with the quality of the opposition
candidate. I fear that, like in 2011, this
election has already been decided on
emotions rather than substance. But
that is not what concerns me today. Baga On the same day that 18 people were
massacred in France by Islamist
gunmen, Amnesty international
reported the massacre of about 2,000
Nigerians in Baga. There was worldwide
outrage and show of solidarity with the French people. However, there was
scarcely any mention of the Baga
massacre in the media. President
Jonathan promptly issued a statement
to condemn the Charlie Hebdo attack,
and rightly so. But, more than a week later, the president has yet to say
anything about the massacre that took
place in his own country. Even worse,
there are no Nigerians on the streets
protesting or standing in solidarity with
the people of Baga who have either been killed or forced to flee their
homes.
President Jonathan has demonstrated
over and over again that he lacks the
will power and a strategy to confront,
let alone defeat Boko Haram (BH). It took the visit by Malala Yusuf, nearly
several months after the Chibok
abductions, before the president saw
the need to speak to the families of the
abducted girls. President Jonathan told
world leaders in France at a meeting convened by President Hollande last
May that his government would build a
wall fence to protect the school from
further assaults. Incredible, but this
was our president’s response to a
question he was asked about the kind of support his government hopes to
give the families of the abducted girls
and why he had not yet visited the
school. (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixCIuAHppC4)
As I have said in a previous article for
Sahara Reporters, http:// /1C32mRA, it is evident that the
President sees BH as a sectional
problem. He body language suggests
that he believes BH is a political tool
put in place to topple his government.
This perfectly explains his lackadaisical attitude to what is arguably Nigeria’s
biggest security threat since
Independence.
But, how about us, the people? My view
is that societies deserve the kind of
leadership that they get. Leaders do not drop from the sky – they are a
reflection of the society from which
they come. We have become
accustomed to the atrocities of BH to
the point where their nearly weekly
massacre of our countrymen hardly elicits any reaction from us. To us, the
victims are faceless and represent just
another statistic. It appears that our
society places very little value on
human life. An American or European
life is seemingly more valuable than a Nigerian life - little wonder then that
the world rallied around France where
18 people were killed but looked away
whilst 2,000 Nigerians got butchered!
Yet, there is not one Nigerian on the
street protesting the massacre and/or demanding action from the
government. You see, people can only
respect you as much as you respect
yourself. Not more.
The problem with Nigeria is . . . . . . .
Nigerians. I know how much we expect that a messiah will come to deliver us,
but neither president Jonathan nor
General Buhari nor anyone else is the
messiah. We don’t need a messiah;
what we need is a change of attitude
and values. Every one of us, that is. We have developed an unproductive habit
of relying on supernatural entities to
intervene and solve our problems. Every
way one turns, one is confronted with
such fatalistic pronouncements as:
‘God will do it’, ‘it is the will of God’, ‘it is well’, ‘e go better’, and so on. We
actually believe that soliloquy and
hunger strikes (aka prayers and fasting)
can solve the problems of leadership,
poor infrastructure and insecurity that
beset our country. We need to realize that these supernatural entities,
assuming they even exist, are not going
to do for us what we need to, and
should do, for ourselves.
At this point, it is pertinent to repeat
my old warnings: As experience has shown in Rwanda, Bosnia, Somalia and
with ISIS fighters in Iraq, situations like
ours can degenerate very rapidly, but
lives can be saved if the international
community acts decisively and timely.
We have a humanitarian crisis developing in Nigeria - whole
communities have been burnt down and
their population displaced; some of our
people have fled into neighboring
countries such as Cameroon, Chad and
Niger to seek shelter as the Nigerian government does to seem bothered
about the plight of its own citizens;
thousands have been literally
butchered; others have fled to parts of
the country that are relatively safe. The
dimensions and magnitude of these problems are under-reported by our
local media. Sadly, Western journalists
have other priorities than Nigeria.
We do not know where or when the next
terrorist attacks will take place. But we
know they will happen because the ideology that drives these attacks has
not been countered. BH has been
tremendously emboldened by President
Jonathan’s apathy. The president has
left us in no doubt that he lacks both
the will power and the competence to defeat BH. If the state of insecurity in
this nation means anything to
Nigerians, then, it is self-evident that
President Jonathan does not deserve
another term in Aso Rock. And those
who think that Lagos and the cities that lie outside the northern geographical
zones are immune from BH terrorism
should think again. This problem
affects us all.
The international community needs to
rally round Nigeria. Jihadist terrorism is a global problem and Nigeria needs all
the help it can get to confront BH
jihadists. If the world does not act now,
it will be forced to do so at a later day
when the threats are even more
difficult to deal with. The time to act is now!
Ijabla Raymond, a medical doctor of
Nigerian heritage writes from the UK.
Contact: Ijabla.Raymond@
facebook.com

Next month, Nigerians will be voting to decide who becomes their next
president. I think that General Buhari’s
soaring popularity is a reflection of
how disenfranchised some of President
Jonathan’s supporter have become with
his performance in government over the last 6 years, and very little to do
with the quality of the opposition
candidate. I fear that, like in 2011, this
election has already been decided on
emotions rather than substance. But
that is not what concerns me today. Baga On the same day that 18 people were
massacred in France by Islamist
gunmen, Amnesty international
reported the massacre of about 2,000
Nigerians in Baga. There was worldwide
outrage and show of solidarity with the French people. However, there was
scarcely any mention of the Baga
massacre in the media. President
Jonathan promptly issued a statement
to condemn the Charlie Hebdo attack,
and rightly so. But, more than a week later, the president has yet to say
anything about the massacre that took
place in his own country. Even worse,
there are no Nigerians on the streets
protesting or standing in solidarity with
the people of Baga who have either been killed or forced to flee their
homes.
President Jonathan has demonstrated
over and over again that he lacks the
will power and a strategy to confront,
let alone defeat Boko Haram (BH). It took the visit by Malala Yusuf, nearly
several months after the Chibok
abductions, before the president saw
the need to speak to the families of the
abducted girls. President Jonathan told
world leaders in France at a meeting convened by President Hollande last
May that his government would build a
wall fence to protect the school from
further assaults. Incredible, but this
was our president’s response to a
question he was asked about the kind of support his government hopes to
give the families of the abducted girls
and why he had not yet visited the
school. (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixCIuAHppC4)
As I have said in a previous article for
Sahara Reporters, http:// /1C32mRA, it is evident that the
President sees BH as a sectional
problem. He body language suggests
that he believes BH is a political tool
put in place to topple his government.
This perfectly explains his lackadaisical attitude to what is arguably Nigeria’s
biggest security threat since
Independence.
But, how about us, the people? My view
is that societies deserve the kind of
leadership that they get. Leaders do not drop from the sky – they are a
reflection of the society from which
they come. We have become
accustomed to the atrocities of BH to
the point where their nearly weekly
massacre of our countrymen hardly elicits any reaction from us. To us, the
victims are faceless and represent just
another statistic. It appears that our
society places very little value on
human life. An American or European
life is seemingly more valuable than a Nigerian life - little wonder then that
the world rallied around France where
18 people were killed but looked away
whilst 2,000 Nigerians got butchered!
Yet, there is not one Nigerian on the
street protesting the massacre and/or demanding action from the
government. You see, people can only
respect you as much as you respect
yourself. Not more.
The problem with Nigeria is . . . . . . .
Nigerians. I know how much we expect that a messiah will come to deliver us,
but neither president Jonathan nor
General Buhari nor anyone else is the
messiah. We don’t need a messiah;
what we need is a change of attitude
and values. Every one of us, that is. We have developed an unproductive habit
of relying on supernatural entities to
intervene and solve our problems. Every
way one turns, one is confronted with
such fatalistic pronouncements as:
‘God will do it’, ‘it is the will of God’, ‘it is well’, ‘e go better’, and so on. We
actually believe that soliloquy and
hunger strikes (aka prayers and fasting)
can solve the problems of leadership,
poor infrastructure and insecurity that
beset our country. We need to realize that these supernatural entities,
assuming they even exist, are not going
to do for us what we need to, and
should do, for ourselves.
At this point, it is pertinent to repeat
my old warnings: As experience has shown in Rwanda, Bosnia, Somalia and
with ISIS fighters in Iraq, situations like
ours can degenerate very rapidly, but
lives can be saved if the international
community acts decisively and timely.
We have a humanitarian crisis developing in Nigeria - whole
communities have been burnt down and
their population displaced; some of our
people have fled into neighboring
countries such as Cameroon, Chad and
Niger to seek shelter as the Nigerian government does to seem bothered
about the plight of its own citizens;
thousands have been literally
butchered; others have fled to parts of
the country that are relatively safe. The
dimensions and magnitude of these problems are under-reported by our
local media. Sadly, Western journalists
have other priorities than Nigeria.
We do not know where or when the next
terrorist attacks will take place. But we
know they will happen because the ideology that drives these attacks has
not been countered. BH has been
tremendously emboldened by President
Jonathan’s apathy. The president has
left us in no doubt that he lacks both
the will power and the competence to defeat BH. If the state of insecurity in
this nation means anything to
Nigerians, then, it is self-evident that
President Jonathan does not deserve
another term in Aso Rock. And those
who think that Lagos and the cities that lie outside the northern geographical
zones are immune from BH terrorism
should think again. This problem
affects us all.
The international community needs to
rally round Nigeria. Jihadist terrorism is a global problem and Nigeria needs all
the help it can get to confront BH
jihadists. If the world does not act now,
it will be forced to do so at a later day
when the threats are even more
difficult to deal with. The time to act is now!
Ijabla Raymond, a medical doctor of
Nigerian heritage writes from the UK.
Contact: Ijabla.Raymond@
facebook.com

