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In a piece titled “Meet The Man Who Tamed Nigeria’s Most Lawless City”, UK Telegraph chronicles how Governor Fashola came into office and transformed Lagos and also how he effectively managed the Ebola epidermic in the state. Read below… He famously claims to be “just doing his job”. But in a land where politicians are known for doing anything but, that alone has been enough to make Babatunde Fashola, boss of the vast Nigerian city of Lagos, a very popular man. Confounding the image of Nigerian leaders as corrupt and incompetent, the 51-year-old governor has won near- celebrity status for transforming west Africa’s biggest city, cleaing up its crime- ridden slums and declaring war on corrupt police and civil servants. Next month, he will come to London to meet business leaders and Mayor Boris Johnson’s officials, wooing investors with talk of how he has spent the last seven years building new transport hubs and gleaming business parks. Yet arguably his biggest achievement in office took place just last week, and was done without a bulldozer in sight. That was when his country was officially declared free of Ebola , which first spread to Nigeria three months ago when Patrick Sawyer, an infected Liberian diplomat, flew into Lagos airport. Health officials had long feared that the outbreak, which has already claimed nearly 5,000 lives elsewhere in west Africa, would reach catastrophic proportions were it to spread through Lagos. One of the largest cities in the world, it is home to an estimated 17 million people, many of them living in sprawling shanty towns that would have become vast reservoirs for infection. To make matters worse, when the outbreak first happened, medics were on strike. Instead, Mr Fashola turned a looming disaster into a public health and PR triumph. Breaking off from a trip overseas, he took personal charge of the operation to track down and quarantine nearly 1,000 people feared to have been infected since Mr Sawyer’s arrival. Last week, what would have been a formidably complex operation in any country came to a successful end, when the World Health Organisation announced that since Nigeria had had no new cases for six weeks, it was now officially rid of the virus. “This is a spectacular success story,” said Rui Gama Vaz, a WHO spokesman, who prompted an applause when he broke the news at a press conference in Nigeria on Tuesday. “It shows that Ebola can be contained. The WHO announcement was a rare glimmer of hope in the fight against Ebola, and even rarer vote of confidence in a branch of the Nigerian government, which was heavily criticised over its response to the abduction of more than 200 schoolgirls by the Boko Haram insurgent group in April. As a columninst in Nigeria’s Leadership newspaper put it last week: “For once, we did not underachieve.” For Mr Fashola’s many supporters, it is also yet more proof that the 51-year-old ex-lawyer is a future president in the making, a much-needed technocrat in a country dominated far too long by ageing “Big Men” and ex-generals. “He is the best governor we have ever had,” said Odun Babalola, a Lagos-based pension fund portfolio manager. “He’s made a lot of progress in schools, railways, and infrastructure, and unlike a lot of politicians, who are corrupt, he’s a good administrator.” True, the successful tackling of the Ebola outbreak was not Mr Fashola’s doing alone. For a start, the doctor’s strike that was under way when Mr Sawyer collapsed at Lagos airport turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Rather than being taken to one of Lagos’s vast public hospitals, where he might have languished for hours and infected numerous fellow patients and staff, he was instead admitted to a private clinic. There he was seen by a sharp-eyed consultant, Stella Adadevoh, who spotted that his symptoms were not malaria as had been first thought. She then alerted the Nigerian health ministry, and along with other doctors physically restrained Sawyer when he became aggressive and tried to leave the hospital to fly to another Nigerian city. Her quick thinking help stop the virus being spread more widely, but also cost her her life: she caught Ebola herself while treating Mr Sawyer, and has now been recommended for a national award. But even by the time Mr Sawyer had been isolated, the virus was already on the loose. Knowing that he had passed through one of the busiest airports in west Africa, health officials had to try to track down every single person who had potentially been infected by him, including the other passengers on his flight. The list started at 281 people and grew to nearly 1,000. as eight others whom he turned out to have passed the virus to subsequently died. That was where Mr Fashola stepped