₦airaland Forum

barcanista: Guy when Tinubu and Buhari become thug?

tinubu is a well known drug-pusher.
wetin soldier be?
everybody knows that soldiers and police are government thugs!

yemaldo: mr tetuila this ur hair wey u dye don already disqualify u,at least dress like a responsible man haba

you no dey dance to his vibes?
support good people, abeg!

leave hair dye matter.
Shekau no dey dye hair but i no una no be pally.

berem: Words of a confused soul.
Tell me if Chris Olukolade wasn't high on 20percent alcoholic drink before going to twitter to display idiocy and stupidity?

Smh

can you reproduce his idiotic twit?
or are you the discombobulated drunkard here!

nduchucks: Good news, lets hope they were handled as prisoners of war with the Geneva convention in mind.

They are not prisoners of war.
The Geneva convention does not cover terrorists.
If no that are too many for police to deal with, they should be handed over to SARS with a few local guns.

This is a horrible blunder from Defence spox.
How did he get to make the false press release?
I guess he is in Abuja. How did he get info that the Chibok girls have been released in Maiduguri?

Did someone in Maiduguri give him a call with incorrect or incomplete information?

Something fishy is really going on.
A)Just this week, CNN or whatever reported the ICRC was negotiating for the release of the girls.

B)First it was 30 girls for 30 terrorists

C)then Yarlan Mallam decided to release all the Chibok girls

D)Then 4 sick Chibok girls were purported to be released

E)Then two busloads of Chibok girls drove into Maimalari barracks!


Jubilation galore!
Skeptics like me wanted to confirm the identity of the girls with the WAEC list in public space.
the jubilation and skepticism has been overtaken by events.

I know that Shettima has sent about 500 girls to study medicine in Sudan
(that was where he was when Yarlan Mallam declared Gwoza Caliphate),

1) Has the Borno state government been in continous custody of the escapee Chibok girls?
havent they been allowed to rejoin their families since all this started?

2) when did Borno state government reassemble them for this transport to Kaduna schools
(Kaduna is another hot spot anyway and I bet they did get kidnapped again there).

3)Which soldiers provided escort for the escapee Chibok girls such that DHQ did not know of such movement?

adanny01: This is not about religion or Northern muslems and southern christians. Its about a failed government and a heartless leader.

Excellent writeup!

Rilwanu LUkman would have been Oil Minister for life.
When he dies, El Rufai will take over.
These are the best guys that know how to chop the oil money

selfishness to the power 1 million.
so this man cannot buy common bicycles for his mumu followers?
see Roachas smiling at their foolishness!
he knows these people mumu pass nama!
and the people mumu no get part 2. How them take leg dey follow person on bicycle?

yero is a biggest failure!

Yero is a damaged good.
He is unelectable in kaduna state.
If PDP wants to keep Kashim Ibrahim house, they better get another gubernatorial candidate for 2015.
(Yero will defect to APC).

By George Kerley

I read, with keen interest, the opinion of Simon Kolawole published on September 14, 2014, tilted "My Grouse with President Jonathan". I found it very interesting, cheery and at the same time depressing. Those of us who read Kolawole regularly know that he does not join the mob in canvassing his opinions. He is usually even-handed and non-partisan. While this is a virtue in an environment polluted by politically biased columnists who have turned President Goodluck Jonathan into their favourite punching bag, I beg to defer with Kolawole on some of the issues he raised.


After accepting that the President has recorded remarkable achievements in aviation, agriculture, education, road infrastructure and even the power sector reform, Kolawole relapsed into the popular line that former President Olusegun Obasanjo fought corruption but President Jonathan is found wanting in this area. However, the truth be told, the same reason no President after Obasanjo has been acknowledged as fighting corruption is the same reason we have not been able to tackle corruption efficiently. Until a President engages in scape-goating and public execution, he is not seen as fighting corruption. I would not expect Kolawole, an expert in governance and development, to toe this line of argument.


