NIGERIA’S 2015 ELECTION By Engr Ajulu Uzodike, OON January 22, 2015

The campaign issues for the 2015 general elections are many. They are – the Economy with sub issues like job & wealth creation (unemployment), domestic industrialization & patronage, investments (domestic & foreign), indebtedness (domestic & foreign); Security of life and property; Transparency of public actions (equated by many as corruption); Recklessness and impunity of government officials; Leader’s vision for the country’s future; and many others. Many authors have made reasonable contributions on most of the issues to enable voters make good judgement about whom to vote in the presidential election and maybe in the other elections too. However, many other articles appear to have been purposely written to mislead the voters.

I would limit my contributions on the above issues to personal experiences and reliable data, not comments, obtained from independent international sources. I would also concentrate on the two leading presidential candidates – President Jonathan of the PDP and General Buhari of the APC. Luckily for me both of them have led Nigeria once and have had to grapple with similar circumstances concerning the above issues. Their records, achievements or otherwise are verifiable.

THE ECONOMY

Under President Jonathan the confidence in the economy is growing. Nigerians abroad are

FG TO RECRUIT 1.3M TEACHERS IN 6 YEARS

It would seem obvious that some one million of the approximately two million teachers deficit currently recognised by the Education Minister will have to come from the north. That's what equity demands. It is cheap talk for the NECO boss Prof Charkes Uwakwe to state that, “The minister was very clear on what our tasks and mandates are." There is nothing clear about the minister's comment. What he handed down was a watery wish list. The APC administration has had at least three years to develop a blueprint (with action plans) to tackle an old problem. To ask the 17 new chief executives to COME UP with an action plan in one month shows lack of seriousness on the part of the administration. What did Buhari have in mind for his people all this while he was gunning for office?

I have written some time ago that at the end of the day the (aggrieved) South will have to provide teachers IF and WHEN the North, currently represented by this Buhari administration, decides to send it's sons and daughters to school. Obviously that's not happening now. That is one more reason why Buhari must get his act together, retreat from the ruinous path he is now treading, erase the existing faultlines and desist from deliberately creating new ones. Otherwise the entire education/teacher's project is dead on arrival. If anyone knows of any other way the north can overcome the current teacher deficit without help from (and peace with) the south, please share it with us. I would want to know.

HAJJ 2016 FX BAZAAR - IT IS THE GOVERNMENT THAT IS BEING MISCHIEVOUS

This government and it's many praise singers and apologists don't seem to get it. The ongoing outcry, which has been on for years but has become a lot more strident lately, is to the effect that our government has no business in matters of pilgrimages of any shade. The entire bureaucracy of the Christian Pilgrim Welfare Board has no place in our Civil Service. Hence the activities there, both capital and recurrent do not deserve a charge on our public revenue.

It has been the hope here that poverty, nay adversity, will make this administration take the right step of distancing itself from matters of religious pilgrimages. This is a step that CANNOT NOW be taken by the previous administration. It has long gone. The opposition by the enlightened members of the public, (not rabble rousers and religious jingoists), has never focused on the hajj. We have alway insisted that government should leave pilgrimages to the faithful to arrange as they deem fit. Apart from consular services at the other end, our busybody Federal Government has no further role. It's "mischievous" involvement and our unrelenting opposition to it clearly predates Buhari's swearing in as president. If a government sustains a silly policy (eg fuel subdidy) it behoves a new administration to throw it out, which Buhari did. Any recourse to pleading precedents indicates a sheer lack of understanding of the finer aspects of governance.

In case Buhari hasn't noticed, let me remind him that we are broke.

http://www.thescoopng.com/hajj-exchange-rate/

Feyi Fawehinmi and The Buyer's Regret

When we complain, the call us wailers.

We understand the load of responsibility and disappointment carried by the likes of Feyi Fawehinlmi. He is not alone. A good many of us agonized for a long time before we finally, despite our scepticism, voted for Buhari. Having repudiated then President Jonathan, it was not an easy decision to make. It was a most difficult leap of faith which has now proven to be without any basis whatsoever. We just couldn't fill the glaring policy blank spaces in Candidate Buhari’s mindset and vacuous statements made during the campaigns.

Having participated in canvassing for votes for Buhari makes the disappointment felt by us "supporters" all the more painful. As a matter of fact it is perhaps only the criticism of this erstwhile reluctant "Sai Buhari" subset that has any likelihood, no matter how remote, of bringing this regime to its senses. The APC is currently so dismissive of the critics from it's PDP "enemies" that there is a zero possibility that it can even reach out for a life vest thrown by that group. It is as bad as that.