in. He broke off from a pilgrimage to Mecca, flew home and then helped set up an Ebola Emergency Operations Centre, which spearheaded the mammoth task of monitoring all those potentially infected. A team of 2,000 officials were trained for the task, who ended up knocking on 26,000 doors. At one point the governor was being briefed up to ten times a day by disease control experts. He made a point of visiting the country’s Ebola treatment centre, a way of communicating to the Nigerian public that they should not panic needlessly. “Command and control is very important in fighting disease outbreaks, and he provided effective leadership,” said Dr Ike Anya, a London-based Nigerian public health expert. “He also said exactly the right things, urging for the need to keep calm. Regardless of whether you support his politics, he has been very effective as a governor and I would be happy to see him stand for leadership.” Born into a prominent Muslim family but married to a Christian, Mr Fashola trained as a lawyer and went into politics after being appointed chief of staff by the previous Lagos governor, Asiwaju Tinubu, a powerful politician often described as Mr Fashola’s “Godfather”. But while he has long enjoyed the backing of a political “Big Man”, is his role as a rare defender of Nigeria’s “Little Men” that has won him most support. Once, while driving through Lagos in his convoy, he famously stopped an army colonel who was driving illegally in one of the governor’s newly-built bus lanes, berating him in front of television cameras. “The bus is for those who cannot afford to buy cars,” he said. “I want a zero tolerance of lawlesness, and those who don’t want to comply can leave our state.” It was one of the first times Nigerians had ever seen a civil servant confronting a member of the security forces, whose fondness for committing crime rather than fighting it has long contributed to Lagos’s legendary reputation for lawlessness. Armed robberies – sometimes by moonlighting police – used to be so common that few people ventured out after dark. Foreign businessmen would routinely travel with armed escorts, and the few willing to live there would stay mainly in a heavily-guarded diplomatic area called Victoria Island, a rough equivalent to Baghdad’s Green Zone. Add to that the suffocating smog, widespread squalor and regular three-hour traffic jams, and it was no suprise that the city had a reputation as one of the worst places in the world to live. Today, much of the problems remain. But members of the vast Nigerian diaspora say they now notice big changes whenever they go back. “When you return you see an absolute difference – things have improved 100 per cent,” said Nels Abbey, a London-based Nigerian journalist and businessman. “Traffic is not what it used to be, bus lanes have been introduced, and it feels a lot safer. Fashola has been like a Tory mayor for Lagos – he is trying to make it attractive to the well-off.” Styling himself as Lagos’s answer to Boris Johnson has not endeared him to everyone. As well as laying plans for a vast offshore business park intended as an “African Dubai”, he has accelerated programs to clear the ever-expanding shanty towns, ordering their occupants to return to their homes in Nigeria’s poorest east and north. That has led to criticism from human rights groups, although others say it is hard to see how Lagos will ever improve otherwise. “Do I endorse it?” said Mr Nels. “I am afraid it is a bit of a necessary evil.” Another big achievement has been increasing tax revenues, vital in a city where the GDP of $43 billion makes it the fifth-biggest economy in sub-Saharan Africa. Mr Fashola has tried to sweeten the pill by putting up signs on all new infrasructure projects, saying “paid for by your taxes”. It is a rare acknowledgement of gratitude in a country where a guaranteed stream of state oil wealth has historically allowed rulers to remain aloof from the ruled. However, despite being relected with 80 per cent of the vote in 2011, the main hailed as Nigeria’s brightest political hope in years is far from guaranteed a life in office. Having served two terms in office already, he is not allowed to run as Lagos governor again. And as a member of a minority tribe and the country’s opposition All Progressives Congress, he currently lacks the political backing to go head to head against Goodluck Jonathan in next year’s elections. In the meantime, fresh from ridding Lagos of Ebola, he is focusing on an arguably even tougher challenge, launching a new initiative to stop motorists stuck in traffic jams from blasting their horns all day. As he put it: “If we can overcome Ebola, then we can overcome noise pollution.” Culled from UK Telegraph… |
