BUHARI, NOT GOOD FOR NIGERIA

WARNING: - BEFORE YOU BUY INTO THE BUHARI SNAKE OIL, WATCH THIS (THE BUHARI) VIDEO!!!

MARRIAGE, AN IMPEDIMENT?

"If Jesus Christ had married, he probably would not have succeeded in his mission to save mankind, considering the powerful and overbearing influence wives have on their husbands." - Oluwasegun S.O. 

Icheoku says in as much this somewhat states the obvious, but what about the saying that behind every successful man there is always a woman? Conversely, the downfall of every man is often woman-caused? Anyway with things Divine, who are we mortals to add or subtract; and in as much as some Christians believe that Mary Magdelene was married to Jesus, Icheoku says it does not really matter either way, as what was destined, as usual, would always come to pass.

ANYIAM-OSIGWE, ASSASSINATED?

Icheoku says the narrative does not add up, of how this man died; allegedly shot dead by armed robbers? Any critically thinking mind,  piecing together the account of events leading up to the killing of Nze Michael Anyiam-Osigwe, would definitely come to the same conclusion that there is a lot the public is not being told about how this man met his death? 

Icheoku on his part is emphatic that based on the circumstances surrounding his death, as narrated, that MAO was not a victim of a random attack by a band of marauding bandits. Rather he fell into the snare of a well planned, carefully choreographed and clinically finished assassination, by some evil people, possibly including his family members, who specifically wanted him out. Hopefully security agencies would, upon forensic investigation, also arrive at this conclusion, make necessary arrest and prosecute his murderers for the crime. But the story, culminating to his demise as is being told, is more of a fable, better reserved for the less endowed upstairs. 

Now patiently travel together with Icheoku as we journey back through the road of what allegedly transpired that eventually led to his death:- The family were en-route Owerri (Nkwerre-Orlu) Imo State from Lagos, for a funeral or an event and in a convoy of about four vehicles. Suddenly on approaching Okada town junction on Benin-Ore road, they ran into a band of armed robbers conducting an operation? They abandoned their vehicles and ran into the bush while their three-man police security detail engaged the armed robbers in a fierce fire-fight? The armed robbers overwhelmed the police detail, who then managed to summon for the help of additional police officers to the scene.  Eventually and still while Michael and co were still hunkered down in the bush, the combined team of police officers forced the armed robbers to flee? 

Please specifically note that these "well trained and fully armed" police officers did not and could not kill nor even successfully arrested any of one of these armed robbers? Following their "victory" over the armed robbers, the lead-police officer, using a bullhorn, called out to everyone who ran into the bush to come out as everything is now all-clear? MAO alongside others, honored the police assured announcement and reemerged from their hiding places inside the bush. Everyone drove off, except for  MAO, whose car suddenly became immobilized and so could not drive off while every other person except him did? According to the story, a bullet had perforated MAO's vehicle's engine and rendered it un-drivable? Icheoku queries a bullet perforating a car's engine, when each day we watch police television shows where police officers hide behind their vehicles engine section while exchanging fire with hoodlums? 

Continuing, suddenly as stranded MAO was still fiddling with his vehicle and wondering what the next line of action would be, one of the supposedly vanquished armed robbers, emerged from nowhere to put two hot leads into MAO's chest and thigh? There was no air-ambulance to MEdiVac MAO to the hospital and he was bleeding profusely from the exit chest-wound? There was also no ambulance either, with trained medical personnel to render good first aid and at least properly secure his bleeding fountains? 

According to their explanation, the nearest helicopter service available was over five hundred miles away in Port Harcourt from the shooting incident and the pilot "does not fly after 6pm and so cannot come to the rescue either?" The result was that a man already mortally wounded and clinging to his dear life, was driven by road back to Lagos, another distance of about four hundred and fifty miles before first proper medical attention could be rendered? He subsequently died in the hospital while preparations were afoot to evacuate him to a foreign country where adequate professional medical assistance is available?  Then the curtain of the narrative falls and with it a life that was productively lived but wickedly cut short. 

Now asks yourself where were those reinforced police team that "overpowered" those armed robbers when that lone straggling armed robber came back? Why was it MAO that the armed robber directed his shot at and at his heart; and there was no evidence of any particular act of provocation from MAO that could have so incensed the bandit to warrant such an aggravated aggression on him? Further, after point-blankly firing the deadly buck-shot at MAO, why did the armed robber not also shoot the other remaining people who were with MAO including two of his brothers? Also, nothing was stolen by the armed robber from either MAO or from any of the other persons as he quietly walked away and disappeared after 'mission accomplishing' his job? Why was it only MAO's car, among the many that were similarly abandoned by the fleeing victims at the scene, that developed a problem that immobilized it? 

Icheoku is asking these pertinent questions because a car engine is not so easily susceptible to nor is it readily compromised by ordinary bullets such as was fired in a cross fire shoot-outs? 

So is it possible that while Michael was hiding in the bush that his car was specifically sabotaged to render him a sitting duck for the assassin to find and execute? Further, why was a  deathly wounded MAO not taken to University of Benin Teaching Hospital or even Okada Teaching Hospital, both of which are very close to the scene, to be first fully stabilized before further seeking medical treatment for him? Why was a man bleeding from the heart driven by road so tortuously to Lagos with all the traffic jams and bad driving conditions factored in? 

