₦airaland Forum

Crisis rocks Methodist Church on September 29, 2013 at 12:50 am in News
By SAM EYOBOKA
THE proposed investiture of a new Prelate for the Methodist Church Nigeria, scheduled for next Sunday, may not hold after all as the process that produced the Prelate-elect has been faulted by the immediate past Prelate of the church, Dr Sunday Mbang, who described the election as an ecclesiastical fraud of the highest order.
Mbang, in a seven-page document, entitled: ‘Holy Almighty Everlasting God, save Your church, Methodist Church Nigeria from indiscipline, manipulation and fraud. So help us God’, alluded to several constitutional breaches in the process that led to the September 1 election of the Archbishop of Enugu, Most Rev. Samuel Uche, as the new Prelate as well as seven others as archbishops for the newly created archdioceses.
According to the Prelate-Emeritus, who headed the church for 22 years at a critical period in the church’s history, what took place during the Emergency Conference and the 44th Special Conference at Ebute Metta, Lagos, can be described as anything but elections going by the dictionary meaning of the word and promptly cautioned those involved in the process to restrain from condemning politicians on election manipulation and rigging.
The erstwhile Christian Association of Nigeria, CAN, president and former chairperson of World Methodist Council, Sunday Vanguard can now reveal, stormed out of the Special Conference following alleged to undermine the church’s 2006 Constitution despite attempts by him and a few others to toe the path of righteousness.
Mbang’s bitterness was palpable when he directed our reporter to the document in a telephone conversation, suggesting that the document was self-explanatory when asked to throw more light on his allegations.
According to the document, which was not addressed to nobody in particular, the former Prelate alleged several constitutional breaches which made him conclude that the election process that produced the prelate-elect and the seven archbishops was not credible.
The Akwa Ibom State-born cleric said the process of nomination and screening was incredulously flawed and at variance with the Constitution which provides the Electoral College as the instrument of Conference for making nominations and recommendations for vacant episcopal positions in the church.
According to him, the 2013 Electoral College was presented with the names of 10 candidates for the office of the Prelate.
He argued that after some of the “unwilling and unsolicited candidates from the 10 candidates failed in the unending voting systems, probably the legitimate ones selected by the secret illegal Electoral College were asked to go out.
”But why were they asked to leave the Electoral College rook if screening was a no-go area? Was this part of the plan of the unconstitutional illegal Electoral College? To this end, no screening was done to establish the suitability and capability of candidates to be elected. This was the case of the blind leading the blind,” he noted.
”The election that took place was an ecclesiastical fraud of the highest order,” he pointed out, asking “Can this church, her leaders and her people have any conscience left to condemn political leaders on election manipulation and rigging? Can the pot now call the kettle black?”
Mbang also drew attention to what he described as “executive indiscipline”, saying the 2006 Constitution of the church encouraged the use of emergency or extraordinary conference to deal with urgent matters requiring conference attention.
It will be recalled that Archbishop of Enugu, Most Rev. Samuel Uche was said to have defeated his Ibadan counterpart, Most Rev. M.K. Stephen, a man reputed to have very intimidating credentials locally and abroad to effectively lead to the church. Feelers, however, emerged after that Stephen initially polled 65 votes as against Uche’s 63 but lost his advantage during the run off.
Outgoing prelate, His Eminence Sunday Ola Makinde described the elections as a smooth transition and urged Nigerian politicians to borrow a leaf from Nigerian churches not only how to conduct successful polls but also how to work together for the good of the nation.

Could this be the beginning of understanding the dramas and intrigues of the historic June 12, 1993 election? Perhaps. Perhaps, too, for the first time, the high priest of that epoch, Gen Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, is going beyond the first layer of the mystery of what is today referred as “June 12.” The retired army general was the military president at the time and he had managed that political process. Chief Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola (MKO) was widely believed to have won the election, but Babangida annulled it before the umpire, the National Electoral Commission (NEC), announced the final result. The consequences of that act were dire and the rebounds ugly. Even today, those consequences are still gnawing at the delicate aspects of the country.
Twenty years on, full and authentic story of that period has eluded Nigerians and it is so because, those who are in the know have maintained sealed lips. Well, until now. A book, Ibrahim Babangida: The Military, Politics and Power in Nigeria, written by one of the founding members ofNewswatchmagazine, Dan Agbese, may have given us a serious glimpse into those dark, troubling days. One of the most striking, if surprising, is that, against all expectations and imaginations, IBB, the man who annulled the election, had actually encouraged Abiola in every way possible to run. In an interview with IBB, published in the book, the former military president said he supported Abiola “a lot, morally and financially in the campaign.” He said he gave Abiola N35 million to help in the election.
According to him, before Abiola entered the race, he and Babangida “talked of the pros and cons” of Abiola’s presidential ambition. And when Abiola “eventually decided that he wanted to go (for it), I supported the idea that he should do it.”
According to Babangida, he had wanted to make Abiola the chairman of the Transitional Council because he believed his friend “enjoyed tremendous political goodwill. His name was a household name. He had the international contact and Nigeria too had a very good chance of having someone like him heading that organisation.”
However, according to the book, this proposition was dead on arrival as some of Babangida’s colleagues in the ruling council opposed it. Instead, they agreed to accept him as a member of the council but not the chairman.
Babangida, according to the book, told Abiola he would bring him in as a member and ensure that the members of the Transitional Council elect him chairman.
The book further reveals that the Armed Forces Ruling Council (AFRC) had decided that the chairman of the Transitional Council should come from the South West where Abiola came from. But Abiola rather wanted Babangida to announce him as chairman “straight away.” He told Babangida that, that was how his family wanted it because they feared that the president might change his mind once he made him just a member. “Left to me,” says Babangida, “I wanted to make him the chairman. Then he decided and blew it.”
The emergence of the two presidential candidates was equally dramatic. It followed the disqualification of 23 presidential aspirants. According to the book, IBB had regarded the 23 disqualified from participating in the presidential election, as the first 11 among the politicians jostling for power. Their ban thus paved the way for the emergence of new political actors on the stage of the transition programme.
“With the first 11 put out in the cold, there were few runners in the field. Two men easily emerged from the thin crowd of presidential aspirants. One was the billionaire philanthropist, Bashorun M.K.O Abiola, who nursed a presidential ambition going back all the way to the major financiers of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN).
“He intended to contest the presidential election on the platform of the party in 1983. The party moguls erected obstacle in the way. He quit the party and partisan politics altogether in 1982. He was affected by the ban on former politicians and public office holders and unsuccessfully challenged his ban at the tribunal. With the ban lifted, he joined SDP in January 1993 and was elected the party’s presidential flag bearer at its convention in Jos in March that year.
The other man was Alhaji Bashir Tofa, who, like Abiola, was a national executive member of NPN. He was the party’s national financial secretary. He picked the presidential ticket of the NRC at its convention at Port Harcourt in March 1993.
Both men were Babangida’s close friends.”
Babangida was not quite comfortable with this. He says he feared people would accuse him of manipulating the transition programme to favour his close friends. He even tried to discourage Tofa from contesting the election
“I told him (Tofa) in the presence of about 13 of his colleagues. I advised him not to seek for that election. I didn’t support him. He was not a winning candidate.”
According to the book, even as the chairman of National Electoral Commission, Professor Humphrey Nwosu, had seen the conduct of the presidential election as critical to the entire transition programme and was on ground to see that it ended on a sound note. But the cloud was gathering, as the “National Defence and Security Council did not openly object to the two presidential candidates – Abiola and Tofa – but some elements in the military in cahoots with some of the politicians wanted to stop them from contesting the election.
“Several times the council, pressurised by these elements, came close to disqualifying the two men. Some members of the council felt that neither Abiola nor Tofa was fit to be president. They assailed Abiola’s character. Babangida recalls that “they never saw him as somebody who was morally upright or fit…”
“They tried to blackmail him as a government contractor to whom the government owed a lot of money and they didn’t feel comfortable that this would be their commander – in – chief.”
The book notes how providence smiled on the two presidential candidates and, according to Babangida, the council feared that “ if we stopped it (the election), we would be in trouble again. What was paramount in our mind then was we wouldn’t like to be accused again of not wanting to leave office. So, we said let the bloody thing go on.”
The decision to “let the bloody thing go on,” was actually a fluke. The military, according to Babangida, believed “that we would have an inconclusive election. We thought we should be fair to let it run and when it became inconclusive, then we would take whatever action that we deemed necessary over a re-run or a re-election or something like that.”
The military, the book says, underrated Abiola’s clout, as his followership unsettled those elements in the military that did not like him. “About a week or so before the June 12, 1993, presidential election, security reports indicated that Abiola would certainly trounce Tofa beyond dispute. He would win on the first ballot. The election would not be inconclusive. The report caused some jitters in military circle. What to do?”
The cabal in the military that didn’t want Abiola, was saddled with what line of action to take next.
According to the book, at this stage of confusion in the military hierarchy, former Second Republic senator, Francis Nzeribe, came up with the military-should-stay campaign, which served as tonic for the government. He formed the Association for Better Nigeria (ABN), with Abimbola Davies as his second in command.
“Nzeribe went to Abuja high court on June 10 to stop the presidential election for alleged irregularities and corruption in the conduct of the SDP primaries won by Abiola. ABN alleged that Abiola used money to induce the majority of the delegates to vote for him.
“At 9.30pm on the same day, the court, presided over by justice Bassey Ita Ikpeme, now deceased, threw the spanner into the works. She “restrained (NEC) from conducting the presidential election on the June 12, 1993.”
Her judgment was the first major indication that the transition programme was under serious threat. “Nwosu tried to salvage it. He appeared before the NDSC on June 11 and put a strong argument in favour of going ahead with the election. He argued, quite passionately, that if the election was postponed, the election materials already on site would be compromised.
“NEC had enough protection under the decree to ignore Ikpeme’s ruling. But the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Clement Akpamgbo, had a different take on the issue. He did not support Nwosu’s position. Instead, he advised that the election be postponed in obedience to the order, NEC could then appeal and have the order set aside by a superior court.