In a piece titled “Meet The Man Who Tamed Nigeria’s Most Lawless City”, UK Telegraph chronicles how Governor Fashola came into office and transformed Lagos and also how he effectively managed the Ebola epidermic in the state. Read below… He famously claims to be “just doing his job”. But in a land where politicians are known for doing anything but, that alone has been enough to make Babatunde Fashola, boss of the vast Nigerian city of Lagos, a very popular man. Confounding the image of Nigerian leaders as corrupt and incompetent, the 51-year-old governor has won near- celebrity status for transforming west Africa’s biggest city, cleaing up its crime- ridden slums and declaring war on corrupt police and civil servants. Next month, he will come to London to meet business leaders and Mayor Boris Johnson’s officials, wooing investors with talk of how he has spent the last seven years building new transport hubs and gleaming business parks. Yet arguably his biggest achievement in office took place just last week, and was done without a bulldozer in sight. That was when his country was officially declared free of Ebola , which first spread to Nigeria three months ago when Patrick Sawyer, an infected Liberian diplomat, flew into Lagos airport. Health officials had long feared that the outbreak, which has already claimed nearly 5,000 lives elsewhere in west Africa, would reach catastrophic proportions were it to spread through Lagos. One of the largest cities in the world, it is home to an estimated 17 million people, many of them living in sprawling shanty towns that would have become vast reservoirs for infection. To make matters worse, when the outbreak first happened, medics were on strike. Instead, Mr Fashola turned a looming disaster into a public health and PR triumph. Breaking off from a trip overseas, he took personal charge of the operation to track down and quarantine nearly 1,000 people feared to have been infected since Mr Sawyer’s arrival. Last week, what would have been a formidably complex operation in any country came to a successful end, when the World Health Organisation announced that since Nigeria had had no new cases for six weeks, it was now officially rid of the virus. “This is a spectacular success story,” said Rui Gama Vaz, a WHO spokesman, who prompted an applause when he broke the news at a press conference in Nigeria on Tuesday. “It shows that Ebola can be contained. The WHO announcement was a rare glimmer of hope in the fight against Ebola, and even rarer vote of confidence in a branch of the Nigerian government, which was heavily criticised over its response to the abduction of more than 200 schoolgirls by the Boko Haram insurgent group in April. As a columninst in Nigeria’s Leadership newspaper put it last week: “For once, we did not underachieve.” For Mr Fashola’s many supporters, it is also yet more proof that the 51-year-old ex-lawyer is a future president in the making, a much-needed technocrat in a country dominated far too long by ageing “Big Men” and ex-generals. “He is the best governor we have ever had,” said Odun Babalola, a Lagos-based pension fund portfolio manager. “He’s made a lot of progress in schools, railways, and infrastructure, and unlike a lot of politicians, who are corrupt, he’s a good administrator.” True, the successful tackling of the Ebola outbreak was not Mr Fashola’s doing alone. For a start, the doctor’s strike that was under way when Mr Sawyer collapsed at Lagos airport turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Rather than being taken to one of Lagos’s vast public hospitals, where he might have languished for hours and infected numerous fellow patients and staff, he was instead admitted to a private clinic. There he was seen by a sharp-eyed consultant, Stella Adadevoh, who spotted that his symptoms were not malaria as had been first thought. She then alerted the Nigerian health ministry, and along with other doctors physically restrained Sawyer when he became aggressive and tried to leave the hospital to fly to another Nigerian city. Her quick thinking help stop the virus being spread more widely, but also cost her her life: she caught Ebola herself while treating Mr Sawyer, and has now been recommended for a national award. But even by the time Mr Sawyer had been isolated, the virus was already on the loose. Knowing that he had passed through one of the busiest airports in west Africa, health officials had to try to track down every single person who had potentially been infected by him, including the other passengers on his flight. The list started at 281 people and grew to nearly 1,000. as eight others whom he turned out to have passed the virus to subsequently died. That was where Mr Fashola stepped in. He broke off from a pilgrimage to Mecca, flew home and then helped set up an Ebola Emergency Operations Centre, which