That a member of the very powerful,  influential, wealthy and well-connected Anyiam Osigwe family of Nigeria, was mortally so wounded and the surviving brothers could not summon help or a helicopter to rush him to a hospital is beyond Icheoku's comprehension? Icheoku is aware that they have access and could have easily put a call through to Aso Rock or the Edo State Government House in Benin for an immediate SOS rescue; but instead decided to make a journey back to Lagos by road and for several hours carrying a man with life-threatening gunshot wounds on his chest and upper thigh?  Finally why were they traveling by road instead of undertaking the less than one hour flight time it takes from Lagos to Owerri or Enugu or even Asaba? 

Icheoku says there are just too many questions not being answered, which if answered would help clear the fog of this case. Icheoku is emphatic that this case smells of an assassination, but certainly not a random act of armed banditry which is plaguing the country. It also does not matter what those brothers of his with him are saying as their own version of the account of event, a thorough investigation is necessary to uproot the very root cause of MAO killing and let parties thereto present explain or answer some of these burning questions. Until then,Nigerians should see it as a lawless execution of a fellow citizen and seriously demand answers from those in the know. 

Icheoku says while the country is so deeply plagued and being suffocated by wanton insecurity,  politicians in that "largest economy in Africa" so called,  who could not do right by the citizens and at least provide some MEdiVac helicopters for emergency occasions like this, and who have also refused to adequately fund the police to help them produce crack crime-fighting police force that could have averted this needless and avoidable death, are once again busily perambulating all over the place and asking Nigerians to reelect them? Icheoku asks reelect them for what? What have they shown for their election of these past years? If only the APC would provide Nigerians with a real choice they can live with? Icheoku laments what a loss! So long Michael Anyiam Osigwe, Adieu!

THE SERVANT-LEADERSHIP, ANY NIGERIAN EXAMPLE?

The type of leadership any politician would provide, whether a servant-leadership or a looter-in-chief leadership, is evident in the "do or die' attitude and near desperation of that politician in his or her quest for power. Having a selfless as opposed to a selfish, self-centered disposition, is the hallmark of a servant leader, which unfortunately is in a very short supply in Nigeria. Icheoku says apathy and political in-activism on the part of the voting electorates is helping institutionalize this loot-o-cracy by these greedy thieving politicians. Icheoku says it was the late Dee Sam Onunaka Mbakwe, governor emeritus of Imo State as it then was, who once said that the rat does not eat something which belongs to a person who is wide awake. Icheoku hence advises Nigerians to become very wide awake in order to stop these band of thieving politicians before they get access to the treasury by means of the ballot. 

Nigerians should just ask themselves, when has serving a people become by force; otherwise why  the desperation to secure power by any means necessary and thus giving credence to the end justifying the means? Icheoku says  these people cannot be so insanely possessed in their quest, if indeed they are merely motivated by their desire to render service to the electorates? But we all know that politics in Nigeria is the surest route to steal and steal, and amass stupendous wealth, none of which these politician actually needs; but which in the words of Imo State Governor Rochas Okorocha, helps guarantee that "our generations yet unborn shall never lack?" Icheoku condemns this attitude as crass gluttony exemplified and thievery of the worst kind, the taking of more than one actually needs by these politicians while starving millions of the people, of the little they need to in order to just stay alive.

Icheoku says who in his or her right mind, being so sincere  to serve the people, would borrow millions and sometimes billions of Naira, maim and kill people, as well as wrought all manners of other kinds of violence, just to secure the authority to "serve" the people?  Their cunning approach is usually a subterfuge they use to masquerade their ulterior intention to visit untold wreck on the peoples sovereign wealth once elected; which was aptly captured in the words of Professor Tam David West. According to TDW, "Aspirants who throw money around are public thieves, looters. The bribe money they offer is public money, our money, recycled to corrupt the public for their selfish ends. Why would anyone take the trouble to spend all his millions to buy votes to enable him serve the public? They have hidden agenda to mega-loot if elected. It’s because he knows that when you elect him, he would make it up in no time. Nigerians, lets say No, No, No, this time, to these band of politicians." Icheoku agrees with the learned professor of urology and says but are Nigerians listening to such wise counsel.

Please Nigerians, when next any of these rabble-rousers  come knocking at your door, tell him or her to take a hike as you are tired of listening to the "messianic" hogwash oozing from their mouth. Icheoku also will like you to demand a break from all these politician-desperadoes and pontificators, who are busily extolling how they would solve all Nigeria's problems once elected, by magically wanding every problem known to Nigerians away. Icheoku says these brand of politicians are deceiving Nigerians and they do not mean well for the country and would loot it into bankruptcy.  So when next any of them comes to you, asking for your vote or your understanding on why they are the best of the pack, and would like to serve you, please tell them thanks, but no, thanks. Alternatively, demand that they  pay you your own portion of the democratic dividend upfront; and/or that they should help you mow your lawn and see what type of a servant-leader they truly indeed are or intend to be if they comply. Please as 2015 comes into view, be vigilant, be active and do the needful not to let these rats into the treasury. Icheoku says this is the time to stop complaining about bad leadership by electing a good leadership. Salute!

RELIGIONISATION OF POLITICS - TAM DAVID WEST

"I have always held that for a lasting and stable polity, we should bring religion into politics but take politics out of  religion. If the codes (Dos and Don’ts) of religion are injected into politics, politics will be necessarily sanitized of all filth. No election rigging, No cheating. No corruption. No looting. No killing. No violence. No intimidation. Love will take over from hate. Real democracy will be realized. There will be justice, peace and progress for all. Remember that things about religion go deep into one's bone marrows, those of politics only end on the epidermis"" - Professor Tam David-West

OBASANJO IS A SPOILER - OZEHKOME MIKE.