Democracy is about institutions. That is what makes it strong and enduring. America's democracy is over 300 years old. Most of the things we celebrate about America today came about because institutions were built and allowed to function in the course of their history. The "strongman democracy" that Kolawole seems to favour is the same reason democracy is in fits and starts in many countries across Africa. But it is only democracies where state institutions are strong that can endure and flourish. To remove a minister for corruption is the least of the problems. Now, if removing ministers could solve the problem, why did Obasanjo have to be sacking ministers on a yearly basis?


There are various ways of fighting corruption. One is to resort to public spectacle. Remove ministers and shame them publicly. Put them in handcuffs for the cameras. Get the anti-graft agencies to blackmail lawmakers to impeach the governors. You can even get six lawmakers in a 24-member House of Assembly to remove the governor illegally in the name of fighting corruption. This public execution strategy will get you a resounding popular applause and you will win awards around the world. But, let's be honest about this, Kolawole, it cannot last. It cannot work in a democracy where people have a right to seek redress. This approach to anti-corruption can only be sustained by a dictator who cares little about the laws of the land.


By the way, President Jonathan has also demonstrated that he can fire ministers. He has done it again and again. Kolawole did not acknowledge this fact while heaping praises on Obasanjo for firing ministers at the slightest provocation. President Jonathan has demonstrated clearly that he too can fire ministers, even if not at the slightest provocation. However, it is not his style to engage in playing to the gallery. He believes things should be done orderly. When he declared his assets, he was being put under pressure to make it public. But he refused. The law does not stipulate that. He did not break any law. It is a public document that can be accessed through due process.


You can fight corruption by playing to the gallery. That is just one way. I'll show you a better way, Mr. Kolawole. You can decide to fight corruption sustainably by adopting administrative, policy, legal and moral suasion strategies. Administratively, some measures have been adopted by President Jonathan that have saved the country tonnes of money previously being pilfered. There are two ready examples here. The fertilizer subsidy cost Nigeria in excess of N800bn over a period of 30 years. Only about 10% of that actually got to the farmers. The President came and put a stop to the fraud. Farmers are getting their fertilizers today and their productivity is unprecedented in Nigeria's history. Billions of naira have been saved in fraudulent fertilizer transactions. It may interest Kolawole that no previous government has tackled this fraud like this administration. That is a way of fighting corruption. It will endure beyond the Jonathan administration.


Another administrative measure to combat corruption is on the payroll. There were thousands of ghost workers who were on the payroll of the Federal Government when President Jonathan came to power. For years, this issue had not been addressed. We all knew that some senior civil servants were milking the treasury mercilessly. Billions of naira were being stolen yearly. However, since President Jonathan's administration introduced the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), over 50,000 ghost workers have so far been identified. Indeed, over N139 billion has been saved. Now, you ask: is that not a neat and sustainable way of fighting corruption? This will endure, you can take a bet on that.


To fight corruption in a less glamorous but enduring way, the President has also adopted policy strategies. When the President sought to end the waste and fraud in the fuel subsidy regime, it was opposed by the same interests that are now saying the President is not fighting corruption. Because of this unfortunate opposition, we are still wasting hundreds of billions of naira on fuel subsidy that could have been better utilised in other areas of the economy. All studies and analyses have shown that the best way to tackle the subsidy fraud in the petroleum sector is to take away the subsidy itself. The money is too much and this creates perverse incentives for the beneficiaries to continue to corrupt the system.


For Kolawole, a journalist of no little standing, I would have loved him to talk about the Freedom of Information bill which was gathering dust on the shelf before President Jonathan came to power. If we are talking about transparency and anti-graft war, FoI Act is one of the most potent instruments to employ. If Jonathan was not interested in fighting corruption, he would certainly have avoided signing the bill into law. Obasanjo did not touch it in his eight years in office. Yet, all countries that we call developed today have this law in their statutes. The citizens use it to hold government accountable. FoI is a legal strategy that President Jonathan has adopted. It does not carry the glamour of handcuffing politicians in public, you can say that, but it is an institutionalised instrument that will outlive the Jonathan administration.


Space will not permit me to list all the measures the President has adopted to combat corruption. His own style is markedly democratic and a departure from the autocratic way some Nigerians want. These measures will surely outlive his administration. We should stop equating anti-graft with EFCC. We think it is when you are publicly executed that the government can be said to be fighting corruption. But it is more than that. Except something catastrophic happens, those ghost workers can no longer return to the payroll. The farmers will continue to get their subsidised seeds and fertilisers. Nigerians will continue to have the FoI to hold government accountable and transparent. These are the institutions that will last.


My grouse with Kolawole is that he refused to acknowledge the various steps the President has taken to combat corruption. He also failed to accept that the President is constrained by the rule of law. President Jonathan has no power over what governors do with their state resources. Even if he removes a minister, he has no power over the justice process. The judges are there. The smart lawyers are there. President Jonathan cannot go and sit in judgment over any accused person. So many cases in court are being frustrated by clever lawyers and those who know how to play the system. You cannot hold the President responsible for that, let's be fair. We make it look like the duty of fighting corruption starts and ends on the President's desk. Let's be careful what we pray for.


I know Kolawole is a fan of Major-Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, having followed his column over the years. But he should be assured that even if Buhari becomes President, he cannot combat corruption the way he did as a military head of state. As a military head of state, he had executive, legislative and judicial powers. But in a democracy, he will discover that there is a National Assembly that he has to contend with. He will discover that he cannot fire a commissioner for corruption in any state. He cannot do anything to lawyers and judges who collude to frustrate cases. It looks easy on paper to combat corruption. But the reality is that there is a lot of work to be done if corruption is to be crushed. President Jonathan is on the right path. Time will vindicate him.


On the issue of Boko Haram, which Kolawole also listed among his "grudges", I think it is very glaring that the issue is very complicated. We want quick results, no doubt. It is a very present trouble that needs a quick solution. But President Jonathan met a lot of rot in the system. The military had been systematically decimated. The air force, which is the key military arm in war fare in modern times, had been systematically incapacitated for decades because of fears of coups. Our intelligence gathering had not stepped to the challenges in a democracy.


All these are enough impediments to confronting the monstrosity of terrorism. But the President also has to grapple with the politicisation of the war against terror. The military has been accused many times by President Jonathan's political opponents of committing genocide by those who would not as much as say a negative word against Boko Haram. The war against terror, as if it is not a major task already, has been compounded by the impression being created by power-hungry politicians who are making things worse by the day. Every step the President takes is being frustrated. If not that President Jonathan is a courageous man, he would have been overwhelmed by this attitude.


In all the mess, we have recorded progress. Many people think the simple solution is to unleash the military and destroy all the villages in the territories being tormented by Boko Haram. Military action alone will not solve the problem. That is why, even though he has authorised military action, President Jonathan has embarked on a major initiative to address the salient issues of lack of access to education, poor infrastructure, environmental devastation and several other negative preambles to the flourishing of insurgency in the North-East. He has launched the Presidential Initiative for the North East (PINE) to address these issues, and has scaled up investment in agriculture, infrastructure, education and health to achieve a long-term winning strategy.


I would like to conclude by emphasising that President Jonathan has delivered the goods. Let his opponents judge him on the basis of facts and figures and not sentiments. He certainly has not solved all Nigeria's problems (not even a magician can do that in four years) but Nigeria is clearly better than it was in 2011. Check all the facts and figures: infrastructural development, power sector reform, education, agriculture, water resources, economic management, etc. Let us compare the data before 2011 and in 2014. An honest opinion would be that he has done well.


*Kerley, a public affairs analyst, lives in Port Harcourt

berem: read your comment again and quote me when you're ready to make sense.

nama and jweed.
a deadly combination.

berem: ...And this is a governor that CAN wants to give an award for God knows what! forgetting that southern kaduna is a christian dominated region that's been tormented by islamic terrorists.

What a shame!

you don dey follow nama so tey your sense no dey work again.
The award is a way of begging Yero not to kill them finish.

If someone is killing you and you no fit fight am,
wetin you go do?
No be to take style beg am?

sammieguze: Yes na.

I still stick to my thought

The Nigerian government wanted some cache of weapons in South Africa and so they borrowed Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor's private jet. Probably because the giant of Africa could not find a befitting aircraft amongst her fleets of military planes to transport the intended weapons for them, not even among the 10 private jets in President's fleet. It is Ayo Oritsejafor's jet that was the best.
Meanwhile, Ayo Oritsejafor did not know that the government intended to use his jet to buy weapons. He leased his jet to a 2nd person ( Eagle Air) and the 2nd person leased to the 3rd (Green Coast Produce) and then the 3rd to the 4th (One Mr John Ishyaku) or so (who happens to be an agent of the government wit one person and an Israeli with 9.3 million dollars).
Sorry, I get it, the Israeli told our government that they should rather buy weapons from South-Africa instead of his country, Israel, because it is better for SA to take the money than Israel who supposedly makes better weapons. Wow! wat a nyc man nd very generous of the Israeli. So Israelis buy weapons for us. Military experts from our country did not have to follow to inspect the weapons and the inventory. Beautiful!
Also, the South African government was unaware that the Nigerian government was coming to buy weapons in their country. In their shock, they seized the jet and the money. Well, buying arms is more or less like buying noodles. It is not a serious thing and so any government can walk into another country without informing the host country that they intend buying weapons in their country. So foreign government just walk into another country like that, buy weapons and then off they go. Wondaful!
Una do well! Moreover, tot d man said dey bought him d jet to ease his duty and support his ministry. is he nw using d jet as Kabu Kabu ni? is d money coming frm d Kabu kabu goin bak into d ministry or personal pocket?
Shebi, Any transaction btw two countries are bn done by d Central Banks? Morever, I tot d F.G now insist on Cashless Banking or it is not effective to d Ogas at d top? Moreso, where is such huge money comin frm b4 getting into d suit cases?
Many Questions dat requires unlimited ansas...

Ogaaaa!
why are you lying?
Ihejirika was caught in the plane laundering money to South Africa!
You Ibo people want to cover that one?

Journalist,
abeg ask Amir Shekau, the Sultan of Gwazo caliphate if the bus load of girls in Maimalari barracks, maiduguri are the real chibok girls whom you said you would marry some and sell the others to the mujaheeden?
Are these the real Chibok virgins?
or are they our runs girls?

Cameroun psy-ops gone belly up!

This is a smokecreen by APC to avoid passing the PIB bill!
Shame on APC!

AKMoney1: So dem girls still dey there? And gej is running for second term? Well I have nothing to say, thank you.

we know your plan is to keep the girls and make gej not to go for second term.
why would we fall for your knavish trick?

dhammyg: IF IT WAS UR DAUGHTER.WILL U SAY THE SAME THING

SHAME ON U 4 BEING SO INSENSITIVE AND STUPI*D

do not be sentimental.
if you release their commanders, you are sentencing another 20,000 people to death.

jtchukwu: I was in town when it happened, several shots went into the air.

the saboteur general mohammed will soon say it is mutiny.

ZeusAyo: lmao!!!! no worry bros we no go touch you for now

I bet i would be the one stepping over you.


We are trying to live by democratic norms and under laws.
You are talking of extra judicial execution of people who, apparently, have committed no crimes.
You shall take it upon yourselves to become prosecutor, judge and executioner like we see our police SARS doing daily.
I have no qualms about pumping enemy combatants full of lead while in hot pursuit, but you cannot kill citizens just like that.
I guess it is your likes that slit the necks of suspected boko haram members and we are using all our spittle to defend you guys,
and you want to take such reluctant support as license to engage in more debauchery.

sweetgala: Exactly, the politician and leaders are so disconnected from the masses and our daily plight.
For instance apart from the laptop crew (okupe and his cohorts) denouncing the missing girls as a conspiracy, the FG nor Police force have not tendered an official report on what is actually going on , even if they have to exclude sensitive info for public consumption.

They treat us like sheep , useful once every 4 years.
The south korean PM resigned due to mismanagement , search and rescue of a ferry accident beyond his influence, that is what you call accountability.
Over 2000 nigerians have died and some 100000 displaced from their communities and GEJ and Co think they are doing a "grand ol' job, top lad"

Bloody Fools

are you suggesting governor Yero should resign
because some fulani men are running amock,
like they have been doing since the days of Dan Fodio, in Kaduna state?