spearheaded the mammoth task of monitoring all those potentially infected. A team of 2,000 officials were trained for the task, who ended up knocking on 26,000 doors. At one point the governor was being briefed up to ten times a day by disease control experts. He made a point of visiting the country’s Ebola treatment centre, a way of communicating to the Nigerian public that they should not panic needlessly. “Command and control is very important in fighting disease outbreaks, and he provided effective leadership,” said Dr Ike Anya, a London-based Nigerian public health expert. “He also said exactly the right things, urging for the need to keep calm. Regardless of whether you support his politics, he has been very effective as a governor and I would be happy to see him stand for leadership.” Born into a prominent Muslim family but married to a Christian, Mr Fashola trained as a lawyer and went into politics after being appointed chief of staff by the previous Lagos governor, Asiwaju Tinubu, a powerful politician often described as Mr Fashola’s “Godfather”. But while he has long enjoyed the backing of a political “Big Man”, is his role as a rare defender of Nigeria’s “Little Men” that has won him most support. Once, while driving through Lagos in his convoy, he famously stopped an army colonel who was driving illegally in one of the governor’s newly-built bus lanes, berating him in front of television cameras. “The bus is for those who cannot afford to buy cars,” he said. “I want a zero tolerance of lawlesness, and those who don’t want to comply can leave our state.” It was one of the first times Nigerians had ever seen a civil servant confronting a member of the security forces, whose fondness for committing crime rather than fighting it has long contributed to Lagos’s legendary reputation for lawlessness. Armed robberies – sometimes by moonlighting police – used to be so common that few people ventured out after dark. Foreign businessmen would routinely travel with armed escorts, and the few willing to live there would stay mainly in a heavily-guarded diplomatic area called Victoria Island, a rough equivalent to Baghdad’s Green Zone. Add to that the suffocating smog, widespread squalor and regular three-hour traffic jams, and it was no suprise that the city had a reputation as one of the worst places in the world to live. Today, much of the problems remain. But members of the vast Nigerian diaspora say they now notice big changes whenever they go back. “When you return you see an absolute difference – things have improved 100 per cent,” said Nels Abbey, a London-based Nigerian journalist and businessman. “Traffic is not what it used to be, bus lanes have been introduced, and it feels a lot safer. Fashola has been like a Tory mayor for Lagos – he is trying to make it attractive to the well-off.” Styling himself as Lagos’s answer to Boris Johnson has not endeared him to everyone. As well as laying plans for a vast offshore business park intended as an “African Dubai”, he has accelerated programs to clear the ever-expanding shanty towns, ordering their occupants to return to their homes in Nigeria’s poorest east and north. That has led to criticism from human rights groups, although others say it is hard to see how Lagos will ever improve otherwise. “Do I endorse it?” said Mr Nels. “I am afraid it is a bit of a necessary evil.” Another big achievement has been increasing tax revenues, vital in a city where the GDP of $43 billion makes it the fifth-biggest economy in sub-Saharan Africa. Mr Fashola has tried to sweeten the pill by putting up signs on all new infrasructure projects, saying “paid for by your taxes”. It is a rare acknowledgement of gratitude in a country where a guaranteed stream of state oil wealth has historically allowed rulers to remain aloof from the ruled. However, despite being relected with 80 per cent of the vote in 2011, the main hailed as Nigeria’s brightest political hope in years is far from guaranteed a life in office. Having served two terms in office already, he is not allowed to run as Lagos governor again. And as a member of a minority tribe and the country’s opposition All Progressives Congress, he currently lacks the political backing to go head to head against Goodluck Jonathan in next year’s elections. In the meantime, fresh from ridding Lagos of Ebola, he is focusing on an arguably even tougher challenge, launching a new initiative to stop motorists stuck in traffic jams from blasting their horns all day. As he put it: “If we can overcome Ebola, then we can overcome noise pollution.” Culled from UK Telegraph… |