“I think that Obasanjo is a spoiler who does not want to sit in podium of great and revered political leaders across the world. Such action as he has taken do not behold well of a man who is suppose to be an elder statesman. The statement (he made) may be true and self evident in terms of executive corruption in Nigeria at all levels particularly at the Federal and State government levels, and in terms of increasing legislative rascality that we have been witnessing from the National Assembly particularly the House of Representatives. All these allegations may be true but there are certain question that need be asked. Firstly, how did Obasanjo perform as President of Nigeria?

Was it not in his time that corruption was elevated to a doctrine and a fundamental objective and directive principle of state policy? Was it not during his time that Ghana Must Go bags where seen being physically carried from House of one legislator to another either to remove an existing Senate President or to perpetuate his third-term agenda. Was it not during his time that the greatest economic and financial scandal in Nigeria’s history, the Siemens and Halliburton scandals were re-enacted? Was it not during his reign that the Petroleum Trust Fund and Petroleum Equalisation fund became a nest of indelible corruption? 

Was it not during his time that two major towns in Nigeria- Odi in Bayelsa and Zaki Ibiam in Benue State where mindlessly destroyed and leveled to the ground by rampaging military men in a manner that portended genocide, where many people, animals and properties where wiped out from the fave of the earth? Was it not during his time that Nigeria won the Gold, Silver and Bronze trophies in corruption under the Transparency International Corruption index? There are more decent ways and manner in which a former president can channel his grievances to a sitting president and the National Assembly, all of which are open to him without question (but he choose otherwise)." - Mike Ozehkome, lawyer and activist, taking on Ota deity Olusegun Obasanjo for his continued meddlesomeness in Nigeria. Icheoku says Mike Ozehkome spoke for Icheoku as well as millions of Nigerians who hereby admonishes Olusegun Obasanjo to just go away and disappear out of sight. Enough of this Obasanjo's Pharisees complex.

THE MEN BUHARI MURDERED IN COLD BLOOD?

Icheoku says pursuant to his intentions to Islamize Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari introduced Sharia zero-tolerance for drug-dealings and retroactively murdered three Nigerians, who committed the offense alleged prior to the promulgation of the decree making it a death penalty offense. Like other Islamic countries, his Nigeria then had to display that it was ready for full Sharia law in Nigeria; and as result killed this three innocent Nigerians just to bare his fangs. According to one of the condemned before hot lead perorated his body and turned him into a cadaver, he said "If i knew this was going to result in my death, God knows i would never have had anything to do with it. That is why i am going to God with all courage and faith, that I don’t have to regret because he knows much better than I do." But Buhari killed him and three others anyway and the same blood-thirsty mongrel wants power again in Nigeria? Icheoku says any Nigerian that encourages his ambition is a partaker in murder. On MARCH 28, reject the murderer, VOTE GEJ

SCARY, HIV/AIDS RAVAGES LAGOS?

One in every twenty people living in Lagos Nigeria is HIV/AIDS positive, that is about 5% of the population. This is according to information provided by the agency in charge of tracking infection and controlling  the scourge, Lagos State AIDS Control Agency.  Its CEO, Dr Tokunbo Dabiri, made the information available while addressing participants at the World's AIDS day in Lagos. 

Icheoku says the only seemingly good news is that HIV/AIDS, unlike the Ebola Virus Disease, is not an instant killer; but gives its victims sometime to live and with proper medication, could be controlled if not cured. But in any event, it is still a scary thought to know that this many people are infected in Lagos Nigeria and the number increases everyday due to promiscuous behavior and lack of safe sexual practices. May God continue to protect his people IJN. 

GOODLUCK AS EMBLEM OF PDP, A TRAGEDY - OYEYEMI

“It is better not to ascend power than to have power and whine about inability to appropriately use it.” GEJ should have gone out to take on the condescending and deleterious “inheritors” of the Nigerian “estate” who made the country “ungovernable” for him. He had the means and the power to put them in their place and help them to understand that all are equal partakers in the stake called Nigeria. He had the opportunity to remind the “Born to rule” goons that Nigeria belongs to all.

GEJ had the opportunity, to reinforce the Republican nature of the Nigerian State and insist that though, “tongue and tribe may differ,” we are all one and the same with equal rights and access to whatever appurtenances Nigeria has got to offer. He should have focused on righting a lot of historical wrongs for the disenfranchised nationalities in the country and carve a niche for himself in history. He had the opportunity to save Nigeria from itself by charting a different path for it. But as his detractors often say, he is “clueless.” His actions have worsen the situation and he has continued to wallow in delusion as he allows his enemies free reign to ruin him and whatever reputation he might have had. Goodluck Jonathan is the emblem of PDP as a tragedy." 

APC IS NEITHER A GOOD OPTION - OYEYEMI?

From the look of things, it is evident that there is fire on the Nigerian Mountain. This fire is all consuming and there is no obvious way of checkmating this fire. The fire, it seems, is going to lead to the end of Nigeria. But for someone like me, who has lost faith in the Nigerian Project for a long time, it is just a matter of course. This is because Nigeria is gradually approaching her DESTINY - the eventual freeing up of the ethnic nationalities within its confines. Like Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, popularly known in history as Lenin, was always saying about the situation in mother Russia in his exile days in Switzerland when the Bolshevik revolution was fermenting, “The worse, the better.” - Remi Oyeyemi

While the dynamics of the Nigerian centrifugal forces are presently cocooned in the façade of politics, giving the wrong impression that we have a country in which we all believe, Nigeria is gradually ebbing away into its natural habitat of independent ethnic nationalities committed to determining their own destinies and being the captains of their own souls. The political class may still be able to postpone the doomsday, if Nigeria survives 2015, but it is a doomsday that would still come, nevertheless. The façade of politics is the present opium of the fake nationalists that believe in Nigeria at all costs, to them Nigeria is a subsisting country when indeed, it is a mirage.

