₦airaland Forum

By Gboyega Amoboye


The late Chief Obafemi Awolowo and President
Muhammadu Buhari might have lived at different
times but, like identical twins, possess many things in
common-dynamism, pragmatism, integrity, self-
discipline, vision and passion-to make Nigeria work.
The impeccable past of these tested leaders has proved
that the bane of the country’s slow development since
independence has been lack of purposeful leadership.


https://www.vanguardngr.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/awolowo.jpg

Chief Awolowo


Unlike the reluctant leaders who had been imposed
on us, Awolowo and Buhari, both armed with
impeccable records of performance, the former as
Premier of the old Western Region as well as Vice
Chairman of the Federal Executive Council in the
regime of Gen. Yakubu Gowon, and the latter, as a
military Head of State, etc, adequately prepared for the
leadership of Nigeria. Three times were each
unsuccessful- Awolowo in 1959, 1979, 1983 and
President Buhari in 2003, 2007 and 20011.


Their paths might have crossed in one form or the
other, that may been the unseen hand of God in their
lives preparatory to the task ahead that :”You Obafemi
Awolowo is my Moses and you Muhammadu Buhari,
my Joshua, for the libration of your people from the
‘rats and mosquitoes’ of your country”. Or could it be
by sheer coincidence that, for the first time since
independence, both the North and the South West are
in effective political alliance? The Thomas’s may
continue to doubt.


Like the Nostradamus that he was, Awolowo, in a
paper delivered in Kano in 1970,had proposed a
seven- point agenda which he called national
objectives that should be implemented simultaneously
in all the states of the federation for the rapid and even
development of the country. He explained that the
revenue allocation formula should be based on the
implementation of the seven objectives and, by so
doing, put an end to the “endless search for the
appropriate allocation formula”. He was speaking in a
paper titled, Revenue Allocation Must be Based on Even
Progress and Needs, delivered in his capacity as the
Federal Commissioner of Finance, to the annual
conference of state commissioners of finance.

https://www.vanguardngr.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/buhari-3.jpg

President-elect Muhammadu Buhari reviews a
document in Abuja on April 1, 2015. Nigeria’s new
president-elect Muhammadu Buhari hailed polls that
will lead to the first democratic change of power in
Africa’s most populous nation as “historic” hours after
he secured a decisive victory. AFP PHOTO


As if confirming the link between these great national
heroes, Buhari recently implemented item seven of
the Awolowo’s seven- point objectives for national
development of 45 years ago and, by so doing, been
praised for “bailing” out states that could not pay
workers salaries. The late sage had said under this item
that it was imperative to put the federal government
in sufficient funds to enable it not only to perform its
allotted functions but also to come readily to the aid of
any state in need while arguing: “But perchance any
state falls on evil day, it would be the duty of the
federal government, acting as an accredited agent of
all the states, to come to the aid of such a needy state
without delay…Before leaving this topic , one may ask
Buhari’s critics where they were when former
President Goodluck Jonathan granted some members
of the private sector a bail out. For instance, Arik
Airline got 600m dollars, Aero -200m dollars, Air
Nigeria-225.8mdollars, Chachangi-55m dollars etc.
(AMCON) in addition to an attempt to buy aircrafts for
them but for adverse public opinion.

TheSonOfMark:
My father is Gay paedophilic terrorist.

My dad offered to blow himself up in exchange for #11,200 and a basket of smoked fish to feed my leprous family.

Soon it'll be my turn. I'll Say "hi" to my betrothed 72 virgins when I get there.

i am a Useless terrorist.

I am a Ramshackle-dwelling deranged hermit.

SeverusSnape:
Shut up you jihadist cone head.

Go and call Buhari your grand Patron. You guys have not seen anything, We will so lampoon the Certificateless illiterate like our life depends on it.Let's go back to 1984. Nonsense!!!

Kontinu

Bukiminaj:
even d holy prophet was welcomed wit song n bandiri in medinah. also heard shaving of eyebrow is haram.sumtyms i dnt listen 2dis hadiths,dy r unbearable

Allah will guide me

TheSonOfMark:
[color=pt]It took you over an hour to churn this simpleton-esque bland hogwash.