to b candid, im a christian what the man said is not politically incorrect. No where in christianity are we encouraged to go to isreal for pilgrimage. most of us christian are looking at it from d view that muslim do go to mecca, which i belive we are just imitating, and it doesnt guarantee u eternal life. Besides the injustice jews show to palestinians no God fearing christian will support it. pls just my view, no tongue lashing. |
pls who has number of DB ABUJA OFFICE, I DID medicals on the 1st of june in abj. but i have not recieve invite . Will they still send 2morrow. |
God will help us , abj hope full, since june 2 |
Skyline of Onitsha city @ bestview, is dis what you call skyline haba, but any way onitsha is one of the most developed cities in Nigeria, but skyline no no no for onitsha yet. |
Jigawa Sate Governor, Alhaji Sule Lamido, on Tuesday said nine Peoples Democratic Party governors voted for the incumbent chairman of the Nigeria Governors' Forum, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, at the June 4 election that later divided the forum. Lamido gave a specific insight into what happened during the NGF election while speaking in an interview with the Hausa Service of the Voice of America monitored in Abuja, on Tuesday Speaking specifically about the election of Ameachi as Chairman, NGF, Lamido said, "I also voted for Ameachi. Look, in the PDP, myself, the governor of Kano, the governor of Niger, the governor of Kebbi, the governor of Sokoto, the governor of Kwara, the governor of Rivers, the governor of Adamawa, nine of us PDP governors voted for him. "This election was for the NGF, not a candidate for the PDP; there is nothing to it." In a veiled reference to the consensus reached by the Northern Governor Forum to present Governor Jonah Jang as consensus candidate. He said, "For one group to come and say 'this is your leader, let's present him to the nation'. Things are not done like that. People forget easily we are all reasonable people and the PDP was founded by reasonable people." Lamido also took a swipe at the party's leadership over the suspension of Sokoto State Governor, Aliyu Wamakko. While describing the suspension of Wamakko by the Bamanga Tukur-led National Working Committee as reckless, he said leaders needed to be circumspect in taking decisions. He said, "Any reasonable politician, who has foresight, knows that doing anything that will cause trouble for party members or bring confusion, a leader should avoid it. "The suspension of Wamakko was a mistake that shows a lack of leadership. Secondly, there was recklessness because what was his offence? "The truth is Bamanga Tukur was defeated in Bauchi or was he not defeated during the zonal elections in Bauchi? He was defeated, not so? "Myself, Wamakko, the governor of Kano and others came together and said what they (North East) did was wrong, so we will not agree; let us go for an election. "The North East said its consensus candidate was Babayo. Bamanga Tukur was brought to us at the convention and we elected him, even from this, you have your answer (about the NGF election)." |
SSS smashes Hezbollah terrorist cell in Kano From DESMOND MGBOH, Kano A combined team of the Joint Task Force (JTF), involving officers of the Nigerian Army and the Directorate of State Security (DSS), yesterday, confirmed that they have smashed a cell of a foreign terrorist organization, identified as Hezbollah in Kano and arrested some of its members who are operating in the country. Daily Sun gathered that the smashing of the terror cell, which particularly shocked the Lebanese community in the state, equally led to the seizure of a large cache of weapons of mass destruction at a property located at No 3, Gaya Road, off Bompai Road, Kano. The said property, according to security officials, belonged to one Abdul Hassan Taher Fadlalla, a Lebanese national, who is currently out of the country. The Director of the State Security, Mr. Eteng Bassey and the Brigade Commander of the 3 Brigade of the Nigeria Army, Brigadier General Illyasu Abbah, said they uncovered an underground bunker in the master bedroom of the said house after a painstaking search conducted by security officers. Speaking to newsmen at the house, they disclosed that the weapons discovered included 11 of 60mm anti-tank weapons, four of anti-tank mines, two of 122mm artillery gun ammunition, 76 military grenade and nine pistols. Also discovered at the house were 21 RPG bombs, 16 RPG chargers one RPG tubes, one SMG, two of SMG magazines, seven AK47 rifles, 44 AK 47 magazines, 103 packs of small detonators, rocket propelled guns and 11, 433 of 7.62mm ammunition, among other dangerous weapons. The security chiefs said: “All the weapons and ammunition recovered were properly concealed with several layers of concrete and placed in coolers, drums and neatly wrapped bags.” Security sources told Daily Sun that the discovery of the bunkers did not come easy as the whole house was full of