Truth is that many commentators, without excusing any of Jonathan's shortcomings, pleaded caution. The expression Hobson's Choice came in handy. I hereby refer to the writings by Abimbola Adelakun in The Punch in the run up to the elections. She warned us. But we had to quickly make a decision one way or the other. We are now stuck with the consequences of our choice. . .Yes, change they call it.

Hhttp://www.thescoopng.com/feyi-fawehinmi/

DOES NIGERIA NEED A NEW NATIONAL AIR CARRIER?

I have been wondering where exactly the bug of national pride bit our compatriot Kiaffa Umaru Maina. I wonder again if the athletes from South Sudan, Zimbabwe, Eritrea, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Burkina Faso, Lithuania, Nepal, Kosovo, Mongolia, Georgia and finally the United States of America arrived Rio de Janeiro on their national airlines. I would really like to know.

People who have spent enough time at the upper echelons of the Nigerian Civil Service can attest to how a board and management is preselected for non-existent organizations even before a structure is put down on paper. The political class then proceeds to pressure their brother or friend in government (say in this case President Buhari) to then establish the said organization or company to be handed over to them. We have been on this sad road many times before. The end result always turns out the same. The company is stripped bare with no negative consequences to the culprits.

Maina wrote: "In 1963, the Nigerian federal government bought out the other shareholders and Nigeria Airways became wholly-owned by Nigerian government. . .
And from there everything went downhill. Is that not so?

Talking about an airline flying the Nigerian flag, what exactly is Arik Airlines? Or the now moribund Air Nigeria? I don't get it.

I become scared when anyone with a cultural or political affinity with the mafia that killed off the hitherto vibrant textile and other industries in Kaduna and Kano starts offering us investment advice. This is truly "fantastic."

One philosopher, in the early years of the United States, stated that, "Patriotism is (often) the refuge of the scoundrel." I do not have anybody in mind. However whomsoever the cap fits, let him wear it.

http://www.thescoopng.com/atlanta-national-carrier/#comments

DANGOTE'S NIGERIA: WHAT IS HIS VISION?

I have in the past drawn attention to the "style" of the late Singaporean prime minister Lee Kuan Yew. An apostle of homegrown solutions, he had almost limitless faith in the human potential of his people. He had no choice. Singapore had nothing else worth reckoning.

We may never fully understand the motivation of Alhaji Aliko Dangote in inviting the Tiger Brands of South Africa to invest in Dangote Flour. It is possible that because the group was overextended at that material time, Dangote decided go reduce the huge leveraging that attended the record shattering expansion of Dangote Cement on a global scale. It is not unlikely that Tiger Brands came on board with a largely short term view of it's investment and that led to the losses earlier recorded. It is not as if Nigerians stopped eating wheat bread and the other derivatives. To date we do not have any reason to turn our backs on the Dangote name.

From all indications, the fate and fortune of the Dangote Group appears to be irrevocably bound up with that of the Nigerian nation or state, no matter how configured. I just hope that the Group Head, Mr Thabo Mabo, a South African, remains loyal to the declared mission of the Dangote Group using local talent which we have in abundance. The day he renders himself redundant or easily replaceable marks his landmark success in that regard.

One final note. I have stated without ceasing that a Dangote presidency will be far, far more fruitful to us than the current exercise in ego massage. . Sai Aliko Dangote!

Again On Ndigbo In Diaspora and Titles

Ikechukwu Amaechi wrote recently on the Eze-Ndigbo phenomenon and the penchant by most for titles. He said:

"I remember telling someone who sat beside me at the gala night (of Ezuruezu Mbaise in Dallas) that there seemed to be more chiefs and lolos of Igbo extraction in the U.S. than we have in Nigeria. . .

In reference to the sprouting of Eze-Ndigbo in the American diaspora, Amaechi used the expression "the burgeoning chieftaincy industry among Ndigbo in the US." Whether we like it or not, this represents the new reality, the new normal. Of course we do not have to fall over and willy-nilly accept it.

Amaechi continued, "A few years ago when Eze Cletus Ilomuanya was the Chairman of the South East Council of Traditional Rulers, the council frowned at the idea of having Eze Ndigbo in the Diaspora.

"In fact, the council banned anyone from bearing the title of Eze Ndigbo outside Igboland. The case went to court because the association of Eze Ndigbos, particularly those in Lagos, kicked against the ban. . ."