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has been in power for the last 15years plus. The Hausa Fulani oligarchy, after frustrating the mandate of Chief M.K.O. Abiola in 1993 made efforts to assuage the anger of the Yoruba Nation by imposing another Egba man from Owu Kingdom in Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, who has always been their “willing tool” (apology to Sir Ahmadu Bello, the late Sardauna of Sokoto and former Premier of Northern Region) to subjugating other nationalities in Nigeria. This oligarchy made sure that the Yoruba never got what they wanted and that the Yoruba aspiration could only be as determined by this Hausa –Fulani neo-colonialists. This oligarchy and its satellites across the country  - Southwest, South-south, Southeast, Northeast and Middlebelt (or Northcentral) – in conjunction with their “militocrats” ensured that Obasanjo was shoved down the throat of Yoruba in particular and Nigerians in general in 1999.

Since the inept days of Tafawa Balewa to the tyrannical aeon of Mohammadu Buhari, through the anomic era of Ibrahim Babangida to the inane epoch of Musa Yar’Adua, the PDP, euphemised in different taxonomies, has been “failing.” I put the word “failing” in quote because as far as Nigerians are concerned, their fate has grown progressively worse in geometrical terms. But as far as the Fulani descendants of Uthman Dan Fodio are concerned, Nigeria could not have been better for them as an “inherited estate” – largely feudalistic and underdeveloped- peopled by hewers with subjugated will and failed dreams.

This brings us to the present spell of Goodluck Ebele Jonathan (GEJ), also on the platform of the same PDP. He is reported to have earned a Doctorate in Zoology. GEJ, as he is popularly called, is an extraction from the minority Ijaw nationality whose homelands have provided Nigeria with its petro-dollars for decades while its landmass had been wasted recklessly and mercilessly by the Hausa-Fulani inspired Nigerian government. His people along with other minority nationalities in South-south have been fighting for preservation of their land while the land was being exploited. The renowned author and dramaturgist, Kenule Saro-Wiwa and seven others were murdered in the course of this struggle in what has come to be known as the Ogoni Eight Murders.  The indifference of the Nigerian Government to the plight of the South-south people led to the calls for Resource Control and Fiscal Federalism.

Thus, when GEJ, who could not afford shoes while he was growing up as a young lad in Otuoke, ascended the Presidency of Nigeria, the descendants of Uthman Dan Fodio, who considered themselves as the “inheritors” of Nigeria, which to them is “an extension of the estate” of their ancestor vowed to make Nigeria “ungovernable” for him. They have made good their promise and have gotten away with it. And I don’t blame them. It is GEJ’s fault, all through and through. This is because as the Yoruba often say, “Aguntan ti ri Jinadu bee, ki o to gba isu owo e.” (The sheep has discerned Jinadu to be insensate before dispossessing him of his yam).

When GEJ assumed power, he was expected to be guided by history. He was expected to remember the struggles of his people to benefit from the resources gushing from beneath their homelands; to remember how over 80% of those who have oil wells are from the Hausa-Fulani stock to the detriment of other Nigerians in general and his people in particular; to remember that his people have suffered endlessly in the hands of the Nigerian political and economic carpetbaggers; to remember how the homelands have become desolate from ruthless exploitation and his people could hardly farm or fish any longer; to remember the tears and the wailings of his people who have been forgotten and thrown to the curbs of poverty and want.

But alas! He suffered pathological amnesia as soon as he got to the comfort of Aso Rock. He not only failed his Ijaw people and other Nigerians who looked up to him as a liberator, he failed himself and all those who fought for him to get to the exalted position of power. GEJ’s case is emblematic of the sayings of my wise forefathers in Yoruba-land “Ai kuku j’oye, osan ju enu mi o ka ilu” literally meaning “It is better not to ascend power than to have power and whine about inability to appropriately use it.” GEJ should have gone out to take on the condescending and deleterious “inheritors” of the Nigerian “estate” who made the country “ungovernable” for him. He had the means and the power to put them in their place and help them to understand that all are equal partakers in the stake called Nigeria. He had the opportunity to remind the “Born to rule” goons that Nigeria belongs to all.

GEJ had the opportunity, to reinforce the Republican nature of the Nigerian State and insist that though, “tongue and tribe may differ,” we are all one and the same with equal rights and access to whatever appurtenances Nigeria has got to offer. He should have focused on righting a lot of historical wrongs for the disenfranchised nationalities in the country and carve a niche for himself in history. He had the opportunity to save Nigeria from itself by charting a different path for it. But as his detractors often say, he is “clueless.” His actions have worsen the situation and he has continued to wallow in delusion as he allows his enemies free reign to ruin him and whatever reputation he might have had. Goodluck Jonathan is the emblem of PDP as a tragedy.  

Jonathan failed his Ijaw people. He also antagonized the Yoruba people through the length and breadth of his administration. The Yoruba were not just relegated from his administration, they were excommunicated. After being excommunicated from the Jonathan administration, the Yoruba became the butt of witch hunting, blackmailing, ridicule and undeserved humiliation. It was Jonathan administration that engineered the idea of the Yoruba State of Lagos as being “no man’s land.” He called Yoruba politicians “rascals.” If not for a Yoruba man, used by Providence, Jonathan would not be President today.  Jonathan has been odiously ungrateful to the Yoruba Nation. He is a tragedy to the aspirations of the Yoruba Nation.   

