₦airaland Forum

davidylan:
government appointment in nigeria has always been about quota system rather than academic distinction. No surprises there.

And until quality rather than quota filling is made the goal then mediocrity and sub par perfomances will continue in a lot of sectors and a significant portion of the work force. This is something that i strongly feel really needs to be addressed, especially the University quota system that seems to encourage a specific part of the country to relax knowing that top jobs are still in reach even with the worst grades. This really does defy all logic considering how valuable and important a work force is to a country and its populace, there are somethings that should be too important to reduce to cheap politics. Such absurdity (absurd to me anyway) has become a symbol of the apparent willingness to accept mediocrity which has become symptomised by lack of significant competition in so many sectors and on so many levels whereby such competition could have been beneficial in driving development and growth in value of the workforce of the country. Isn't Nigeria supposed to be a federation of sought? When are things going to begin to resemble such?

naijaking1:
@Sky Blue
You don't appreciate the nature of privatization to the extent PCHN doesn't have to be privatized in-block. What you privatize is the ability or an opportunity to provide, maintain, and manage power supply for example to a defined population in Nigeria. First of all, the federal government has to let go its control of these redundant monopolies (you know how difficult that would be-- to ask FGN to release its cash cow!). If you remove govt. monopoly in power supply to say Lagos state, I bet that within a year, there will be 2 or 3 power companies reliably suppling power to different parts of Lagos. The same way telephone companies were allowed to compete with NITEL, private power companies should be allowed to supply power to different areas of the country. The federal govt. agency will be meant to play a purely regulatory role.

Can you please elaborate?

@naijaking privatisation is not the answer to all problems, it is a very important part of the solution but it is not bread and butter. NEPA was changed to PHCN and then "privatised", now what? What did it change?  NEPA still has complete monopoly of the Nigerian power market and is does not actually paint a picture of a trully independent corporation. Government has to start getting its hands out of all the pies it put its lfingers in due to greed and selfishness and corruption and this is where privatisation comes in but such won't result in any significant change unless accompanied by a free, fair and open market where companies can all have a shot at competing without any being favoured by the government as has continued to be the case on so many occasions from OBJ and Dangote Cement to the reported group that apparently tried everything to make sure NEPA remained government controlled and hence more milkable than it is now coutesy of corruption. When a free, fair and open market is in place then government can now play the role of regulator or if i dare say an impartial referee.

One other aspect that is seriously lacking in Nigeria is good customer services. I am pretty sure i don't need to elaborate this, we have all had that experience, people at airports and clerks at offices and waiters at restaurants etc, in Nigeria that treat you as if you are even lucky that they are attending to you and should hence even be appreciating being given the opportunity to bask in their glorious presence notwithstanding that such people are getting paid for the job, the frequent lack of understanding and comprehension as to how those things called queues work, etc. Such behaviour is not restricted to Nigeria alone but apparently any place that embodies "Nigerianness", i.e Nigerian embassies in different parts of the world apparently. Does it really kill that much to smile on the job and be polite? LOL

^^^ You could at least have referenced where you got that last post from since such view was taken from an article.

When wrong cannot be condemned in public what message is being sent to citizens of the country both at home and abroad? Embezzle, mismanage, but share some and you will be celebrated? @ow11 at the end of the day you have to give credit to the skill required by the writer of the article you posted a link to, the writer was able to reiterate the greatness of the man called Peter Odili without ever actually stating in any substantiated way why such a character was great, that is one thing that i find irritating about a wide section of the Nigerian press - the lack of subtlety and finnesse to successfully sell cheap and worthless propaganda when they want to. 'Peter Odili is great, Peter Odili is great' without actually being able to point a finger at any solid and substantial achievement being made under that governorship.

Well, i am irritated sure but far from surprised at the public celebration of such a figure when we consider that we speak of a nation whereby integrity and credibility is being sold nationwide at an alrming rate for a plate of rice and wrong doing or bad governance cannot be condemned but celebrated, what else do you expect?

I would rather wait till this news is properly verified and i desperately hope it is not because Ibori was inconvenienced that Ribadu is being gone after when people like Odili and Ibori are still walking around freely. I just don't know anymore, i keep on wondering so desperately when we will get the straw that breaks the camel's back, what is left to happen before the victimised masses are moved or forced to action against the powers that keep holding the people ransom HONESTLY. Instead as has been shown consistently on nairaland, everything quickly disintegrates into tribalism instead of unity against a government, house and party that are holding a nation of over 140 million people ransom. What can one say anymore?