Any keen observer would have noticed that Eze Cletus Ilomuanya and his colleagues were more than 40years late in confronting this monster. They were trying to secure the stable door long after the horse had bolted. Incidentally I was at a meeting of the Association of Anambra State Development Unions (AASDU), Lagos when the above letter/directive of South East Council of Traditional Rulers was read. The matter was not even discussed. It is possible that some of my fellow delegates at that meeting were aspiring Eze-Ndigbos. You can't use Belzeebub to chase out the devil.

IS NNAMDI KANU A HYPOCRITE, for "secretly" accepting to renounce Biafra?

There is this report that appeared recently in most online media, (here I am quoting The Daily Post) that the "defunct(?) militant group, Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND, has alleged that the incarcerated leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu, secretly agreed to denounce the struggle for the actualisation of Biafra despite claiming otherwise in public." . Really? Was this agreement with MEND or with Buhari's federal government?

Pray, when does a "defunct" organization become a "Reliable Source" for an important story such as this? Is MEND defunct or not? Is MEND an agent or mouthpiece of the federal government with which Kanu and IPOB are supposedly negotiating, as in talks about talks? Or is MEND collaborating with IPOB? We may never know until the actual talks commence.

It is also possible that anyone facing the same predicament as Nnamdi Kanu will say just about anything to escape from an irrational and illegal gulag imposed on him by a despot who seems unperturbed that more than fifty percent of citizens regard him as either perpetrating or condoning genocide. Any deal that he is deemed to have struck will be as useless as a confession extracted by a brutal police force at gunpoint. To expect his many followers, or more correctly co-agitators, to respect that, is quite silly. What exactly is the ideological significance of such a development? Nothing! Zilch.

The ideological foot soldiers of IPOB and MASSOB are all over the place. Meanwhile the enemies of the struggle are strenuously hoping to add Nnamdi Kanu's scalp to their mounting head count, to what end I may never know. God forbid bad thing! I can imagine the IPOB stalwarts reasoning that Kanu will readily outlive oldman Buhari, and taking note of the cool wind of change blowing over some parts of the north already tired of its own home grown violent militants. Against the grain, many people there, including Atiku Abubakar, are talking "restructuring." They are coming to terms with the fact that they have actually no axe to grind with Kanu and his ilk. What with all the corruption and poverty that they have had to contend with.

Now, let us look at this story from another angle. When it broke over a fortnight ago, there was one common thread. Almost all the reporters couldn't help but gloat. As if to say,

Re: On the matter of the dog named ‘Buhari’ - The Punch: Thursdays with Abimbola Adela

This opinion piece by Abimbola Adelakun reminds me of an earlier one titled KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT: SURVIVING NIGERIA'S NORTH written by budding author Ms Jennifer Emelife. She chronicled her experiences growing up and schooling in Sokoto, specifically Usmanu Danfodiyo University. Just reading of her experiences was very unnerving. The things that she and her fellow Christian students had to put up with just to avoid "trouble." And her father for years kept up appearances with his Muslim friends by not engaging in certain "sensitive" topics. What a life! Ms Emelife said it as it is but didn't strain to be as judgemental as I did in my rejoinder.

This wrapup by the inimitable Abimbola Adelakun has taken the discussion to a whole new level altogether. The tragedy is that nobody seems to be paying any attention to the real issues at stake as she eloquently pointed out. On the part of the government, the same lack of moral clarity manifested serially in the Fulani herdsmen outrage, which she had earlier addressed, is also at play here. The police, after all these long years, does not seem to be in any hurry to learn what is it's constitutional role in society. It choses to pander to the whims of Any-Government-In-Power and the political and monied class who can pay for protection deserved or not. We have all decried this tendency manifested in another form during the Oga-at-the-top episode that went viral. Unfortunately it remains with us

Finally, one must mention the complicity of the not-so-elite middle class who refuse to step out of their comfort zone to challenge this march into anarchy. The nation is collapsing on their heads while they are busy clutching the fast diminishing comforts that separate them from the masses. For how long?

AGAIN ON RACE RELATIONS IN THE US: Re: Former Marine Identified as Shooter of 3 Baton Rouge Officers

WHAT IF RAMBO WAS BLACK?

Now, another ex-marine Gavin Long, probably a drifter in the mould of Rambo, has done the same thing, taking on the law enforcement establishment. This is clearly bad news.