But as 2015 approaches, another serious threat to the survival of Yoruba Nation is in the horizon for which Jonathan would be indirectly culpable if it comes to fruition. Jonathan would be indirectly culpable because he has given “cover” to some compulsively traitorous Yoruba politicians to be able to actively collaborate with the enemies of Yoruba Nation in the bid to unseat him (Jonathan) because of his “cluelessness” and the tragedy that his administration represents for and to the Yoruba Nation. And that threat is represented by the leadership of the All Progressive Congress (APC) and their sentries. The APC has foreclosed its presidential ticket to the “Born to Rule” Hausa-Fulani ethnic stock. This is the ethnic nationality that has held Nigeria to ransom for the last five decades.

Both through the history of Nigerian civilian and military administrations, several ethnic nationalities have been seeking ways to extricate themselves from the bondage of the “Born to Rule” Fulani “inheritors” of the Nigerian State. Obafemi Awolowo was denied the leadership of this country by this clique because he insisted in defeudalising Nigeria. Gideon Orkar and company laid their lives down for this freedom. Tai Solarin was consumed by this struggle. Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu’s life’s trajectory was changed because of this struggle. Yohanna Madaki suffered unfairly and had his career taken from him in his bid to ensure this freedom. Alhaji Abdulrahman Shugaba was humiliated and deported from his motherland because he resisted this feudalism. Colonel Adekunle Fajuyi sacrificed his life to attain this freedom.

Ebitu Ukiwe’s career was cut short by this Hausa Fulani oligarchy while insisting on this freedom. Fela Anikulapo Kuti dedicated his talent for this struggle. His nationalist mother, Mrs. Funmilayo Ransome Kuti was murdered in this fight. Ken Saro-Wiwa died in this struggle. Gani Fawehinmi died engaged in this fight. Isaac Adaka Borro gave up the ghost seeking this freedom.  Wole Soyinka foreclosed his youth and mortgaged his adulthood in order for us to have this freedom. Beeko Ransome Kuti gave all he had for this struggle until he died. Even, Major Abubakar Umar Kankiwa, a Fulani himself, got a raw deal because he dared to dislike feudalism as espoused by the oligarchy of his ethnic nationalism.

And this precisely, is what the APC is trying to bring back and send the Yoruba Nation and other disenfranchised ethnic nationalities to another round of slavery in the name of politics! If the APC is a serious political party, intent on bringing true change to Nigeria, why must it dexterously preclude other ethnic nationalities from its presidential ticket without having to say so? To make matters worse, the APC could only showcase the worst of the Hausa-Fulani in its contenders! From a born-again cunning tyrant, incompetent and incorrigible religious fundamentalist in Mohammadu Buhari through a baptized international fraudster in Abubakar Atiku to the loudmouth political neophyte named Rabiu Kwankwanso, the APC is projecting itself as a NEW THREAT to the dreams of the constituent units of ethnic nationalities in Nigeria - to be free and be able to self determine their destinies.

For the Yoruba Nation and other ethnic nationalities in Nigeria, this indeed, is a serious dilemma!

But 2015 would not present a dilemma if we could all find the courage to do the right thing. Before the advent of further bloodshed, the killing and maiming of innocent children and women, we could muster the courage to do the right thing. Enough people have died already. If Option One – PDP and GEJ is unattractive; and Option Two – APC and the trio of Buhari, Atiku and Tinubu is also detestable, then it is time to consider Option Three – break up this façade called  Nigeria and let my people go. Yes, to your tents O Israel!! 

OBAMA GIRLS ATTACK, ELIZABETH LAUTEN IS A RACIST BIGOTED WHITE WHORE?

"Dear Sasha and Malia, I get you’re both in those awful teen years, but you’re a part of the First Family, try showing a little class. At least respect the part you play. Then again your mother and father don’t respect their positions very much, or the nation for that matter, so I’m guessing you’re coming up a little short in the ‘good role model’ department. Nevertheless, stretch yourself. Rise to the occasion. Act like being in the White House matters to you. Dress like you deserve respect, not a spot at a bar. And certainly don’t make faces during televised public events." - Elizabeth Lauten, a Republican from Tennessee. 

Icheoku says imagine what a fully grown adult white woman wrote about two little black girls, whose only 'sin' is that their father is presently occupying "their" White House and she is not finding their black-color adulteration of "their" White House funny? Icheoku says it appears that all these white people keep hating, as if hatred for people who  do not look like them is ingrained in their  DNA, all of them and without any exception. The only thing is that until they are caught, they keep on putting a pretentious face of being holier than thou in the racism department. Imagine this bimbo being highly critical of two little girls just for "making faces" at a White House annual Thanksgiving day turkey pardon event. 

But Icheoku knows the true underlying reason is not that the two little black girls made faces, which little girl doesn't? It is simply because of the the very fact that they are two little black girls, running around in "their" White House. Imagine asking two little girls to show some class? Then further piling up on them by bringing their parents as an issue? And condemning the two little black girls for falling short in the "role model department?" And of course telling them that they are ONLY privileged to be in "their" White House and ought to respect that circumstantial fact? And lastly equating them to girls of easy virtue (whores) ready to be picked-up at a bar? 

Anyway, Icheoku says it is only those people who are in denial of the increased racism among racist white Americans since the "ADVERSE" occupation of "their" White House by the BLACK Obama family, that still get surprised at some of these racial outbursts. As for Icheoku we fully understand the ramification of race in everything America as we live, feel and see it, everyday, everywhere; and denying its existence is being in self-denial and is unhealthy for the mental health. But unfortunately for these racist pigs, no one is living America for anybody; it is rather too late to contemplate that outcome, a desire which many of them nurse and hopelessly wish for as an eventual inevitable. Also if they may, the bad news for them is that black people will and shall survive!