The Christian Association of Nigeria, Kwara State chapter on Friday declined the state government’s invitation for CAN to conduct the ceremonial service for 2013 Independence anniversary.
The Christian body also directed all Christian intending pilgrims to Jerusalem this year to reject any offer of sponsorship from the state government.
The state CAN Chairman, Dr. James Folaranmi, on Friday told journalists in Ilorin that the organisation took the decisions during its emergency meeting on Friday in Ilorin.
He said its members should instead gather at the United Missionary Theological Church along Offa Garage Area, Ilorin by 5pm on Sunday for “a special prayer for the nation.”
Folaranmi said, “We received a few days ago a letter from the government seeking for our organisation of this year service for the nation’s independence anniversary.
“But we have asked the concerned authorities that can two persons walk or work together except they had first agreed?
“In view of our position and the governor’s own, we are not in tandem and we can’t be hypocritically organising any service ordered by the government that is denying our existence in the state.
“Because we love our father land, all Christian faithful have been asked to gather at the UMTC on Sunday evening to pray for the peace and progress of our country.
“Besides, no Christian in the state should accept any Jerusalem sponsorship from the government. These are the decisions reached on Friday at the end of our emergency meeting.”
CAN had complained of marginalisation in appointments, political positions and promotions.
It had claimed that out of about 147 political positions in the state, less than 30 are Christians.
But the Governor, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed denied any maginalisation of Christians.
He also claimed that appointments into political offices and other positions in the state were purely on merit and geographical balancing.
He said considerations for appointments ‘had never and will never be on religion.’

Police is your friend indeed

Because of obvious reasons informed by its mode of operation, many people in Abuja do not recognise the Abuja Environmental Protection Board as the environmental watchdog of the Federal Capital Territory; rather, the impression many residents and visitors have is that this environmental outfit is just a disguised “local police” for the FCT. These dark-shirt-and-peak cap boys would rather arrest a lady who, by her manner of dressing – or gait, resembles a commercial sex worker, than pick up a waste bin that has blocked a gutter in a residential area. They are ready to chase hawkers, itinerant artisans, and other hapless petty traders into any bush in town, and overzealously apprehend them, than chase an eco-hazardous vehicle or a carbon emitting truck. An Abuja resident once described them as “policemen without boots”, because some of them wear bathroom slippers to engage the so-called “Abuja vagabonds”.
This was why I was taken aback when I read in the media, during the recent Lassa fever epidemic, that the AEPB had introduced sanitary measures to ensure that residents of the FCT would not fall victim of the virus that was transmitted by hairless tailed bush rats that abound in the country. It was sad to read that 40 lives including some medical personnel had been lost to the disease with over 400 others infected this year alone. Although Abuja was not among the 12 states of Edo, Taraba, Borno, Gombe, Yobe, Plateau, Nasarawa, Ebonyi, Ondo, Rivers, Anambra and Lagos, which harboured the acute viral disease which was first discovered in 1969 in Lassa Town in Borno State, the nation’s capital city needed to be quickly hemmed in by preventive measures against the outbreak.
The AEPB’s sanitary measures include the re-introduction of sanitary inspectors to carry out a citywide house-to-house inspection of premises to ensure that residents applied environmental health practices. According to the Assistant Director, Environmental Health and Safety of the AEPB, Kate Ogbonna, residents are advised to keep their homes and environments clean including their kitchen, pantries, cooking utensils and others. The campaign also kicks against rearing of animals, birds and fish within residential premises. It also stops the parking of abandoned cars and other household property, and enforces the clearing of blocked drainage and stagnant water within and around residential apartment in the territory. It was learnt that the sanitary inspectors commenced work immediately on February 25 and were moving from house to house to inspect and also serve defaulters with notice to comply with safety and cleanliness rules and regulations, failure of which they would be charged to court.
For Abuja to wake up from a deep environmental slumber and start doing what needed to be done, means that, perhaps, the Lassa fever outbreak has finally sounded the clarion call that this is the time for Nigeria to wake up to the reality that the direct consequence of poor environmental sanitation is high morbidity and mortality rates due to sanitation-related diseases like cholera, diarrhoea, dysentery and typhoid. The wise adage says, “A stitch in time saves nine” or, more colloquially, prevention is better than cure; but we live in a country where the government and the people’s body language says “cure is better than prevention”.
I wonder what made us forget where we are coming from as a country. Some of the best aspects of governance like sanitary inspection which used to be standard practice before, have been discarded, and now it is manifest that we are paying dearly for it. Can we count how many times we hear of individuals and families dropping dead after having a particular meal? Could it be that some of these incidents were just cases of contamination due to widespread poor environmental health situation in the country today? Those that lived in the colonial and post-colonial periods in Nigeria knew them as “Wole-Wole” among the Yoruba, “Nwa ole-ala” among the Igbo, and “Duba-Geri” in the Hausa-speaking parts of the country. They were the dreaded, respected and, yes, obeyed government workers in Nigeria who took preventive health to an enviable height.
It is interesting that the AEPB used the old nomenclature, instead of calling them Environmental Health Officers as is the modern practice. I therefore pray that the aura of service shall descend on these workers today as it was in the past, so that they will achieve a lot. Nigeria needs them today more than ever before. This is because as the adverse effects of climate change is visiting developing countries, the adaptation strategies must include environmental health. Sadly, in Nigeria today, the position of environmental health officers in Primary Health Care has been hijacked by medical health practitioners (most especially medical doctors) and it is not supposed to be so. The truth is that doctors have professional orientation that centres wholly on curative health, and not preventive health – the guiding practice of environmental health.
Environmental health officers, also known as public health inspectors, the world over have standard duties which include protection of water sources, waste water treatment, waste management, vector and pest control, prevention and control of land, air and water pollution, food hygiene and safety. Others are air quality management, occupational noise management, occupational health and safety, accommodation establishment, port health duties, accident prevention, environmental health aspect of public recreation and tourism, etc. In more developed countries, sanitary inspectors are actually the people who review the floor plans of new buildings and give approval for builders. Could it be that the absence of these officers is a fundamental contributor to the ubiquitous cases of building collapse in Nigeria in recent times?
Our government needs to sit up. Health delivery is not only about cure and care. There are a lot of diseases that are environmentally preventable. And there are a lot of environmental indices that set the template for the inevitable breeding of vectors, and then subsequent outbreak of epidemics, just as witnessed in the case of Lassa fever. Now is the time to be wholistic in planning for the safety of the Nigerian masses, rather than wait for emergencies. Let us take a look at the Roll Back Malaria programme for instance. There are four intervention strategies: Early diagnosis and prompt treatment; Use of insecticides treated bed nets and mosquito control; provision of malaria treatment for pregnant women to reduce impact of malaria infection on their health, and on the health and development of their children; and prevention and responses to epidemics. But the situation is that the last strategy is downplayed in favour of the first three; ironically, prevention and response to epidemic is the one Nigeria needs more to stem the tide of malaria permanently and this is where environmental health management is required.
What is more, the government needs to make it mandatory for all institutions to make provision for the office of environmental health officers. At the moment, many Federal Medical Centres, federal hospitals, state hospitals and other health institutions and ministries do not have such essential office. I believe that when the government fills this yawning gap, the nation’s institutions of higher learning will create courses and degrees for environmental health management where these officers will be trained, just as it is the practice in advanced nations. In Nigeria, there is a paucity of platforms for certification and capacity building for public health inspectors at the moment. Should the situation remain unchanged, even the brand new Abuja sanitary officers after a while will go back to chasing commercial sex workers and hawkers, and this too will become a chapter in our notorious national storybook aptly titled: “One step forward, two steps backwards”.

Recently, the Minister of Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, was interviewed on 90 Minutes, a current affairs programme on the African Independent Television. The minister used the opportunity to shed light on the achievements and challenges of Nigeria’s health sector. Among the giant strides that he claimed the country has made include the extermination of guinea worm and Type 3 polio; significant reduction in maternal and infant mortality; improvement in the condition of service of health workers – nurses can now go on internship likewise, other professionals in the health sector can now get to Level 17, which is the highest in the civil service cadre. He also claimed that some states in Nigeria had met health-related MDG goals.
The minister tried to distinguish between health and health care and that he was only in charge of health care and not the health of the citizens. He asserted that while efforts were being made to improve health care delivery in the country, there are other things that contribute to people’s well-being like their lifestyle which is totally independent of the health care. For instance, reckless driving, indiscipline, lack of hygiene can cut short people’s lives. The minister nonetheless agreed with the panel of interviewers that there are still significant challenges with Nigeria’s health care delivery system and that he and his lieutenants were doing their level best to overcome them.
Be thaqt as it may, a critical aspect of any health care system is drug production, distribution and administration. Patients are normally examined and diagnosed by doctors and laboratory scientists followed by prescriptions to the pharmacy for drug purchase while nurses, among other services, ensure proper usage of prescribed drugs. For decades, Nigerians have been under the siege of substandard, adulterated and counterfeit drugs. Charlatans and unqualified personnel have taken over the production, distribution and administration of drugs all over the country. There is also the sale of expired drugs. This has been the stock in trade of local chemist shops or itinerant medicine sellers; unfortunately, some General Hospitals were recently alleged to have dispensed about-to-expire drugs to some patients. Mention must also be made of genuine drugs that have lost their potency as a result of improper storage. All these have resulted in thousands of premature deaths while some others end up being permanently disabled as a result of being administered counterfeit drugs. This phenomenon is most flourishing at our rural communities and urban slums where the prying eyes of regulatory agencies are less vigilant.
Aside administration of fake and substandard drugs, there is also the largely unregulated activities of herbalists and local medicine sellers. Here, I mean those selling herbal concoctions at motor parks, inside buses and at village markets. There is a popular medicine in Yorubaland known as aporo-epa-ijebu, a much-touted cure-all or antidote to all-known human sickness. This patently dangerous drug is still very much on sale in open market in all nooks and cranny of Yorubaland.
The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control was established to safeguard public health by ensuring that only the right quality drugs, food and other regulated products are manufactured, imported, exported, advertised, distributed, sold and used. The agency specifically has the mandate to do the following: Regulate and control the importation, exportation, manufacture, advertisement, distribution, sale and use of regulated products; conduct appropriate tests and ensure compliance with standard specifications; undertake appropriate investigation of the production premises and raw materials of regulated products; and compile standard specifications, regulations, and guidelines for the production, importation, exportation, sale and distribution of regulated products.
NAFDAC also controls the exportation and issues quality certification of regulated products intended for export; establishes and maintains relevant laboratories for the performance of its functions; ensures that the use of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances are limited to medical and scientific use only; undertakes the registration of food, drugs, medical devices, bottled water and chemicals; undertakes inspection of imported regulated products; and, pronounces on the quality and safety of regulated products after appropriate analysis
In a recent interview in Thisday, August 31, 2013, the Director-General of NAFDAC, Dr. Paul Orhii, said: “…counterfeit drugs were first detected in 1968. By 2001, more than 40 per cent of the drugs in the country were counterfeit or substandard. Due to the effort of my predecessor, by 2005, counterfeit drugs were reduced to 16.7 per cent.” That should be cheering news, isn’t it? However, Orhii went on to say something scary, which is that narcotic drug barons are now divesting from hard drugs to manufacturing of adulterated and counterfeit drugs. According to him: “With the recent crackdown on illicit narcotic trade, most of the drug barons have now diverted their resources to manufacturing counterfeit medicines. Globally, the business is worth about $75bn annually. That is the quantity of fake drugs circulating internationally; it is more globalised and with the former hard drug barons now entering the business, it has become more militarised. It is now more dangerous fighting counterfeit drugs. Now, they are more sophisticated.” That, indeed, is scary and disturbing.
Orhii is not done, there is another challenge. It’s increasingly difficult to identify fake drugs, he declared aloud. He voiced his frustration when he said: “Before, once you looked at the packaging of a medicine, you knew that they were counterfeit, maybe from the printing. But now, with the sophistication in printing technology, when you see the packaging, it is copied exactly and sometimes they even copy more than the original. We attempted to put holograms on medicines but the counterfeiters got the hologram before us. Nigeria is a good market that attracts drug counterfeiters. We have a huge market; we have a good buying power; so when they bring their counterfeit drugs here, they sell.” Even though the NAFDAC DG ended the interview on a positive note that his agency had brought the incidence of fake drug to a single digit, I doubt the sincerity of that statement.
Nevertheless, I commend NAFDAC and the Pharmaceutical Council of Nigeria for raiding drugstores with fake, adulterated and expired drugs. However, a lot more needs to be done to safeguard the health on Nigerians. Preventive medicine and measures are the only foolproof option. After all, if one is healthy, there won’t be any need to use drugs, whether fake or genuine.