Moving stuff and i do genuinely feel sorry for the people who lost homes, it probably was not their fault. However was it also reported the many cases of people building without any law or consent whatsoever? How everywhere is a market and people add extensions over gutters, etc? How such actually exacerbates the problem of flooding as well as traffic? Of course it is a moving piece because it involves people, however at thesame time isn't it about time some sense was put back into the situation? As for the displacement of people, i really do believe that lagos needs to venture into huge scale development which low earners can afford, lower income housing, and also there has to be more vertical building work, lagos is already starved of land and overpopulated. One more incentive for the state government to improve the coverage of its tax collection because such tax money can be used to invest in such ventures.

tpia:
I hope it wont get to the point where drastic measures will be employed in the Niger Delta.


because so many people will suffer and remain scarred by the memory long after the original issue.

LOL, quite amusing i have to say. A sense of insecurity that was well and truly exploited by militancy and so called "freedom fighting" has given every joe 'i want to make money' the courage to take to arms and hold a state and region ransom with all the violence, kidnappings, oil bunkering, profiteering, assasinations etc, forcing business to leave the region while the indegenes as a result suffer job losses and a further decline in what was already a laughable economy in that region to begin with, while the country continues to lose money and things aren't drastic enough yet? LOL.

What is even more amusing is when you actually consider this: if the problem is people not wanting oil taken from land around them then how come the Ogoni people were able to achieve such in peace and without all this havoc and suceeded in kicking shell out of their land? Are they from mars? If the problem is derivation then won't it be wiser to actually fight for ammendments in the constitution which has SO MANY things that need to be reviewed and rectified one of which being the law that states that anything below 6 feet belongs to the federal government? Such a law is actually one of the reasons that the federal government can claim ownership to oil and is among quite a few laws that need to be rectified along with the secret act law which is actually the antithesis to the proposed 'freedom of information'.

If the problem is development then who should be fought, the state government or the federal government? I find it laughable when groups like MEND say seeing pictures of abuja and lagos developments in contrast with the Niger Delta situation is one of the reasons the so called "freedom fighting" is supported. So does that mean that if there was no development in other parts of the country that MEND and co would have been more accepting in resignation at the bad situatiion of underdevelopment, environmental degredation, etc which does exist in the Niger Delta? Take for instance now, who is developing lagos, is it the federal or the state government? Who was developing Abuja, was it not El Rufai who although was involved in questionable dealings fought to get Abuja refocused on development?Juxstapose such with Rivers State. A ring road project in a particular area has been on the table for well over a decade now. Money has been thrown around and nothing has happened. Just read a few days ago that china has gotten a $1 billion dollar contract to start and complete the project and i desperately hope it is done, but what if it isn't now, would it also be the federal government's fault?

So if it is agreed that a more fundamental approach to the main issue should be tackled and we are agreed that such lies in the constitution and rectifying its many flaws and ammending it, then what is blowing up of pipelines actually achieveing? This agression could be channeled much more effectively whereby results actually yield and yet the option that so far seems to be working apparently (according to some) is oil bunkering for profiteering and buying and introduction of more weapons in an already volatile region? I quit being frustrated at this absurdity and just resigned myself to amusment from it because it is quite funny, are we so starved of actual credible groups and avenues that we are so quick to label anybody who blows up a pipeline a "freedom fighter"? I so know what to expect in response to this post and i actually anticipate it, i don't mind being amused  . Some people will read this with one eye closed and asume that i am saying the Niger Delta has no problems, followed by being called an "imposter" (as if that has anything to do with the arguement)  infact let the blind arguements begin. LOL.

vigasimple:
Maybe if we are talking realistically VISION 2050 more like.

Yar A'dull is a clueless President. He is not a leader like many before him. Even in the midst of all the problems and the corruption he should have at least pick an issue as a flagship so that we can work out his intentions.

The people behind him are simply waiting for 4 years to be used up and campaign for re- election for another 4 years and maybe even 3rd time like they did with OBJ.

God help us.

Since when did Nigeria have good leaders as presidents that lead you to state that line in bold? Please let us stop comparing kwashiokor with leprosy, bad is bad.

LOL, what else can one do but laugh? So these "freedom fighters" have become bored of the Niger Delta and are now setting their sights on Abuja? Maybe that would wake the president up so that this continued child's play will stop. Whatever is going to happen had better happen quick so that the country can move on from this absurdity.

As long as whatever investment gotten from oil (eg excess crude account, etc) does not have to be linked or affiliated with NNPC then fine, if not it just seems futile. NNPC is foul.

Probe: ‘$22.6bn refinery, gas, electricity projects not executed’
By Chiawo Nwankwo, Abuja
Published: Monday, 4 Aug 2008



Projects worth $22.6bn meant for the improvement of the downstream segment of the petroleum sector with 18 months completion date, beginning 2006, have not been executed, investigation has revealed.

The projects, numbering 10, were tied to oil blocks awarded by the Department Petroleum Resources to local and foreign companies that participated in the 2005 and 2006 bid rounds.

Many of the oil blocks were won through discretionary powers of the Minister of Petroleum as contained in the Petroleum Act, just as many of the enjoined the right of first refusal, a process that ousted competition and ensured payment of cheap signature bonuses.

It was gathered that the initial commitment to the projects by the bid winners attracted the Federal Government to the deals.

However, the House of Representatives 26-member ad-hoc panel, chaired by Mr. Igo Aguma, probing the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation and its subsidiaries, discovered that none of the projects for which the oil blocks were sold had gotten off the ground.

A NNPC document dated July 30, 2008, and exclusively obtained last Friday, listed the projects, the proposed investment on each project; the oil blocks attached as well as the current status of each of the projects.

According to the document entitled, “Designated downstream projects,” “alternative project (is) to be considered” for nine out of the 10 projects.

The only exception to this arrangement was the $6bn gas plan and gas pipeline projects attached to OPL 321 and 323, won by KNOC, Equator Exploration and NJ Expansion Limited.

The affected projects are gas-fired power plants in Abuja and Kaduna; gas pipeline from Ajaokuta to Kano through Abuja and Kaduna, just as it had another line from Zaria to Katsina, through Malumfashu and Musawa.

The current status of the projects showed that “feasibility studies for both power plants and gas pipeline (have been) completed.

“Land acquisition for power plants in the two locations, project site office in Abuja have been established. The steering committee has approved the feasibility study for the pipelines.”

Other projects involved are a new refinery for Port-Harcourt valued at $2bn, and attached to OPL 298.

Four companies, Oando Plc, Camac International Limited, Allied Energy and First Axis Oil and Gas are involved with the oil block.

The NNPC remarked on the projects status, “Steering and working committees established; and alternative project to be considered.”

@4 Play why the surprise that Africans might place greater importance to countries and locations outside the continent when viewed in the global political space? People can sometimes underestimate the potential power (whether good or bad) the media has over a general populace. The West has CNN and BBC, the middle east has Al Jazeera, what does africa have? NTA? The thing i find disheartening about the African situation is that all through history the opportunity has not been taken to actually tell our own stories, a significant ammount of the celebrated history documents written about africa are and were written by 'foreigners' as if such would generally have a better perspective of the reality of the situation than those who experienced it. Take for instance the history of the region that is today Nigeria, don't be surprised if you go and ask a kid how the people in the region that is today Nigeria lived and you get the impression that the general belief is the stereotypical and false view of naked people swinging around trees tarzan style on their way tol meet their friends which are monkeys which they can of course speak to (ok, might be a little extreme, LOL). These kids won't have the knowledge of kingdoms or cities that existed like the Benin City which when described by portugese traders when they discovered it was a description of surprise and awe, a city that was later destroyed, burnt snd plundered by colonials in their further conquest of africa.

There really isn't one News station that you can point to in Africa and look upon such with the level of respect people attribute to CNN and BBC of which i don't really watch the latter because i feel they deal too much in propaganda. Of course i don't immediately take every angle i hear from news channels ad gospel truth and i find that most if not all have an agenda they try to push and ironically the News channel that seems to have the least dilutted form of such is Al Jazeera. If the rise of Al Jazeera has thought us anything, it is that the people are willing to listen and the market is there to exploit. Sadly, with the level of incompetence in news coverage, reporting and broadcasting displayed on channels like NTA that pride themselves as the biggest news network in africa while also specialising in political butt kissing, i feel people will generally look for better and more competent alternatives, and hence everyone but africans will continue to tell the stories of africa

@Lusky just out of interest, how does that cctv camera you posted the link to get power? It can't possibly be from the national grid that hardly has any power in the first place can it?

osasp:
i do agree that it will reduce the crime rate in the area but it appears you don't see what im trying to say.
handling these machines in the first place takes alot of training.
they need the database to identify people(doesnt have to be a criminal one)
i saw in one of your posts that they could build power plants just for d cctv
do you really see that happening in nigeria?
i don't know if its just my perspective blinding me but the system 2 me is so messed up that probably getting these tapes for an investigation would be hell.
im really looking forward to seeing the whole cctv thing being introduced into the system
but who are we kidding?
now that its got power problems, it has probably ground to a halt
flushed down the drain like other ill structed projects

all i am saying is, it wont work because it is nigeria we are talking here

Tinapa although now on shaky ground because of the whole free trade zone and customs issue which could easily be resolved by the federal government but has not, was going to be powered by its own power station. I don't think the power supply issue should be an excuse to do nothing. How long has the power supply in Nigeria been an issue? So should everything have been halted because of this? MTN loses billions because pretty much most of their stations are run on generators, so does that mean that the GSM revolution should not have happened? And that last line in your statement, sorry, i don't share such resignation

And such a change will help things how? @poster with no solid arguement as to the effects such will have, i hope you are not one of the people who went to UN to discuss Nudity Bill o, LOL. Priority

@osasp again sorry but i will have to disagree with you. Why do some shops use dummy cctv? The issue of cctv as a means of deterring criminal activity does not have to do with immediate gratification but depends on if such a tool is well implemented in investigations and used to successfully prosecute criminals. The fact that criminals can be recorded during their criminal activities and such being later scrutinised as a means of going back in the past to identify the culprit is how cctvs serve as a deterrent. When criminals know that successfully escaping from the scene of the crime does not automatically mean the end of the story (as is the case most of the time in Nigeria) then progress in crime prevention has been made. By the time there are a significant number of culprits being prosecuted and such is well publicised and people now know that the acts can be recorded and that the past can come back to haunt them, then won't that be a deterrent to robbing someone in front of the camera? It might not completely eliminate such but don't you think it would cause a reduction? A criminal database? Is that actually essential for such to work? By the time a person is identified on camera and the details of the person and picture are pasted on news paper you still think people like relatives, friends, neighbours, etc won't have anything to say about that? If anything it might even be more effective if well utilised and implemented in Nigeria because Nigeria has that strong community and family culture which britain in my view does not measure up to. At the end of the day cctv is a tool, cctv does not catch criminals on its own, but it can be used to do so. Hence with the implications of cctv i do think it is more important than you seem to give it credit for and i do think it is a priority because security is a huge issue in Nigeria

@osasp sorry but i disagree. Yes the power supply problem remains the giant elephant in the room but cctv coverage is also very important as a means of ensuring security and stability as well as solving crimes. Nigerian criminals continuously exploit the ineptitude of a non functioning police force and as long as people in Nigeria know that they can commit crimes and so easily get away with it, the security situation will remain appalling and thereby affecting everything from home lives to businesses, banks are robbed so often it is ridiculous. It is so easy to argue from the perspective that if you raise the living stndards then such will stop but i don't buy this, Nigeria's own case is mostly greed, greed, greed. I am for anything that will serve as a tool for law enforcement because i can't see how people all over the place can continue to break the laws and get away with it while people continue to call such a working society. If you just think about it carefully, Nigeria and lawlessness go hand in hand hence the state of things. It has come to define everything, from inflating of contracts to just daylight robbery in the political community, from stealing of votes to bribing of every official in range just to get work (which people are paid for) done or not. I mean, even the police force needs policing themselves.

The importance of power to Nigeria can never be overstated because it affects everything, if the lagos government can somehow provide that state with stable powersupply, that alone i believe will drastically improve the economy (and that is just lagos). However seeing that this power problem has remained at a critical stage for so long now, does that mean that everything else should remain in suspended animation? Fixing power and doing other things aren't mutually exclusive, so if both can be attacked then why not? If special power plants need to be built just to run such venture like CCTV then so be it.

I don't even know if or not there is a regulatory body for this sort of things but i feel the only way to curb this is if people refuse to part with money to bribe such rubbish because it can only encourage it. Understandably you had a client, but if you drove such back to the main office to complain or to the police station wouldn't things have been different (i don't say such with full confidence LOL). But it is when people refuse to accept such rubbish that it will stop, hence the CCTV venture in lagos is a welcome one.

Stuff like this irritates me. The country needs a working engineering and building regulatory body because this case of building just collapsing is annoying. Are there any standards or codes that people are made to follow or do people just build any how they want?

LOL, @ehie, i will not state where i am from just to feed some cheap fight that i am not even having with anyone and mainly because i don't think whether or not i am from the Niger Delta (which you don't even know by the way) is fundamental to this arguement. So what if i was to say i was from the Niger Delta and named a town and all of the above, i could easily forsee being called a liar because it would just completely go against the very beliefs that a certain poster seems to have. That everyone has to agree with him/her else such a person can't possible be from thesame region (which is not even important to the arguement by the way). All in all i can see the direction this thread is taking and i will simply learn to avoid respoding to anything by such poster as i already decided to do earlier before i was attacked on this thread. I have no will to expend energy on such,LOL, just not my thing so have fun with it alone. @All, have a nice day.

Ibime:
You bloody imposter! Claiming to be a Niger-Deltan! Please state your town and state, let me see which part of Niger-Delta you are from. At best, you are an Ishan.

Please tabulate all these billions we have supposedly wasted, let me count it. Then tabulate the billions the Hausas have embezzled, let me count that also.

How can you blame Niger-Delta for Nigeria's problem? If Nigeria are so concerned about the level in corruption in the Niger-Delta, why do they not monitor all the thieves and bring them to account? Why are James Ibori and Peter Odili still running around freely? Is it the Niger-Delta people that failed to bring these thieves to trial or is it the Nigerian Government who endorse and encourage such corruption? We Niger-Deltans have no LEGISLATIVE POWER to curb corruption. It is only the Nigerian Government who have the legislative power to fight corruption. So why blame us for a Nigerian problem? Bloody idiot!


That is like the owner of a drinking parlour telling his employee that he will not pay him his fair amount because the employee is only going to waste it on alchohol - when it is the owner of the drinking parlour selling him the alchohol. If the owner of the drinking parlour stopped selling him the alchohol, then he will not be able to waste his money on drink.

In the same way, the Nigerian government should stop using corruption as an excuse for not giving Niger-Deltans their fair share - when they are the ones who have the power to fight such corruption.


Please address the real issue. Is it fair what I have quoted below?


If Nigeria is serious about corruption in the Niger-Delta, they can deal with it. What is EFCC there for? To use a Nigerian problem as an excuse for cheating a people out of their right is absolutely bollocks and is not credible. So stop talking semantics and let us deal with the issue.

LOL, what an irony, you have decided to follow me around nairaland after accusing me of doing thesame few days ago. Your continuous stance that no one from the Niger Delta could possibly hold views contrary to yours and then using such as a fundamental line to all your arguements is something i find quite immature, and that is when i even ignore the insults you continually throw my way. Hence what my post was actually stating, focusing on the trivial and hammering on about where i am from when it is not even fundamental to the arguement. I ignored all your postings on the other thread because i decided it was just futile and here you are again. LOL, i am flattered.

Where did Peter Odilli get the restraining order to stall EFCC prosecution? Was it not from Port Harcourt? So the Judge that gave him such was from where (not that that is even a fundamental issue but i won't put it past you to make it so)? How much money did Peter Odilli supposedly spend on gas turbines? Please do inform the house? Do we even need to go into the whole Port Harcourt Airport and the launching of Arik? Do we have to bring in the 100 billion Naira that was mentioned in the EFCC report that was used by OBJ to compel Odili to desert Presidential aspirations not to even talk of the money that is not known about? Has you hate for any view contrary to yours led you to actually try to support such an administration and ignore that the Southern Governors who have access to so much money seem to therefore steal the most? But of course that is not an issue according to you even when money that could be used to uplift the state and bring this much vaunted development people sing about is stolen, the fundamental issue is according to you how much money is availbale for these people to steal and you will now throw away such award winning lines like "Niger Deltans have no legislative power to curb corruption", LOL how amusing, can you break that down and explain how that is so?

Corruption is not an excuse i use, i continuously state that there are problems in the Niger Delta and that there are lots of things to be disgruntled about but that i don't believe MEND have the interest of the people at heart and seem to be fighting for their own pocket (illegal bunkering). Of course you won't see that i stated that there were problems, your rage at anyone who does not agree with you does not permit you to see anything else but your word which we are all supposed to live and die by. You should know by now that i don't trade insults, i have never and i don't intend to start so all i will say is that if you have taken offence at whatever i have said, sorry you took offence but i still hold my views anyway so you just have to find a way to deal with it and stop calling everyone who does not agree with you an imposter. So please i beg you, genuinely, just don't read my posts so that you don't keep on getting hypertension. LOL please just leave my posts alone, i am not going to indulge you any further or respond to your posts when it continues doing thesame thing. Have a nice day and god bless.

Bigun:
I am surprise that in this day and age when as a nation we are suppose to put our heads together and use our intellect to advance our country, some self-centred, egocentric people have decided to use the problems in the country to achieve their aims. If Nigeria must remain as one, then we have to put to an end this notion that some parts have second-class rights to the nations resouces. The statement that the north is a parasite is anti-progressive. Lets stop running away from the issues that matters (mismanagement of the nations resouces by our leaders, bad governance and the unpatriotic attitude of our people) and just be beating our heads over trivial issues that will not help us. Besides, how confident are you that the "Niger-Delta" as a state will stand with the very unpatriotic and self-centred attitude some of it's people?

Although there are some things i do not agree with in your post especially the last line, i do share a feeling that people continue to miss the point totally and go for something else. The issue is not 50% or 13% derivation. The issue is accountability in government and corruption, unfortunately it seems some people are fixed on turning the fundamental issue into oil derrivation when the billions that have been pumped into the Niger Delta continuously has been unaccounted for and looted due to bad governance and poor accountability. However people will miss all of this and blame it on oil derivation. People will choose to believe that an increase in derivation will magically cause these vices that eat at every state in Nigeria to somehow disappear and translate to progressive development as opposed to just more money for people to steal. Does that mean that the raised issues could not become more important further doen the line? No. But when people choose to ignore the dog that is hyena that is chasing them and focus on the mosquito that is biting them, you really have to wonder.

@Ibime sorry but you always seem to be missing out part of he arguement to prove a point. So because i am not in agrement with you or in support of MEND i can't possibly be from the Niger Delta? How laughable an assumption and generalisation, so asically only those who accept wha you say as gospel truth can be from the Niger Delta? Why did i even bother? When did the issue of kidnappings really blow up. around what period, please do tell. Why are you so quick to absolve MEND of any negative impact on the economy when oil ompanies and other businesses that have pulled out of the region have left has affected th indigenes of the state negatively. I am out of this because it is just futile, have a nice day

What i find funny is the way MEND is continuously being painted as "the voice of the people" when the activities of such groups have given a lot of people the boldness to capitalise on the poor security and law enforcement in the region and hence you just have a big mess and orgy of kidnapping, violence, oil bunkering, etc, meanwhile the economic activity is declining in the state and people are losing jobs because companies are pulling out. How come the the Ogonis were able to get shell off their land without resulting to such violence and kidnapping? Did they have two heads or were they foolish for refusing to follow such a line of reasoning? Does this mean there are no grievances to be adressed in the Niger Delta? Of course most certainly not. There are issues but i fail to see how a group that is involved in oil bunkering which has caused explosions and claimed lives as well as caused a lot of oil spills hence adding further to the environmental degradation can be seen as "freedom fighters".

Ibime:
Why do you ask me who I speak for? Are you from Niger Delta? Well, shut up then.

People in Port-Harcourt are scared of Soboma George, Tom Ateke, kidnappers etc. Nobody in PH is scared of MEND. GET THAT THROUGH YOUR THICK SKULL!

Your friends told you they are scared of militants, not MEND! You are abviously too stupid to tell the difference. If we want to chase me all over Nairaland, go to the previous thread where we had this discussion and read my explanation on why MEND could not go after Odili.

You don't know how to differentiate between MEND and militants? People in PH are scared of getting kidnapped or shot at, not because some oil installation in faraway Opuruama got blown up. MEND do not take hostages and are not involved in kidnapping or election thuggery. The problem they had last year in PH was totally orchestrated by the PDP. Ateke was a PDP thug who turned against them so they hired Soboma George to go after him, causing chaos all over PH. This is all PDP work.

MEND is not even in PH.

Please read posts before raising the same old shit I have already dealt with weeks ago.

Now, abi you want to speak for Niger Delta?

LOL, quite amusing. How do you know if i am or am not from the Niger Delta? Since when did you become a MEND spokes person that you can be sure of the legitimacy and "people friendly" initiatives of all their actions? When did you become voice of Niger Delta that you are sure they are not scared of MEND who i might add have taken responsibilities for for quite a long list of so called "freedom fighting" including phone interviews with newspapers by so called MEND spokesperson who, so what are you talking about? "Freedom fighters" who never made such an effort to go after past leaders that kept on stifling their development but want to take on the whole Nigeria, yes, very reasonable indeed, LOL.

According to you MEND operates outside port harcourt so it means that they are not affecting the lives of the people or the economy of the state when all the businesses are leaving due to insecurity hence further increasing unemployment and reduction in whatever economic activity there was in the first place? Everything bad is conveniently put down to the actions of militants while anything you deem worthy is also very conveniently acredited to MEND without aknowledging that MEND are actually part of the insecurity issue in the region? You so desperately want to assume you know where i am or am not from as a means to legitimise your arguement when in fact you hardly know anything if anything at all about me. Sorry but i have never entered a sparring and insult slinging match on Nairaland and today will not be the day where i break such a mould. Enjoy your day and stop trying to speak for everyone. 

@Ibime i am continuously cofused at your willingness to continue to speak for everybody in the Niger Delta as if you are the voice of the whole populace, i just find this quite irritating to be honest. How many companies have pulled out of the Niger Delta as a result of insecurity and therefore how many jobs and employment positions have been lost due to this? And yet you think everyone is in support of this militancy ? When you say the people are "FULLY" in support of MEND it makes me wonder whether you are now a mind reader. Please no one asked you to speak for everybody, speak for yourself. I know a lot of people in Port Harcourt and have friends there and none of them are rejoicing over militancy but find the insecurity quite irritating. Insecurity that has actually led to reduction in the little employment that was there in the first place. So is it only the Niger Delta region that is being marginalised? When people like Peter Odili were getting chieftancy titles all over Nigeria and from traditional leaders while killing his people and refusing to develop the state where was the "freedom fighting" "high and mighty" and glorious MEND. Why am i even bothering? I am sure you will come up with a convenient excuse, it is not difficult to do so if you really want to.

I have avoided this issue because this topic had been discussed to exhaustive lengths so don't take people's unwillingness to argue it out with you as a sign that they agree with what you say. The only reason i responded was when you started towing that line of 'you know how everybody feels about the issue'. Please speak for yourself, i find no credibility whatsoever in MEND and think they are a bunch of criminals. If you think they are not then that is you and not everybody including friends and people i care about in Port Harcourt who keep on complaining that the army should come in and stabilise the region.

Some people should really just stick to the topic instead of going off tangent and making what they say equivalent to "god's word". So Nigeria1 you are now god? Sorry i had to break my golden rule of never responding to you and you likewise but that post was just . . .  . . . Let me give you another quote, proverbs: "a fool is wise in his own eyes". It seems because you are arguing against a lot of what we here perceive to be logic you are trying to tap into sentiment blindly by saying your word is what god wants and that is just hilarious and i can't believe you would tow that line. . . . but you did.  You know what, i am going to do what some have already been doing. Forgive my lack of patience but from now on your posts are just joke commentary to me, i am too stupid and "unwise" to comprehend it and i hope it can make sense to someone else so they can break it down for the stupid ones.

At the end of the day when you create all these states are they going to generate their own revenue or would it just be an extra mouth to feed and extra baggage for oil derivation to handle??

So are policemen going to be carrying rulers around now to make sure the clothes are 2cm below the neck? If this bill passes before bills like FOI bill then it would be a very dark day indeed in the history of Nigeria. Sometimes i wonder, please help me out but, do governments in Nigeria actually go out of their way and work hard just to make sure the country does not develop? If that is the case we can conclude that Nigerian public servers are very hard working indeed.

This is so sad and i feel sorry for the families of those who lost their lives. I am sure if vehicles were forcefully subjected to MOT and road worthy standards by law you will get people on Nairaland shouting murder and this and that, however you can see the results of letting all these vehicles that are not fit to be on the road to run around wildly. This is what you get. Tighter regulations are definately required. Lorries and tankers especially should be handled with more care this has become too common and should be addressed.

Sorry, i don't see any reason to celebrate. What is the money going to be used for and i hope it is in no way going to be used as a means of further strengthening NEPA's monopoly on the market. The market should be open and such plans should be finalised. Enough of treating cancer with panadol. Let us see what happens with the money, if this little is even going to be put to good use and if it will in the long run translate to more power.