OPEN APPEAL TO SAHARA REPORTERS' OMOYELE SOWORE.

Dear Mr Sowore Omoyele, 

CURRENT DIRECTION OF SR TROUBLING?

It is with the utmost reluctance and hesitation that Icheoku writes to plead with you to please tone down your current rabid fixation on President Jonathan because it is somewhat now hovering on the lunatic fringes. You have become what psychologists call borderline dysfunctional in your attacks on the president and his government while cleverly looking the other way as it concerns the other side. As a media outfit, you should report stories as they unfold but not necessarily mislead the public by skewing stories to derive a particular agenda. At the end of the day, the president might win or lose the election but SR will never be the same again, especially not in the eyes of Nigerians, many of who now regard your outfit as another yellow pages, that is not only not dispassionate but totally inbed with everything anti-Jonathan and out to do the president in.  

Your SR never reports anything positive or productive of the government including the little gains they periodically make against Boko Haram as well as other areas of noted progress, admitted more, as always, could have been done. Except if you have unknowingly fully morphed into an aparatichik of those not wishing Nigeria well, it is about time you take some introspection and rejig both your approach and needless subjective criticisms. Facts are universally sacred and objective but never subjective, except you have become another Fox News whose "just the facts" mantra excludes to mention that it is the "facts" according to their own jaundiced perception ONLY. 

Politics and politicians are like the barracks, soldier come soldier go, but barracks still stay open; so why so recklessly wage a war that is otherwise avoidable. No one ever quarrels with objective reporting or writing, but not when it crosses the line and becomes a hatchet job out to destroy and/or humiliate a president and his government?  However, Icheoku is not in a position to tell you how to live your newly chosen life of an attack dog for the APC or in any way wants to direct the trajectory of your outlet, but suffice it to say that SR has lost the lustre and great anticipation that heralded its introduction to the world and the Nigerian reading public in particular. If you must be that asinine and bias against a person of the president or his party, at least come out openly and declare for the APC like NdaNusa of Leadership Newspapers, so that people would know where you are really coming from. But please stop masquerading yourself as an investigative social media person "reporting it as you see it", admitted you may be making a killing, smiling to the banks, because of the turn you have taken. 

Your crass frenzied support for Muhammadu Buhari's presidency also unnerves millions of Nigeria who have been wondering lately whether you were born just yesterday and before Buhari's first coming that you so naively crave his second time around? What type of a democrat would so frontally be canvassing for a Muhammadu Buhari encore, fully aware of the type of despotic regime he ran between 1983 to 1985? But that is your privilege to support whoever you want, but please try to separate your personal interest from the "public" interest which SR supposedly represents. Anyway, a word should be enough for the wise and hopefully you still retained some reason to reason along this personal outreach, but you decide how you want to be remembered. 

Thanks.

Still the same as ever,

Icheoku.

BUHARI CAN NEVER RILE NIGERIA AGAIN - ARIBISALA.

"The nearest Buhari will ever get to Aso Rock in 2015 is attending Council of State meetings as a former head of state, period." - Femi Aribisala.

BOKO HARAM HITS KANO, DISUNITY FUELING THE INSURGENCY?

Icheoku says the continuing menace that is Boko Haram is still wrecking havoc in Nigeria because Nigerians have not decided to come together to fight it as a united people. Icheoku says but for the joint effort at tackling Ebola Virus Disease, may be the virus disease would have completely devastated the whole Nigerian populace by now. But Nigerians saw it as a national emergency problem which would afflict all Nigerians if unchecked, and decided to come together to tackle it as a one people and it was defeated and gone. Icheoku says this is the same attitude that Nigerians need to approach Boko Haram with and in order to similarly get rid of it. 

But a situation where some people think and perceive Boko Haram as a sectional problem or some people see it as a problem for the PDP and President Jonathan alone to fight, then Nigerians, we have a problem. Some critics of Jonathan's administration,  instead of speaking directly to Boko Haram and condemning their nefarious activities, are rather busy blaming the president for not timely solving the problem? icheoku emphasizes that such attitude emboldens Boko Haram as they see themselves as fighting a cause on behalf of some people and/or that some people at least tacitly support their activities. 

Icheoku says until this "all of us are in it" approach is adopted, with every section of the country and peoples, sitting down together to marshal out a plan to uproot these mad dogs, the problem of Boko Haram will continue unabated. Like cancer, it is metastasizing and rearing its ugly head in various parts of the North and tomorrow it might spread to other parts of the country. A matter made worse because all the key security agencies in the country are headed by Northern Muslims, yet they cannot seem to have a handle over this lingering problem caused by their fellow Muslims, the fanatical Boko Haram zealots. Icheoku says if not them, who else can speak the language these animals would understand to make them see the need to stop their campaign of impunity and great devastation. 

Icheoku queries if indeed Boko Haram is fighting for Muslims and Islamic domination of Nigeria, why are they killing their fellow Muslims who were praying to their Allah in their mosque praying grounds? If Boko Haram war-cry "Allahu Akbar" means anything to them, why are they making people who similarly believe that their 'God (Allah) is Great' suffer such avoidable and needless deaths and devastation as was witnessed today in Kano? Today over 100 Nigerians' lives were wasted in Kano under the continuing siege of the country by these faceless and cowardly miscreants. Again, Nigerians are mourning and afraid of what is becoming of their dear country. Icheoku says it is not only Kano people that the devastation happened to, it happened to the entire Nigerian people, whose fellow countrymen and women were  so callously and needlessly blown to pieces and shot with automatic weapons. Something need to be done to stem this mayhem or at least clot the bleeding. 

