₦airaland Forum

talk2hb1:
Technically Nairaland is a Blog!

danzycool:
my blog receives up to 250,000 monthly pageviews, and i get up to 10,000$ monthly with adsense only...... am not married.

danzycool:
lol funny you.. we make some research and interviews

The Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Mr. Uguru Usani, was indicted for fraud and abuse of office during his tenure as a commissioner in Cross River State, SaharaReporters learned on Monday.

Usani was the Commissioner for Agriculture, Water Resources, and Rural Development during the last military administration in the state, which was headed by Col. U. F Ahmed (Rtd). It was Military Administrator Ahmed who handed over to the elected governor of the state, Mr. Donald Duke, at the beginning of the Fourth Republic on May 29, 1999.

Our correspondent on Monday obtained a document published in 2000 by the Cross River State Government indicting Mr. Usani for fraud and abuse of office.

In its gazette, the state government concluded in its findings that Usani along with a firm, Gersh Henshaw & Company, defrauded the government of about N16m through a contract for the valuation of the assets of an agency under his ministry.

It recommended that the former commissioner be prosecuted and that details of the transaction be forwarded to the Code of Conduct Tribunal.

On June 21, 1999 Governor Duke inaugurated the Financial Impropriety/Verification Standing Committee to, among others: ascertain the assets and liabilities of the ministries and institutions, all forms of financial impropriety (if any) in government ministries and establishments, the perpetrators of such financial improprieties; and recommend appropriate disciplinary actions to be taken against the culprits including recovery of all such sums.

The committee, which was led by Chief Orok Oyo, included Chief Andy Ikpeme, Ekpe Essien Ita, Otu Oka, Mr. Akomaye Adie and Okoi-Obono Obla (who was later replaced by Mr. Stephen Asuquo).

The recommendations of the committee and approval of the state government were published as Cross River Gazette titled, ‘Views of the Cross Rivers State Government on the Report of the Financial Impropriety/Verification Standing Committee.'

The 37th contract involving Usani and which was investigated by the committee is titled in the Gazette as 'The Case of Gersh Henshaw & Company.' It involved “the contract for the valuation of vehicles, workshops/equipment of the Cross River State Water Board”, awarded by Usani as the then Commissioner for Water Resources and Rural Development to Gersh Henshaw & Company, Estate Surveyors, and Valuers.
Usani was said to have paid about N20,750,000 to the company for the execution of the contract. The Head of Practice of the firm, Mr. Gersh Henshaw, was said to have testified before the committee, giving the impression that the firm did the state government a favour by accepting the lump sum of N20,750,000 from the then commissioner for the execution of the job.

But the committee stated that in line with the approved scale of fees for the valuation work done, Gersh Henshaw & Company ought to have been paid only N4,426,850.

The committee recommended that the sum of N16,323,150, being the excess of the payment, be recovered from Usani.

“The then Commissioner, Mr. Usani U. Usani, expressly refused to pay in accordance with the approved scales or fees although that would have meant a lot of savings on the part of government. He rather ended up paying an amount which was N16,323,150.00 higher than the approved scale or fees," the gazette read in part.

The committee had recommended to the government that a total sum of N17,031,446 comprising N16,323,150 being excess payment on the contract sum and N708,296 as tax deduction should be recovered from Usani.

But the government stated that the N708,296 tax deduction had been waved.

The government approved the recommendation that the particulars of the transaction should be forwarded to the Code of Conduct Tribunal with a complaint of “financial impropriety and abuse of office” against Usani.
According to the document: “The committee found that Mr. Usani and Mr. Gersh Henshaw deliberately failed to apply the approved scale of fees and in order to defraud the government.

“The Government of Cross River State should recover the total sum of N17,031,446.00 made up of N16,323,150 being excess payment on the contract sum for the valuation of the assets of Cross River State Water Board and N708,296.00 being total tax deduction.”

In the comment section, it said: “Government accepts this recommendation and directs that the sum of N16,323,150 only should be recovered from Mr. Usani U. Usani, the then Commissioner for Agriculture, Water Resources and Rural Development being excess payment on the contract sum for the valuation of the assets of the Cross River State Water Board. He should also be prosecuted.

“Government however, waives the payment of N708,296.00 being total tax deduction in view of its comment expressed in paragraph 38 (viii) above. Government shall forward particulars of this transaction to the Code of Conduct Tribunal with a complaint against Mr. Usani Uguru Usani for financial impropriety and abuse of office.”

On the issue that the firm be allowed the sum of N4,426,850 as total Consultancy fee (gross of total), the government accepted the recommendation, saying: “The Government of Cross River State should make a formal complaint against Gersh Henshaw & Company to his professional body, the Nigerian Institute of Estate Surveyors and Valuers for unprofessional conduct.”

Noting that recommendation, the government said: “The firm of Gersh Henshaw & Company should be blacklisted from further patronage by the Government of Cross River State.”

EgusiSoup:
Closed school intuition of Buhari delving green and yellow Gresham vasco dagama we cannot thank how many freedom Fidelity of Burstai she ideas gworo?

Opistorincos:
Let it stayed open forever

FastShipping:
Were you ever a literature student? Read between the lines. Those who released the communique acted on behalf or Daura/Kiyari/presidency. When such fight starts, the principals use third party to do the attacks for them. Watch out how a SW group releases their own statement on behalf of Tinubu without saying Tinubu sent them.

FastShipping:
Shots fired. Buhari is going the way of Jonathan. He's low in approval rating and trying to start a fight that is not necessary. It is too early for him to fight Tinubu. Buhari can't win the media war against Tinubu. Such fight should wait till he wins a second term in office. I guess he's only serving 4yrs in office.

The likes of Dele Momodu and Sahara Reporters have begun to write articles against Buhari for the reason that Tinubu has given them the green light to destroy Buhari's government. Buhari should thread carefully and learn how Obasanjo navigated the murky water when he had problem with Atiku.

I now agree with those who said Buhari is not smart. The man seems unintelligent.

StephanieLuv:
At the end they will say Ibo's love money but how many former eastern governors have been remanded in custody of EFCC.




We are the only tribe that can take this nation forward, even with the pocket money they eastern states as federal government allocations every month still we are doing exceptionally well

NgcoboP:
lolz

Two sources at the Presidency in Abuja have told SaharaReporters that Mamman Daura, a nephew of President Muhammadu Buhari and arguably the biggest power player in the government, was the source of a major speech delivered by the Nigerian president in which the words of US President Barack Obama were plagiarized.

The two sources claimed that Mr. Daura had hijacked the task of providing speeches for the Nigerian president, adding that he often threw away draft speeches that he did not commission.

Asked whether the president’s nephew personally wrote the controversial speech that stole Mr. Obama’s words without attribution, our sources said that Mr. Daura certainly produced the speech. “It is possible he wrote it himself, or he went and asked somebody else to go and write it and bring,” said one source. The other stated, “I can tell you that nobody writes speech anymore for President Buhari but Mamman Daura.”

According to our sources, Mr. Daura was behind President Buhari’s inauguration speech, which lifted a famous quote from the late French leader Charles de Gaulle. They said the president’s nephew was also solely responsible for writing or commissioning Mr. Buhari’s now infamous speech entreating Nigerians to accept the idea of “Change begins with me.”

Our sources disclosed that the Presidency was trying to fool the public through its spokesman, Garba Shehu, who said a deputy director had written the now widely ridiculed speech. Mr. Shehu had also declared that the speechwriter would be punished.

Our investigator discovered that Mr. Attah Esa is the only deputy director attached to the State House media office. His duties are concerned only with newspaper reviews.

Our sources disclosed that, unlike former Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo, Umaru Yar'Adua, and Goodluck Jonathan, President Buhari does not have an identified official speechwriter. SaharaReporters learned that presidential aides, Femi Adesina and Garba Shehu, often only get to see President Buhari’s speeches when such speeches are distributed at official functions. “That’s why Nigerians no longer get an advance synopsis of presidential speeches online as happened during Jonathan’s era,” said one source.

The same source added: “Under President Buhari, all types of speeches, whether on the economy, education or terrorism, are organized solely by Mamman Daura, who thinks he knows everything. Buhari’s Personal Assistant, Sabiu Yusuf (popularly known as Tunde Idiagbon) then types the speeches.”

Our sources disclosed that Mr. Daura even discouraged any input from MDA. “He is known not to use drafts submitted by MDAs, even on technical issues such as budget, climate change and maternal health,” one of them said.

During Jonathan's Presidency, Oronto Douglas, who died last year, served as the official speechwriter. Draft speeches from MDAs were submitted to him for vetting, and he consulted with the agencies throughout in order to ensure objectivity and correctness.

nuelzy:
she is an ex girlfriend to one talentless midget.. dunno if i remember his name...he is an upcoming artist..

North Korea’s fifth nuclear test appears to have been the most powerful of the lot. A female newsreader clad in pink, whose main job seems to be announcing nuclear detonations, was pressed into service to proclaim the joyous event on state television.

But there is one fact about North Korea that she will never mention. In a country that has strained every nerve and sinew to develop nuclear weapons, spending countless billions, at least a third of all children are chronically malnourished. The same is true of a quarter of pregnant women.

For the past 22 years, the World Food Programme has quietly been doing its best to help North Korea’s people survive the ravages inflicted by their rulers. You can be sure that Kim Jong-un’s regime is not grateful; on the contrary, providing humanitarian aid inside a country like North Korea is a supremely delicate business.

In truth, there are few things more sensitive than helping the suffering citizens of authoritarian – or even semi-democratic – states in much of the developing world.

Why? Because the governments of these countries will rarely admit the existence of a problem, especially if – as in North Korea – their policies helped to cause it in the first place.

And of all possible disasters, famine is the one that governments are most unwilling to acknowledge.

The best explanation was provided by Meles Zenawi, a late prime minister of Ethiopia. Remembering the famine endured by his own country in 1984, Meles said the worst aspect was the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. “But the second worst,” he added, “was having to beg for help”.

More than two decades later, Meles was dismayed to discover that wherever he travelled as prime minister, one image that people always associated with Ethiopia was that of emaciated children surrounded by flies.

Other African leaders took careful note. They realised that once the label “famine” attaches itself to your country, there is a grave risk that you will never shake it off.

There are two possible responses to this legitimate fear. One would be to ensure that famine never strikes by following sensible policies. The other would be obsessively to hush-up food shortages whenever they occur.

Sadly, many African leaders have adopted the latter approach. If Ethiopians had to beg for aid, some African governments prefer to make the aid agencies beg for permission to help. In 2011, the United Nations declared a famine in three regions of southern Somalia including the capital, Mogadishu. At the same time, the UN launched a global appeal for $1.5 billion to help Somalia.

When I interviewed Somalia’s then prime minister , he could scarcely contain his rage. He was not angry about the famine – oh no – what really annoyed him was that the UN had dared to tell the world about it. Even worse, the UN had appealed for help on Somalia’s behalf.

“They don’t know what they’re talking about,” said Abdiweli Mohammed Ali. “But what I can say is enough relief came to Somalia and we provided enough relief to those affected by the famine.”

A few streets away from his office in Mogadishu, thousands of people were huddled inside displacement camps, including emaciated children with wisps of reddened hair – a telltale sign of malnutrition. But, warming to this theme, Mr Abdiweli told me: “I don’t believe there’s a famine in Mogadishu. Absolutely no. You know the aid agencies became an entrenched interest group and they say all kind of things that they want to say.”

So the task of alleviating humanitarian disaster in Africa often begins with gently coaxing the government in question to accept the existence of the problem.

This is the stage that the UN has reached in Nigeria today . The ravages of Boko Haram have inflicted terrible food shortages in Borno state, large areas of which were previously controlled by the Islamist gunmen. Once the killers were driven out, they left behind a wasteland in which few crops had been planted.

In fairness, the Nigerian government bears no responsibility for this disaster. But it remains deeply unwilling to admit the scale of the food shortages in Borno, or allow aid agencies and the UN to escalate their response.

It seems that nothing is more politically sensitive than a straightforward offer of help.