Femi Fani-Kayode’s nationality question and his views on the Igbo raceon September 25, 2013 at 11:31 am in Viewpoint
A shortwhile ago, series of articles on “the Igbo race and their unrestrained quest for dominance” churned out from the pen of Femi Fani-Kayode.
The ripples of those articles have not abated as the altercation between Fani-Kayode and one of the ladies mentioned in one of the articles continues to show. With Kayode’s last article on this subject matter titled, “The Nationality Question”, one is left with the impression that those articles on Igbo race was, among other things, also Fani-Kayode’s own way of contributing to the nationality question.
As a priest living in the cosmopolitan city of Rome, I have a firsthand experience of the importance of discussion and dialogue for groups that are made up of different races. But the question one may pose is whether Fani-Kayode’s method and his present posture over fallouts from those articles can ever be a civilized way of addressing the issues despite his claim to civility.
An analysis of the four articles – “Lagos, The Igbo And The Servants of Truth”, “The Bitter Truth About The Igbo”, “A Word For Those Who Call Me A Tribalist” and “The Nationality Question” – reveals a woeful failure in this regard.
Before I analyse the articles, let me note something which I found interesting in one of the articles- “A Word For Those That Call Me A Tribalist” – where Fani-Kayode asked whether there is no Hector out there to challenge him the great Achilles. Unfortunately, those articles do not present Fani-Kayode as the Achilles but rather as Hector.
A look at the Homeric presentation of Achilles and Hector in his great poem-bookIliadwill definitely vindicate this position. In the HomericIliad, Achilles despite his military prowess was able to recognise danger when he saw one. He censured Agamemnon for his arrogance and refusal to send back Chryseis to the priest of Apollo despite the danger that holding her entailed.
Hector the son of King Priam, on the other hand, despite the warning from Polydamas that he should retreat to the city wall of Troy refused to do so at the cost of his death by Achilles. The tone of Fani-Kayode’s articles both then and now does not show him as someone who is aware of the dynamite he is sowing, including the recent threat to reveal the lurid details of his past love-life.
The contents of his articles are simply a writ-large of Hector’s Arrogance. And with this, let us see to what extent Kayode’s method helped in building or destroying the nationality question.
His diatribe over the Igbo race all began with a statement attributed to Orji Uzor Kalu that “Lagos is no man’s land”. With this first salvo, the pen of Fani-Kayode ran free in one of the most unguarded views over any race I have ever seen in my entire life.
First, he began in what in his own estimation is the history of the Igbo hegemony over the rest of Nigerians since the last 100 years and then went ahead to deduct from his inductive examples what the Igbo people have always been and still are. For the sake of our paper, let’s assume that the historical data he gave about the civil war, the first coup, the role of Colonel Adekunle Fajuyi, the NCNC’s Herbert Marcaulay, the statements of Zik, Mr. Charles Dadi Onyeama and other things he mentioned are all true, the question is, to what extent is he free to categorize a race as being uncouth and ignorant based on this scant historical data and from the said actions exonerate another race?
Of course, as a lawyer, I supposed he studied the elementary logic of inductive and deductive reasoning. And he knows that despite the fact that induction is the basis of scientific hypothesis, in logic, it only supplies a “probable” ground for the veracity of the conclusions that are drawn from it. How can he, as learned as he claimed to be, derive a universal proposition from a particular.
As a Cambridge alumnus, I thought he studied simple Aristotelian Syllogistic reasoning. With the above little historical evidence in the previous paragraph, he went ahead to profile a race, writing “the Igbos have not only taken us for granted but have also taken our liberty for license…. instead of being grateful the Igbo continuously run us down ….. unlike them we are not mere traders but we were (and still are) major industrialist and investors…. worst of all, generally speaking, they have no restraining factors because money and acquisition of wealth is their sole objective and purpose in life”.
Again from the one or two responses made by individuals about his article he went hay wire to write “that those that I have described as being COLLECTIVELY unlettered, uncouth, uncultured, unrestrained and crude in all their ways are all those things and a lot more… (and you proudly stated) I make or offer no apology for my numerous assertions on the Igbo stand”. Haba!
With this written conclusion about a race, he had also the effrontery to argue subsequently that he is not a tribalist. Of course, I will never call him one since it is not my mission in this write-up to pass a judgement on him. But whether Fani-kayode as a person is a tribalist or not is immaterial, what is important is what his articles say about him.
Of course, I suppose he knows that in the philosophy of language, words are only signs and symbols on paper when considered on their own. They only assume a meaning when considered from the intention of the writer. I suppose as an Alumnus of Cambridge, he studied Aristotle’sDe interpretationewhere he wrote: “Written words are the signs of words spoken (and) words spoken are symbols and signs of affections or impressions of the soul.”
And as a prolific reader which I believe he is, he must have read Jerry Foder in his language of thought where he argues that “spoken and written language derive their intentionality and meaning from an internal language encoded in the mind.” The statements of these learned men have always been expressed in the aphorism “ex abundantia cordis, os loquitur” (from the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks).
In the light of the above, if his articles represent the condition of his mind, we need to go further to argue that those things in his mind cannot be incontrovertibly removed from him.
As Thomas Aquinas stated “nihil intellectu est, quod prius in sensu fuerit” which simply means that there is nothing in the mind that has not first been felt in the senses. In other words, what we put down in our writings are somehow what we believe. So the facts in his articles are speaking out for themselves.
Again as a Christian, I am a little bit worried about the arguments he has supplied to defuse the tension and unyoke the tribal toga that is being placed on him. Among them he wrote, “I was not a tribalist when many years ago I attended and gave my life to Christ in a Church called TREM which was established by a great Igbo man by the name of Bishop Mike Okonkwo”.
Did Femi really write this? Did he say that he gave his life to Christ or Bishop Okonkwo- Igbo man. As a learned man, did he not see the contradiction contained in his write-up. Has Christ been incarnated in bishop Okonkwo or has Christ been “Igbonized”.
If he gave his life to Christ how has that turned him a patronizer of the Igbo race. Please, when has religion become an avenue to patronize a race? When has being a Protestant turned one into a patronizer of England or being a Lutheran into a patronizer of Deutschland? Like Christ, I will ask him, who did you go to TREM to look for? Honestly, it is disturbing reading something like this from someone who went to Cambridge. I thought he would have known better?
Did he not think that his lecturers in Cambridge will be wondering what has gone wrong with their learned Alumnus. I thought he bagged a diploma at Christian Action Faith Bible Seminary in Accra, Ghana in 1985. Did they teach him that religion is no more about God but about individuals and patronization of a race? The reasoning that led to this conclusion is really disturbing.
As if the above intellectual tragedy is not enough, he went further to list the names of Igbo girls he has had intimate relationship as a way to show his detribalized nature and his openness to the Igbo race. Haba! He is really a genius to be attempting to turn his selfish youthful philandering into a favor for a race. I will suggest that his name be put in the Guinness Book of record as the only one whose selfishness in giving free reign to “the dark god in his blood” as C. S Lewis described instinct also performed an honorable act. As a Christian, I thought he would have known better.
How is it that he is not able to make a distinction between the animal instinct which from his write-up was playing out in those relationships from a moral-rational decision that one makes when he wants to live out the universal brotherhood of humanity.
Did he really write this himself? Where lies the Christian dignity which he attributed to himself in the last write-up? Has he never read theHeroidesof Ovid where the story of Greek heroines was well presented. If frolicking with women is a mark of love for a race, Ovid’s heroines would not have been complaining of the wickedness of their lovers to their race. And Aeneas who produced a child with Dido the founder of Carthage should not have seared Rome a city that destroyed Carthage.
Since the article is based on the mantra of truth as he argued, whether the historical content which he presented in them are the “sacred truth” of the Nigerian history or not, it must be noted that truth is not an independent reality.
Correspondency theory argues that the truth expressed must tarry with the facts. But reading through his articles, one sees that the truth which is the mantra he is holding unto is deficient. It is so because the premise for his unjustified pronunciation of a race as uncouth and uneducated and money driven lot is not true and can never support his conclusion.
The untruthfulness of his article is based on the fact that his article by its own judgment cannot sustain its argument. It only provided examples with the actions of less than 100 concrete individuals out of more than 50, 000, 000 groups and from there, made a general judgment over the group. Again, he should remember that what one calls truth in history is only interest-oriented and not a dogma. Each historian presents a story from his own perspective as it appeals to him. A history provided by Professor Kenneth Dike cannot be exactly the same provided by a Yoruba historian.
A look at his articles can even authenticate this argument. In his write-up for example, he said in the first article, “I have nothing against my fellow Nigerians from other parts of country and I have proved over and over again that I love Nigeria and that I am a Nigerian before anything else.
Yet, he went further in the last article to write, “I am first and foremost a Yoruba and I will live and die for the Yoruba and indeed for my nation Nigeria if need be.” So based on the altar of truth which he has pontificated upon, it is very clear that the first statement and the second statement can never be true under the principle of contradiction unless both objects of love are loved under different circumstances which in this case is not so. It is clear that from his articles he is presenting these two objects of love in relation to the other.
This simply means that the truthfulness of any of the statements excludes the other. But of course, I know that each statement is driven by the group he was trying to address and the facts he was trying to contest.
The analysis above, therefore, is not meant to argue which one he really loved before the other but only to show him that truth, even in his own articles, are only presented as much as it soothes his own taste, driven by the audience he wants to address.
So please, would it not be better if he were more honest and humbler than taking the Socratic posture of truth-upholder when his articles do not substantiate that. Nigeria is in dire need of nationality discussion as a veritable tool for harmonious existence among different ethnic groups but Femi Fani Kayode’s method is a disaster in that regard. God bless you all.
Gerald Azike is a Catholic priest living in Rome