Icheoku says it is about time this madness is stopped and to do this, all Nigerians should see themselves as having a skin in the game; otherwise the effort to rid Nigeria of this scourge would linger on for a long time to come if not forever. Nigerians, Icheoku says, please let us all come together and join hands and give Boko Haram a concerted chase, similar to that which saw Ebola Virus Disease roundly defeated. Let us all, once and for all, rid the country of the Boko Haram continuing reek of goriness and take our country back from these bloodthirsty marauding jackals. Enough of the partisanship; enough of the sectionalism; enough of the political cum religious undertone; enough of the blame game; enough of passing of the buck and of course enough of the tepid approach, all of which are bedeviling the current effort at crushing Boko Haram! This bloodshed must end and now is the time to end it. Away with Boko Haram and may such primitive ideology, driving this lunacy, be mightily crushed and NOW.

THE OBAMA POWER MYTH, BEING IN POWER DOES NOT MEAN HAVING POWER?

Icheoku says still wondering why President Barack Obama, the first and probably the ever black president America would have, cannot do anything to fix black peoples problems in America, Africa and the world over including Haiti? Wonder no more because his is an example of a tragic-comedy of being in power but without having power. He is just but a number out of the many that constitute the jigsaw of American power structure; and in a democracy, his voice is but one and coupled to power of persuasion can only sway but a few. 

Also the United States Senate, another power repository, has 100 all white senators, none of whom is a colored person until very recently with then Senator Obama and currently Senator Booker of Newark New Jersey who is still the only minority senator in the US senate? They vote accordingly and they vote the interest they represent. So could someone please tell Icheoku why these all white senators should seriously concern themselves with "extra curricular" issues that does not advance white domination or which would water it down or threaten it. 

Power in America belongs to various entities including Wall Street, the business community, military/industrial complex, the congress and of course the security agencies. So to get any pendulum-swaying thing done, these various bodies must first be persuaded on it and even lobbied hard for them to sign off on it? Now because majority of them are virtually 100% white controlled, effecting any legislation that would favor minorities including black people often meets Kevlar bullet-proof resistance. So one does not need to be a  rocket scientist to figure out why the colored man in "their" White House is powerless in the face of all these numerous challenges facing black Americans.  To some folks, it is rather surprising that the president could not send in the cavalry to save them from the constant provocations by white people who seemingly are now doubling-down on minorities especially black people under his watch? Icheoku says it is not as if the president does not in his heart of hearts want and desire to do something about it in order to affect the status quo, but he cannot and does not have the ability to so do. 

Unfortunately the president is bound to that fate and any attempt by him to overreach himself might be forcibly resisted; and if it includes terminating his presidency in any way possible, so be it. After all this is America and in America, vested interests and dollar bills are the only two things that actually matter and propel everything. It therefore goes without saying that anyone in the White House must respect this gear that drives America; a fact that becomes even more imperative when that person is a "That One". This is the complexity of the now in America especially with regard to the disillusionment of many with  the Obama presidency. It also further drives the disappointment in the African American community, that their OWN person is in the White House and is not coming to their aid and rescue from all these white police officers who are constantly and frequently killing their children. When the high unemployment rate in their community, joblessness, dysfunctional homes, rapid-fire imprisonments and a skewed justice system, unfairly targeting blacks, as well as a laundry list of other things disproportionately affecting African Americans then their anger and disappointment at the president boils over. 

It is not as if these tipped scale just effervesced overnight, no, they have been there for ages and this is what stirred the joy and jubilation that initially accompanied President Obama's election, that at last a messiah has come to liberate them and lessen their burden. But as every black person in America is sadly finding out, it seems their lot was perhaps better under the previous order. At least there was no great expectation, hence no disappointment; as everybody knew what the deal was right off the bat. But when you have your own person in authority, expecting that he would do something to alleviate your hardship and he does not, disappoints you or fails to meet your expectation, then it become doubly troubling. This is the fate of blacks in America as well as the overall minorities under President Barack Obama's presidency. Their heightened expectations and raised hopes were not only not met, but were dashed; and regrettably, they may never recover from their damaged psyche to start believing in fairness of America again. 

Icheoku understands the power game in America and knows the great limitations of President Barack Obama. As a result, instead of joining the lynch mob, Icheoku sympathizes with the man who is hanging in that limbo and perhaps praying he safely completes his term in office. Icheoku does not particularly blame him for failing to do much and/or for literally doing nothing for the black community of America. Desiring an outcome is one thing and being allowed to 'mission accomplish' it, is another; and Icheoku honesty believe that the later was the president's hamstrung not the former. Good intentions that were frustrated was a major part of it and on hindsight, possibly he is regretting ever running for the office when he could not use it to reposition things and/or making promises that he did not know then they would not allow him to fulfill. 

Anyway, it is the way of the world and it is what it is; admitted that blacks are heavily disappointed that one of them could not and was unable to salvage or ameliorate their situation in America. But black  Americans will survive, they survived 400 years of slavery, they survived pre-Obama presidency and they will survive anything post-Obama presidency will throw at them. It will not matter either what the white people decides to further dump at them to make their lives more living hellish and as punishment that one of them dared occupy "their" White House and as deterrent for any future further attempt? It would only require perseverance and prayerful stoicism as well as strength to overcome the future without a "protector" in "them" White House. Icheoku says when the history and stock of President Obama's presidency is finally written and taken, it will be possibly summarized thus: "His, was an example of when being in power does not translate into and is not tantamount to having power and black Americans felt the impact roundly."

ORJI KALU Vs. ORJI UZOR KALU, A TESTAMENT AGAINST POLITICAL GOD-FATHERISM?

Icheoku says any observer of the Nigerian political landscape, particularly as it appertains to Abia State, would have noticed the cut-throat rivalry or rather intolerance of one another that is existing between the current state governor Orji Kalu and his erstwhile mentor and former governor of the same state Orji Uzor Kalu. This fact of consequence has so perturbed Icheoku that Icheoku wonders what in the hell is wrong with Igbo people that they cannot easily get along together with themselves? Their penchant for always wanting to be in the lead and never to be led; as well as their never submitting under the authority of one of them, especially one that knows better, is an issue of grave concern and a militating factor against their political progress in Nigeria. Icheoku asks Igbo people and their republicanism, to please tell Icheoku how far this their attitude has led them and how many leaders can a people have at the same time? 

Icheoku is writing this opinion piece because ever since the present governor was smuggled or "elected", straight from where he was locked up in jail to the government house in Umuahia, there is no love lost between him and the very man that supervised that feat. Well meaning Nigerians, including none biased Igbo people as well as Icheoku ask in bewildered amazement, what is this beef between the apparent mentor and his mentored, that cannot be settled? Whatever it is, does the present governor not ever advert his mind that without the former governor's help, that he would not have become the governor of Abia state? Further, that irrespective of how personally popular he might have been during that election,  that being physically in prison,  drastically and automatically constrained his chances of being elected governor? Yet he won and someone made it possible; but suddenly that facilitator is now the governor's worst enemy? This baffles many conscientious and objective observers of the politics of Abia State and they want an answer as well as a resolution of whatever it is that tore this people apart.

Why, Icheoku asks, cannot this governor let bygones be bygones and let all Abian PDP politicians move forward as a one united partisans? Plateau State Governor Jang just showed an example of how to carry all the people along by reconciling with all hitherto disenfranchised Plateau State PDP politicians, including former governor Dariye. Icheoku emphasizes that at least, Governor Orji Kalu should show some respect to his former mentor, Uzor Orji Kalu, and allow him some political space to operate in his Abia State. As his predecessor and the man who once held fort therein, it is a good political gesture and laudable magnanimity and by necessary implication, precedent setting. Governor Orji Kalu himself will soon become an ex-governor and Icheoku asks would he accept what he is presently dishing out to the man he succeeded from his successor? Icheoku says their latest dirty fight over the refusal of the governor to let the former governor go to the senate is otherwise avoidable, were the governor a thinking politician who craves a place in history.  The smack down which has forced the former governor to demand refund of his deposit and incidental fees for declaration of interest,  shows that their family feud has no end in sight and has only become more asinine. Icheoku condemns this unforgiven spirit of the governor and maintains that Orji Uzor Kalu has suffered enough political isolation in the hands of the man he helped become governor of Abia State from where he was in prison and deserves some reprieve. 

The only good lesson derivable from this Abia State impasse  is the utility or otherwise of sponsoring or endorsing anyone to any political office in Nigeria. As has been shown with the current governor of Abia State who later turned around to become his sponsor's worst nightmare, such is an effort in futility. A nemesis of some sort, who would readily brand such sponsor his worst enemy number one that must be politically crushed or caged, isolated, banished and emasculated completely. Icheoku strongly believes that on hindsight, Orju Uzor Kalu must be regretting his action, ever sponsoring a man who is in prison custody to the governorship of Abia State. That the same man was an Alusi Okija deity worshipper did not matter to Orji Uzor Kalu then, nor deterred his action to "elect" him as governor to occupy the government house in Umuahia? But hey, Icheoku has no dog in the fight and so could care less who Abians decided should governor them or how they went about arriving at that decision. What a hard, bitter lesson to learn, that sometimes your well intentioned action often turns out to be your worst nightmare. But illegality is illegality and if it begets illegality, so be it, who gives a damn? 

Lastly, because humans do not necessarily learn from history or allow past experiences to guide their present action, the present crop of soon to be ex-governors are busy endorsing and sponsoring candidates to succeed them as well to other legislative offices of their states. Icheoku asks what is the guarantee that they will not similarly suffer the same fate which they are exposing their former mentors to; assuming what goes around still comes around?  Are these soon to be former governors not thinking that possibly their new political god-sons might someday suddenly grow up, following their inauguration, and begin to chastise them to the extent of even chasing them away from their states? But only time will tell the treachery hidden in the hearts of men. Icheoku and the elements "dey laugh" at the follies and foibles of man, as presented by these current lords of manor in these states, who presently see themselves as demo-gods, before whom every person in their state must bow and tremble. But one good thing with time and which time only does very well, is human humbling. Icheoku says sooner than later, it will be deja vu pay back time, with these now beloved political god-sons dealing the then former governors the same very back hands these governors are presently dealing their own predecessors. What indeed are we humans, that we are this daft, not to correctly imbibe history and apply it as our guiding compass to all our future actions? 

EVERYTHING IS GOING DOWN - BUHARI?

"Everything is going down in spite of all the money. What are they doing with the money. We must stop PDP from destroying this country. If we don’t get rid of the PDP, PDP will get rid of (us) Nigerians. We are fed up. Whatever your sentiments let us work together and rebuild this country.” - Muhammadu Buhari.