BH can keep the girls.
No deal!

ZeusAyo: death squads(If you have been positively identified as Λ BH high ranking Member or sponsor, theses guys should be tasked with the honor of writing the last page of your life)

i do not know what stuff some of you guys smoke,
but that yar plan no go work,
in Tb Joshua name!

Ijebu pipu and money!
Aaaah!
You see, because of small samuel Doe money, Abiola lost the shance to seat on niger Delta money!
Aaaaah!
Greedy is not goodu!
it is good to be good, my sisters.

ihatesycophant: Good one fromthe Governor. There's always difference btw godly man and the worldly man

The office of governor is a not a religious office.
He "rules" over all citizens/residents of his state.
He should not make distinction between Sunni, Shite, Izala, Wahabi, baptist, Anglican, Ifa, Okija, etc.
The only distinction should be lawful citizens/residents
and outlaw/criminal residents/citizens.

So Yero has no problems receiving awards.
It is either

1) Like a lot of Nigerians he does not like CAN

or

2) He has not fostered peace, unity, faith and progress in kaduna state.

Yero wins and accepts Global Peace award in London


In what is another acknowledgement for his determination and effort to making Kaduna a Peaceful State, Governor Yero receives yet another Peace Award, second in a roll, the first which was the MTN Peace Icon Award in Kano, a london based Peace Association honoured the governor with another award,this time, The International Peace and Security Award.

In a statement issued by the Director General Media and Publicity to the Governor, Ahmed Maiyaki said the award was in recognition of the positive impact of various peace building initiatives of the Yero administration in sustaining lasting peace and security in Kaduna State.


http://leadnewsnigeria./2013/12/01/governor-mukhtar-yero-receives-global-peace-award-in-london/

Yero wins and accepts national Integration award

Kaduna State Governor, Dr. Mukhtar Ramalan Yero was Saturday conferred with an Award of Excellence as the Best Supportive Governor on the campaign for National Integration and Purposeful Leadership in Nigeria.

The award was conferred on the governor by the Nigeria Young Professionals Forum at its maiden International Summit with the theme; Fostering National Integration and Purposeful Leadership in Nigeria held at the International Conference Centre, Abuja.

The event was attended by President Goodluck Jonathan, Ministers and other Government officials.

Speaking at the event, Governor Yero urged young people in the country to assume greater responsibility for building a peaceful and prosperous nation saying “With all sense of modesty and due respect to our elders, I believe it is time for young people to take center stage in the decision making process and I believe we can deliver the desired results.


http://govyero./2014/08/11/governor-yero-wins-national-integration-award/

Yero wins and accepts peace award


Kaduna — Kaduna State Governor, Mukhtar Ramalan Yero has won the Peace and Stability Award at the First Political Excellence Award 2014, organized by the City People Magazine in Lagos.

The award held yesterday in Ikeja, Lagos is aimed at 'Celebrating the Very Best in Politics' and is granted to people that have distinguished themselves in making a difference in the various categories.


Governor Yero was nominated by the selection committee over his uncommon commitment to building lasting peace and stability in Kaduna State and indeed between the diverse groups of people from all over Nigeria resident in the State.

Speaking at the event, Governor Yero represented by his Director General Media and Publicity, Ahmed Maiyaki reiterated his commitment to ensuring peaceful coexistence amongst all the diverse citizens of the State.


daily trust feb 14

sweetgala: Nigeria is a student that should be scoring 50% and has remained to score 20% because we do no think there is anything wrong with where we are. An incessant knack for poor excuses and quick work-arounds.

I answered your question you just failed to find reason in it.

you think a governor should not be recognized for doing his job. or are you yero?
my question is has Yero ever rejected or accepted awards from any body?
there is no answer to that in your responses.

Do you think it is easy to jump from 20% to 50%?
Do you think the student is making low scores from lack of trying?
some systemic things are holding the student down and they should be appraised in detail.

it is just like the new power DISCOs trying to get a 100% revenue target overnight.
wishful thinking.