Rivers State Governor, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi
| credits: File copy
RIVERS State Governor, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, has accused the State Police Commissioner, Mr. Mbu Joseph Mbu, of mingling with criminals in the state.
Amaechi, who spoke at the maiden edition of Rivers International Fashion Week in Port Harcourt on Sunday, said the development had worsened the security situation in the state.
The governor explained that those that orchestrated kidnapping, killings, rape and armed robbery in the state in 2007, were fighting hard to come back to power in the state.
Amaechi added that the state would not allow the current commissioner of police in the state to take the state back to 2007 when crime was at it highest level in Rivers.
He recalled that the state government was able to fight crime from 2007 with the support of several police commissioners that came to serve in the state, adding that only Mbu had gone contrary to his (Mbu) function of securing lives and property.
The governor explained that the people would not allow those stealing the state’s resources to come back, adding that his administration was committed to protecting the state’s resources.
“Mbu is mingling with criminals, but no matter the number of police commissioners they send here, we will not allow the state to be taken over by criminals.
“We have been able to fight crime in the past and we chased criminals away from the state with the support of police commissioners who came to serve in the state at that time.
“But only Mbu has refused to support us in fighting crime. Those who stole the resources of the state are trying to come back, the government with the people of the state will not allow them,” he said.
However, efforts made to reach the State Police Public Relations Officer, Mrs. Angela Agabe, to react to Amaechi statement, was not successful as she could not respond to several calls put across to her by our correspondent.
This further fuelled speculations that the PPRO had been removed over the alleged shoddy manner she handled the story of the release of the kidnapped Archbishop Ignatius Kattey.
The clergyman had said that the police were not responsible for his release contrary to what Agabe told the press.

crackhaus: All you said is the hard-on fact and I actually used to think I may be the only one who sees the hypocrisy of my country-men/women for what it is.
Trust me, I have made more enemies and haters in my less-than-30yr existence than most people would in their entire lives, just because I'm always quick to point out & deal squarely with the hypocrisy and two-faced attitude of Nigerian Niqggaz & Bishes (especially those who call themselves born-again Christians).
Mehn, these days I tend to look the other way and mostly ignore it all. I mean come-on, it's Nigeria and it is what it is. I'm not about to be responsible for my own demise or matyrdom in the hands of many out there who just hate the truth or are too much of cowards to accept it.
My advice is that you do the same(ignore) if you wish to go far in a country like ours.

I support you on this

Women!women!!women!!!

I reserve my comment

Gov. Suntai: Protests At S’ Court, N’Assembly
17.09.2013, 7:48Politics
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Security operatives yesterday in Abuja prevented protesters from gaining entry into the premises of the Supreme Court to complain over what they called subverting of justice in Taraba State.
The protest was organised by Save Democracy Group (SDG) who were also at the National Assembly.
In a letter presented by leader of the group Solomon Adodo, the group asked the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Aloma Maryam Mukhtar, to prevail on the Chief Judge of Taraba State to adhere strictly to the tenets of the judiciary on the health status of Governor Danbaba Suntai.
In the letter Adodo said:"Whereas the legislature and the court of public opinion has granted its nod to a fit Garba Umar to proceed as the acting governor of Taraba state, the judiciary should give its unbiased and balanced judgement on the matter at hand as it did in the case of the then ailing President Yar'Adua."
He described the letter reported to have been written to the Taraba State House of Assembly by Suntai as the handiwork of "imaginative writers and signature cloners" seeking to impose the ailing governor on the people and rule the state by proxy.

i_laugh: I am surprised at the responses here. If this had been written about a PDP governor, these same goons will twist their mouth and say something else, but because its against the almighty Fashola, then, the poor are miscreants. No hope for Nigeria with these mind sets.

it's bcose pdp gov are crook

awodman: Why not entirely dismissing your assertions because you are viewing it from your own perspective...how about putting yourself in the shoes of these guys

How about what the writer said...build low cost houses for these guys...you don't just demolish their slums without providing alternatives...
Remember how the transport commissioner was stoned and booed at Gani's memorial...that goes to show you the discontent about the transport situation in Lagos

Finally if u are very close to Fashola,tell him this
"...Fight POVERTY not the POOR..."

how can Fashola Fight poverty when our mind also is poor ,tell me

Lagos city ,Its a sin to be poor

Nasarawa: Soldiers kill Ombatse leader, arrest others
September 17, 2013 by Adelani Adepegba and Kamarudeen Ogundele
Nigerian soldiers
| credits: File copy
Troops deployed to contain the violent communal clashes in Obi Local Government Area of Nasarawa State have killed the leader of the Ombatse militia group who allegedly led the attack that claimed over 30 lives in some communities in the area, a police source told The PUNCH on Monday.
The body of the militant leader whose name could not be ascertained as at the time of this report, and three other assailants were said to have been deposited at an undisclosed hospital in Lafia, the state capital.
The deceased was said to have been killed when he went to demand for the release of his men that were detained by the police.
Three Ombatse militants who were on the same mission with the slain leader were said to have been apprehended by the police and detained at the State Criminal Investigation Department in Lafia.
Scores of warring Eggon and Alago youths were also arrested by the police and detained at the state command headquarters
The Nasarawa State Police Public Relations Officer, Cornelius Ocholi, who confirmed the incident on the phone, explained that three unidentified assailants were killed in the crisis and that four others who sustained injuries had been taken to Dahaltu Specialist Hospital, Lafia, for treatment.
Detachments of policemen were seen at the police command headquarters, waiting to be deployed in the flashpoint where violent clashes between the Eggon and Alago ethnic groups had claimed many lives and property. Many, mostly women and children, were also displaced.
The Army authorities had deployed soldiers to contain the violence and wanton killings by the Ombatse militia group and the reprisal attacks by Alago youths in Obi Local Government Area.
Armed troops have also taken over strategic parts of Lafia and other parts of the state to prevent a possible surprise attack on the town by militants identified as Ombatse members.
Meanwhile, the National Youth Service Corps has said it will not redeploy corps members serving in the state.
No fewer than 30 persons were feared killed in renewed skirmishes between Eggon and Alago ethnic groups in Obi, headquarters of Obi Local Government Area of the state, on Saturday.
The NYSC State Director, Mrs. Bolanle Olabanji, told one of our correspondents that NYSC had evacuated affected serving corps members to safety.
She said there was no plan to post them out of the state.
“We cannot redeploy them because that will mean posting them out of the state. The only thing is that we can repost them within the state if the crisis continues. We just moved them out of the crisis. By tomorrow (Monday) we will meet to discuss our next plan,” she said. Source : PUNCH NEWSPAPER

Who should we believe now

Nigeria is dead

News
Lafia - Four persons were killed on Friday when Thunder struck at Mechanic Village in Lafia Local Government Area of Nasarawa State.
An eyewitness said that the incident occurred at Bukan-Sidi around 7:05 p.m. when the four men were about leaving their workshop following a downpour.
According to the eyewitness, when the deceased noticed that it was to was about to rain, they decided to lockup their workshop and go home, but before they could leave the workshop thunder struck .
Sympathisers and passers-by were seen in groups, discussing the incident.
Also the bodies of the victims have been deposited at the Dahaltu Araf Specialist Hospital in Lafia.
When contacted on telephone, the Deputy Police Public Relations Officer in the Police Command in the State, ASP Cornelious Ocholi, confirmed the story.

Jonathan dey chop craz

A civil rights organisation, the Anti-Corruption Network, has given the Federal Government “one week” to resolve its dispute with the striking members of the Academic Staff Union of Universities.
It said it would mobilise Nigerians for a protest to the Federal Ministry of Education.
The group, which expressed disappointment at government’s lukewarm attitude to the plight of students, suggested that President Goodluck Jonathan should take loan to offset the N92bn being demanded by ASUU.
It said in a statement by its Executive Secretary , Dino Melaye, that government’s attitude showed that it had no interest in the future of Nigerian students.
The statement reads in part, “The ongoing face-off between the Federal Government and ASUU is a reflection of bad government and keeping quiet would be like the proverbial adult who, while at home, allowed the she-goat to suffer the pains of malnutrition on its tether.
“The Federal Government as far back as 2009 went into an agreement with ASUU and signed that agreement. Why will you agree to what you don’t intend to do? A gentleman will go into an agreement and then carry out the agreement to the latter. The agreement was made in 2009; why was there no budgetary provision for that agreement in 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013?
“Why would the Federal Government enter into an agreement they don’t intend to implement? So we are giving them one week of grace and if by Friday next week, the government did not resolve the crisis with ASUU, we will mobilise Nigerians, students and parents to be on the streets to protest against this reckless and irresponsible government.
“By Friday next week, if the Federal Government refuses to resolve the ASUU crisis, we will protest to the Federal Ministry of Education where we will register our anger against an insensitive government.
“They just went to China to secure a loan of $1.1bn. Why is it difficult for the Federal Government to raise N92bn to solve the problem in our education sector? Education is the bedrock of every development; it is the bedrock of any nation. It is shameful that the Federal Government is showing this lackadaisical attitude towards the next generation.
“If the Federal Government is serious, there is something in the parliament that is called virement. There are lots of contracts that have been budgeted for in this dispensation that they have not even started this month.
“All the Federal Government needed to do is for the President to write the National Assembly and seek for a virement or even take a loan. They can spend money on frivolities, they can spend money on very many unreasonable things. But the Federal Government cannot source for N92bn. Above all, the Federal Government has shown that is is not a responsible government.”
Also the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar III, on Thursday advocated for sustainable peace in Nigeria and its universities.
According to him, sustainable peace is very crucial to the realisation of Nigeria’s scientific, technological and socio-economic needs.
“Without peace, there won’t be any chance for development, and this will be disastrous for Nigeria and the world,’’ the Sultan said.
He also said that peace in the universities and other institutions would impact positively on the training of quality manpower for the nation.
“If this is not ensured, the opposite will be the case and the county would continue to lag behind,’’the monarch added.