decoys and distractions, apart from the fact that they had reinforced locks and keys on the doors and windows leading to the master bedroom, which had the bunkers. A source told Daily Sun that the hidden bunker was eventually discovered with the help of explosive detectors, which insistently alerted the security agents to the effect that there were weapons in the house, a situation which caused the security team to tear the ceilings of the building as well as to dig into the under ground layers of the house. Reeling out the sequence of events leading to the arrest of the suspects, the security chiefs stated that the discoveries were as a result of an ongoing counter terrorism investigation by the Department of the State Services Abuja spanning over several months. The security sources noted that the investigation had confirmed to the existence of a Hezbollah foreign terrorist cell in Nigeria. According to the director of the state security, “the investigation is ongoing, but what you see here, all these things you see here, is the handiwork of a foreign terrorist organization. They call them, Hezbollah. This is the handiwork of Hezbollah. What has just been discovered is a cell of Hezbollah and what you have seen here is a Hezbollah armory.” He also said the suspects had confessed that the entire arms and ammunition were targeted at facilities belonging to Israel and Western interests in Nigeria. “These arms were said to have been brought in to use them against Israel property or Western interest in Nigeria, but whatever it is, our security forces are on the heels of the investigation. The truth of it would come out: If the arms are for what they claim or if they are imported to harm our country.” The discovery, according to the two security chiefs, followed the arrest of one Mustapha Fawaz on May 16, 2013 by the Directorate of State Security. Mustapha Fawaz, they said, was the co-owner of the popular Amigo Supermarket as well as the Wonderland Amusement Park, all in Abuja. “Thus, his arrest and confession unveiled other members of the foreign terrorist network, which led to the interception of one member of the syndicate named Abdullah Tahini, a Lebanese national at the Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport with an undeclared amount of $ 60, 000 on him en-route Beirut. On May 26, they subsequently arrested one Talal Roda, a Lebanese national with Nigerian passport in the said house at No 3, Gaya Road in Kano, which led to the search conducted in the house. The two security chiefs said all the suspects arrested had confessed that they underwent a Hezbollah terrorist training, besides implicating the said Fauzi Fawad. They described the entire episode as a serious security matter, pointing out that the cell, if they had succeeded in their goals, could have caused a lot of diplomatic problem for Nigeria, even as they expressed worry that the terror group had the capacity to provide support to the local terrorist group operating in Nigeria. Brigadier General Abbah also expressed anger that the owner of the said house had deceived the people of his street by building a mosque in front of his compound adding that: “At the entrance (of the compound) you will see something like a mosque, where people do pray. If you look out-from the beginning of the street up to the end of the street-nobody erected anything like that. “He (suspect) wants to show people that yes, he can pray and the people can come and pray there, while he is amassing weapons that could destroy the same people he is gathering in front of his house to pray,” Abbah said. According to the General, he could not say how long the weapons had been kept in the house, adding that only a weapon expert could determine exactly how long the weapons had been kept in the house. He, however, pointed out that they fired one of the weapons and it fired very well, a situation he said signified that the weapons were in good condition to be put to use at anytime. He also disclosed that they were expecting the members of the National Assembly and other top policy makers who were concerned with security and defence matters in the country, who would be visiting the state in the next few days. “These officials,” he said, ‘would offer them firsthand information on the smashing of the terrorist cell and the discovery of a huge cache of weapons in the state.” Culled from sun newspaper |
For as many that will be posted. if u are looking for where to stay over or to take you at the park when you get to jalingo and take you to the orientation camp anytime. call (07054990100, 07061563522, 08170560950) The redeemed christian corpers fellowship. Every one is welcome |
is this a problem, the poor man is just trying to be himself |
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