I am Ibibio, an Akwaibomite, and we set the pace for you parasite dimwits. While my state is taking giant developmental strides, you are stuck to begging Sen. Musiliu to send 30 more trailers of rice to feed your anorexic lineage.You are a jihadist, a paedophile, a numbskull and an odoriferous raccoon. Your ilk supported GEJ's stoning (attempted assassination). How many of your 9-year old almajiri cousins have you sexually molested, dimwitted paedophile? Deadbrained hallucinating happy-go-lucky slimy myopic rectum-loving psychopath.

SeverusSnape:
Because Presidiot terrohammadu Buhari is now the president??Buhari IS A FOOL, HE'S AN ILLITERATE AND AN IDIOTIC PLEB.

Keep it up.

SeverusSnape:
Buhari aka POO*HARI IS AN ID*IOT.

that's all I have to say. Let DSS come. Fools

TheSonOfMark:
[color=bl1pt]Paedophilic terrorist, why did you try to assassinate GEJ in Bauchi?
[/size][/i]lor]

And here comes the foólish flat headed yo-yo of ibibio. I think I need to clarify some things to you about who I am, maybe you will stop having this delusional view about me.

* I am not a terrorist - you have been asked on different occassion to define the word 'terrorist' and prove to me that I am one. If you can't do that, then know that you are not just disgracing yourself, you are disgracing the entire flat head race.

* I am not a northerner and I have never been to the northern part of the country. Perhaps you should tell the hoi polloi how I got to Bauchi.

* I never planned to assasinate GEJ and I will never do. I have done my country good by using my voters card in sending the drunkard back to otuoke. If you are still pained about it, please go to hell, no one gives a Bleep about you and your entire lineage...I just hope you are ready to continue wailing for the next 8 years.

Wish u best of luck pal.

PPAngel:
Ask your Buhari to construct concentration camps because there are 13 million of us who never voted for him and will ever ever vote for him.

And who is soliciting for your vote? You should go to hell with your 13 million neanderthals

PPAngel:
[s] This is an obvious violation of rule 2 and if you (Seun) continue to undermine free speech in your forum then get ready to see your forum go to the dustbin. This is the 5th and final estate that we have. They own the Press and Media. It is from Internet sites like these that the real truth can be discussed without any threat to one's liberties. Seun, if you feel that any post against your APC and Buhari are not welcomed here then issue a fatwa on it rather than sit back and watch the zombie dunces of the APC threaten other posters here. Look into this thread. https://www.nairaland.com/2494972/dss-quiz-two-nairalanders#36501982

abduljabbar4:
Gej told us that the refinaries would start working by 2016 and 99bn was needed. Something that gej wanted to do in a year has been done in 2 months by Buhari without needing 99bn.

'Jonathan is a disaster to this nation' - barcanista

The governor of Bayelsa state, Seriake Dickson, is not the only politician hacking phones and intercepting communication of political peers and rivals in Nigeria.

Almost all recent governors of the South South region of Nigeria intercepted calls and hacked phones and computers, an illegal practice that gave them backdoor access to many people’s private lives, an ongoing PREMIUM TIMES investigation has revealed.

Our findings show that Rotimi Amaechi, former Rivers state governor; Godswill Akpabio, former Akwa Ibom state governor; and Emmanuel Uduaghan, former Delta state governor illegally acquired technologies that allowed them conduct mass surveillance and hack people’s gadgets, mainly to eavesdrop on their conversations, know who they talked with and what their plans were.

These three formers governors are the latest privacy violators and spymasters weeks after Mr. Dickson was exposed for similar illegal practice. They all exited office as governors in May, following the end of their second term in office.

Most of the hacking carried out by the governors occurred within the last four years, during the last term of their two-term tenures as governors and at times in liaison with compromised federal security authorities.

In fact, those who should know said some officials of the State Security Service, SSS, colluded with the governors as they engaged in massive hacking, helping disguise their acts as federal security projects.

Officials at the office of the National Security Adviser admitted demanding explanations from the hacking governors over their illegal surveillance programmes at different times with each of them giving similar excuses.

“They claimed they were using it to track kidnappers,” officials at the office of the National Security Adviser said. “The governors claimed they were carrying out the operations with the SSS, but our investigations showed they were running it from their offices.”

Investigators from the office of the National Security Adviser later found the governors’ claims that they were hacking phones to track kidnappers to be false, suggesting the governors targeted political superiors, associates and peers, while using the SSS to disguise the expedition as approved national security projects.

Some politicians and businessmen interviewed for this story from the affected states said they knew all along that these governors monitored their communications illegally.

A contractor from Akwa Ibom said Governor Akpabio refused to pay him for the project he executed for the state after he tapped his phone and overheard some critical comments he made about the former governor to some friends.