It is just as well one takes note of the new man on the dais in Iran. Hassan Rouhani. For it may please President Goodluck Jonathan to host him in Abuja one of these days. More so as it is now known that individuals and nations with decidedly certain reputation are Nigeria’s friends. Of course, when the North Korean embassy celebrated its country’s independence anniversary in Abuja lately, Nigeria didn’t discriminate. Representation at the celebration was high-powered, led as it were, by a Minister of State for Foreign Affairs. Even the reporter for the Nigerian Television Authority that covered the event knew of certain reputation so he had begun his report on the defensive: “As a non-aligned nation, Nigeria has relations with all countries of the world.” It’s true. Didn’t Nigeria allow Sudan’s Omar al-Bashir on its soil; a man the International Criminal Court had asked Nigeria to arrest, only for the country to end up going to the ICC lately and defend its failure to arrest him? And Mr. President had hosted Uhuru Kenyata whose prosecution the ICC will begin soon, and had visited Kenya at a time the ICC said even if Kenya withdrew as a signatory to the ICC statutes, the court would still prosecute Kenyatta for his role in the 2007 post-election murder of Kenyans. The point is that the United States of America may not like the Iranians for being so independent-minded, but because Nigerians may wake up to see Rouhani in Abuja where President Jonathan will predictably give him a bearish brotherly hug, it’s helpful that Nigerians know ahead the kind of man their leader gives a hug. That’s one essence of this piece.
Come to think of it, getting Nigerians to know Rouhani will even reduce the workload of some of the President’s lieutenants. Otherwise, if he visits, the President’s lieutenants may find themselves shouting, “Back to sender!” as they try to protect their principal from imaginary and imaginable arrows of criticisms sent by the opposition. But then those ones too love Nigeria, that’s why they closely watch the kind of foreign friends Mr. President brings home, those he doesn’t like to see anywhere near the Aso Villa gates, and those he gladly flies to visit, expending Nigeria’s common wealth. Now, to business. Iran is a country where being a cleric doesn’t stop one from being an active politician. There, a cleric took the oath of office as president recently. In fact, his name, Rouhani, means, Cleric, or Spiritual. And he had been known to sit next to the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomenei. Everyone knows him, the first Ayatollah of the 1979 Revolution and the one who had said Salmon Rushdie should die because he profaned religious tenets by writing The Satanic Verses. There is now another Ayatollah Ali Hosseini Khamenei. As another spiritual leader has succeeded Ruhollah Khomeini, so have elected presidents come and go. Among those before Rouhani are, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Mohammad Khatami, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Everyone knows Ahmadinejad had been a pain in the neck of the Americans for all his eight years in power. Now, Rouhani says he has a different message, although the principle doesn’t change. The reasons are made clearer shortly.
Iran is a major player in the Middle East. And on the international stage, this country sends America’s blood rising from time to time, the same way the young man in North Korea has given President Barack Obama grey hairs. The other day, Rouhani’s government said it’s with Syria’s Bashir al-Assad and has warned the Americans against attacking Syria over al-Assad’s use of chemical weapons on Syrian citizens. And because they are perennial enemies, Israel refuses to take serious Rouhani’s recent friendly greetings on the occasion of the celebration of Jewish New Year Day. And, by the way, Iran’s actions and inaction have remote effects on Nigeria. Oil prices may jump or fall if Iran goes roguish and becomes as unpredictable as North Korea, for instance. And arms shipment from Iran might suddenly appear at Nigeria’s ports without a face to it as it was the case in Lagos not long ago. And haven’t a couple of that country’s citizens been caught along with other nationals in Nigerian waters with ships carrying stolen crude oil? There are other reasons why taking note of who the new Iranian leader is becomes important, as he will define his country’s outlook for the next four years, and may be, eight.
Rouhani was born in 1948. He’s a Muslim cleric, lawyer and diplomat. He had been a lawmaker in the Iranian Parliament and secretary of the Supreme National Security Council from 1989 to 2005. In the latter capacity, he also headed Iran’s former nuclear negotiating team and was the country’s top negotiator with the EU Three – UK, France, and Germany – on Iran’s nuclear programme. That means he had always been an insider on what angers the West most – Iran’s nuclear programme. In May 2013, Rouhani registered for the presidential election that was held on June 14. He had said if elected, he would prepare a “civil rights charter”, restore the economy and improve rocky relations with the West. He was elected as President on June 15, and took oath of office on August 3. Rouhani had started religious studies in 1960. And he obtained his bachelor’s degree in judicial law in 1972 from the University of Tehran. He entered military service in 1973. He graduated at Glasgow Caledonian University in Scotland with an M.Phil degree and a Ph.D degree in Law in 1995 and 1999 respectively for theses on Shariah Islamic Law with reference to the Iranian experience. As a young cleric, Rouhani started his political career by following Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Way back in 1965, he had begun travelling throughout Iran making speeches against the Shah’s monarchical government.
During those years, Rouhani was arrested many times and was banned from delivering public speeches. He fled the country to join Khomeini in Paris. Following the 1979 Iranian Revolution in Iran, Rouhani returned home where he reorganised the disorderly Iranian army and military bases. He was elected to the Parliament in 1980 where he spent a total of 20 years. On the basis of being pro-reform and a moderate, he was elected president in 2013. The foregoing shows Rouhani as an establishment man. He believes in the Iranian Revolution, his academic works show it.
What then should be expected of a man like this? Will he come and, overnight, throw overboard what Iran stands for both in the Islamic world and in the politics of the Middle East? This is a strong voice in the region, and ever conscious of its own powers compared to its neighbours. And there are its national interests. Now, both in terms of religion and national interest in relation to the outside world, Iran under a personality such as Rouhani will not change much. But he has promised that his engagement and approach to the rest of the world, compared with his predecessor’s, will undergo modifications. And that’s all he has promised. Long before he was sworn in, he had signalled his interest in improving relations with the US. “It is not that Iran has to remain angry with the United States forever and have no relations with them. Under appropriate conditions, where national interests are protected, this situation has to change,” he had said.
At home, it remains to be seen if Rouhani will pave the way for major reforms or if he will uphold the conservative stance of the Ayatollah. Yet, the fact remains that he arrived office because majority of voters perceived him to be reform-minded. Now, here is a new man at the top but the system in which he will operate remains what had existed before his election. Compared with Ahmadinejad though, Rouhani is considered level-headed. But for what the Americans would love to rock and roll about if it happened – changes to Iran’s nuclear programmes – Rouhani can’t do a thing without the Ayatollah’s nod, and the president had said Iran would not give up “one iota” of its nuclear rights. So, where does that leave the Middle East? The Saudis don’t like the Iranians for the reason of regional superiority contest, and for the reason of Iran’s brand of Islamic faith – Shiite. The brand that the Saudis practise, Sunni, is what is majorly obtainable in Northern Nigeria. Iran and Israel haven’t jettisoned their cat and mouse relations. And majority of the other nations in the region are suspicious of Iran. Point is, the world may see an Iran that is less rhetorically combative. But in terms of its need to remain a major regional player, the power configuration to it means Iran won’t be less assertive. But of course, White House’s disposition to either encourage or discourage Rouhani who has indicated readiness to engage the West better will prove a factor, too – for the next four years.

A former Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, has said there are many corrupt Nigerians getting away with corruption with the help of the judiciary.
He stated this in an interview he grantedZero Tolerance, a magazine published by the EFCC.
Reacting to a statement that former Delta Governor, James Ibori, was cleared of corruption by the judiciary in Nigeria, he asked, “How many people have been cleared by our judiciary?
“A judge even said one man should not even be taken to court. So, there are many Nigerians getting away with the help of the judiciary. The judiciary is also part of the challenge. Not to say that all judges are bad, no. There are judges that got a lot of them convicted.
“Even in the case of Ibori, a Federal High Court Judge sent him to prison and kept him there for two and a half months. He was a judge that exhibited unbelievable honesty, integrity, competence and knowledge of the law. He is also a Nigerian, let’s celebrate him and forget the other judge that gave our country a bad name,” he said.
Responding to another question, Ribadu added, “There are worse people than James Ibori in Nigeria. I think probably Ibori was not the smartest one among them. There are some crooks worse than Ibori; and I still see them. Some of them are even being celebrated right now in our country. Some of them are trying to re-write history. Ibori didn’t handle his own criminal affairs smartly, and he ended up paying dearly for it. There are smarter crooks than Ibori, who did more damage to the EFCC; but God will judge them.”
Asked why he prosecuted a former Inspector-General of Police, Tafa Balogun, the former EFCC boss replied, “Well, the point is that whoever crosses the line will be dealt with; whether a constable or an Inspector- General of Police, it’s the same thing. The solution is not to cross the line.
“When you execute your mandate honestly, you become blind to the position of individuals. Justice is blind. So, Tafa Balogun was my boss as the IGP, but he crossed the line. He did things that were wrong and was brought to our attention, and the law took its course.”
In a separate interview with the magazine, the incumbent EFCC Chairman, Ibrahim Lamorde, said corrupt individuals had developed other means to perpetrate fraud in order to beat prosecution.
He lamented that the anti-graft agency was operating under a tight budget and was impeding some of its activities, especially abroad.
Besides, he said, the operatives of the commission now live in danger because of the desperation of corrupt individuals.
He said, “For example in 2003 up to 2006, we could afford to send people to any part of the country to go and carry out an operation and you will not have fear in terms of safety; but now there are places you can’t go in Nigeria even if you have a serious matter. A reasonable boss will not subject the life of his members of staff to danger unnecessarily by sending him to certain areas.”

The leadership of the All Progressive Congress has directed its governors to enter into talks with their aggrieved counterparts in the ruling Peoples Democratic Party.
The 11 APC governors, including Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State, it was gathered, had been asked to use their contact and speak with the governors on the possibility of defecting from their party.
Seven PDP governors are at loggerheads with the leadership of the PDP over the running of the party and other issues.
The governors walked out of the PDP mini-convention on August 31 in Abuja to form a faction of the party.
It is not clear if the APC governors have started carrying out the directive of the party’s leaders.
The Interim National Publicity Secretary of the APC, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, confirmed this while speaking with journalists after the meeting of his party’s National Working Committee in Abuja in Thursday.
He said that since the party’s governors were members of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, they were in the best position to woo their aggrieved counterparts from the ruling party.
He said such contact with the aggrieved governors was not discussed at their meeting and that it was not the duty of the NWC members to woo the aggrieved governors.
He said, “It isn’t a matter you discuss at executive meeting but I know that what the party resolved is that since our governors are also members of the NGF, and they also meet regularly with these other governors we have left that assignment in the hands of our governors.
“We have agreed that if and when the aggrieved governors of the PDP are desirous of making contact with the party they should do so through our governors.”
But when contacted, the National Publicity Secretary of the Bamanga Tukur faction of the PDP, Chief Olisa Metuh, said that governors of the party would not join the APC.
He said that members of the ruling party would resolve their differences.
Metuh said, “There is no committed PDP member that will go the APC. The PDP offered platform for them to become governors. They cannot abandon it. We may have our differences. That does not mean that they will cross over to the APC that its ideology is ethnic and religious based.”

Peoples Democratic Party Chairman Bamanga Tukur yesterday called the secretary of the new PDP Olagunsoye Oyinlola an unrepentantant dictator of the first order.
Mr. Tukur was reacting to the statement credited to Mr. Oyinlola that he referred to Mr. Tukur as a "dictator" and the main cause of the crisis in the PDP.
In his response, via a statement by his media relations directorate, Mr. Tukur said Mr. Oyinlola's statement "is both laughable and ridiculous for the world know the antecedents of Chief Oyinlola as a Military Dictator and Administrator, whose style of politics is at variance with the current political dispensation in the country".
"It is a fact that Oyinlola was one of those Military punch who held down our democracy for a long time. As a former Military man, Chief Oyinlola is an unrepentant dictator of the first-order," Mr. Tukur added.
He also said under normal circumstance, Mr. Oyinlola should not be heard mouthing "platitudes or righteous pontifications on the ideals of democracy and the rule of law" because by training and orientation "he is a slave to order and command of the military". I am not responsible for your plight
The statement added that Mr. Oyinlola's grouse with Mr. Tukur and the party was his removal as national secretary "on the account of the flaws inherent in his election". "He has directed his aggression to the National Chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, yet Tukur has no hand in his political travails," it said.
The statement claimed that Mr. Oyinlola was "smuggled in as national secretary , even when he was bereft of the basic competence, experience and the pedigree needed to hold such a sensitive position in a big political organization like the PDP".
The statement added, "Since his removal from office following the patent loop-holes in the electoral process that produced him, Oyinlola has continued to besiege the portals of our Courts in search of far fetch reliefs which are neither here nor there. Besides he now relishes brick-backs and vitriolic on perceived enemies especially Alhaji Tukur.
"Unfortunately, Oyinlola has refused to understand that Tukur is not the architect of his political problems. Oyinlola' nemesis is traceable and also has its roots on the way and manner in which he was foisted on a Party that is the bastion of democracy in Nigeria, Africa and the entire black world," it said.

Chief Edwin Kiagbodo Clark
Chief Edwin Kiagbodo Clark is a man of many parts. An Ijaw leader, who has served as the nation’s Information Minister. The Octogenarian is a prominent player in Nigeria’s regional politics and an unrepentant ally of President Goodluck Jonathan. The Chairman of the Delta State Elders’ Forum in this interview with journalists bared his mind on the crisis rocking the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). In his usual confident posture, he rubbished the fear that the crisis might rob President Jonathan the opportunity of a second term in office. SENIOR CORRESPONDENT, Rotimi Akinwumi, was at the session. Excerpts:
At the PDP national convention, six governors along with former vice-president, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, stormed out of Eagles Square and assembled at Yar’Adua Centre to announce the formation of a parallel national working committee. What is your take on this? Don’t you think the crisis that the matter is generating will affect the fortune of President Goodluck Jonathan in 2015?
Thank you. President Jonathan is president of the entire federal republic of Nigeria. He isn’t President of PDP. It is true that PDP is the party that presented him. So, what happened at the convention will not affect his fortune in 2015, because it is only Nigerians, the voters, the Nigerian citizens—whether you are in PDP or not – that have responsibility of making President Jonathan, president in 2015 or not. No one else. So, no amount of people ganging up because of their personal ambition will affect President Jonathan in 2015, that will make Jonathan to lose sleep. In the first place, all those of them – I don’t know the reasons, but I know as a matter of fact, all the people – who walked out had a meeting on the eve of the convention; Atiku was there, all the governors were there, including Amaechi and the gang of five. Bukola Saraki was there. They had a meeting, they knew what they were going to do, before they went for the convention. So, what took place at the convention venue that made them to walk out? They have their secret agenda and the gang of five, if their problem was the administration of PDP, they couldn’t have gone round the whole country, causing problem. They have made up their minds that they would prevent Mr. President from contesting in 2015. That’s the only trouble they have! Amaechi’s problem isn’t different from what is going on in Adamawa; Amaechi’s problem is a party problem within Rivers State. What happened? Two executives were elected in Rivers State, one nominated by Amaechi, that is Chief Ake; then the other one nominated by the Minister of State for Education, Wike, and his group. The congresses were conducted and the faction supported by Wike was adopted by the party after they had gone to court. They went to court and the court decided against the faction of Governor Amaechi. Amaechi, then surrounded by some professors from Lagos, said that the judgment was manipulated in Abuja and I said, how can the judgment be manipulated, when the man who is talking as a governor was a product of a court judgment? Without the court, Amaechi wouldn’t become the governor of Rivers state. It is the supremacy of the party. When Obasanjo in 2007 when to Port Harcourt to flag off the south-south governors, he said there was a ‘K-leg’ in the case of Rivers State and he refused to give the flag to Amaechi. He asked the then governor Odili to send for Omehia. At the end of the rally they came to Abuja and that’s how Omehia was anointed by Obasanjo. When the heat was on, Amaechi ran to Ghana and it was Wike who later became the chief of staff who stood for him. So, for Amaehi now to talk about people manipulating judgment, it is an insult to the judiciary and it is a reckless statement and I am surprised that those professors who sat with him watched him make that statement. We must have respect for our judiciary. It isn’t only when it suits you, favours you that the judiciary is alive, when it doesn’t favour you the judgment is manipulated. So, he is now creating the trouble. Instead of him to face his trouble, he brought in Mr. President. The same trouble Amaechi has in Rivers state is going on in Adamawa state where there are two factions: one by the governor, the other one by the national chairman. How was the division in Rivers state different from the one in Adamawa State that the gang of five should go to Rivers state to pay solidarity to Amaechi. I think there is something wrong somewhere. How do you expect the governor of a state who isn’t a member of the house of assembly, never mind whether you were a speaker of that house for 8 years – you are no longer a member, you are now in the executive. So, you want Mr. president to walk from Aso Rock to the National Assembly to control it? That’s recklessness! So, these are the things happening but nobody wants to talk about them. It is a breach of the Nigerian constitution for a governor to leave the government house with his retinue of officers, go to the house of assembly, in his presence they used the mace to hit one of the members. Because he enjoys immunity? Otherwise, Amaechi should have been the first person to be arrested. Instead of him to inform the commissioner of police—if he had a quarrel with the CP, why did he not call the army commander? Ameachi had made up his mind five years ago that he wants to be the vice-president of this country and Chief Obasanjo who was president of this country encouraged them—that Lamido and Amaechi should run in 2015. That’s where the trouble started and Amaechi thought that because Bukola Saraki used the Nigeria Governors’ Forum to pursue his ambition to become president of Nigeria and when he became chairman of the NGF, he thought he could use the chair to become the vice-president of Nigeria and we said, no! The people of south-south wanted a president and we have got a president, we don’t want a vice-president. That’s our quarrel with Amaechi. So, the gang of five, which Amaechi now joined, believe that only a northerner should become the president of Nigeria in 2015 and some of them said, if a northerner doesn’t become the president of Nigeria in 2015, there would be no Nigeria. That’s what they said! So, what happened therefore is not new. Atiku said he is a PDP man—that he has no hand in forming PDM, whereas he is a leader of PDM, all his men and women are in PDM, but he turned round to say I cannot stop my followers from going to another party, or other parties. Is that a loyal member of a party? A leader of a party, all your followers have gone. We also heard from Governor Murtala Nyako of Adamawa State that all his people have left the party—that he will remain in the PDP and bury it. And perhaps that was what they thought they could do yesterday. So, from the beginning they have planned to embarrass everybody. They didn’t go with the intention of participating in the convention. They thought more people would follow them in their mission to break up the party. They will fail; it is mission unaccomplished.
You have said what is happening in PDP wouldn’t give President Jonathan sleepless night over his 2015 ambition. Yes, but Nigerians know that the strongest political platform now is the PDP; will it not affect his chances of using the party platform?
The governors will soon be alone and I am very sure that PDM was created for them by Atiku and they are all waiting to move to PDM. But I can assure you that PDP will grow stronger and the members will be more loyal and faithful without these governors. They will soon discover that they don’t command any followers. Maybe in the next few days reason will prevail and they will decide to accept the PDP NWC as constituted.
Would you advise them to forgo this war and return to the party without them getting sanctioned?
That’s not my business! The PDP has an executive, has a national chairman, has president as the leader. I am just a member. So, that’s not a matter I should comment on.
What happened at Eagle Square and subsequent events have a lot to do with 2015 permutation. Is that what you are saying?
I agree with you, absolutely.
Against the backdrop of the advice given President Jonathan by Professor Ben Nwabueze when he met with him, that President Jonathan shouldn’t contest 2015, what is your take on that?
Well, you will agree with me that what happened at Eagle Square, particularly by the gang of six governors and Atiku Abubakar who has sworn that he must be president of Nigeria, in fact, he wanted to overthrow his own boss, Chief Obasanjo in 2003, and Obasanjo had to plead with him, beg him, as Nasir el-Rufai said in his book,The Accidental Public Servant. He said, Obasanjo knelt down for Atiku and when Obasanjo finally got re-elected, that was how Atiku lost all thepowers he enjoyed as vice-president. Now, the question you ask is that I told you that those 5 governors thought they could use Rivers problem to cause greater problem in this country. No, it cannot work. Rivers is just one state, out of 36 states. Now, coming to the question you asked about Professor Ben Nwabueze – I have always said Ben Nwabueze taught me Constitutional Law in London in 1961-62. So, I have very high regard for him as an old teacher of mine. But I am nextsenior to him; he is just entering 80 and I am 86. He isn’t a consistent man. He isn’t a politician, he cannot win his ward in Anambra State. When Mr. president gave his mid-term report at the Transcorp HiltonHotel, Nwabueze then wrote in the Guardian newspaper, analyzing the mid-term report of Jonathan’s Transformation agenda and came to the conclusion that he was advising Jonathan not to contest the 2015 election, because he has done nothing for Nigeria. He is unfit to govern Nigeria and he referred to Ataturk, a military man who transformed Turkey. So, the question I asked him at that time, you want Nigeria to go back to military regime so that you can become Secretary of education again, because you cannot win election or nobody will appoint you. So, going to see Mr. president at Aso Rock with his Patriots, there was nothing wrong. Patriots was formed by Chief Rotimi Williams of blessed memory, he never put Patriots into controversy. It is now that Professor Nwabueze has assumed office as president of the forum that he is causing all these confusion. So, if Mr. president has respect for you, you went there, talked about many things about Nigeria, including national conference, Mr. president agreed that there is need for a dialogue in this country—how to approach it is something that we must work out. That was the aim. He didn’t tell Mr. president, don’t contest election in 2015, but he came out and instead of raising what he discussed with Mr. president, during their meeting, he now told them that Jonathan shouldn’t contest the election in 2015, because transformation of Nigeria is a very big job, therefore, it requires a full time and if Jonathan does that he will be a hero in Nigeria. The issue is, in what capacity will Jonathan continue with that job, if he isn’t elected by Nigerians in 2015, particularly when the transformation exercise will not be completed in another 2 years? Now, I learnt he has said what he was reported to have said was personal to him. I think members of Patriots have told him that what he told State House journalists wasn’t discussed with Mr. president at the meeting. So, Nwabueze is one of those who believe, for no just cause, that a minority cannot govern this country, cannot be president of Nigeria. But he is just one, out of the millions of his own people—that’s why I said the man isn’t popular in Nigeria, not even in Anambra State where he comes from. He cannot win election, because he is a confused man.

A high court recently granted the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFFC) permission to freeze N33 billion worth of illicit assets allegedly acquired by two former Police Pension Office officials being tried for alleged pension theft. Larger assets have been seized from a bank boss, Mrs Cecilia Ibru: she forfeited hundreds of property across the world worth N191 billion to the EFCC, following her six-month conviction in October 2010. Former Edo State governor Lucky Igbinedion also surrendered property and funds worth billions of naira to the commission after he was convicted in 2011 for stealing state funds as governor. And, early this year, self-confessed police pension thief Yakubu Yusuf gave up 32 prime property to the government.
The pertinent question now is: what has happened to these and other assets forfeited to the government by suspects successfully prosecuted by anti-corruption agencies like the EFCC and the ICPC? While the media report on certain property forfeitures as announced by the EFCC via its official statements, the anti-graft agency has not given commensurate publicity to how it has been treating the forfeited assets. Many Nigerians believe that the seized property are simply being “re-looted” by those in the anti-graft system, their masters and cronies in a vicious circle that leaves the country worse off.
While no case of actual “re-looting” of seized assets has come to light thus far, the climate of doubt that has apparently descended on this all-important national issue needs to be dispelled immediately. Transparency in the process of selling all confiscated property and funds by anti-corruption agencies should be a logical end to the widespread media coverage received by the trial and conviction of economic criminals; it is sine qua non to the success of the country’s anti-corruption campaign.
In the light of the foregoing, we demand that all anti-corruption agencies make full disclosures of all assets forfeited to the government through them on their official websites and in the print and electronic media without further delay. The disclosure should be explicit enough and include the revenue, if any, that these forfeited assets have generated for the country since they arrived in government custody. If any of these seized assets has been sold, we demand that the anti-graft agency involved indicate how much it was sold and to whom. This will dispel the widespread belief that the convicted former owners went behind to buy back these confiscated property using proxies. The transparent treatment of all tangible property as demanded here should also extend to frozen bank accounts and the funds therein.
The anti-graft campaign is losing traction. No amount of chest-beating by the agencies would convince citizens about their sincerity of purpose. An honest public rendition of their accounts is the breath of life the anti-corruption war needs now.

UMUAHIA – The Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, has blamed chairman of universities’ NEEDS Assessment Committee and governor of Benue State, Mr. Gabriel Suswam, for the lingering strike by the union.
According to the union, the governor and his committee did not advise the Federal Government properly.
ASUU also accused Suswam of trying to blackmail the union but warned that no amount of blackmail or intimidation would stop it from pursuing the implementation of the 2009 FG/ASUU agreement, which was the only way to move the nation’s education forward.
Briefing newsmen at the Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike, Abia State, the Calabar Zone of the union, led by Dr. Charles Ononuju, accused the NEEDS Committee of rushing to release money to pro-chancellors and vice chancellors, instead of addressing abnormalities in the NEEDS Report Implementation Committee.
Flanked by ASUU chairmen at the university of Calabar, Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, University of Uyo and Cross River State University of Technology, Calabar, Ononuju said by throwing arbitrary awards at the universities, the government had repudiated the 2009 agreement and 2012 MoU.
He said: “Since the commencement of the strike, our union has met with government team for more than 11 times. After the last meeting, the union raised some observations/abnormalities on the Governor Gabriel Suswan-led NEEDS Report Implementation Committee and communicated same to the chairman of the committee, Governor Suswan, expecting a response.
“Rather than responding to the observations raised by the union that would usher in quick and peaceful resolution of the impasse, the government summoned a meeting with pro-chancellors and vice chancellors and offered to them N130 billion with a matching order for the lecturers to return to work, thereby pulling out of the dialogue.
“Government, by throwing arbitrary awards at the universities, has in effect repudiated the 2009 Agreement and the MoU of 2012 based on that agreement. We reject the arbitrary imposition of money from the government. What makes a person, an organisation, including government honourable is honouring an agreement freely made.
“The government should honour the agreement it freely entered into with the union since 2009. ASUU is not making any fresh demands. This is our position and where we stand and shall continue to stand.”
Ononuju also attacked Governor Suswam for accusing the union of playing politics with its demands, describing the governor’s position as “false, dishonest, calculated to misinform the public and cause disaffection towards the union.”
“Rather than seek cheap popularity, he should tow the part of honour by asking his principal to honour the agreement.
“We hereby call on our members and the Nigerian people to reject this cheap blackmail and continue to stand on the path of truth and social justice.”
“No amount of blackmail will make the union jettison our resolve to get the government to implement the 2009 ASUU/FG Agreement and MoU of January 24, 2012.
“We wish to emphasise strongly here that our struggle has no political undertone as is being falsely and mischievously propagated. Those saying otherwise are economical with the truth.”
….As SSANU, NASU, others give FG ultimatum over August salary
By KELECHI AZUBUIKE
ABUJA—Three other unions in the nation’s university system, besides the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, yesterday, gave the Federal Government till tomorrow to pay the August salary of members or they will begin an indefinite strike.
The unions are Senior Staff Association of Nigeria University, SSANU, National Association of Technologists, NAAT, and Non Academic Staff Union, NASU.
President of SSANU, Samson Chijioke Ugwoke, in a statement said: “I, Samson Chijioke Ugwoke call on Federal Government of Nigeria to release the August 2013 salaries of federal university workers without further delay. Today is September 11, 2013, and August 2013, allocations to Federal universities are yet to be released and no one has given reasons for the delay.
“This situation is unhealthy and it is bringing untold hardship to the workers, their families and dependents. SSANU and other sister unions in Joint Action Committee, JAC, will be forced to review her stand with the Federal Government if by Friday, August 13, 2013, the salaries of our members are not paid”.

On Tuesday, September 11th 2001 when four passenger jets were hijacked and intentionally crashed in the United States of America, killing nearly 3,000 people, many knew that it was the start of a dark era in the stability of the world order. However, few would have imagined twelve years on, the effects of that fateful day would continue to be felt around the world in such the raw manner that it is being felt. With the recent spate of bombings and insecurity in Nigeria, we can see firsthand the consequence of the precedence set by 9/11 on our very soil.
Apart from all the talk of terror and war associated with that day, the one common feature has been a castigation of Islam as the catalyst for the atmosphere of violence. In the last couple of weeks since the countdown to the 12 year anniversary began, I have felt the need for those of us who understand the misconceptions that are associated with religious extremism and violence to set forth the teachings of Islam so that expressions of numerous acts of violence are fully exposed for what they are in the light of Islamic teachings.
As a Muslim, I become frustrated when I hear people attribute the kind of violence we are witnessing in this age to Islamic teaching. I become frustrated and angry because even though I know that Islam doesn’t in anyway encourage people to kill innocent civilians and engage in suicide bombings, I understand that there are these misconceptions because some of the people who engage in these violent activities use Islam as a shelter to commit them and their extreme interpretation of Islam as their justification. Every year as I mark the anniversary of 9/11, I always find myself elaborating on my understanding of the position of Islam on the kind of violence we witnessed on 9/11, the bombing of the UN headquarters in Abuja and other similar acts of violence.
It is regrettable that Islam, a religion of peace, hope, harmony, goodwill and brotherhood has been used to justify unwarranted acts of violence such as suicide bombings and hostage taking. I know that at the very base of Islam is the quest for freedom, justice and equality so when a Muslim condemns another because they do not share the same faith, that discrimination is totally foreign to the teachings and doctrines of Islam. In the Quran, God bestowed honour on every single individual, no matter their background, race or tribe. Liberty and everything that emerges from it are some of the great favours God has given us and concepts such as kidnappings and assassinations are alien to Islam. Under the Islamic dispensation, a person should not be held captive as a prisoner against their will. Prisoners can only be taken in the event of acknowledged war and not for any other reason or under any other pretext. The Holy Quran specifically states:
“It does not behove a Prophet that he should have captives until he engages in regular fighting in the land. If you take captives, except in regular fighting, you will be regarded as desiring the goods of this world, while ALLAH desires for you the Hereafter. And ALLAH is Mighty, Wise”.
This verse negates any validation of hostage-taking and hijacking of innocent people not involved in actual combat. Furthermore, in his farewell address the Holy Prophet of Islam gave special instructions regarding good treatment which should be meted out to prisoners. The Holy Prophet said:
“O men, you still have in your possession some prisoners of war. I advise you, therefore, to feed them and to clothe them in the same way and style as you feed and clothe yourselves... To give them pain or trouble can never be tolerated”.
One of the most controversial terms that is used to lend credibility to the notion that Islam encourages violence is the concept of jihad. Owing to the performance of some influence, the media envisages an incorrect perception of Jihad. The word Jihad brings into play the vision of a marching band of religious fanatics with savage beards, short trousers and fiery eyes, brandishing swords, screaming in Arabic and attacking those that are not Muslims.
However, the true spirit of Jihad in Islamic terms means to endeavour and strive in a noble way. Over time this meaning of Jihad has been eradicated or at least diluted. The critical juncture in the Islamic world requires reviving and recapturing the true and pristine meaning of Jihad. Jihad can be divided into two broad categories. First is Jihad-e-akbar. This is Jihad against one's own person to curb sinful inclinations, which is the purification of self. This is the most difficult Jihad and hence in terms of rewards and blessings is the highest category of Jihad. The second is Jihad-e-asghar. This is Jihad of the sword. This is communal Jihad and presupposes certain specific conditions. The Quran speaks of fighting only as a self defence and this is the very condition laid down in other verses of the Holy Quran as well. The so-called verse of the sword in the Islamic scripture is often taken out of context as if it inculcates an indiscriminate massacre of all non-Muslims. The Quranic words such as “kill whatever you find them” apply only in cases of self defence, they do not apply to unprovoked wars and battles. The Muslims who interpret these verses in any other manner commit a travesty of the lofty ideals of Islam. There is not a single instance in the life of the Holy Prophet where he offered the alternative of the sword or Islam to anyone.
It must be remembered that the Holy Quran does not make Jihad, in context of an article of faith. The sayings and traditions of the Holy Prophet render it into a formula for active struggle that invariably and incorrectly tended towards a militant expression. Suicide bombings, hijacking and killing those of alternative and different faiths is contrary to the purview of the real spirit of the Islamic Jihad. The presentation of Islam as a crude and barbaric religion which gives itself the right to cause unwarranted human and material suffering and destruction under the guise of Divine authority is not the kind of Islam we find in the Holy Quran and in the precepts of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (SAW).
Among the attributes of God, the Holy Quran mentions that “He is the Source of peace and the bestower of security”. The establishment of peace and maintenance of security must, therefore, be the constant objective of all Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Every pursuit and activity which disturbs peace is severely condemned in Islam. We find specific injunctions in the Holy Quran: “And create not disorder in the earth after it has been set in order....” Mischief and wickedness are condemned in several other verses and Muslims are commanded to work wholly for peace”.
The Holy Quran teaches that God has sent His revelation to all people from time to time. Many of prophets of the Old Testament are mentioned by name and so is Jesus who with other prophets is honoured and revered by all Muslims. Indeed, the Quran requires belief in the truth of all the Messengers of God and requires an affirmation in all prophets wherever they appeared and therefore it seeks to bring about reconciliation between the followers of different faiths and to establish a basis of respect and honour among them. The Quran says: “Surely, those who believe and the Jews and the Christians and the Sabians - whichever party from among these truly believes in ALLAH and the Last Day and does good deeds, shall have their reward with their Lord, and no fear shall come upon then nor shall they grieve”.
The basic unity of the followers of all faiths is emphatically stressed in the Holy Quran and the creation of discord and disunity by terrorism or otherwise has no place in Islam. Islam is an all-encompassing codes of values and conduct and with those values, those of us that practice it must use its teachings as a ground of hope to progressively promote unity and accord in Nigeria rather than using it as a justification for violence.
I believe that the world should always remember the 9/11 crisis and the tragedies and wars that fell in its aftermath and that memory should serve as a lesson for the innocence that the world lost on that day. Regardless of the religion one is, only through conformity to the spirit of peace, unity, freedom, conscience and the promotion of human welfare can we achieve the ideal of a secure nation free of hatred and violence.
Written By Hannatu Musawa

