Monday, September 6, 2010
BABANGIDA SEEKS TO OUTFLANK JONATHAN THROUGH THE SOUTH-EAST?
Saturday, September 4, 2010
NIGERIA IS BROKE AND CANNOT PROPERLY FUND ELECTIONS 2011?
Icheoku says surprise, surprise; the news that the Federal Government of Nigeria is broke and cannot properly fund the coming 2011 general elections as well as some ongoing projects in the country! Why won't the country be broke judging the intensity of the draining of its meager financial resources especially by the buccaneers parading themselves as members of the National Assembly, whose take-home pays/allowances is shrouded in topmost secrecy. It was Olusegun Obasanjo who first raised the outcry that at the rate the National Assembly members are pillaging the national treasury that very soon it will become impossible for Nigeria to continue to sustain its democracy. Now less than two months after one minister was demoted for letting the cat of Nigeria's near insolvency out of the bag, another top government source is putting Nigerians on a grim alert on the near insolvency state of their country.
Yet President Goodluck Jonathan is carrying on as if there is nothing to worry about; and speeding up to spend a whopping 50billion Naira celebrating Nigeria's 50th independent anniversary; and you wonder what is there to celebrate? President Jonathan is celebrating a 50 years white-washed penury, corruption, crimes, joblessness, lack of good roads, electricity, health services, housing, water, education, food etc? The tragedy of it all is that some of the invited officials of foreign government would themselves be wondering whether the extravagant foolery and revelry is worthwhile, judging from the decay in the country which would have benefited more from having the 'wasted' fund invested in them. But no, not in a country that never gets its priorities right and which has never been able to figure out the way forward and out of its state of near total malaise. Icheoku says the 50th anniversary celebration is symptomatic of a government without a clear vision of its goals or any well defined mission statement which would have forced its hands to a more goal-directed priorities, towards achieving very meaningful palliative objectives for the people. In short, it is a misplaced priority by the Jonathan's government which increasingly is manifesting traits of an Obasanjo's third term and have surrounded itself with the same discredited people that helped Obasanjo ruin Nigeria. Their latest project is the drunken sailor like profligacy of a 50 billion 50th independence anniversary celebration, to celebrate nothingness; yet there is no money for INEC?Where is the sacrifice of the leadership, especially those of them in the National Assembly, such as taking a pay/allowance cut to ensure that INEC got the money it requires to conduct the coming elections. No, they would rather a broke INEC is rendered incapable of conducting a free and fair elections, so that they can see an opportunity to rig themselves back into office for the looting party of the national treasury to continue. But hey, a country deserves the type of leadership it gets; so until Nigerians decide to take their destiny in their own hands and chase out all these mongrels in power, and instituting real peoples' leadership in its place that are accountable to the people, it is going to remain the same - a Nigeria under the vice-hold of creeping plundering thieves. Finally Icheoku says the latest development that Nigeria is on the threshold of becoming the bankrupt Greece of Africa is shuddering in view of the receipts taken in as revenue by the same government over the years.But the election must hold and money must be found or borrowed if need be to ensure that INEC is not purposely encumbered by election riggers set to rig themselves back into office in 2011. Nigerians must therefore say no to these election riggers and condemn their latest antic of trying to deprive INEC the resources it needs to conduct a meaningful election in 2011. This "Nigeria is broke and cannot fund the elections" sounds like an act taken out of election riggers play book, hence it must be resisted as an already in progress election rigging!
Friday, September 3, 2010
Thursday, September 2, 2010
DR. JACQUELYN KOTARAC'S DEATH INSIDE A CHIMNEY, CRAZY IN LOVE OR CRAZED OUT IN LOVE?
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
ROMANIANS EXPULSION FROM FRANCE, A FRENCH-STYLED NAZISM COME ALIVE?
Monday, August 30, 2010
PRESIDENT GOODLUCK JONATHAN, PLEASE DO NOT GO AGAINST THE GODS
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Friday, August 27, 2010
ABIOLA BETRAYED NIGERIANS, SOLD OUT ON JUNE 12TH FOR $800 MILLION?
PRESIDENT JONATHAN, A DOCTOR WITHOUT PHILOSOPHY? - an article by Salisu Suleiman
It has been reasoned that part of the intractable leadership deficit in Nigeria may be because we have been consistently saddled with leaders with undistinguished academic credentials. So it was with great expectations that we watched the inauguration of the late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua as the first university educated executive president of the country.
It is hardly worth repeating that those expectations were crushed by what turned out to be the most lethargic, provincial and uninspiring government in Nigeria. When Yar’Adua was inaugurated in 2007, there was hope that his academic credentials, exposure and broadmindedness imbibed in university would transmit into better decision making, policy implementation and good governance.
Of course that never happened. It may be argued that without the debilitating and ultimately terminal illness Yar’Adua, might have been a different president. That, unfortunately, is something we will never find out. But as fate would have it, Yar’Adua’s successor, Goodluck Ebele Jonathan is one notch ahead on the academic scale - he is a doctorate degree holder. Jonathan had another chance to prove that Yar’Adua was a fluke and that academic qualifications do have a bearing on constructive governance.
After spending about the same time as Gen. Murtala Mohammed spent in office,
President Jonathan is yet to make any meaningful landmark. The president is relatively young and has no known illnesses. I definitely expected him to bring some semblance of exposure, self-confidence, charisma and creativity in the conduct of governance. That has not happened. And with his preoccupation with remaining in office beyond 2011, it never may.
Even if the president has no constructive ideas, he should at least communicate with us intelligently. As a former university lecturer, public speaking should not be a challenge. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, PhD, must have defended his graduate and doctoral theses before internal and external examiners and would have presented seminar papers, participated in symposia and other activities associated with teaching and learning.
So how come public speaking is such a difficult task for him?
Apart from the absence of a clear vision since assuming office, why has it proved so difficult for the president to speak with any conviction, even when reading from prepared texts? Assuming for any reason that he failed to communicate effectively with his students as a teacher, what about his days as a civil servant? Granted, this species are trained to be inconspicuous and granted, the work of bureaucrats in these climes require little or no intellectual input beyond the metronomic repetition of chores, he must have carried out public functions to have risen to the directorate cadre.
But notwithstanding how he got his doctorate degree and the kind of academic or bureaucrat he was, the moment he joined politics and emerged as a deputy governor, it is inconceivable that no effort was made to burnish Jonathan’s dour demeanour, diction and delivery. It may be that that behind the facade is an astute and sharp mind. I used to believe that until Jonathan began to eye the presidency.
I have no quarrel with Jonathan’s ambition, just the way he has gone about it and the charlatans he has assembled to actualise it. Gen. Murtala only spent six months in office, but at the time he was assassinated, his approval ratings (had anyone cared to measure) would have been over 90 percent. If Jonathan had the depth expected of a PhD, he should have borrowed a leaf from history and embarked on a highly populist agenda to sell his ambition.
A good starting point would have been demystifying Nigeria’s recurrent nightmare, Olusegun Obasanjo; probing the missing trillions from our coffers; cutting the bloated pay of the peacocks at the National Assembly, or taking the corruption bull by the horns. Instead, he is consorting with the likes of Tony Anenih, Ibrahim Mantu, Jerry Gana, Jonathan Zwingina and other politicians with extremely dubious moral credentials. Bode George will probably join them as soon as he is released.
With his laboured, ponderous and pusillanimous approach to governance and the tortured route he has chosen to pursue his ambition, Jonathan may be a doctor, but he certainly has no philosophy.