“He once boasted to me that he knew what I was doing and what I was saying about him,” the contractor said.

Rivers State

The Rivers spying program started in 2008 – in the wake of the Niger Delta amnesty program – as a security contract targeted at helping the police in the state respond faster to crime scenes using a C4i (Command, Control, Communications, Computers, and Intelligence) technology deployed by an Israeli military security firm, MPD Systems.

The project saw the Rivers State government and MPD Systems train at least 1,500 security officials, providing the perfect ‘federal’ cover under which the political spying was carried out.

The spokesperson of the Amaechi regime, Ibim Semenitari, argued that the project could not have been used for spying on politicians.
“Given the well publicized infractions between the Rivers State Government and the GEJ (Goodluck Ebele Jonathan)-led federal Government the state would not have been able to embark on the issues raised without the security agencies clamping down on its officials,” she said.

She also argued that the project was approved by late former president, Umaru Musa yar’Adua, after a presentation attended by Nigeria’s service chiefs at the time and the then head of the SSS, Afakriya Gadzama.

“Equipment were imported with the approval of the NSA,” and “The outfit was manned by security officials drawn from the Police and SSS who were responsible to their state commands,” Ms. Semenitari argued.

The office of the National Security Adviser denied issuing the End User Certificate for C4i. Also, the command centre was installed and operated from the Government house, rather than the SSS or Police department.

Mr. Amaechi’s last term as Rivers state governor was very turbulent. He fell out with his close allies, including former first lady, Patience Jonathan, and the current governor, Nyesom Wike. His deputy governor jumped ship few days to the elections.

The state recorded an unprecedented level of political violence in the run-up to the general elections. Mr. Amaechi’s political party, the All Progressives Congress lost that election in the state. A commission of inquiry Mr. Amaechi empanelled to probe the election violence recorded at least 30 deaths of the former governor’s party members. The opposing Peoples Democratic Party boycotted the inquiry.

Akwa Ibom state

Even though Mr. Akpabio and his Rivers counterpart disagreed on many fronts, their appetite for surreptitiously collecting private data from their political associates and rivals appear to tally. Both former governors started their spying facilities on similar premise – to fight kidnapping and other related crimes.

“We knew that he (Godswill Akpabio) acquired a device to monitor people’s telephone calls but there was absolutely nothing we could do,” Umana Okon who was secretary to the state government when the device was installed said. “The device was acquired at the time kidnapping was quite high in the state. But after kidnapping abated, it was used to monitor telephone calls of private citizens and government officials.”
The period when Mr. Akpabio used the phone hacking tools in Akwa Ibom also coincided with a period that was fraught with political assassinations, kidnapping and intimidation.

The National Security Adviser, once in 2012, declined to issue Mr. Akpabio an End User Certificate to buy Hacking Team’s cyber warfare tools.
The Akpabio regime in Akwa Ibom denied running the hacking facility.

Aniekan Umana, the state’s commissioner of information – he was also the information commissioner under Akpabio – said Mr. Akpabio never ran any private security facility, insisting that everything security was run by the SSS and police.

Officials of that government who spoke to PREMIUM TIMES in confidence however confirmed the existence of the spying facility. Like Rivers’, Mr. Akpabio’s spying facility was also installed and run from the governor’s office rather than the SSS or police department.
The state government also denied the claims.

“The governor (Mr. Akpabio) has no need to hack anyone’s phone,” Aniekan Umana said. He claimed that when the state sought the Hacking Team’s tools, it was to help the security agencies.

When the spying became very obvious, many politicians who felt their privacy had been invaded complained to the National Security Adviser but nothing was done.

With a new government installed since May 29, the opposition in Akwa Ibom are now calling for a full-scale investigation of the surveillance programmes and its privacy breaches.

“If the law was breached in any way, those guilty will be made to face justice. That is the minimum we expect from the Federal Government,” Mr. Okon, now an opposition leader, demanded.

Delta state

Delta state was not as violent as both Rivers and Akwa Ibom state during the last elections. But Emmanuel Uduaghan, the state’s former governor who operated the spying tools – also from his office building – cited kidnapping as the reason for purchasing the tool.

Mr. Uduaghan could not be reached for his comments. Text messages and telephone calls to his spokespersons were neither answered nor returned.