Factional National Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, has identified President Goodluck Jonathan and the National Chairman of the party, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, as those behind the crisis rocking the party.
He said that President Jonathan had not taken any step towards ensuring peace in the party since the crisis that led to the party's polarisation began.
Oyinlola, who spoke while addressing members of the PDP loyal to him in all the 30 local government areas of the state during a rally held in Okuku, his hometown, said his travails in the PDP started in 2011 as a result of his loyalty to former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
He alleged that President Jonathan was aware of his face-off with Tukur and did nothing to resolve it. "Even when the President called both of us to a parley in Abuja, nothing meaningful was achieved. I also tried to advise Tukur as an elder that he is to me, but he turned deaf ears to my advice," Oyinlola said.
He recalled that the current crisis which polarised the PDP started in 2010 when President Jonathan declared his intention to contest the 2011 presidential election and perceived some serving governors as not being supportive of his ambition.
He said: "President Jonathan called me at about 1.00a.m sometime in 2010 and requested that I should come to see him in Abuja. I honoured him and when I got to him, he told me of his ambition to contest the presidential election and sought for my support."
"The President later told me that he knew that my hands were tied but I told him immediately that I was not a goat, so no one could tie me.
His belief was that I would give maximum support to General Ibrahim Babangida because of my relationship with him and interestingly Jonathan had 99 out of 100 votes cast by the delegates from Osun State."
Oyinlola accused the President of taking sides in the process that led to his removal as the national secretary of the party, adding that all peace meetings called by notable leaders of the party to resolve the matter were deadlocked.
He said he had not contravened any provision of the constitution of the party by teaming up with like minds to form a parallel faction, stressing that, "the PDP constitution does not prevent anyone from teaming up with like minds."
Recalling the genesis of his problem with Tukur, Oyinlola said: "My problem with my former boss, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur started right from my first day in office. He introduced some strange things like creating the office of the Chief of Staff and others. I kicked against this development and he took offence for my action.

DAMASCUS (AFP) – Jihadists who overran Syria’s ancient Christian town of Maalula last week forced at least one person to convert to Islam at gunpoint and executed another one, residents said Tuesday.
“They arrived in our town at dawn on Wednesday and shouted ‘We are from the Al-Nusra Front and have come to make lives miserable for the Crusaders,” an Islamist term for Christians, said a still frightened woman who identified herself as Marie.
She spoke to AFP in Damascus, where she was attending the burial with hundreds of others of three Christians from Maalula killed in last week’s fighting, the long line of mourners led by a brass band playing dirges.
“Maalula is the wound of Christ,” mourners chanted as they marched through the narrow streets of the capital’s ancient Christian quarter, their voices nearly drowned out by the rattle of automatic gunfire in honour of the dead.
There was an irony in that, as the assault on Maalula came only a couple of weeks before a major feast, the Exaltation of the Cross.
Maalula, around 55 kilometres (34 miles) from Damascus, is one of the most renowned Christians towns in Syria, and many of its inhabitants speak Aramaic, the language of Jesus.
Home to around 5,000 people it is strategically important for rebels, who are trying to tighten their grip around the capital and already have bases south and west of Damascus.
Maalula could also be used as a launching point for attacks on the highway between the capital and Homs, a key regime supply route.
Clashes first erupted on Wednesday, when Al-Nusra Front fighters and other Islamists attacked an army checkpoint at one entrance to the town.
The advance raised fears of attacks on churches or Christians in the town, but on Friday, the opposition Syrian National Coalition said rebels had withdrawn.
On Saturday, the Observatory said rebels were fighting pro-regime militias in western Maalula, and were also clashing with Syrian troops on its outskirts.
Tuesday night, the Free Syrian Army said rebels had withdrawn from Maalula to spare its people and heritage, but only on the condition that the regime kept its forces out as well.
Recalling the events last Wednesday, 62-year-old Adnan Nasrallah said an explosion destroyed an archway just across from his house that leads into the town.
“I saw people wearing Al-Nusra headbands who started shooting at crosses,” said Nasrallah.
One of them “put a pistol to the head of my neighbour and forced him to convert to Islam by obliging him to repeat ‘there is no God but God.’”
“Afterwards they joked, ‘he’s one of ours now.’”
Nasrallah, who spent 42 years running a restaurant in the US state of Washington named after his hometown, said he was devastated by what happened in Maalula.
“I had a great dream. I came back to my country to promote tourism. I built a guesthouse and spent $2,000 installing a windmill to provide electricity in the town.
“My dream has gone up in smoke. Forty-two years of work for nothing,” he lamented.
But worse, for him, was what he said was the reaction of his Muslim neighbours when the town was seized by the rebels.
“Women came out on their balconies shouting with joy, and children… did the same. I discovered that our friendship was superficial.”
But Nasrallah’s sister, Antoinette, refused to condemn everyone.
“There are refugees from Harasta and Douma (in the suburbs of Damascus) that we have taken in, and they are spreading the poison of hatred, especially among the younger generation,” she said.
The most tragic story was that of Rasha, who recounted how the jihadists had seized her fiance Atef, who belonged to the town’s militia, and brutally murdered him.
“I rang his mobile phone and one of them answered,” she said.
“Good morning, Rash rush,” the voice said, using her nickname. “We are from the Free Syrian Army. Do you know your fiance was a member of the shabiha (pro-regime militia) who was carrying weapons, and we have slit his throat.”
The man told her Atef had been given the option of converting to Islam, but had refused.
“Jesus didn’t come to save him,” he taunted.

Some leaders of the Peoples Democratic Party led by a former Chairman of the PDP in Kaduna State, Alhaji Audi Yaro-Makanma have joined the Abubakar Baraje faction of the party.
Yaro-Makanma was the state party chairman between 2001 and 2007 under the Ahmed Makarfi administration in the state.
A statement signed by Yaro-Makanma and a former member of the State House of Assembly(1999-2007), Mr. Gideon Morik, in Kaduna on Monday, said the decision to join the New PDP was to save the party from destruction.
It noted that the decision of the former Vice -President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and seven governors elected on the platform of the party, was not only worthy of commendation, but should be emulated.
Specifically, the chieftains added that since the elevation of Namadi Sambo as the Vice-President, the party’s fortunes had dwindled in the state.
The party noted that the Vice-President was unable to control the party because “he lacked the political wherewithal to do so.”
The leaders said that the revolutionary moves to sack the Bamanga Tukur-led PDP and replace it with the current one led by Alhaji Kawu Baraje should “be replicated in all the states chapters of the party.
The PDP chiefs stated that in Kaduna, the support base of the party had been shrinking since 2007 when Sambo became governor and decided to rubbish the party and its supporters.
The party leaders said that in the last few weeks, a political Tsunami was unleashed on the nation with the emergence of a new leadership to pilot the affairs of the PDP.
They said, “The PDP in Kaduna State therefore proudly and wholeheartedly identifies with the new leadership of the party, under Alhaji Kawu Baraje and follows in the footsteps of its sister chapters of Adamawa, Jigawa and Taraba states in setting up new leadership to give our party a new lease of life.”
But the Kaduna State chapter of the PDP said that it was in support of the Tukur group in the party.
The PDP’s Public Relations Officer in the state, Ibrahim Mansur, in a statement said the party executive in the state rejected the “ploy” by the former chairman to destroy the party.
He said any attempt at creating confusion by political jobbers under the guise of dirty party politics in the state would surely attract the attention of law enforcement agencies.
The state read in part, “There is only one PDP, which is the one led by Bamanga Tukur, this much has been determined by a court of competent jurisdiction. The claim by the so called group is false and totally criminal, as the party is intact and united under the able leadership of Dr. A. G. Haruna.
“The PDP in Kaduna State remains undivided and one big family that is committed to the transformation agenda of our leader, His Excellency President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan and his vice, Sambo.”
But Makama and other pro-Baraje politicians said that the decision to join the new PDP was taken after a deep reflection on happenings in the state.
Efforts to get the reaction of Sambo’s media aide, Sani Umar, did not succeed. He said that he would send his comments, but he had yet to react as at the time of filling this report.