PRD:
And this is not making front page on Nairaland but it is making serious discussions in Europe's house of common...moderator please

this issue needs to be seen by everyone in Nigeria. I hope the moderators will do der own part by takin this serious issue to front page

may God help us all

In the past few days, Nigeria has been
in the news all over the world as a result
of the Boko Haram’s killing of about
2,000 people in an attack on Baga
village. It is described as the deadliest
attack by Boko Haram since their wicked campaign and our politicians
have been going about their campaign
without taking a day out to mourn
people that lost their lives in the attack. KINDLY SHARE THIS TILL IT GET TO
THEM. NIGERIANS STAND UP TOGETHER TO
SAY NO TO BOKO HARAM. PRAY FOR BAGA! PRAY FOR BORNO! PRAY FOR NORTHEAST! PRAY FOR NIGERIA!

No matter hw mr president try to hide under the platform of his so-called name *Godluck*, the devil in him will soon be shown to the whole world.

South Africa’s eccentric youth leader
and federal lawmaker, Julius Malema,
has launched a blistering attack on
President Goodluck Jonathan over his
handling of the massacre in Baga,
Borno State, describing the Nigerian president as “irresponsible” and
suggesting South African intervention
against the extremist Boko Haram sect. Mr. Malema, who leads the Economic
Freedom Fighters Party, criticised Mr.
Jonathan for rushing out public
condemnations of the terrorist attack
on a newspaper in France when he has
remained silent until date on the bloodbath in Baga, a troubled town in
his own country. The youth leader said the South African
National Assembly will consider a
motion on a possible intervention in the
bloody campaign by Boko Haram that
has claimed thousands of lives and has
worsened in the last weeks. Boko Haram seized Baga, a fishing
community on the northern tip of
Borno State by Lake Chad, sacking the
military base there and killing soldiers
and hundreds of civilians. Rights group, Amnesty International,
said at least 2,000 people were killed in
the attack, and said the carnage is the
worst attack since Boko Haram began a
bloody campaign targeting civilians and
government officials in 2009. On Tuesday, after over a week of
silence, the Nigerian military said about
150 people died in the attack, including
Boko Haram militants, rejecting the
figure provided by Amnesty
International. The call by the military came barely 24
hours after a spokesperson said the
casualty figures could not be “credibly
determined”. Mr. Jonathan, who has been on the
campaign trail ahead of the February 14
presidential elections, has yet to
comment on the attack till date. But the president was one of the first
world leaders to issue a statement
condemning the killing of 12 journalists
and police officers in Paris, by Al
Qaeda-linked terrorists. While the president has not condemned
the Baga attack, his cabinet members
too have not commented on the
incident. Yet, like the president, Finance
minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, also
tweeted messages of solidarity with the
French people, condemning the attack
on Charlie Hebdo. Mr. Malema, who had previously served
as the president of African National
Congress Youth League, said the action
of the Nigerian president had
demonstrated “irresponsible
leadership”. Speaking at a press briefing, Mr.
Malema mocked Mr. Jonathan using his
first name, Goodluck. “Eh Goodlook, or Goodluck or whatever
his name is or badluck I don’t know …
He is quick to release statement about
the killing in Paris; but don’t (doesn’t)
say anything about the killings in his
own country. That’s an irresponsible leadership,” Mr. Malema said. “We are really saddened by what is
happening in Nigeria. It is highly
disturbing.” “And we need South African
Government to intervene and we will be
raising the matter in the Parliament. “We will make the Parliament to debate
it as an urgent matter and pass the
resolution for South African
intervention in Nigeria,” he said.http:///1yimsa6

chuksmad:
This man nawaooo, you can't even spell declare as bolded

was declear d only one u saw, hmm nd i thought u have somethin to say..lol. Since u really cant defend d president ur killin urself 4, better look for a job to do..cus i know ur jobless. Blind follower of GEJ

Tonylyte:
Shut up! It a federal university. Stop comparing amaechi WAYO'S projects with that of goodluck jonathan. We all know what happened to his railway project.

hahaha...u forgot what u wrote "kogi state university" or dont u know what ur sayin anymore..frm state to federal uni, eyyaa what a shame. Come to rivers state and see the good schools build by our governor

chuksmad:
This man nawaooo, you can't even spell declare as bolded

is dat d only one u saw..lol. I thought u wanted to say somethin else. Blind followers of GEJ

Tonylyte:
Na amaechi build kogi state university na...dispute this one first, i will tell you more.

ur not ashame of urself..kogi state university, is state schools build by federal government. I thought u have betters things to talk about. Without grass root education, who will attend d uni nd poly. Mention 20 schools dat ur so-called president build, compare to d schools dat ameach build in most local govts in rivers state. The federal govts are suppose to assist d state govts in buildin nd fundin schools, but what are der doing apart from lootin our moni. Rivers state monthly allocation has been divided by half it anual funds.