Why was the movie Rambo such a big hit with the public which, without equivocation, rallied in support of the mythical Rambo against the no-nonsense Chief of Police. For all the abuses to which he was subjected, was Rambo right at any stage of the saga to take the law into his own hands? The answer is a resounding no. Why then did the movie going public cut him so much slack? What I want to point out here is the clear ambivalence that exists in relating to the response of aggrieved US citizens to perceived or real injustices at the hands of the police.

Would the movie Rambo have resonated with the US movie going public if the iconoclastic one man wrecking machine of a character, Rambo, was portrayed as a black ex-marine? This line of inquiry just came to me as an inspiration as I was deleting some old news headlines.

The question now is, could Gavin Long have been just another Rambo, though black, deserving of our understanding based on whatever it was that pissed him off and pushed him beyond his personal tipping point? Far be it for me to root for him. However because we are in a society where everyone including a proven mass murderer like Dylan Roof is entitled to due process, I was just wondering if it is possible to temper the demonization of this obviously angry black man especially since no one has yet tried to walk a mile in his moccasins. I imagine that this would be very difficult in this season of Trump. The lynch posse is out.

This is just food for thought.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/07/17/reports-baton-rouge-police-officers-shot/87218884/

BUHARI COMMISSIONS ABUJA - KADUNA RAIL LINE. . . HURRAY!

I have written extensively on the potential for rail transportation, both on its own merit and the needed relief for the overburdened road network. Thank God for small mercies. The President Buhari administration has now thankfully completed an inland rail project conceived two administrations ago and commenced by the past one.

However, I am not one to heap praise on anyone for just doing his job. There is so much left to be done. In terms of modern planning, every single progress that can be achieved now by any Nigerian government can be deemed to be at least a quarter century belated. Why for example did the Obasanjo, Yar'Ada, Jonathan and finally the Buhari administration not find it worthwhile to put into service the Warri to Ajaokuta rail line that has been fully built ten years ago? We must be mad to have left that completed project go to waste. If we had our heads properly screwed on, we would have by now, 2016, completed the doubling of that standard gauge track and extended it to Lokoja and beyond to Abuja.

This new Abuja to Kaduna rail line being heralded would then remain what it actually is, a side show, a useful but overrated mass transit system. Who ever carries much of anything from Kaduna to Abuja?

To make matters worse, the government issued a statement a couple of months ago that the new Abuja to Kaduna rail line would be operated as a FREE service for sometime. There we go again. How long is "sometime"? The path to perdition is often paved with good (but stupid) intentions. The people a.k.a. masses of Nigeria never asked anyone for free services. How then did anyone come up with this strange idea? We are yet to recover from the self-inflicted injury of the fuel subsidy bazzar. I cannot recall the last time the federal government had a budget surplus.

The yet to be appointed minister of the FCT will find his or her effort to rid the streets of Abuja of beggars to be stumped by this free transport policy. We repeatably shoot ourselves in the foot, and later wonder aloud where the pain is coming from.

SECTIONALISM AS ROOT OF CORRUPTION:

If Jonathan, Why Buhari?

Like other Nigerians, I have closely followed President Buhari's public statements, slips, threats, body language and other posturing only to come to one inescapable conclusion. The mindset that Buhari has concerning Nigeria, the very baggage with which he has trudged along these past three decades, is impossible to eliminate, delete or eradicate. The man, winning the last election after so many tries, truly believes that God is on his side and hence can do no wrong. He is probably incapable of deep introspection or wilfully suspended the relevant faculty many years ago. Time is not on his side. He cannot learn current trends and ideas. Note his unhelpful commentary on the devaluation of the naira, even after the fact. For that we are still paying dearly as a nation.

I have lamented publicly that I sorely miss having more street-wise individuals like Atiku or Dangote at the helm, that is if we must have a president from the north. When misguided praise singers like Gov Aminu Masari hail Buhari, in spite of his missteps, they only make matters worse. My fear is that, despite our goodwill towards our president (out of enlightened selfinterest), we are non the less forced to watch him self-destruct. No citizen deserves that kind of punishment.

AMERICA, THEIR AMERICA: MELANIA TRUMP PLAGIARIZED MICHELLE OBAMA

The evening started with a promise for drama, the first being the attempted revolt by the NEVER TRUMP Group, quickly squelched by the RNC convention chairman. We expect more action on this front. . .

And then how did it end? The revelation of the glaring lifting of complete passages from Michelle Obama's 2008 speech by whosoever in the Trump team that wrote Melania Trump's speech. Pundits are not going to sleep at all this night. Everyone is digging.

Meanwhile the Republicans are unusually quiet.

BLACK LIVES MATTER - Nigeria's Ms Opal Tometi

Did you know that OPAL TOMETI, co-founder of BLACK LIVES MATTER with Ms Alicia Garza and one other lady, is a Nigerian?

I don't care which passport this young woman carries, but one thing is certain. She carries our can do attitude, which is usually unleashed outside the constraining shackles of the gerontocrats who are holding Nigerians down in a pin-fall, to a new level.

Yes, I am closely following the current US election cycle. With the recent events in Dallas and Baton Rouge,and the history of Ferguson, Missouri, Sandra Bland etc, one must pay attention to the mischievous outburst of former New York mayor, Rudy Giuliani. Hence my return to BLACK LIVES MATTER, and our daughter Opal.

Meanwhile for anyone who thinks that I am letting off the US blacks with barely a rap on the knuckle, note that we Nigerians are all deeply involved. Please read up my "The Debt That Nigeria Owes Blacks." That would be instructive enough.

NDIGBO CONTRIBUTED TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF LAGOS, ABUJA. - OHANEZE ; SO?

The constitutional rights of Ndigbo in Lagos, Abuja or just about anywhere else does not in any way depend on Igbo contribution, 10, 30 or 60% towards the physical development of these metropolis. Hence harping ceaselessly on these percentages drags otherwise busy individuals into unnecessary disputes and arguments with our host communities which may find a reason to dispute such figures. The same applies to the regular exercise of estimating whether or not Ndigbo constitute 42 or is it 45% of the population of Lagos. The reaction of our hosts is often irrational, but we cannot stop them from feeling scared. Many of them would not take land at Ohanku in Ngwaland, even for free. Meanwhile the talk is that Ndigbo will not sell land to other Nigerians, which is not true. We have all learnt to live with this campaign of disinformation. We are adventurous. That are not.

It is amazing that the leading lights of Igboland somehow believe that the exodus of Igbo intellect, brain and business acumen has anything to do with Ndigbo not loving their homestead. Nothing could be further from the truth. The real cause has been the lack of business opportunities which in itself has been a result of longstanding deliberate political policy of those who strangely claim that there was "No Victor, No Vanquished " in January 1970. That is and remains a huge lie. I have worked in the East, and would never have relocated to Lagos decades ago but for the tug of the preponderance of business opportunities. Yes, I love Lagos, warts and all, but would most probably never have left the Enugu-Onitsha axis if things were different.

Lack of electrical power, abandoned road infrastructure, the dismissal of the concept of the 2nd Niger Bridge and the East-West Railway are all factors that led to the decades old abandonment of the East. While I would not recommend a total recourse to a well-earned persecution complex, it would do Ndigbo no good not to recognize those external factors that led to this current situation being decried by Ohaneze, Ndigbo Lagos, etc. To say that Ndigbo are their own worst enemies is not true. It is a huge lie.

For example, but for the exodus of our brightest and the best from Igboland, the multibillion Naira investments, school fees and businesses related to the education industry, in which our people excel, would have made an unimaginable economic impact on Igboland. Understandably we take our children along wherever we go together with teachers. Then we build schools in "foreign lands" to help bridge the gap in classroom availability. Note that this last observation is not an original of mine. Unfortunately, I cannot immediately recall who put it together.

As Ohaneze and all such Igbo socio-cultural organisations meet to put minds together, I recommend that the emphasis should no longer be on who has the loftiest sounding title, the tallest red cap, widest cow skin fan or the most intimidating Armada limousine. Each individual, in the privacy of his home, should interrogate himself thus: "Who among Ndigbo within my span of influence or control, better educated, brighter than me, can I recommend, to take my place in this coveted position for which I am currently hustling."

The problems confronting Ndigbo now go beyond ordering of goods, clearing and forwarding, ownership and renting of warehouse space and the typical wholesale and retail trade. We are experts here already. Who and who can discuss electrical power going forward 30years? Anyone? You cannot depend on Chief Emeka Offor who has enough on his plate, to do this for our people. This is my pet subject. I have never kept my views to myself. Meanwhile no one, and I mean no one, has ever asked me for any clarification. Jamborees of all the "Onwanetiloras" in the South-East, who actually shine on no one, will not get us nearer to the promised land. It is not unlikely that a good half of their deliberations is taken over by the dispute over who gets to break the kolanut.

What a pity!

http://dailypost.ng/…/ndigbo-contributed-to-the-developme…/…