Political Goons, Cyber Bullies

The Rivers state C4i, Ms. Semenitari claims, was handed over to the new government, suggesting it is probably still in use.
The Akwa Ibom facility is still in use in the governor’s office, our sources said.
The current state of the Delta state spying facility is unclear.

The office of the National Security Adviser claims the hacking governors repeatedly ignored warnings to discontinue their “illegal” projects, in apparent abuse of their political influence.

Mr. Amaechi was a strong member of the then ruling Peoples Democratic Party and Chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum at the time. He later fell out with former President Goodluck Jonathan and became the leader of President Muhammadu Buhari’s campaign team. He is currently a close ally of Mr. Buhari.

Messrs. Akpabio and Uduaghan were strong allies of former President Jonathan. Mr. Akpabio later became chairman of the PDP Governor’s Forum. He is now a serving senator and Minority leader of the Senate.

Bayelsa Hacking Team

At the time the NSA was probing these three governors, the hacking expedition of the Bayelsa state governor, Seriake Dickson, was largely unknown.

Until it was exposed by PREMIUM TIMES, Mr. Dickson’s hacking activities were stealth and done without permission by the office of the National Security Adviser.

It was only revealed after Hacking Team, the Italian cyber weaponry firm, which provided Mr. Dickson with attack tools was itself hacked early July and internal company documents leaked to the public.

The documents indicate governor’s hacking activities began in 2012 and lasted through 2013, according to Hacking Team’s leaked internal company documents.

In Nigeria, only federal security agencies are allowed to acquire cyber attack and defence tools. And when they did, it has to be with the permission of the National Security Adviser who provides End User Certificates. The right to either intercept communications or act to suspend rights in the face of national security rests with the Federal Government.
None of the hacking governors got either permission or End User Certificates from the Office of the National Security Adviser before embarking on their privacy-breaching surveillance.
In fact, the former Akwa Ibom state governor, now a senator, once failed to secure an End User Certificate from the NSA to buy Hacking Team’s Galileo in 2013.
Cyber security analysts say data acquired by the hacking governors may have been used – and could be used in future – for cyber bullying, intimidation and blackmail.
These illegal hacking activities of politicians spotlights the vulnerability of the private lives of many Nigerians. The Hacking Team’s hack revelations and this, from the office of the National Security Adviser, shows anyone – individuals and organizations – with enough financial and political clout can acquire and deploy hitech hacking tools and illegally collect private data from targeted Nigerians.

“Unfortunately, the law that should protect the right to citizen privacy, and allow them seek redress if illegally hacked, doesn’t exist in Nigeria,” Gbenga Sesan, Executive Director, Paradigm Initiative Nigeria said. “That’s one of the reasons why all the biometric information being obtained by banks (BVN), NIMC (NIN), etc, are unsafe and should be halted until data protection is guaranteed in Nigeria.”

If the former NSA, Sambo Dasuki, who probed these former governors had opted to prosecute them, he would have been held back by the lack of clear laws against the former governors. Nigeria’s CyberCrime law was only enacted in 2015.

A section of the law which could be deployed to punish the hacking governors prescribes a prison term of not more than two years, or a fine of N5 million or both.

“Unauthorised surveillance of individuals is ethically wrong even if our laws are fuzzy about our rights to privacy from digital intrusion,” Femi Longe, co-founder of Co-Creation Hub, argued. “Heaven knows how they have used the information obtained illegally to pervert justice and unduly influence individuals within and outside the state.”

PhockPhockMan:
Shaarrrrraaaaap, I'm not in the same class with the OP, two edged sword, he thinks supporting the obvious suppression of Ndigbo will give him Nationalist outlook.

So sad.

omenka:
Good!! Now it is coming from PT themselves. I created a similar thread couple of weeks back www.nairaland.com/2452978/opportunity-cost-corruption-under-goodluck but Lalasticlala and Ishilove refused to honour it for reasons best known to them.

God dey.

PPAngel:
Start planting cotton and groundnut

chuna1985:
Oh!!! Journalists are foools.

O thou wisest, what makes the OP foolish journalism

Christmasdon:
What do you have to react.on this. Cc. Lalasticl..ala

Smh.

Futureleader1:
oh really? Then make a difference

glamourroudy:
A lot?.........I didn't read d post

Are you that lazy?

abduljabbar4:
Thank God for change. God will punish those that wanted us to continue living that way

MuhdG:
Hahahaa. No oo. I'm looking after my wife and kids.

Lol. You are not alone.

Futureleader1:

MuhdG: