August 29, 2015

THE NATION SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

NEWS 3

Buhari’s appointments: War of the ‘southern leader’ Inside Plauteau’s

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ARELY two days after the accusative Southern Nigeria and purpose. The resurgence may gather steam in the weeks Peoples Assembly, a.k.a. southern leaders or SNPA, pointed ahead, going by the southern leaders' clever casus belli. Apart out what they described as President Muhammadu Buhari's from suggesting President Buhari's appointments so far have not inequitable pro-North appointments, the president blithely went been fairly spread, a point seized upon by the Southeast to label ahead to announce a few more positions along his idiosyncratically the president insular, they are also suggesting that his anti-graft default, pro-North mode. The new appointments have caused a war has become selective. huge uproar, an uproar that had been seething below the surface for weeks. After he was sworn in on May 29, the president's critics As brilliant as the need to fight graft is, and as great as it sounds reminded the nation, his first set of appointments largely benefited to talk of looking for brilliant people to serve in his government, the North. Some three or four tokenistic positions, they added, President Buhari must not forget that in a democracy, politics is were grudgingly conceded to the South the common denominator, the out of the 15 or so appointments made so unassailable leitmotif. He must be far. And in a scathing but informative cognisant of the numerous, if sometimes July interview, Col Tony Nyiam (retd) powerful, tendencies in the society, not had also wondered whether those who only in terms of opinions and beliefs, but

By AYKUBE accused President Buhari of being caged also in terms of appointments, positions were not accurately reflecting the nation's and ethnic dynamics. As popular and sad reality. timely as the first 1966 coup was, for instance, it quickly became embroiled in the quagmire of tribal and regional politics because At any rate, Thursday's fresh presidency appointments will of wrong perceptions. Part of the job of politics is recognising, doubtless give amperage and trenchancy to the criticisms of the managing and placating society's competing tendencies. President southern leaders who had suggested in their Tuesday Akure, Buhari will have no choice but to find ways to manage this Ondo State, meeting that the president was not really mindful of difficult political chore that obtrudes on his leisurely pace and the insularity of his appointments. There had been some programmes. suggestions that the public needed to wait until the president had concluded his appointments in order to be able to accurately gauge For now, the southern leaders, the Southwest section of which is their temper and colour. After Thursday's announcement of fresh an aggrieved faction of the Yoruba socio-cultural and political appointments, it is doubtful whether apart from the expected organisation, the Afenifere, are more or less a part of the Peoples ministerial postings in September there are any other presidency Democratic Party defeated in the last presidential poll. President appointments sensitive enough to arrest the attention of the public Buhari should run his government at an elevated, transcendental or preclude an accurate conclusion. level, and make appointments and enact policies that will persuade the public to view the SNPA as an appendage of the Perhaps President Buhari will feel the need to offer logical loathed and defeated PDP. If by chance reasons for what his critics say is the that loathsome view is altered beneficially skewness of his presidency appointments. for the southern leaders and they gradually And perhaps those reasons will be become rehabilitated and are recast as the persuasive enough. But if the reasons do South's popular and leading opinion not cut ice with the people, if indeed the moulders, then the South's progressive critics see the appointments made so far as forces will become weakened, thereby indicative of the president's mindset and of vitiating the hold of the APC on the South's his general lack of exposure and closed geopolitical zones. circle of trusted friends, he faces the danger of allowing a critical mass of southern This dreaded mutation is not far-fetched. animosity to form against his presidency Even if APC leaders refuse to acknowledge and against his government's political and it, the Southeast and a section of both the bureaucratic exclusionism. In particular, South-South and Southwest are beginning the southern leaders in the SNPA will feel to fear that an unhealthy skewness might reassured in their conclusions about the have slipped into the Buhari government's Buhari presidency, and engender a new appointments. That skewness, which may vroom and venom to their pained voice, if in time be transferred to policies, has the public and commentators respond well probably led to appointments that give the to their pungent view of the Buhari wrong impression of deliberate presidency. orchestration of northern political irredentism and bureaucratic reclamation.

Politics is all about perception. President This is probably unintended. If that Buhari must be encouraged to deftly impression is in fact unfounded, then those manage how his government is perceived. who have the ears of the president, either It is doubtful whether at the moment, and in the wider public or in the ruling party, given the temper and colour of his must give him the benefit of their wisdom. appointments, his presidency is managing They must remind him that a few months that perception with the sensitivity the ago, Dr Jonathan found himself in that situation and the distress of the country distressing position of trying to undo the demands. He of course has the freedom to damage his thoughtless appointments of make appointments to suit his purpose; many years had caused him. Perhaps the and his party, the All Progressives damage during the Jonathan presidency Congress (APC), can do little to shape those was also unintended. But, alas, it was too appointments. But in Nigeria's syncretic late by the time he sought to remedy the and still coalescing democracy, it is situation. expected that the ruling party must form part of the defence bulwark for the president and the government.

If the progressives are to lead the country for a much longer time Whether the APC can play that onerous role when the chips are than their enemies hope, they will have to do much better in down is, however, a different matter, going by how the president policies and appointments. So far, their puny and conflicting has seemingly shut out the party from his critical appointments. efforts are depressingly uncoordinated and disconcerting. They will also have to learn to listen to those who even appear, like Shortly after the APC won the presidential election, Oba Rilwan Bishop Matthew Kukah, to be in love with the enemy and the Akiolu of Lagos was quoted as privately urging those who knew former president. They will have to learn to prosecute their good how to pray to intercede on behalf of APC leaders who, it seemed causes, not with the reckless bravado of fanatical politicians, but to him, were about to be shortchanged in terms of the spoils of with the calm and magisterial detachment of wise elders and electoral war concluded in April. Some weeks later, former APC statesmen. They will have to look at the bigger picture with the interim leader and one-time Osun State governor, Bisi Akande, paradoxical humility of those awed by the importance of their stridently warned that some parochial northerners were ganging future goals and the attraction of the distant utopia of their up against the Yoruba in the party. It is not clear just what level of dreams. disquiet exists in the APC, particularly its southern wing. But it won't take many more appointments, especially if mismanaged, to President Buhari will have to change tack and, in a brilliant and unravel the careful edifice built to snatch power from the sublime manner, do much more than he has done so far in policies, conservative Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). appointments and methods. He needs an expanded and expansive vision of himself and the country he leads to enable him engage After the elections, groups that reasoned and politicked like the the electorate and revamp and remould Nigeria. For, whether he SNPA were fading in national significance and relevance. The likes it or not, his methods are as relevant and invaluable as his SNPA had met in January in Enugu at a well-attended forum to goals. If democracy is to endure, and if Nigeria is to achieve the endorse former president Goodluck Jonathan. Critics had greatness that has eluded it for decades, then President Buhari will suggested they were presumptuous to label themselves southern have to dig deeper and fetch a magical rabbit from somewhere. It leaders, not to talk of the additional mishap of choosing Dr will indeed be sad if the southern leaders who foolishly endorsed Jonathan as the South's standard-bearer. The spectacular Dr Jonathan in Enugu in January, and gathered again in Akure shellacking they and their candidate received was strong enough early this week to complain of selective anti-graft war and to consign them to the dunghill of Nigerian politics. Unfortunately, parochial appointments, are rearmed by a presidential lack of President Buhari's leadership orientation and methods are caution to regain their force and voices in the nation's body politic. exhuming them and imbuing the pressure group with a new life

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CROSSFIRE

UNDER OW

war of attrition

Berom, Fulani trade blame as fear of ethnic cleansing heightens As Fulani militia continue to hunt for lives among their Berom hosts, there are fears of systematic advent of ethnic cleansing and calls on government to nip the trend in the bud. YUSUFU AMINU IDEGU reports on the renewed killings and the resultant humanitarian crisis.

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INCE February this year, no fewer than 200 Berom people are reckoned to have been killed by gunmen suspected to be Fulani herdsmen. More than 15 Berom villages have also been sacked in a trend that has raised fears of ethnic cleansing systematically carried out by the Fulani militia. The population of orphans is on the rise, just as more and more young widows and widowers are being produced on a daily basis.

Indeed the fear is heightening that the Birom ethnic group may be wiped out in the near future unless the government does something to check the activities of the gunmen that hold the people hostage.

The Berom people had to take their case to the Secretary General of the United Nations, Bank KiMoon during his visit to Nigeria early in the week because they were beginning to think that the government was not interested in their case. The restoration of peace which the Berom people had expected from the administration of Governor Simon Lalong has also turned into a pipe dream as the peace and reconciliatory committee constituted by the governor does not seem to have an answer to the crisis. The government has held three different peace parleys with the stakeholders since Lalong assumed office with strong appeals for calm, but that does not seem to have altered the trend.

Rather than allow peace to reign, the Berom and the Fulani are back in their trenches. Consequently violent conflicts have been the order in the last two months. The warring parties have engaged in series of attacks and counter-attacks, prompting Governor Lalong to impose a dusk to dawn curfew in the areas twice in the last two months. Yet, there seems to be no respite as the warring parties appear to have transferred their aggressions to innocent road users.

Knowingly or unknowingly, both parties have launched attacks on innocent travellers at one time or the other while laying ambush for each other.

Last week, following the eruption of violence in

Continued on Page 7 A student of Federal Polytechnic Nasarawa Gyang Pam shot in the eye later died in Plateau Specialists Hospital Jos

Planned probe of Niger Delta Ministry It is no surprise that the former President Goodluck Jonathan failed woefully because he surrounded himself with such charlatans as Godsday Orubebe, whose only credential is his ethnic origin and the large size of his bowler hat. Here was a man whose un-ministerial conduct at the election nearly plunged the nation into an avoidable crisis We are not surprised at the timing of Orubebe's latest outburst. It is, no doubt, not unconnected with the planned probe by President Muhammadu Buhari of the billions of naira allocated to the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs, even as the East-West road remains in bad shape...

-- Adams Oshiomhole

I am proud to have been a vital instrument used by God to take the once abandoned East- West road project to an admirable 80 percent level of completion. It is unfortunate that our respected Niger Delta could produce the likes of Oshiomhole who is a garage boy that should be at the motor park. … I have my facts to prove my points. I am not afraid of probe.

-- Godsday Orubebe

4 NEWS

THE NATION SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

Sagay: Activist don in familiar terrain Many have hailed the choice of Sagay as the committee's head. Prof. Sagay is passionate about human rights and democracy. At every opportunity, he does not leave anyone in doubt as to where his allegiance is to the people, and he is not apologetic about it. “I was politically aware at the age of 21

Gbade OGUNWALE, Assistant Editor, Abuja

Joseph JIBUEZE

THE NATION SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

NEWS 5

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THE NATION, SATURDAY AUGUST 29, 2015

News

•Some vehicles seized by troops from Boko Haram insurgents in Borno

•The three suspects arrested . See story on Page 4

Buhari defends appointment of SGF, others P

RESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari yesterday de fended the appointment of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Babachir David Lawal and five others.

The appointments, announced on Thursday, had sparked reactions, with reports of complaints in some quarters that they tilted in favour of the North.

Appointed alongside Lawal were Alhaji Abba Kyari, Chief of Staff to the President; Col. Hameed Ibrahim Ali (rtd), Comptroller-General of the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS); Mr. Kure Martins Abeshi, Comptroller-General of the Nigerian Immigration Service; Senator Ita Enang, Senior Special Assistant (SSA) to the President on National Assembly Matters (Senate) and Hon. Suleiman Kawu, SSA to the President on National Assembly Matters (House of Representatives).

The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, yesterday assured Nigerians that President Muhammadu Buhari’s political appointments will balance out soon.

Adesina spoke on a radio programme, Political Platform, on RayPower 100.5FM, monitored by our correspondent in Lagos.

Adesina said the President

•President says positions will go round soon Innocent DURU; Okodili NDIDI, Owerri; and Nicholas KALU, Calabar

was aware of federal character and expressed the belief that there will be balance by the time he makes more appointments in September.

While admitting that appointments are Buhari’s prerogative, the presidential spokesman also said that nobody can fault the fact that those that have been named so far ?were appointed on merits.

He also said it would not be fair to blame the President for positions that were filled as a result of elections, like those of the National Assembly and appointments made on the basis of next in command, like those of the acting Chairman of the Independent Electoral Commission and Chief Justice of Nigeria.

He assured all stakeholders that the President would keep to his promise of appointing the remaining aides and ministers ?in September.

Adesina said: “Nobody can fault the fact that the persons appointed were appointed on merits.

“In terms of the spread, the President has prerogative to appoint and he knows there is

federal character. I am sure that there will be balance in the future.

“These are still early days. At the end of the day, we will have a balance.

“By the time more appointments are made, it will balance out. The President is trying to get the very best of Nigerians.

The issue of key positions and no key positions should not be the issue.

“He gave a deadline of September for the appointment of ministers, ?and he will keep to it.”

The President’s Senior Special Assistant Media and Publicity, Mallam Garba Shehu, also issued a statement yesterday urging critics of the President’s appointments to be patient with the administration over political appointments, adding that the appointments made so far constitute less than five per cent of the total that would be made.

Besides, he said, the people so far appointed by the President are mostly people acting as his staff or unofficial advisers, many of whom had been working with him in official capacities.

The statement reads: “Our brothers and sisters and fellow countrymen should bear with

Buhari’s template good for responsible governance, says APC chief Ideh

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TSEKIRI leader and chief tain of All Progressives Con gress (APC), Dr. Alex Ideh, has appraised the performance of President Muhammadu Buhari in his first 100 days, saying that the President has carved a template that would accelerate the nation’s development.

While there had been complaints in some quarters about alleged slow pace of the administration, the APC chieftain said in a statement he issued in Warri, Delta State yesterday that the President’s “meticulous approach” was due to his determination to lay the foundation of sustainable structures for “good, transparent and people-oriented governance.”

Defending the steps taken so far by the three-month-old administration, Ideh, a two-term commissioner in Delta State and secretary to the APC National Convention Committee which produced Buhari as the party’s flag bearer, called for patience and understanding of Nigerians in rallying support for the President.

The statement reads in part:

“I can assure all Nigerians that the President is actually working out a template for good, transparent and people-oriented governance.

“Things might appear to be somehow slow on the surface, but a lot is going on silently. We voted for change, but if it is not built on a solid or concrete foundation, in no distant future after the expiration of the tenure of the Buhari administration, the nation might slither back into corruption and mismanagement of our commonwealth.

“Streamlining federal ministries, parastatals and agencies are part of the work going on.

Discovering and blocking loopholes and wastages are also being worked on. Preparing a ground for smooth take-off of this administration in all areas is part of what the president is doing at the moment.

“Nigerians are fortunate to have President Buhari at this critical period in the nation’s history who willingly offered to rescue the nation from the brink of total economic gloom back to normalcy.

“The first step in this direction is confronting and defeating the hydra-headed monster called corruption which is germane to the emerging development, especially on the economic sphere.

“For instance, because President Buhari is in the saddle, some things have started working and Nigerians are beginning to feel the impact of the change in leadership.

“Take power supply for example. As at today, we have a marked improvement in power supply in many parts of the country. Likewise, the petroleum sector is receiving attention while lopsided last-minute appointments made by the immediate past administration are being reviewed or redressed.

“With the recent appointments of Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Chief of Staff and a few other strategic positions, it further confirms that Mr. President is working steadily behind the scene to firmly reposition the sliding quality of governance especially at the centre.”

the new administration as it takes its measured steps towards an effective take-off.

“These appointments are just beginning. The ones down so far, apart from the security services, are mostly of people acting as unofficial advisers or staff of the President.

“They are mostly men and women who have been doing things for the President and the positions are being formalised.

“Statistically, the appointments don't amount to five per cent of what is to come. There will be ministers, heads of government departments, federal boards and ambassadors.

“At the end of the exercise, no part of the country will be left feeling left out.”

Reacting to the appointments, a faction of the Movement for the Actualization of Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) had described them as an insult to the Igbo race whose members he said were not appointed into any top office.

The group, in a statement signed by its Director of Information, Uchenna Madu, said the actions of the president since he assumed office had shown that he is not a lover of Igbo people.

"The latest appointments and previous ones since Buhari’s administration should be an eye opener to Ndigbo that Buhari is not seeing Ndigbo as part of Nigeria.

"These appointments have further confirmed the fact that the present administration is against Ndigbo, despite the massive support some Igbo leaders like Gov. Rochas Okorocha, Chief Ogbonnaya Onu, Senator Chris Ngige and Rotimi Amaechi, among others, gave to Buhari and the APC during the last general election.

This is an insult to our people.”

In the same vein, the Ohaneze Youth Council (OYC) expressed concern over the President’s latest appointments, saying it was regrettable that no south easterner was included in the appointments.

In a statement signed by the organisation’s President and National Public Relations Officer, Mazi Okechukwu Isiguzoro and Hon. Obinna Adibe respectively, the group said the appointments were totally unacceptable to Ndigbo, adding that they violated the principle of federal character enshrined in the Nigerian constitution.

OYC said: “We stand to condemn the continuous exclusion of Ndigbo by the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari. Before this time, he had

appointed Service Chiefs without looking the way of the South East. To make matters worse, the position of the SGF, which was originally zoned to the Ndigbo, has been denied the region.

“We are indeed shocked by this turn of events, which are totally at variance with Mr. President’s earlier stand that he was for everybody and for nobody.”

However, another Igbo group, Ndigbo Unity Forum (NUF), voiced its support for President Buhari.

The Chairman of the group, Mr. Augustine Chukwudum, who is also president of the Southern Nigeria Peoples Mandate, called on the Igbo, in an interview with our correspondent, to support the President for him to achieve his aim of transforming the country.

NUF said: “We have been watching all that have been happening in the past few weeks, all the talks about the president marginalising Ndigbo.

“We want to use this opportunity to inform them, if they are not aware or not enlightened enough, that the President has not appointed his cabinet. I don’t see where the marginalization of Ndigbo has come in.

“Some Igbo leaders are just making noise for nothing. After all, those people who are condemning Buhari should be ashamed of themselves.

“We want Ndigbo to have a rethink of what is happening now. He has not done anything wrong to them.

“As president of Ndigbo Unity Forum, I still maintain that Buhari has not done anything wrong to my people. Let Ndigbo count their teeth with their tongue.”

Commenting on the appointments in a media briefing at the end of the 55th National Conference of the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) yesterday, its president, Austin Alegeh, said he was convinced President Buhari was committed to the country’s growth.

He said: “Probably, these are key technical positions that are being filled by the most competent available persons. But, you can always compensate when you are making other ministerial appointments. I think we should all adopt attitude of patience, and should always have trust and confidence in the people we have elected.

“We must know that the president won this election with many people contributing to the election. So, let us look at the

appointments he has made along those lines.

“I have listened to the President speak and I can see his conviction in a greater and better Nigeria.

“I am not a party man, and I am not his personal friend, but from what I have seen, I have no doubt in my mind that he means the best for Nigeria, that he will not do anything to infringe the Nigerian Constitution.

“But let us wait for all the appointments to be in before we start talking of federal character.”

Lagos-based lawyer, Festus Keyamo also issued a statement yesterday, saying that “the socalled ‘uproar’ over the perceived ‘lopsided’ appointments made so far by President Buhari is nothing but an orchestrated frustration of a few jobless politicians who depend only on government appointments as their means of livelihood and, of course, the noise of the latest opposition party in town.”

He said majority of Nigerians only want to see good governance and care less about the ethnic origin of those appointed into positions.

“My worry is that the decade-long general division of government positions into ‘juicy’ and ‘non-juicy’, and the mentality that these few ‘juicy’ positions must be shared equally amongst the major ethnic groups was nothing but a contraption of the old order from which we have just liberated ourselves,” he said.

“To my mind, all government appointments pose an equal challenge to those appointed as a call to higher service of fatherland.

“All public positions come with an equal responsibility to be honest, forthright and dedicated. To go further to classify them as ‘juicy’ or ‘non-juicy’ is just a euphemism for positions that have enough money from which to steal and those that are ‘dry’.

“Therefore, any agitation from a section of the country to get ‘juicy’ positions is only an agitation for their kinsmen to be appointed to steal enough from which they would benefit.

“I therefore unreservedly condemn, in the strongest of terms, the so-called ‘uproar’ about ‘juicy positions’ going only to a certain section of this country. All sections of this country should be happy and content with whatever positions the President deems fit, at the end of the day, to give to their kinsmen.

“After all, the President still has a long way to go with appointments. He has not even filled up to five per cent of available positions. Please, let the President be.”

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THE NATION, SATURDAY AUGUST 29, 2015

News

Install competent Ooni, Obasanjo tells Ife kingmakers

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ORMER President Olusegun Obasanjo yes terday advised the kingmakers and the high chiefs of Ile-Ife to ensure that a rightful, competent and capable prince is selected and installed as the new Ooni.

Addressing? members of the ruling houses, the kingmakers and the high chiefs while commiserating with them on Oba Okunade Sijuwade's transition in Ile Ife, Obasanjo called for transparency, fairness, honesty and openness in the choice of the late Ooni’s successor in order to engender peace, harmony and tranquility in Ile-Ife and its environs.

The former President, who also cautioned against violence and chaos in the selection process, maintained that any disunity witnessed in Ile-Ife would send a bad signal into the lives of the people not only in Ife but in the entire Yoruba race.

He described the stool of the Ooni as dignifying?, significant

Adesoji ADENIYI, Osogbo and central to the Yoruba race and must therefore be occupied by a ?man of honour and dignity.

According to him, whoever must be enthroned should possess sterling qualities of a royal pedigree and antecedents.

He said: "With the demise of the Ooni, the entire Yorubaland has been thrown into mourning?. So, after Oba Sijuwade, the spirit of unity, peaceful coexistence and stability laid by him must be sustained.

“This is the season of financial and material inducements from aspiring royal candidates.

I want to advise the kingmakers to abstain from any act capable of undermining the royal integrity and soaring image of Ile Ife which symbolises the source and cradle of Yoruba race.

"No doubt, the whole world is looking forward to a clean outcome of the selection process

as well as the installation of the new monarch.

“I am saying that anybody that would fill the vacant stool should start from where the Oba Sijuwade stopped.

“So, this is the period for the kingmakers to demonstrate high level of discipline, credibility and honesty in choosing a revered person based on merit, competence and proficiency to succeed Oba Sijuwade.

"Oba Sijuwade was a symbol

of unity, peace, harmony, who used his position to foster peaceful co-existence between Yoruba, Hausa and Igbo throughout his lifetime, and his notable contributions to the development and sustenance of the cultural heritage of Yoruba race within and outside Nigeria would forever be remembered and celebrated."

He commiserated with the wives and children of the late Oba as well as the chiefs,

friends, associates, government and people of Osun State for “the irreparable loss that the departed soul has caused,” urging them to be consoled with the fact that Sijuwade lived a fulfilled life.

He prayed God to comfort the bereaved family and give the ancient town a worthy person to take over the throne.

Responding on behalf of other chiefs, the Obalufe of

Iremo Quarters, Oba Solomon Omisakin, expressed gratitude to Chief Olusegun Obasanjo for the visit and promised to ensure fairness and transparency in the selection and enthronement of the new monarch.

Oba Omisakin pledged that Ile Ife as the source of Yoruba race would not in any circumstance engage in any negative activity that could tarnish their soaring image and reputation, before, during and after selection process and installation.

Police redeploy 19 AIGs, 49 CPs …as IG appoints first female force spokesperson

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HE Inspector General of Police, Solomon Arase, yesterday approved the redeployment o?f 19 Assistant Inspectors General in various states.

Arase also redeployed 49 ?Commissioners of Police.

The posting, according to a statement from the Force Public Relations Officer, CSP Abayomi Shogunle, followed the vacancies created from the recent retirement and promotion of senior police officers.

The statement added that the former Force Public Relations Officers CP Emmanuel Ojukwu, had been redeployed to Kogi State as the Command’s CP. Also yesterday, the Inspector General of Police, Solomon Arase, appointed Acting Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Olabisi Alofe Kolawole, as the new Force Public Relations Officer.

Kolawole becomes the first female police officer to be appointed as the spokesperson of the Police Force at federal level.

The appointment, according to a statement from the Deputy Force Public Relations, CSP Abayomi Shogunle, is geared towards harnessing the potential of Nigerian ?female police officers.

Kolawole, who holds a first degree in Law from Ogun State University and a Masters degree in Police Leadership and Management from the Univer-

Faith YAHAYA, Abuja sity of Leicester, United Kingdom, replaces CP Emmanuel Ojukwu who is now the Commissioner of Police, Kogi State Command.

The new FPRO has served in various capacities at national and international levels. She was the Force Gender Adviser before her recent posting.

The statement said that Arase also appointed Ag. ACP Idowu Owohunwa as Principal Staff Officer (PSO) to the IGP. The new PSO, who holds a bachelors degree in International Studies from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria as well as a Masters degree in Criminal Justice and Policing from University of Leeds, United Kingdom, has served the Nigeria Police in diverse capacities, such as Staff Officer to the 2006 Alhaji Dan Madami-Chaired Presidential Committee on Nigeria Police Reforms and Divisional Crime Officer, National Assembly Complex Police Division, Abuja.

He was pioneer head of the Intelligence Analysis Unit of the Force Intelligence Bureau.

Ag. ACP Owohunwa takes over from CP Austin Iwar who is now the Commissioner of Police, Gombe State Command.

Before his appointment as PSO, Owohunwa was the Personal Assistant (PA) to the current IGP.

•From left: Ridwanulahi Olanite; Wahab Shittu, lead counsel, Vintage Press Limited; Alayo Akanbi and Emmanuel Sadoh PHOTO ABIODUN WILLIAMS during the hearing of a suit by Vintage Press Limited at the Federal High Court, Ikoyi, Lagos

Senate served with order in The Nation’s suit

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HE National Assembly has been served with the in terim order of injunction restraining the Senate from compelling The Nation’s Editor, Gbenga Omotoso, and a correspondent, Imam Bello, to appear before its Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions over a story.

A proof of service filed by a Federal High Court bailiff, Lambo Moshood, shows that the Senate was served on August 27.

In an Affidavit of Service which he swore to, the bailiff said a Deputy Clerk of the National Assembly, who gave his name as Martins, received the processes.

He said he met Martins at the National Assembly Complex, Three Arm Zone, Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja at about 2.14 pm.

Among processes served are a copy of the court order, a Motion on Notice, an Originating Motion, Written Addresses and

Joseph JIBUEZE, Abuja affidavit exhibits.

Justice Mohammed Yunusa made the order on August 21 following a motion ex-parte moved by the applicants’ lawyer, Mr Wahab Shittu.

Vintage Press Limited (publisher of The Nation), Omotoso and Bello are the applicants, while the National Assembly and the Senate are the respondents.

The Senate had in an August 4 letter invited Omotoso and Bello to appear before it unfailingly over the story: ‘Motion: 22 APC Northern senators ‘working against Buhari’, published on July 30.

The Senate wrote another letter on August 11, threatening to invoke Section 89 (1) (D) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) to compel the applicants' appearance.

But Justice Yunusa granted an order of interim injunction

Electricity: NBA seeks abolition of fixed charge

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HE Nigerian Bar Associa tion (NBA) has called for the abolition of fixed charge being paid by electricity consumers in the country, saying that it is unjustifiable and illegal.

It recommended that the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission’s (NERC’s) policy on maintenance fees charged on meters amount to oppressive multiple taxation and should be discontinued forthwith.

The association also called for the abolition of oil subsidy policy in view of the corruption in the process and suggested transparent harnessing and deployment of the nation’s resources.

NBA, which justified the law prohibiting same-sex marriage, said the law on prohibition of the practice “does not amount to a violation of any

Eric IKHILAE, Abuja individual’s fundamental human rights.”

On the position of the law on the role of First Ladies, the association noted that although wives of the President and governors could contribute to national development, “there being no constitutional recognition of that office, the first lady is to complement the duties of the President and not embark on any parallel programme already captured within various ministries.

“Projects of the First Lady should be funded from the private sector and not from public funds.”

These formed part of recommendations contained in a communique issued yesterday in Abuja at the end of the NBA’s

55 annual conference. The NBA President, Augustine Alegeh (SAN) read the communique.

The NBA said it would partner with government in the fight against corruption, being critical to national development, and shall work assiduously towards achieving a positive attitude against corruption within the Bench and the Bar. “Also critical to national development is the removal of fuel subsidy as it is one of the aggravating factors in corruption in that sector apart from the potential for national development thus afforded if funds thus freed up are duly harnessed,” it said.

The association called for prompt passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) in view of its critical importance for the nation’s development and noted that there was need for major

review to include the removal of clauses which tend to delimit the rights of the access to the courts by citizens who are negatively affected by petroleum operations, reduce the wide and overriding powers of the minister.

“Oil Companies causing environmental degradation shall in addition to fines imposed by government pay a fair, full and adequate compensation to any persons aggrieved as determined by a Judge sitting in the jurisdiction of injury whether state or federal, provided that the sum payable shall be as determined by an advisory ad hoc multi-disciplinary college of referees appointed by the Judge comprising toxicologists, surveyors and valuers whose fees shall be charged to the polluter,” it said.

restraining the respondents, whether by themselves, their members, committees or agents from summoning or directing the appearance of the applicants or any of their agents before any Senate Committee.

The court barred the lawmakers from requesting the applicants to produce any papers, notes or other documents in respect of the story.

The judge also restrained the respondents from issuing a warrant to compel the applicants’ attendance before the Senate Committee set up to investigate the publication.

The order, the judge held, is to remain in force pending the hearing and determination of the applicants’ motion on notice.

Shittu, in a supporting affidavit to the motion ex-parte, said unless the respondents were restrained, there was a great likelihood of the breach or threatened breach of the applicants’ fundamental rights to receive and impart information as guaranteed by the Constitution.

The applicants said the content of the publication has not been disputed or challenged, nor has the National Assembly issued a rejoinder to the story or made a formal complaint over the publication.

According to them, the laws of libel and slander are available to anyone who feels aggrieved by any offensive publication, an option that is also available to the Senate.

Shittu said rather than react to the story or deny it, the Senate wrote to the applicants directing them to compulsorily appear before the committee or risk being arrested.

The lawyer said the applicants are seeking to enforce their fundamental human rights to personal liberty and freedom of expression.

He said the story, which is of national interest, was published

based on “anonymous but informed sources” who cannot be disclosed to anyone in line with the ethics of journalism.

Shittu said the Senate was trying to compel the applicants to explain the source of the story, threatening to violate their right by arresting Omotoso and Bello should they fail to show up before its committee.

“The rights of the applicants to freedom of expression and the press guaranteed by Section 39 of the Constitution is about to be infringed upon except your Lordship interferes quickly before one of the country’s leading newspapers is brought to ridicule.

“If they (respondents) have any cause to challenge the story, they can go to court and sue for libel. They also have a right to publish a rejoinder.

Unless your Lordship restrains them, they will issue a Bench warrant and our clients will be embarrassed beyond repair.

“We urge your Lordship to grant the reliefs in the interim so that they will not foist a fait accompli (state of helplessness) on the honourable court,” Shittu said.

Besides, the lawyer said the Senate cannot compel the applicants to appear before it under Section 39 because the applicants are not a government agency, but members of the Fourth Estate of the Realm whose functions are guaranteed by the Constitution.

“Section 89 of the 1999 Constitution does not derogate from the rights guaranteed to the applicants under Section 39.

The invitation is intended to prevent the applicants from discharging their duties in the ordinary course of business,” Shittu said.

After listening to the submissions, Justice Yunusa held: “I have considered the processes filed and the constitutional provisions relied on. I hold the view that the application has merit and is hereby granted.”

Tony AKOWE, Abuja

It was expected that our peaceful stance, despite being the aggrieved party, would lead to a measure of fairness in handling the issue, but a deaf ear has been turned to our numerous pleas for the ban to be lifted. It is more than two years since construction work was stopped and yet nothing is being done about it

THE NATION, SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

10

Power, corruption and anxieties start today on the premise or saying that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. To dilate on this matter I will look at the life and times of three personalities in the news recently and the high expectations and anxieties hanging on their actions and inactions given their offices and ambitions in their environment. The first is our President Muhammadu Buhari, his fight against corruption and the public fury over the fact that most of the appointments he has announced so far have been lopsided in favor of the Northern part of the nation.

The second personality is Donald Trump, American real estate billionaire and for now the leading candidate of the Republican Party for the 2016 presidential elections in the US. The third is the EFCC Chairman Lamorde who is being tried for diversion of seized money by Nigeria’s Senate whose leader and his wife are good customers of the EFCC on allegations of corruption.

The three gentlemen are very powerful individuals and attention is being drawn to their use and misuse of power by their actions or inactions in the last few days.

Let me say clearly here that in any democracy such as Nigeria, the largest black nation in the world, and the US the leading global champion of democracy, the quest for equal opportunities and protection for all citizens, fairness and justice should be the yard stick to measure human progress and development. It is in the light of these values that I shall look at the relationship of these three leaders with the use of power or the quest for it in their various stations in life.

Starting with our President I think he should expect the brouhaha that the announcement of appointments has generated in the nation especially the South West.

This is because it was in the Southwest that the egg that hatched a famous presidential 2015 elections victory was hatched and there is no need to mention any name.

For now the people of the Southwest are stunned and in a quandary. It is not as if they are the only people in the South of Nigeria. But the last election results showed clearly that the South East and South South did not vote for the new president. So expectations are not high there on appointments as in the South west where there is palpable grief and disappointment on the domination of the North on the appointments so far. Which simply means that the President should do a rethink and redress the imbalance in the next list of presidential appointments. That is the only way to prevent the South East from celebrating what they see as the emasculation of the Southwest by the North and that really will be their way of making merry with the embarrassment of the South west which is what the present lopsidedness in announced appointments is all about.

Undoubtedly the President is experienced enough as a former Head of State and Commander In Chief to know

I

that those who have sour grapes over his election are going to make mischief out of the appointments as they are and revive the fear of the Born To Rule syndrome associated with a once dominant North in our recent political history. Surely that must be in the past now and the president’s subsequent appointments must reflect Nigeria’s federal character. A redress in the geopolitical in balance of the present appointments is needed urgently to reflect equity and justice and reward those in the President’s political camp who put their lives on the line to secure his election and give him the huge powers now at his disposal.

With regard to Donald Trump his quest for the presidency of the US was treated with levity and contempt before obviously because of his controversial public image and outspokenness. Now most Americans as well as their political leaders are laughing with the other end of their mouths as Donald Trump is slowly but surely emerging as the popular choice among Republican Party members and most ordinary Americans. Trump is handling the campaigns masterfully and is oratorically sounder than the rest of the Republican Party candidates and I am not too sure that he will not beat the famous Bush name. Just like Barak Obama emerged from the blues

’

I think he should expect the brouhaha that the announcement of appointments has generated in the nation especially the South West. This is because it was in the Southwest that the egg that hatched a famous presidential 2015 elections victory was hatched and there is no need to mention any name

a few years back to beat Hilary Clinton and clinch the Democratic Party ticket before going on to become the first elected black US president in history.

Donald Trump is lucky he is contesting in the US where he is assured that people will respect his immense wealth and know that he will not use his good offices when elected to loot the public wealth and common wealth. Which really is a common nagging problem in Nigeria when quite rich people go on to loot the state treasury on getting elected to public office. A situation that has made really honest and wealthy Nigerians to stay away from politics so that their clean money will not be dirtied by stolen public money which some have made indistinguishable from hard earned money by their greed and avarice.

Lastly the travails and trials of Nigeria’s Anti Corruption Czar Lamorde is to be expected. The saying is quite true here that those who live in glass houses should not throw stones. Lamorde should learn two things on the use and misuse of power on this senate trial. The first is that media trial of suspects and the destruction of reputation of suspects before going to court is not only unfair, it is unjust and undemocratic.

That is what the allegation against him has done with his reputation and he has virtually no sympathizers as this has been the modus operation of the EFCC since its inception and under his leadership. The second is that some crooks are bold and shameless enough to claim what they stole as their own and are ready to contest the amount in question. A former governor of Kano State once said he left a certain amount in government house far higher than what the police said they found and that is the same thing happening to the EFCC boss nowadays.

Undoubtedly I do not see Lamorde getting away with the allegations against him at a trial in a senate which has many of its members on trial by the EFCC in the media. In a way its payback time for the EFCC boss and I do not envy him the grilling and harsh questioning awaiting him. I pray all the same that he gets justice in our senate. Otherwise I take consolation in the statement that what is good for the goose is sauce for the gander. Again, long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

THE NATION, SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

COMMENTARY

11

The Muhammadu Buhari odyssey UHAMMADU Buhari’s most vivid childhood memory, which he still recalls hitherto was falling off a horse (a strawberry roan) on his way to the village well. He still recalls the fright he felt lying down between the feet of the enormous animal. He could see the horse’s big belly heaving and the five-stripes on its forelegs flashing before his eyes. At that instance, he thought to himself that the beast could kick or trample him to death. Still in pains, he hurriedly stood up, dusted his clothes, remounted the horse and continued his journey to the well In Homer’s Greek poetic masterpiece, The Odyssey, the hero, Odysseus, was, by and large, depicted as a man of outstanding endurance, courage, wisdom, eloquence, loyalty, honour, magnanimity and skill. From his heroic feat during the Trojan War to his wandering travails, which lasted for 10 years as he struggled to return home after the Trojan War and reassert his place as rightful leader, Odysseus’ bravery and skill are represented throughout the epic.

Every so often, through the ages, providence points out a person with the conclusive resolve, features or personality traits of a great leader.

In the case of Muhammadu Buhari, his odyssey started from birth, continued through his career and did not end after his retirement.

The name Muhammadu Buhari means different things to different people. Some erroneously claim he is an Islamic fundamentalist, while others say he is an ethnic bigot. However, the vast majority of the Nigerian people regard him as one of the most incorruptible individuals in the country and the man that can pull the country back from the precipice of self-destruction to which it is heading. This pervasive impression is founded on the performance of the military administration he once headed almost a generation ago. During election times, his person and reputation are consistently targeted. In other words, he is viewed in some quarters as one who loves his religion, Islam, and is proud of his Hausa/Fulani ethnic identity. But that does not automatically mean that he has an aversion to other religions or ethnic groups.

As is usual, when trying to get a better understanding of people, it is important to look back at their origins.

General Muhammadu Buhari was born on a Thursday, the 17th of December, 1942 at house No 14 Waziri road in Daura town, Katsina State, Northern Nigeria to a Fulani father and a Hausa mother. His mother was the daughter of Musa Sarkin Dogarai (Head of the Daura Infantry) who was also the son of the Kauran Daura Lawal (Head of the Daura Armed Forces) during the period of fierce battles between the Hausas and Fulanis for dominance in Daura in the early 1800’s. His maternal great grandfather, Mallam Adamu, was the son of a Kauran Kukawa, who was the head of the army during the fierce battles with the Rabe of the old Borno Empire. So it could be said that soldiering is in his blood. At the time of his birth, the world was still reeling from the horrors of the Second World War. On that day in December, 1942, the Allies issued the Joint Declaration by Members of the United Nations.

This was the first time the Holocaust was publicly acknowledged.

Unlike many other Northerners who were born into aristocratic or royal families, and rose to prominence by riding on their family names and prestige, Buhari was born into a noble but humble family. Having

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lost his father, Ardo Adamu Buhari at the age of three or four, there were limited opportunities for the young Buhari as he was the 23rd child of his father and the 13th and last child of his mother, Zulaihat. His mother was a widow with seven children before she went on to marry his father.

Muhammadu Buhari lost his father early in his life at the age of four.

All he could remember of his father was that he was tall and fair in complexion. Though his father was the Ardo of Dumurkol Village near Daura, the title didn’t have much bearing on his life, neither did it elevate his status in any way. At the time the only feasible alternative was to be a cattle herdsman. Muhammadu Buhari, not being one to cower in the face of adversity strove hard to excel in primary and secondary school.

During his childhood, Muhammadu Buhari was fondly nicknamed and called “Leko.” This was due to the fact that he was born after a set of twins that died. Leko was the Hausa nickname given to a child born after twins who died. He spent his early childhood days playing around the dusty lanes and tree-lined roads of the vibrant Daura Township. Muhammadu Buhari’s most vivid childhood memory, which he still recalls hitherto was falling off a horse (a strawberry roan) on his way to the village well. He still recalls the fright he felt lying down between the feet of the enormous animal. He could see the horse’s big belly heaving and the five-stripes on its forelegs flashing before his eyes. At that instance, he thought to himself that the beast could kick or trample him to death. Still in pains, he hurriedly stood up, dusted his clothes, remounted the horse and continued his journey to the well.

He commenced his primary education at Mai Adua Primary School in 1948-1952, where his senior brother Mal. Dauda Daura was the head teacher of the school. As a child Muhammadu Buhari was known to have a childhood disdain for going school and this resulted in naughty and mischievous behavior that often got him into trouble.

Consequently, his break time was usually forfeited as punishment.

According to his nephew, Mamman Daura, who is two and a half years older than Muhammadu Buhari and was also his senior in primary and secondary school, “Buhari was above average academically and more than usual naughty.” Similarly, Muhammadu Buhari himself also

adds; “I was a truant in primary school. I spent a lot of my time playing around, but when I went to secondary school, I changed.” His classmates in primary school still fondly remember him as a fast runner and the centre-forward for the school’s football team. Another major attribute of his, which he was known for since primary school and which has stayed with him is that he is always very smartly dressed and neatly turned-out.

He later attended Katsina Middle School in 1953-1955, Katsina Provincial Secondary School (now Government College, Katsina) 19561961.

His uncompromising knack for sticking to his principles no matter what, go as far back as when he was in secondary school. A story was related of how the young Buhari became a lone ranger of sorts when he refused, on a matter of principle, to join in a strike of his classmates despite the fact that he was the youngest and the smallest in the class.

Some of his classmates recall some of his glowing attributes: Malam Mukhatri Zango, a former classmate of Muhammadu Buhari once stated, “He used to baffle me. He was strong-willed and principled. He always stood his ground and would not follow the crowd.”

Another childhood friend of his, who grew up with him in Katsina before they joined the Military and rose through the ranks together, and who was the Deputy head boy to Muhammadu Buhari, the late former Vice President, General Shehu Musa Yar’adua also opined that, “He was reserved. He was one of the few boys in the school that was trusted by his classmates and who was quite dependable.”

Some of his classmates at Katsina Provincial Secondary School included the former President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Umaru Abdullahi as well as the former Inspector General of Police from 1993 to 1999, serving under the military governments of Generals Sani Abacha and General Abdulsalam Abubakar, Ibrahim Comasie. Inspite of this evidence of fact, during the campaigns that preceded the 2015 elections, it was alleged that Muhammadu Buhari did not attend or finish secondary school.

General Muhammadu Buhari is one of the most decorated Generals in the Nigerian Army. He is the recipient of numerous awards such as the Defence Service Medal, National Service Medal, General Service Medal, Republic Medal, Loyal Service and Good Conduct Medal, Forces Medal, Independence Medal and Congo Crisis Medal.

‘Coming soon,’ a thoroughly gripping and intricate insight into the full journey of a fascinating patriot; born to lead a nation towards positive change, the services he rendered to his country in various capacities, the challenge that saw him rise above incarceration, suspicion, defamation, persecution, to show the strength of character to be the ‘change’ he desired for his country, the ideal upon which he built a movement that, once again, gave a people a reason to believe.

It is the odyssey that defines the calling of General Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR from military leader, to head of state, to military/political prisoner, as well as the long political struggle that saw him, against all odds, emerge as the 16th president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Understanding Buhari in 100 days HE ENORMOUSLY popular talk show, Berekete on Wazobia FM radio, Abuja station told the incredible, yet true story of the hardworking and respected school teacher somewhere in Plateau state who hanged himself.

He hadn't been paid salary for seven straight months. He came home to find that no one had eaten and two of the children had medical prescriptions for which there was no money. He sneaked out without talking to anyone. After a long while, news came home that he had strangely been caught with a stolen goat.

On his day in court, the teacher confessed to the offense. The reason he stole,he told the local judge, was that he hadn't been paid for seven months and when he got home to see what he saw, he just couldn't stand it.

The judge allowed him to go home on bail on self-recognition given, as he said, the good impression the entire village had of the otherwise respected teacher.

All were shocked to find his body dangling from tree the morning after. He couldn't live with the shame.

In the recommendations and notes the Ahmed Joda transition committee presented to him as President -EIect, Muhammadu Buhari was informed that a section of the Fedaral government as well as 27 states hadn't paid salaries, in some case for up to a year.

The Joda committee advised that this was a national emergency and should be treated as such.

It is on account of this that one of the activities- please note the choice of this word:activities, not achievements- of President Muahammadu Buhari in these past three months is the settlement of unpaid salaries. This is going on right now.

Like the proverbial blinking of the eye, Saturday September 5th will mark the 100th day of the Buhari-led All Progressives Congress, APC government which took office on May 29th after the new party became the first in opposition to unseat an incumbent government in an election adjudged by everyone as free and fair.

There are many out there who say that the performance of a president and his government in terms success or failure cannot be judged in 100 days and I agree with them. But history will be written anyway.

In the coming week or two, a rash of commentaries and analyses to commemorate the event will be made.

I myself don't deny that 100 days is long enough to know and understand the man who is the head of a government.

Buhari arrived power with strong support from young men and women and this country's poor. The new government was not favored at election by the monied power-brokers although that did not stop the President from taking measures such as improving security that are good for business and investment. This government is business-friendly but not one that is for crony capitalism.

The new government inherited enormous problems created by the tainted PDP administration, largely caused by the lack of governance,corruption and lawlessness. This was mostly evident in the last two years of the Jonathan Goodluck administration. As the President continues to point out,the drift is most evident in the oil sector.

I believe that there is enough on the ground in those 100 days to understand President Buhari, his government and what it stands for.

I will cite a few of these. Before I do that, I will make a little confession.

In the course of electioneering, the presidential campaign had so many centers of public communication which, for whatever reason were on the loose.

There is a certain document tagged "One Hundred Things Buhari Will Do in 100 Days" and the other, "My Covenant With Nigerians."

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Garba SHEHU Both pamphlets bore the authorized party logo but as the Director of Media and Communications in that campaign, I did not fund or authorize any of those. I can equally bet my last Kobo that Candidate Buhari did not see or authorize those publications.

As a consequence of these publications, expectations have been raised unreasonably, that as President, Muhammadu Buhari will wave his hand and all the problems that the country faces- insecurity, corruption, unemployment, poor infrastructure would go away.

But that notwithstanding, President Buhari has given the job his best shot and •Buhari the whole country is saying that we never had it so good. He has re-instituted the values of hard work and administrative efficiency. The President says times without number that this country needs to fix governance and that he won't tolerate laziness.

Some of the other activities I wish to enumerate also include the fact of his taking relations with the country's immediate neighbors to new heights. By their open admissions, this country's neighbors did not have someone they could talk to on the deteriorating security situation in the Lake Chad Basin area in Aso Rock.

Buhari embarked on his foreign policy on Day Four of his administration.

When he met Barak Obama, the U.S president told the Nigerian leader that he was getting it right and that it is only when Nigeria gets it right that Africa will get it right.

The United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon who came calling this week said that our president is "courageous, focused and firm."

Relations with the "G 7" group of industrialized countries have since been "reset" and the dividends of this have begun to flow inwards.

In the area of economic management, Nigerians are already seeing things happen that they thought were not possible in so short a time.

He didn't put a Kobo to finance the power sector. Yet, reading his

’

But that notwithstanding, President Buhari has given the job his best shot and the whole country is saying that we never had it so good. He has re-instituted the values of hard work and administrative efficiency.

The President says times without number that this country needs to fix governance and that he won't tolerate laziness

body language alone and knowing that there are things you cannot do and get away with under Buhari, electricity supply all over the countries has risen to unprecedented heights.

Actually, some cities are on the verge of calling 24-hour, round the clock power supply. The country generates more power than can internally be taken by the deplorable distribution system we have on the ground, which points to the next challenge that the country faces.

Framework for the management of the country's finances has been put in place. The wobbly Naira is being stabilized and inflation is headed towards a single digit.President Buhari is keeping a close eye on the government treasury.

Agriculture is getting its own shot in the arm.

Rice importation has been curtailed and seven governors whose states are priming a massive local production of the commodity have had a strategy meeting with the President on the next steps that are coming. Americans say their intervention in our agriculture will come next year.

Boko Haram, which had more or less been allowed to fester for about five years is about being ended but what is even more interesting is that intelligence coming from the fired-up armed forces who now work in synergy with each other is raising hope that the Chibok girls may, repeat may be found in good numbers in a geographic location of interest somewhere in the North-East.

President Buhari is being praised at home and abroad for his ongoing fight against corruption. He said from the beginning that his government will not tolerate this vice.

Borrowing the words of India Narendra Modi's, he said himself that "I won't steal and I'll not allow others to do it." President Buhari has walked his talk since he come to office.

Himself and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo have not only given up half of their salary, they have cut a good number of funding lines to their official homes and offices.

President Buhari also takes the environment seriously. He blames the lack of security in the Lake Chad region on the recession, almost drying up of the lake. He has undertaken to clean up the Ogoniland.

In this country, appointments and removal from office are done usually in accordance with a spoils system.

A new government sacks officials on the basis only that it did not appoint them, but the predecessor-adminstration.

President Buhari has shown that his government is different. He wants to look at each case on its own merit and it is clear by now that he is not ready to surrender the country to burnt out politicians.

Technocrats will have a big place in his administration.

He has appointed no ministers yet, but the government is running smoothly.

In this period of three months, government certainly deserves a pat on the back for improved power, reform in the energy sector, foreign relations fight against corruption and insurgency and the fact of Nigerians being at peace, not only among themselves but with their neighbors and the rest of the world.

In think in summary, I would like to end this piece by saying that President Muhammadu Buhari will turn out to be a leader in the tradition of Lee Kuan-Yu and India's current reform-minded Prime Minister Modi with strong and clear emphasis on detail and execution. He may however differ with them by not micro-managing things.

•Garba Shehu is SSA Media and Publicity to the President.

Gbade OGUNWALE, Abuja/Ernest NWOKOLO, Abeokuta/ Innocent DURU

The committee also said that a parcel of land measuring 100ft by 50ft was allocated to the Christian community and that from its investigation, the Muslim community had dissociated itself from the demolition of the chapel

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ENTERTAINMENT

ENTERTAINMENT

THE NATION, SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

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L-R: Arthur Dieffenthaler, Commercial Manager, Air France KLM, Grammy Award winning artiste, Angélique Kidjo, ace filmmaker Tunde Kelani, and Kunle Afolayan during a press conference on Afolayan's new movie, The CEO

•Kemi Lala

•Tade Ogidan

THE CEO: KUNLE AFOLAYAN UNVEILS CAST OF MULTI-LINGUAL MOVIE …Begins shoot at Inagbe Resorts

L-R: Aurelie El ia Oluwakemi So m with bowale

le Ayayi, •L-R: Wa

Kemi Lala

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SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

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THE NATION SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

46

Men in women’s world: ‘we cook better than women’ It was a chore regarded as exclusively reserved for women. In times past, the sight of a man suited in apron and toque (hat) would ordinarily attract derision from his friends and family. But the world has moved on. Today, the number of men working as cooks and caterers in hotels and public functions has gradually increased, with men now winning cooking competitions against women. In this report by HANNAH OJO, she looks at the attractions for the men in a sector previously considered an exclusive preserve of women.

•Igwe twins with Ice Prince

•Segun and his workers

HE sight of males wearing apron and hat and the pang their culinary skills. At the beginning, they would bake cakes heart diseases. Unknowingly, many use their money to purof hunger do not leave one to languish in idleness for and distribute free of charge to the children in their church. chase their death. It does matter where the food we eat comes long. That is the summary of the lemon to lemonade From the children department, they extended freebies to from. How the food is prepared and the things used in preparstory of Titus and Tobias Igwe, twin brothers and co-founders older group, giving free cakes to the intending couple’s class. ing it should also be considered before approaching a food of popular mobile eatery, Speedmeals Mobile Kitchen.

That strategy worked, and soon friends, family and church vendor. Some of these people even use camel meat instead of For the twins, the journey into the world of culinary members began to order for customized birthday and wedbeef. started as little boys at home. The first of nine children, ding cakes. And at a point, they were delivering between 5-10 “A lot of cholesterol oil are turned into fats, that’s why many Titus and Tobias earned a paltry sum of N10,000 as cleancakes weekly to church members. Their game changed when people are adding unnecessary weights and growing belly ers to support their family. a couple took them to the ATM and withdrew N90, 000 as fats. We are investing our time in cooking healthy meals to But their lives changed in 2009 when their father payment for a wedding cake. ensure healthy lives,” the twins said while speaking with The died in an accident. The first challenge was to “We used the money to purchase some baking equipNation. raise the money needed for the burial. But ments. Then, we went for training to learn how to On their challenges, the twins admitted that they are conWorkers that was resolved when they raised the make small chops. From that point, we went into fronted with two major challenges- getting the right personnel should have sum of N150,000 as donations and gifts. full scale catering. In 2009 we decent meals. There is “After our father’s death in an acciregistered Speedmeals dent in 2009, it fell on us to take care an increasing rate of heart kitchen. That was how we of our younger siblings. We are nine, started the company.” diseases. Unknowingly, seven boys and two girls. We were But the big fortune working in Apapa as office cleaners many use their money to pur- smiled on the Igwe and earning N10, 000 individually chase their death. It does mat- twins when they OW did you become a coming to the world again, I per month. We were able to raise clinched the second ter where the food we eat chef? would still be a chef. about N150, 000, mostly donations place in a business plan comes from. How the food is competition organized I was an accountant by What has been your experience to bury our father from the church.

We were also volunteers in the chilprepared and the things used by MTN. For their effort, profession until I travelled to the since returning to Nigeria? dren department.” they were rewarded the UK. On getting there, I was planAfrica has become a very big in preparing it should also sum Unsure of the what the future holds of N5 million, which ning to write the final stage of thing already in terms of food. I be considered before for them, the two boys decided to save they invested into their busi- ICAN, but I needed to get a job had offers even back in the UK. N50,000 from the money they realized. ness. approaching a food because I had bills to pay. I start- So, coming here to work; acceptThat singular decision may have turned Today, their enterprise has vendor ed as an inventory officer at the ance wasn’t difficult because I out as the best decision ever taken by the grown into a multi-million indusRain Forest Café, where I later have a whole lot of jobs after me boys, as it marked the turning point in their lives trial catering firm catering for individrequested to be given an account- right now. There is need for the “We knew life will not remain the same again after uals, corporate organizations and events. ing job. But I was advised by a skill. The industry is full of the burial of our father, so we decided to save N50, The list of their clients includes the 000. And so, when we came back to Lagos, we had American embassy. manager to apply for another unqualified persons and it is already lost our jobs as cleaners and we just got admisFrom their experience as office cleaners position since white people usubecause we don’t have career sion to UNILAG”. where workers often send them to buy ally do not trust blacks with chefs. You will see more of people With over N200, 000 waiting to be paid to secure a place for a food, they discovered most of the foods money. I read accountancy, so who just want to earn a living DLI programme at the University of Lagos, one of them had to people consume from road side restaurants what else would I do?

I wasn’t and they found themselves in the drop out since they both couldn’t raise the money required to are prepared in unhygienic environments. even thinking of being a chef at restaurant industry, and they defer their admission.

They also discovered that some of the all. I was even thinking of how I start cooking. You don’t have With the experience already garnered from cooking at home, operators of such canteens use rotten tomawould tell people I am a chef. So, much of career people who you they chose to invest the money saved from the burial to hone toes and other bad materials to prepare the I went online and discovered could call core professionals. The food they sell to the public.

This experience has helped to there are lots of celebrity British whole idea is all changing and sharpen the focus of their business, chefs making lots of money. So, I that is what we are doing to the as they are presently putting a bigger said fine, it’s worth doing. ones coming up. I do training, it’s food factory in place, which they disBecause I knew at some point I not like I am being paid, but I am closed, will employ 30 people. would have to come back to giving back to the people. This is Aged 28, the twins has dream to Nigeria, I didn’t just do the something that if you have pascater to the food needs of 10, 000 apprentice thing, I attended sion for, then develop it and you workers in Lagos on a daily basis. the Southbank University, can beat your chest anywhere in They are already looking into the London, to do a whole lot of the world and be proud to be a future, as they intend to build a system that would work, regardless of courses. That was how the jourchef. their presence. neys started. And looking back Why are there more “Workers should have decent now, if there is anything like men celebrity chefs than meals. There is an increasing rate of •Titus and Tobias-Igwe twins

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THE NATION SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

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and capital.

“We need chefs. Sometimes, when you call them here and ask them to prepare continental cuisines, they will be looking at you like ‘Oga, If you teach me, I go learn’. They don’t even know the basic food handling techniques. After you train them to a level, they are now attractive to a bigger client and they jump ship.

“Capital is also an issue, but we have been trading with our own internally-generated funds. We roll over our money; we try to keep our overhead as low as we can. We don’t want to create so much profile outside and begin to attract unwanted influences.

“We manage our growth by using our profit to buy more equipment. We also use locally manufactured machines to produce our meals as alternative to the foreign ones,” they added.

What do people think of them as male caterers? Although they faced some discriminations at the beginning, but all that have vanished in the face of the success they have been able to achieve.

“We didn’t start cooking because others are doing it. It was •Olukayode and a friend about a self discovery process. Our parents made it a duty that the boys will do the cooking, while the girls do other things.

He also has his eyes on establishing a strong brand of the So, right from when we were as little as five-year-olds, we Okada species in Nigeria and the Diaspora. were already taking turn in the kitchen.”

“The drive at inception was to test the reception of Ofada rice With their success story, Titus and Tobias want young people by the young, since it is thought to be a delicacy enjoyed by not to see their university degree as a meal ticket, but to adults, because of its nutritional and health value,” he said. acquire new skills that will set them apart from the crowd.

Reacting to the financial reward of catering as an For Segun Anifowese, the boss of Glaberina, specialist in enterprise, he was quick to assert that the reward didvarieties of Ofada rice, the mantra is when men cook, there are n't come in handy at the inception, as there was a need no left overs. to first meet the satisfaction of his target audience by Instead of concerning himself with word structures and sengiving them something of value they can willingly tences formation having graduated from the university of pay for.

For Lagos with a degree in English, Segun, who refers to “The profits sometimes range from 7k to 10k a man to suchimself as a celebrity chef, for over 14 years now, daily when the cash flow has been analyzed. have found fulfillment in preparing different forms cumb to doing Though, the financial reward can actually Ofada rice and other varieties of food. boom, but more capital would be needed what has been A winner of the maiden edition of the UNIto purchase a state of the art equipment tagged a female LAG business plan competition, Segun has also needed to expand to other places and participated in the making of a chef competition, reserve, then he must employ more hands,” he stated. where he was tutored by Chef EdwinScholly, With competition coming from other have been driven by an European-trained German certified chef with food outlets and big brands in the hospipassion. The passion tality 26 years culinary experience. industry, the self-acclaimed celebrity “My main niche is Ofada rice, but I make all deafens his ear to chef believes competition is vital to his kinds of meals. I operate two restaurants in UNIbusiness, and quickly added that it has criticism and he LAG and Federal College of Education, Akoka. helped in improving his cuisine. gives it all it We also cater for events,” he enthusiastically told The “Competition keeps me on my toes and Nation. takes makes me device means of getting better with Tracing how he began the journey of mastering a field my product and customer service.” formerly believed to be a woman’s world, he attributed the On challenges, he confessed that the delay in getting decision to start cooking as a talent he discovered when he the accreditation for a physical structure to situate his started spending time in the kitchen rather than playing footbusiness within the campus has been nerving. ball with his peers while growing up.

Other challenges, according to him, include inadeHe also confessed to being inspired by his mum who also quate capital and protocol in the course of securing an runs a catering service. approval for operational license.

“She took her time to teach me how to swim through the Getting his hands dirty with flour waters of healthy food preparation. Meanwhile, the passion of It is not always the case that a strong academic background making culturally-appreciated and healthy meals influenced should always push one to seek a white collar job. my decision to start cooking. I started out as a waiter, waiters’ Olalekan Adekoya, was obviously an above average student manager, purchase personnel, cook, chef, chief chef and later to have been able to earn a second class upper degree in moved on to establish my own business in October 2011.”

Geography from the ObafemiAwolowo University, Ile-Ife. Speaking on how he named his brand Glaberima, Segun Rather than seek a paid employment, Olalekan had eyes on said the name is coined from the botanical name of Ofadaricebeing a big employer of labour by getting his hands dirty in OryzaGalberrima. Speaking further, he confessed his preoccuthe world of flours. pation is to become a model of excellence in the production of “My first official cake was during my birthday in the year Ofada rice cuisines, namely Jollof Ofada Rice, Fried Ofada Rice 2002. I had to bake it myself because I didn’t have money to & Unique Ofada Rice. contract it out and it came out good.

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•Olalekan at work “After that, I baked my neighbour’s birthday cake, and friends started calling me to bake their cakes. That was how I discovered my passion for baking. I then decided to research further by getting trained. I have since improved.”

On September 15th last year, Olalekan opened his outfit, Whitehands, a cake studio in Ile-Ife, where he now trains other young people in the art of cake making.

“By God’s grace, I'm looking forward to a cake school where people can enroll formally and we would have lecturers grading students akin to what you have in a tertiary institution. Our specialization won’t be on cakes alone, but anything that can be made with flour.

“Also, I am looking forward to having outlets all over the country where people can pick our flour product, place orders, eat out and enjoy freshly baked products.”

Olalekan believes the period when catering is regarded as an exclusive reserve of women is past. “For a man to succumb to doing what has been tagged a female reserve, then he must have been driven by passion. The passion deafens his ear to criticism and he gives it all it takes.”

Though he is not married yet, Olalekan said he will not mix business with pleasure by taking the duty of the cook at home when he gets married.

“The kitchen is a woman’s property. I can only show my stunts once in a while if I want to pull a surprise,” he said smiling.

When he is not doing makeover management or music recording, Olukayode Williams, a computer science graduate of the Lagos State University would be busy making cakes and grills.

Kayode’s romance with baking cakes and making grills began when his cousin asked him to help organize a barbecue get-together.

“That was my first brush with barbecue experience. I decided to get better and make a life out of it. The cake came afterwards when a three-month vocational program was organized by the church I attend, and fortunately LASU was on strike.

So, I took it up and I decided to add it to things I do.”

Olukayode, who caters to weddings, bridal and baby showers, said the creativity and authenticity he brings to the floor has helped him in staying ahead of a trade besieged by competitors.

He said: "A man can do best what a woman can do better."

more money than an accountant —Akintunde Adeshina Chef Akintunde Adeshina, popularly known as Chef Shine, is a prominent executive/ consultant chef trained in the UK. He speaks on the prospect of the industry as a money spinner with HANNAH OJO. women?

We have quite a number of female celebrity chefs in the UK. I also think it’s because male chefs are more career conscious. In Africa, you don’t see men in the kitchen, so if you are coming into it, you need to do the extra mile. But for people like us, it has become an art. Women have accepted it as a duty and there is a different line between duty and career.

When you do duty, you do fantastic food in your house, but there are so many other things that got to do with food apart from •Chef Shine just cooking it. There is the management, costing, presentation, health and safety aspects and a whole lot. Men have just overtaken it because it has become a field that they felt needed specializa-

tion.

How financially rewarding is the work of a chef?

It is financially rewarding. But coming back to Africa, it might be a different ball game. I think it is super financial rewarding to be honest. It comes with you being good on the job. If you are well-known for what you are doing, the sky is the limit. Here in Nigeria, there is need for the skill, because foreign outlets are opening and they need people who can prepare a taste of what they can get, say in Italy for instance. If I weigh it as an accountant, I will still prefer to be a chef, because the opportuni-

ties I have as a chef in this short while, I don’t think I would have had them as an accountant. On this job, I run a house in UK, I have my own house in Nigeria and I have a good car. Being a chef has also taken me to other countries of the world. I enjoy what I am doing, so it is rewarding.

Out of business, who handles the cooking at home?

Out of business, of course you still leave the home people to do their stuff.

We try not to fuse our job with the domestic way of life. If you take your career into the home, you start questioning a lot of things madam does in the house. Of course, there are days I give them a treat when I am not working and I’m at home. I love to experience a lot with food, it’s never tiring. That is the beauty of it.

Your message to people who think cooking is for women?

I will tell them to wake up and see what is going on in the world. We have Jim Oliver and other respected chefs out there. If they think it is a woman thing, let them googlechefshine or go on social media to see what the brand has become.

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THE NATION, SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

NEWS

CRIME & OTHER STORIES

Bizman docked for stealing bags of beans

Save us from cultist group,

n Rukayat JIMOH n HE police have arraigned a 41- year- old businessman, Emmanuel Eze, before a Chief Magistrate’s Court sitting in Ebute Meta for allegedly stealing bags of beans.

The defendant was said to have fraudulently conspired with others sometime in 2010 to steal 125 bags of beans worth N4 million, property of one Chief Mbonu Cagethern, a representation he knew to be false.

Emmanuel, it was learnt, fraudulently collected the bags of beans from Mbonu who resides in Kano.

The defense counsel, Imelda Adebambo, prayed the court to admit the defendant to bail in the most liberal terms.

The offence, according to the police prosecutor, Inspector Cousin Adam, contravened Sections 409 and 175 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2011.

Magistrate Fowowe Erusiafa, admitted the defendant to bail in the sum of N500, 000 and two sureties in the like sum.

The case was adjourned till September 7 for mention.

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Shop attendant, driver arraigned for stealing diapers n Rukayat JIMOH n 34 -year- old shop attendant, Bello Kehinde and a driver, Tairu Babatunde, 35, have been arraigned before a Chief Magistrate’s Court in Ebute Metta for allegedly stealing diapers worth N4 million.

The accused persons were said to have conspired with others at large on August 15, 2015, to steal the product belonging to one Mrs Jacquine Wise at No. 175 Kaduna Street, Crystal Estate Amukoko.

Tairu , a resident of No19 Coconut Avenue Badagry and a graduate of the Lagos State University, LASU, was allegedly introduced to Mrs Wise by his wife (now at large).

Tairu’s wife was said to have carted the goods away in the early morning of the day at Ebute Ero Market, Lagos.

It was said that Tairu plotted his wife’s escape before the arrival of the policemen sent to arrest her.

The accused persons were arraigned on charges bordering conspiracy and stealing .

The offence, according to the police prosecutor , Sergeant Akhaluode Matthew, contravened Sections 409 and 285 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2011.

Counsel to the defendants, Saka Bello, applied for the bail of his client in the most liberal terms.

The presiding magistrate, Mrs O.I Adelaja, admitted the defendants to bail in the sum of N400, 000 and two sureties in like sum.

The case was adjourned till October 10.

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•A victim

•A Victim

OUTHS numbering over 50 yesterday stormed Asaba, the Delta State Capital, protesting the activities of a cultist group known as White Ladder in Okirighwre community, Sapele Local Government Area of the state.

Okirighwre community is a suburb of Sapele town.

The protesters blamed the numerous cases of murders, arson and kidnapping since 2009 on the cultist group.

Defying the heavy down pour, the protest-

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•Another Victim

Okungbowa AIWERIE, Asaba

ers marched on the Delta State Ministry of Justice where they tendered a petition to the office of the Department of Public Prosecution demanding investigation into the alleged murder ,arson and kidnapping cases against the group led by one Okoro alias G1.

The protesters carried placards with inscriptions such as:‘A Cry to the NPF to swing into action because Okoro is dragging their name into the mud’, ‘We reject cultism,

killings and kidnapping in Sapele’, ‘Sapele politicians stop shielding criminals,’A cry for justice’, ‘DPP prosecute the killers of our brothers from Okirighwre,’ among others.

According to the leader of the group, Gabriel Omofeye, who spoke to The Nation, the community has not known peace since 2009 due to the activities of the White Ladder cult group.

He accused some politicians of the ruling PDP in the state of being behind the cultists who allegedly worked for their election vic-

Tears as suspected smuggler crushes student to death on ‘Rag Day’ n Kunle AKINRINADE n Rag Day celebration staged by students of the Federal College of Education (FCE), Abeokuta, Ogun State, ended on a tragic note when a 200 level student, Oluwatobiloba Adeniyi, was crushed by a reckless driver.

Adeniyi was until his death penultimate Wednesday a student in the Integrated and Computer Science Education Department.

The Rag Day was part of the programmes marking the Students’ Union week of the school.

It was learnt that the incident occurred at about 7:30 am near the Ministry of Agriculture in Asero area of Abeokuta.

Our correspondent learnt that the unidentified driver was a suspected smuggler.

A source, who spoke in confidence, explained that the driver was returning from Ibadan when he suddenly veered from the road and crushed Adeniyi.

He said: “The man (driver) was returning from Ibadan in a Volvo car and lost control of the car while on top speed. Before we knew it, he had knocked down the student. The boy was rushed to Ijaiye General Hospital, Abeokuta, where he died a few minutes later.”

Another source, who simply identified himself as Adewale, said: “The late student was apparently tired and had just bought a sachet water

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to quench his thirst when the driver of a Volvo car without a registration number veered off the road and knocked him dead. From the way the man drove the car, it was apparent that he was a suspected smuggler trying to avoid law enforcement agents.”

The Nation gathered that the late student was contesting for the post of Financial Secretary in the Students Union of the institution.

Colleagues of the deceased student during a candle light procession in his honour in the evening of the day of the incident described him as warm and fun loving.

Chanting solidarity songs, the distraught students asked the police to fish out the killer driver and ensure justice.

“His heartbroken mother, who slumped after she received the news of the death of her son, has just been revived and has not fully come out of the shock of the incident,” said one of the students called Muyiwa.

Unconfirmed reports, however, indicated that the errant driver is at large, while the car has since been moved to the Ogun Police Headquarters, Eleweeran, Abeokuta.

Confirming the incident, the spokesman of Ogun State Police Command, Mr. Muyiwa Adejobi, in a text message, said: “ The suspect has been charged to court and the case is ongoing.”

•Late Oluwatobiloba

NEWS

THE NATION, SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

olukunle87@yahoo.com

Delta community

cries out tories.

He alleged that some policemen were aiding the criminal elements, making fat gains through them.

His words, ‘The reason we have come for this protest is that our lives are at stake. Series of killings have been going on in our community.

There is this notorious boy, popularly known as Sunday, a.k.a G1 who has been killing innocent people from Okirighwre community. Killings have been carried out in broad daylight.

Three of the cultists are in Sapele Prisons right now.

“The arrest followed a petition written to the Delta State Commissioner of Police. He has evaded police arrest, even when policemen from Zone 5 Office in Benin came, they could not arrest them. We have all fled our community for fear of being killed. A top PDP chieftain is behind this group who have continued to terrorise us. It is the same politician who is trying to arm-twist the DPP to enter a no case submission in favour of the suspects.”

He added: “A particular police officer (names withheld) is aware. Since 2009 when these killings started, he has always tipped these cult guys off any time the police want to arrest them.”

A victim, Agboroki Agboroh William, while narrating his ordeal said: ”I have not been around because I have been

away to Ghana. I returned home February 4th to renew my passport and return. The cultists asked me to join their gang or I must leave the town. I was given an ultimatum to leave the community, but I exceeded the ultimatum.

“The cultists numbering over 10 attacked me with bottles and knives shooting sporadically to scare away people. I was left for dead, but a Good Samaritan saved my life. I only regained consciousness in the hospital .I have not relented since this attack because they (cultists) stole a lot of my properties. The two fingers on my left hand are paralysed .This led to the arrest of three cultists who are now remanded at Sapele Prisons. But the cultists are threatening to come after me, boasting that a no case submission will be entered in their favour by the office of the DPP and they will be released.”

The Director of Public Prosecution, (DPP), who spoke through an official, Champion Umukoro, denied allegations of bribery against the DPP’s office. His words: “I assure you you have done the right thing by ensuring that your protest is peaceful. We can assure that we do not shield criminals. All allegations will be investigated. The DPP has a reputation of integrity. Justice will be done.”

Murder suspect goes to prison Chief Magistrate’s that the defendant be ren Rukayat JIMOH n Court in Ebute manded in prison pending Metta has ordered that a 19 – legal advice from the office of Director year- old murder suspect, Ibrahim of Public Prosecutions, DPP. Ogunkoya aka ‘National’, be remanded The presiding magistrate, O.O.A in prison custody.

Fowowe Erusiafe, ordered that the deIbrahim, a native of Ijebu Ode, who fendant be remanded in prison cusresides at Block 336, Flat 4 Jakande Estody pending legal advice from DPP’s tate, Lekki was said to have stabbed office. his 18- year- old friend, Eniola Toyin, The case was adjourned till October with a kitchen knife on his left armpit 19. during a scuffle.

The defendant, it was learnt, is a footballer and plays in the same team as Eniola.

They were said to have engaged in a fight on March 10, 2015 at Emirate Club, Small Kuramo along Lekki Beach Road, Lekki during which Ibrahim stabbed Eniola to death at about 7pm.

Ibrahim was said to have fled from the scene but was later apprehended and subsequently charged to court.

His plea was not taken The police prosecutor, Agoi Gbemileke, •Suspect filed an application

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( 08167164657 or 08023910970 )

Young mother who dumped baby asks for forgiveness Osemwengie Ben OGBEMUDIA, Benin “It was never my BOUT two intension to do months after a 28-year-old girl threw away her new what I did, I just took the decision immediately I delivered. born baby soon after she put to bed, she “I felt labour pains when I was about to has come out to ask for forgiveness from have my bath and when I had the baby, I her parents and Nigerians. held her in my hands for some minutes Joy Osarhiakhi, had on June 13, 2015, seand asked myself what to do with the cretly delivered herself of a baby girl in a child. bathroom of the house she lives with her “It was then I saw a N10 nylon bag and parents and immediately packed the baby rapped her inside I in a nylon bag and quietly dropped her dumped her in the across the fence. I neighbourhood. regret my action But the baby surand appeal for forvived after she was giveness from discovered by everybody.” neighbours three Also speaking, days after she was her parents, Mr dumped.

Ebohon Osarhiakhi Joy, who said she and his wife, Mrs successfully hid Elizabeth Osarhiher pregnancy akhi, who both defrom her parents nied knowledge of for nine months, their daughter’s attributed her acpregnancy, said tion to the fact that they would not her lover denied have allowed her being responsible take the decision for the pregnancy. she took if they Joy has been rewere in the know of manded in prisons her condition. since July after ‘When we heard spending about of the outcry that three weeks in the greeted the discovcustody of the ery of the baby, we Nigeria Police who joined them to curse arrested her upon whoever did it and her confession. never knew the per“I regret my acson was with us. tion and have “I don’t know begged my parents • Joy what my wife disand siblings for the covered for her to pains and embarlater ask me to rassment I have question my daughter about the baby. I caused them. I also want Nigerians to forimmediately handed her over to the secugive me. rity agency for her to face the appropriate “I want my baby back. I want to take punishment after she confessed.” proper care of her and promise that I will not in any way harm her.

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Bus crushes man to death in wife’s presence

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Osagie OTABOR, Benin HE head of an unidentified man was yesterday severed in the presence of his wife by a Mass Transit bus at Ekae community in Oredo Local Government Area of Edo State.

Witnesses said the incident occurred at about 12:30pm while the couple was waiting to board a vehicle to Warri, Delta State.

The bus marked ED110-B28 and owned by the Edo State Government was said to have veered off the road and rammed into the victim.

Widow of the victim narrowly escaped being hit while some passengers on the vehicle sustained injuries.

An eyewitness who spoke in confidence said: "They (the couple) were waiting to board a bus to Warri when the bus suddenly hit him. It looks like the brake failed because

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of the way the bus hit the man and removed his head. The man died instantly but the woman was lucky to escape."

Confirming the story, the Sector Commander of the Federal Road Safety Corps(FRSC), Mr. Oluwasusi Familoni, explained that the identity of the deceased could not be ascertained at press time.

Familoni, however, said that the body of the victim has been deposited in a mortuary in Stella Obasanjo Hospital.

"It happened at about 12:30pm, involving a Comrade Bus, along Sapele road. It killed a man that was travelling with the wife.But the body was deposited in a mortuary at Stella Obasanjo Hospital. By the time we got there the occupants of the vehicle had left," Familoni added.

Abandoned vehicles’ owners get ultimatum HE Lagos State Police Command has warned owners of recovered and abandoned vehicles in the following divisions to remove their vehicles within 14 days or forfeit them.

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Anthony Village Police Station 1.Toyota Camry (blue colour)-KSF 31 DD 2.Mazda car (Gray colour)-EW 687 KJA 3.Toyota Carina - DS 93 AA

Ilemba Hausa Division, Ajangbadi Ford bus (Yellow colour)-XB 666 MKD Alapere Division, Ketu 1.Toyota Camry-AW 444 KSF 2.Nissan Blue Bird-EC 502 AAA 3.Mazda car-DW 464 LND 4.Toyota Carina car- BL 979 EPE

THE NATION

NEWS 57

SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

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PEAKER of the Oyo State House of Assembly during the Rasheed Ladoja administration, Mr.Adeolu Adeleke and 31 other members of the assembly at the time have a date with the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC).

The commission has invited them to explain what they know about the N1.5billion alleged to be missing from the state coffer s between 2002 and 2007.

Adeleke and one of the affected former legislators who does not want his name in print confirmed EFCC invitation.

EFCC investigators have already visited the state ministries of finance,lands and justice to peruse documents relevant to the matter.

Governor Abiola Ajimobi had claimed that former Governor Ladoja refunded the sum of N500million to the state through the EFCC being part of the alleged stolen money.

The former governor vehemently denied making any such refund only for Ajimobi to publish bromide of cheques purportedly issued by Ladoja for the refund .

The money in question is said to be proceeds from the sale of shares belonging to the state government by the former governor.

The former governor is alleged to have used a

EFCC summons ex-Oyo Speaker, 31 Ladoja’s lawmakers over N1.5bn fund Oseheye OKWUOFU and Jeremiah OKE, Ibadan company owned by him to buy the shares and thereafter raised the sum of N78million through a prominent commercial bank to acquire a property located at 361 Agodi GRA ,Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.

The former governor was also accused of doling out N20million each to 14

lawmakers who were loyal to him for constituency projects.

None of the ex-legislators is known to have spent the money for that purpose.

It was also gathered that apart from the N20m received by the 14 loyal members of the house, Ladoja also allegedly purchased a Nissan Ssunny for each of the lawmakers.

The money was allegedly taken from the proceeds of

the shares.

Sources also said that the chairman of an Oyo State government agency during the Ladoja government confessed to EFCC investigators as the one who shared the funds.

When contacted yesterday former Speaker Adeleke described the invitation by the EFCC, eight years after he left office, as politically motivated .

He accused the All

Progressive Congress (APC) led government in the state of masterminding EFCC’s fresh investigation into the alleged missing fund.

He said “any invitation that is extended to me by either EFCC or any other body will not be a surprise because rumour had it sometime ago that the APC led government was and is still desperate to circumvent the election petition of Senator Rashidi Adewolu

Ladoja having failed to stop him from going to Election Tribunal . “ I left office as Speaker more than eight years ago ,so common sense dictates that any invitation extended to me by this time is an attempt to distract Senator Rashidi Ladoja from reclaiming his stolen mandate and therefore ,such invitation is politically motivated and is bound to fail.”

Saraki assures investors of attractive business environment

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ENATE President Bukola Saraki yesterday spoke of the commitment of the Senate to the enactment of appropriate legislations for the creation of an attractive business environment in the country.

Saraki spoke when the Chairman of Black Rhino Group and Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II, led the Chairman and Cofounder of Blackstone Group, Stephen Schwarzman and his delegation on a courtesy call on the Senate President in Abuja.

The President, Dangote Group, Alhaji Aliko Dangote, was also a part of the delegation.

The Senate President said

•Tasks committee on uninterrupted power supply

the 8th Senate would concentrate on commercial aspects of the nation’s laws having successfully reviewed the criminal aspect in the 7th Senate.

Saraki said: “one of our priorities in the legislature is to look at the private sector and the business environment because some of our old laws have not been reviewed and that is why we are setting up committees to look at and make it more interesting and attractive to invest in Nigeria.

“In the Seventh Senate, we had done a review of the criminal aspect of the laws

and brought them up to date and now we are dealing on the commercial side.”

Earlier, Emir Sanusi II said his firm, Black Rhino Group, which handles Africa’s infrastructure investments, is partnering with Dangote Group to make significant investments in the country.

The Emir of Kano said: “I am here in my capacity as the chairman, Black Rhino Group which handles Africa’s infrastructure investment and we are committed, in partnership with President Aliko Dangote, to

make significant investments in power, energy and infrastructure in this country.

Also yesterday Dr.Saraki charged the Senate Ad-hoc Committee on Power to urgently work towards the resolution of all the challenges currently facing the power sector.

Inaugurating the Committee headed by Senator Abubakar Kyari in Abuja,Saraki said the economic woes in the country can only be addressed when the power sector is fully made functional.

He said the immediate

concern of the 8th Senate is to use every legislative instrument at its disposal to ensure that “light replaces the darkness” in the country.

Saraki said the economy “cannot be prosperous without us addressing the problems of the power sector.”

“The power sector is a key driver of the economy. Whatever we do in trying to address the problems of the power sector is essential in trying to rebuilding economy. The power challenges that we have are real. They are serious and many.”

Suffocating migrants beaten down with knives

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eople smugglers used knives to subdue a group of African migrants who were struggling for air and water in the crammed hold of a ship, according to Italian prosecutors.

Authorities in Sicily have detained 10 people on suspicion of people smuggling and murder after they allegedly held the migrants in an airless hold of a boat this week.

The Swedish ship Poseidon rescued 439 survivors,some of them Nigerians, from the boat on Wednesday, but crew members discovered 52 corpses after smashing the vessel’s deck.

Survivors from the boat told police the smugglers would force the migrants back with knives if they tried to come out of the hold for air.

“When theses migrants tried to relay their need for air and water, they were mishandled, injured, knifed in a truly fierce way,” said Carmine Mosca, the head of the Palermo police squad.

Palermo prosecutor Maurizio Scalia said the detained crew included seven Moroccans, two Syrians and a Libyan.

The migrants were mostly from sub-Saharan Africa including Sudan, Senegal and Nigeria - but also Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The bodies of the dead arrived in Palermo late on Thursday. Officials say the migrants likely died of asphyxiation.

It comes after hundreds of migrants are feared to have

died when two more boats capsized off the Libyan coats.

On Thursday a lorry was found in Austria containing the bodies of 71 migrants , including several children.

The International Office of Migration has recorded 2,432 deaths linked to Mediterranean migrant crossings this year.

The figure is expected to rise as Libyan authorities count the dead from three shipwrecks off the Libyan coast in the past two days.

Scores of smugglers’ boats leave Libya every day, packed with migrants trying to reach the safety of Europe.

From left: Executive Secretary Lakaji Development Alliance (LDA); Mr Henrii Anyaogu Nwanguma; Guest Speaker, President/Chairman of Governing Council, Mr samuel Yemi Akeju; Director General/CEO, IoD, Mr Victor Banjo and Chairman/CEO Resan Investment Ltd/Chairman IoD Abuja, Chief Rex Onyeabo, during the Institute of Directors Nigeria 2015 August Members Evening in Lagos … yesterday Photos: Biodun ADEYEWA

Shell shuts down two key pipelines over sabotage

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NGLO-DUTCH oil giant Shell has shut down two key supply pipelines in Nigeria because of leaks and sabotage and declared a “force majeure” on crude oil exports.

Shell’s subsidiary in Nigeria SPDC said in a statement the force majeure became effective from Thursday “following the shutdown of both the Trans Niger Pipeline (TNP) and Nembe Creek Trunkline (NCTL).”

The two pipelines take crude to the Bonny Light exports terminal, one of the country’s main oil terminals.

The company said a leak was reported on the TNP at Oloma in southern Riv-

ers state, “while the NCTL is shut down for the removal of crude theft points.”

Shell said it was working to repair and reopen the two key pipelines as

quickly as possible.

“Force majeure” is a legal term releasing a company from contractual obligations when faced with circumstances beyond its control.

Shell, a major oil operator in Nigeria, did not disclose the volume of output affected by the incident.

The company has blamed repeated oil thefts and sabotage of key pipe-

lines as the major cause of spills and pollution in the oil-producing region.

It is estimated that Nigeria loses about $6billion worth of crude to thieves annually.

Agbakoba tasks new Customs boss on improved people would be confident MARITIME lawrevenue generation that sub-standard yer, Dr Olisa

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Agbako (SAN), wants the newly-appointed Comptroller-General of Customs (CGC) to secure the nation’s borders against smuggling.

Agbakoba, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos yesterday that the task of ensuring a well-secure border is criti-

cal to the growth of the economy.

Every other important assignment being carried out by the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS),he said, will rest largely on a secured border.

He said: “the new CGC must have as paramount, the task to ensure a secured

border because it is on that basis that the local economy can grow.

“He needs to do this, to restore confidence in the customs because there is no confidence in them now.”

He said that a secured border would encourage investments, wherein

smuggled goods would not chase them out of business.

Agbakoba also asked the new CGC to triple the current N1trillion generated by the organization.

Agbakoba said that achieving enhanced revenue would mean plugging off all revenue leakages.

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SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

West African College of Nursing honours Afe Babalola

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HE trailer-load of Awards, Recognitions and Encomiums that have been the lot of the frontline legal icon and Founder of the wave-making Afe Babalola University, AdoEkiti (ABUAD), Aare Afe Babalola, SAN, got extended to the West Africa sub-region with the recent decoration of the acknowledged philanthropist, farmer and educationist with the Fellowship of the West African College of Nursing (WACN).

The college, a specialized agency of the West African Health Organization (WAHO), with headquarters in Bobo Dioulasso, Burkina Fasso, had on April 16, 2015, informed Babalola of how it singled him out for the honorary fellowship award of the college in appreciation of his enormous contributions to quality education including nursing education in Nigeria and globally.

This award which came barely two months after Babalola was awarded the Honorary Doctor of Laws by the famous University of London, (making him a ripple alumnus of the famous university) has become another merited feather to the already crowded cap of honours and multiple chieftaincy titles of the author of “Impossibility Made Possible” whose major pastime is impacting lives.

The April 16, 2015 letter signed by WACN’s Executive Secretary, Mrs. Henrietta A. Okedo, FWACN, said inter

alia: “We recognize your bold initiatives in founding the fastest growing private university in Africa. We recognize you for the development of human resources in Nigeria and indeed Africa through the provision of quality education.”

The WACN boss commended Babalola with particular reference to the swiftness with which he is reforming education and his doggedness to turn out professionals in all areas especially in nursing profession.

According to her, with the establishment of the Department of Nursing in ABUAD, where all the programmes presented for accreditation, including core ones like Medicine, Law, Engineering, Computer Science among others have secured 100 per cent accreditation, coupled with the improved standard of education and practical skills being imparted on Nurses “there is no doubt that the long awaited reform in nursing (education) is already in sight.”

This, she stressed, “is in tandem with the overall goal for which the West African College of Nursing was established to promote excellence in nursing education at the basic and post-basic levels, to maintain the standard of practice of nursing within the subregional community and to contribute to the improvement of health care within the family and the community as well as to formulate and support nursing/midwifery edu-

cation”.

Responding at the award ceremony in Ghana recently, an elated Babalola who dedicated the award to humanity, said there would appear to be a meeting point between ABUAD and WACN in the development of quality humanity, stressing that “we in ABUAD are known for quality and functional education in our avowed and unbending endeavour to develop total men and women. This has been so recognized early in our five years of existence that UNESCO acknowledged us as a world class university, while the NUC, the regulatory body for university education in Nigeria, described it as a model, benchmark and reference point in tertiary education.”

No wonder it was not difficult for WACN to observe and note his modest efforts at bringing quality and functionality to bear on the training of nurses, a development which made the college to single him out for the award.

“With this, you have joined the long queue of admiring and appreciative stakeholders who recognize and applaud what we are doing here,” Babalola quipped.

He used the occasion to draw attention to the dwindling standard of education in Africa. To combat this endemic cankerworm, he noted that UNESCO has invited ABUAD to partner with it in order to address this challenge. In the same vein, he

frowned at the persistent drain in the foreign reserve of African countries, including Nigeria, occasioned by the unacceptable labyrinth of people going abroad for quality medical care.

According to him, this is one of the things he is out to address and checkmate through the quality medical education in ABUAD’s Medical College and provision of superlative health care in its teaching hospital, which upon completion in March next

•Aare Babalola year, will be a clear leader in the region.

Emphasizing the place and import of nursing right from

Ancient Greek, Roman Empire, Dark Ages, Medieval times through the Renaissance up to modern times, Babalola posited that the recent emergence of diseases especially of viral origin such as HIV/ AIDS, SARS and Ebola Viral Disease (EVD) should be of serious concern to the nursing profession with a view to expanding the scope of nursing training through the development of curriculum that will take care of new discoveries and health concepts.

For him, the time has come for nurses to embark on specialties rather than general nursing. He encouraged graduate nurses to aspire to become specialist nursing practitioners rather than general nursing practitioners.

Chad sentences 10 Boko Haram members to death

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•Sect kills 28 in Borno villages

EN members of the terror sect,Boko Haram,have been sentenced to death in Chad as part of the effort by that country to stamp out lawlessness.

The 10 were found guilty of terrorism by a court in the capital,N’Djamena,according to Reuters quoting judicial sources.

“They are all sentenced to death,” said one of the sources.

N’Djamena, less than 100 kilometres from the Nigerian border, was hit by a series of suicide bombings in June and July that killed more than 40 people. *Terrorists kill 28 in Borno Boko Haram in its latest at-

tacks in Borno State killed 24 people at Marfunudi, about 60 kilometres from Maiduguri on Tuesday night and another four in the fishing village of Kafa on Thursday.

The insurgents,according to a resident of Marfunudi, Abubakar Jojo, slit the throats of many of the victims.

A member of the local vigilace group in Kafa,Sadiq Kaka, said the terrorists threw the bodies of those killed in the village into a river.

Earlier this year, troops from Chad and Nigeria drove the extremists out of some 25 towns held for months in what they had declared an Islamic caliphate. The insurgents have returned to hit-and-run tactics

and suicide bombings.

Hundreds have been freed from Boko Haram captivity but none of the 219 girls abducted in April 2014 from a school in Chibok were rescued. Thursday marked the girls’ 500th day in captivity.

The extremists last week ambushed the lead vehicle in a convoy carrying the Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai. One soldier was killed and two were wounded while soldiers killed five attackers and arrested five.

Defence chiefs from Nigeria, Niger Republic, Chad, Cameroun and Benin Republic have finalized details to deploy 8,750 troops from five countries against the sect.

NEWS

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Ambode enjoins youths to utilize talent, create ideas • Commissions Onikan Youth Centre AGOS State governor, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode, on Friday enjoined youths in the state to always utilise their talent in creating great ideas and unleashing great potentials in all areas of human endeavour.

The governor spoke at the commissioning of the newly reconstructed Multipurpose Onikan Youth Centre, Lagos, executed by PZ Cussons Foundation.

Ambode, who commended the effort of the management of PZ Foundation for the execution of the project, further enjoined youths in the state to utiilise centres such as that as a rallying point for the conception of bold ideas and unleash their potential in all facets of life.

"I thank the management of PZ Cussons Foundation for reconstructing this centre. Centres such as this will serve as rallying point for the conception of great ideas and unleashing of potentials in all areas of human endeavour, ” he said.

The governor maintained that the reconstruction of the centre is a good example of how private sector organisations can support the efforts of government for the common good of the society, calling on other corporate organisations to come up with credible mechanisms and projects to stimulate the society. ” Government alone cannot handle the many challenges our society is faced with. I also call on other private sector organisations to come up with credible mechanisms and projects to stimulate the society. ”As a government, we will continue to explore ways to create an enabling environment to make businesses thrive. We are committed to introducing new incentives for businesses in Lagos to enable them grow, support the society to take more of our youths off the streets,” he said.

Governor Ambode also directed that the Centre be immediately connected to the Lagos Island Independent Power Project (IPP) to ensure 24-hour power supply to enable youths access the facility at all times.

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•Lagos State Governor, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode (left) with his Kaduna counterpart, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai (right) during a condolence visit to El-Rufai on his father’s demise in Kaduna... on Thursday

Fayose appoints 72-yr-old illiterate carpenter as council chair KITI State governor Mr Ayo Fayose, yesterday, sent tongues wagging with the swearing-in of a 72-year-old illiterate carpenter, Pa Olatunde Afolayan, as the caretaker chairman of Moba Local Government.

The governor, immediately after the inauguration held at Abiodun Adetiloye Hall, Trade Fair Complex, Ado Ekiti, also appointed a graduate to serve as the Personal Assistant of the septuagenarian.

He also swore in two other caretaker chairmen during the ceremony. The appointees, Mrs. Omolara Bayode Ayeni (Ikole) and Owolabi Ajewole (Ijero) were appointed to replace their predecessors who recently resigned their appointments.

Fayose also swore in the new chairman of the State Independent Electoral Commission (SIEC), Justice Kayode Bamisile a former Chief Judge of the state and other members of the commission to set the stage for the conduct of the local government polls before the end of the year.

Elated by his appointment, Pa Afolayan, commended the governor for the kind gesture, saying: “What I expected was for the governor to make me a ward chairman. I have never gone to school for a day, but that does not diminish my intelligence. I may not be educated or certificated, but I have the experience to pilot the affairs of the council. I promise to surpass the records left be-

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•Hires graduate as his PA Odunayo OGUNMOLA, Ado-Ekiti hind by my predecessors to justify Governor Fayose’s assertion that local people are intelligent and visionary."

Justifying Pa Afolyan’s appointment, Fayose said many elected political office holders rode on the votes of illiterates and insignificant people only to forget them after assuming office. He maintained that the appointment of an illiterate as a council chairman is a way to appreciate such segment of the population.

The governor said: “In my government, whether you are educated or not, you will get

"Members of this honourable commission must be men of impeccable characters. So, whoever has anything against any of the members must come forward to prove it and if you do I will remove such person immediately.

“It baffles me when leaders make their in-laws or friend or relations members of electoral body. This is immoral. I have criticized President Buhari for making Mrs Amina Zakari the head of INEC in the country based on certain reasons and I cannot afford to toe the same line. So, the people I have here are those that can do us proud. I urge you to discharge your duty without fear or favour,” he said.

Alhaji Gay: Lack of DPP’s advice stalls trial of suspects USTICE A.J Bashua of a Lagos High Court sitting in Igbosere, yesterday postponed hearing in the bail application for 12 men accused of complicity in the killing of a dreaded Lagos land speculator, Tunji Rasak Olaniyi aka Alhaji Gay. The judge adjourned the matter till September 1 following lack of letter of advice from the office of Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).

The defendants, who were initially arraigned before Justice J. Sonaike of a Lagos High Court in

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Muhammad emerges NGE President Mike ODIEGWU, Yenagoa HE Acting President of of the Standing Committee the Nigerian Guild of headed by Mr. Ray Ekpu.

Editors (NGE), Mr. Also, Mr. Steve Ayorinde, Garba Deen-Muhammad, on former Vice-President (West) Friday became the substan- became the Deputy President, tive president of the Guild. while Funke Egbemode, Muhammad replaced Mr. Managing Director and EdiFemi Adesina following the tor-In-Chief, New Telegraph, latter's appointment as the emerged as Vice-President Special Adviser on Media (West). and Publicity to President In his acceptance speech, Muhammadu Buhari.

Muhammad expressed apThe new President emerged preciation to the Guild for the through a voice vote at the mature manner they handled ongoing Annual Nigerian Ed- the election. itors Conference in Yenagoa, He promised to always be Bayelsa State. accessible, saying that he He was nominated by Mr. would do everything within Idang Alibi, of Daily Trust, his power to ensure that the while Ibrahim Umoru sec- members did not regret their onded the motion. decision.

This followed the decision

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something. The vote of a professor and an illiterate is the same.

So, under my administration, those who are not educated can rise to any level they want.”

He reiterated his call to President Muhammadu Buhari to sack the Acting Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Mrs. Amina Zakari, urging the President to appoint credible and trustworthy Nigerians as national commissioners of the commission.

Fayose challenged the people to expose any of the the newly appointed SIEC chiefs with questionable characters promising to remove such individual.

Rukayat JIMOH Igbosere and remanded in Ikoyi Prison were however absent in court.

Counsel to the defendants, Mr Adebayo Lawanson, whose application for bail had been pending, urged the court to order effective reply from DPP. He stated that the defendants are older people whose fragile health should be put into consideration.

Lawanson argued that the DPP has failed to forward its response to the application for bail of the defendants despite being adequately served the notice.

A representative of the office of DPP, Mr Ogunsanya, however told the court that his office was not duly notified of the bail ap-

plication.

Olaniyi was allegedly killed by angry mob on Monday July 20, 2015, when he led thugs to the scene of a protest against his forcible land grabbing activities in Temidire area of Alagbado, a suburb of Lagos.

The suspects, Chief Najeem Abioye,64; Adeola Ogungbade,37; Ganiyu Abioye,26; Ogundare Ogunsanya,63; Olanrewaju Ololade,62; Bello Lasisi,60; Ajani Kasali,54;Oyedele Musiliu,64; Jonathan Sanyaolu,68; Taoreed Bakare,61;Olaidi Albert,66 and Wahab Abioye,38, had been charged with five offences bordering on murder, arson, rioting, unlawful gathering and malicious damage.

Zone Two PCRC hails recruitment of additional officers HE Police Community R e l a t i o n s Committee(PCRC), Zone Two Police Command, Lagos, yesterday applauded the Buhari administration’s directive for the recruitment of 10,000 fresh police officers by the Nigeria Police Force.

In a statement by the Chairman, Archbishop George Amu, the organization said it is exceptionally gladdened by the news, in view of the security challenges facing the country at the moment, adding that President Muhammadu Buhari should compel the police authority to commence the recruitment exercise immediately to avoid any bureaucracy or unnecessary foot dragging.

Archbishop Amu called for full police / public partnership in all the zones of the police commands in order to modernize the Police Force by “buying modern training equipment which are now obsolete, building of police quarters and total improvement of the police infrastructure. Private partnership should be involved to enhance the police force because government could not do every thing alone.”

“My opinion is that government alone cannot do everything for the Nigeria Police. Government cannot effect modernization of all obsolete police equipment. I hereby advise and

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Community leader appeals to Amosun over land grabbers’ attack community leader in lage in Ado-Odo Ota Local Government of Ogun State Chief Peter Fagbenro has appealed to Governor Ibikunle Amosun to save them from land grabbers and hoodlums terrorizing his village.

Chief Fagbenro made this appeal during the week after a group of hoodlums sponsored by some land grabbers in the community swooped on the village on Monday with guns and cutlasses shooting sporadically into the air.

According to the commu-

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nity leader, the hoodlums robbed and raped some women in the village and made away with three motorcycles, money, handsets and other items after shooting sporadically into the air to scare us away.

The three members of the community whose motorcycles were stolen include: Kola Adebakin, Ayo Ogundeyi and Samson Arikusa.

Kola Adebakin, while narrating his ordeal said, “at first, we did not take the commotion going on in the ßvillage that day as something serious not until we heard gunshots

several times. Immediately we heard these gunshots, we parked our Okada and ran for our lives but after the commotion, when we went back to where we parked out okadas, they have disappeared”.

The land grabbers claimed they have a judgment from an Ota Grade I Customary Court but the Ota High Court in Suit No. MT/85/13 presided over

by Justice A.A Babawale on 14th November, 2013 ruled that the Balogun Popoola Oliyide Olaore Olanipekun Family is not a party in the said suit.

recommend that the government should authorize full private partnership with Police Zones. The police has a Trust Fund in Lagos State. What stops the Police to also set up Trust Funds with business partners in their zones.”

GCI holds annual get-together Hannah OJO OVERNMENT College Ibadan Old Boys A s s o c i a t i o n (GCIOBA), will hold her fourth annual get-together on Sunday, August 30, 2015 at Jogor Events Centre, Ibadan.

The event tagged “An afternoon with our young girls’ will feature programmes such as various programmes aimed at revisiting the academic and social status of the school.

Dignitaries expected to grace the event include, the national president of GCIOBA, Prof. Biodun Jolaoso, the branch chairman, Mr Jide Badejoko as well as past and present class sets presidents and branches president from home and abroad.

The Speaker of Oyo State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon Michael Adeyemo is the special guest of honour.

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RCCG holds convention HE Redeemers’ Men Fellowship of the Redeemed Christian Church of God, Province 13, will hold its second annual convention titled “Men of Honour Making Outstanding Impact” between August 28 to 30, 2015.

The pastor in charge of the province, Bode Odesola, urged all married men to attend the programme assuring that it would to be a life transforming and power packed experience.

The event will take place at the provincial headquarters in Gbagada, Lagos.

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SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

Ignore Abia, probe NDDC, N/Delta youths tell Buhari

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OUTHS in the Niger Delta region, under the aegis of Aggrieved Niger Delta Youths (ANDY), yesterday

Precious DIKEWOHA, Port Harcourt called on President Mohammadu Buhari to dis-

regard the statement credited to the Managing Director of Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Mr. Dan Abia, that no

We have changed Bayelsa — Dickson

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HE Governor of Bayelsa State, Seriake Dickson, has claimed that his administration started the process of changing the state in 2012.

According to Dickson, “the massive infrastructural development of the state and the attitudinal re-orientation of Bayelsans are manifest testimonies of the change we brought to bear on governance in Bayelsa State.”

The governor said that public funds are now being prudently utilized for the people, adding ‘‘that is why in the last three years, we have been able to turn Bayelsa to a construction site, and at the same time restore the people’s confidence in government.”

Governor Dickson, who spoke on Thursday at the 11th edition of the All Nigerian Editors Conference, said the theme of the conference, The Change We Need: the role of the editor and the choice of

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Bayelsa as host were no happenstance.

He said the Guild’s decision may have been prompted by its knowledge of him as a change agent, as well as the prevailing peace and security in the state.

He said his decision to host the conference was not just because he is media-friendly, but also because of the capacity of media leaders to tell the Bayelsa story in line with his philosophy of ‘‘taking Bayelsa to the world and bringing the world to Bayelsa’’.

He said: ‘‘For me as a PDP governor, my position is that, after election, all men and women of our country must unite to move our nation forward and bring about the needed change, because the important issues, like security and economy that we are elected to deliver on, are not partisan.

“Hunger has no partisan boundary or colour, terrorism knows no partisan colour. We need to give support to the Fed-

eral Government led by President Muhamed Buhari.’’

While urging the editors to set agenda on the diversification of the Nigerian economy without oil, Governor Dickson lamented the sad story of the dry oil well in Oloibri, the first oil well in the country.

Earlier, the representative of the Vice President and Permanent Secretary of Ministry of Information, Dr. Folashade Yemi-Esan, urged editors to be fair, balanced and objective in their reportage.

The chairman of the occasion, Mr. John Momoh, enjoined media organisations to do things in a different way in order to bring about the desired change in the country. According to him, the mass media are reflections of the country they operate in.

Acting President of the Guild, Mallam Garba Deen Muhammed, thanked the governor for hosting the Guild, and pledged the readiness of editors to be agents of change in the country.

Cross River prepares to mitigate effect of Lagdo dam discharge

HE Cross River state government has said it is taking proactive step towards mitigating the effect of the flood that may arise from the discharge of excess water from the Lagdo Dam in Cameroon.

The Director General, Cross River State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) Vincent Aquah, stated this in his office while speaking with newsmen.

He said that SEMA was mobilizing its partners and other stakeholders, including the vulnerable communities, on how best to miti-

Nicholas KALU, Calabar gate the impending disaster.

Mr. Aquah emphasized that intensive sensitization and enlightenment would be carried out through the media and traditional modes of mass communication, as well as interpersonal interactions.

Cross River State, located in the south-south part of the country with several rivers and streams traversing the entire landscape from the middle belt of the country to the sea in the south, is highly vulnerable to any swelling of

the water channels.

The state has over six major rivers, all inter-connected with the coastlines inhabited by people in villages and towns.

These coastlines towns and villages are often vulnerable to flooding during the rainy seasons and could be aggravated if excess water from the Lagdo Dam is discharged.

It will be recalled that when a similar incident occurred in 2012, the Federal Government rated Cross River in category B of the disaster profile as a result of the magnitude of the disaster in the state.

money was missing.

The group expressed surprise over Abia’s threat to challenge the report of the Auditor General of the Federation.

The leader of the group, Prince Amatari Bipeledei, who spoke during the organization’s emergency meeting in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, said they have sent a letter to the Auditor General di-

ment of the NDDC boss that there was no money missing. The commission must not escape probe.

“Through our letter, we have directed the Auditor General and his team to audit the NDDC’s account from 2012 to 2015. It is not enough for someone to say I have no hand on the issue that concerns him or her. As far as we are concerned, NDDC is stinking.”

Court restrains lawyer, others from defaming Akpabio

HIGH Court of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) has granted an injunction restraining an Abuja based lawyer, Mr Leo Ekpenyong from publishing or causing to be published any defamatory statement against the Minority Leader of the Senate, Senator Godswill Akpabio.

Justice Valentine Ashi of Court 29, granted the injunction following an application brought by Rickey Tarfa (SAN) , Counsel to Senator Akpabio, following series of unsubstantiated publications

by Mr Ekpenyong against Senator Akpabio.

The legal counsel to Senator Akpabio had argued that the reputation of the former Governor of Akwa Ibom State has been disparaged and tarnished following series of defamatory statements by Mr Ekpenyong and unless restrained, he would continue to publish such spurious statements which have portrayed Senator Akpabio in bad light before the public.

The lawyer further held that Senator Akpabio’s reputation had been seriously injured and had suffered considerable distress and anxiety, following the series of disparaging statements published against the Senate Minority leader.

In the suit, counsels to Akpabio are asking for dam-

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recting him to commence an audit of NDDC’s account from 2012-2015.

He said another audit report to cover Dan Abia’s tenure would determine if the MD of NDDC is clean or not, noting that the group will go a long way to ensure that NDDC under Abia is subjected to probe. “ We are calling on President Mohammadu Buhari not to listen to the com-

ages for libel in the sum of N1 billion and an order compelling Mr Ekpenyong and others to publish a full apology to Senator Akpabio on the internet and two major national newspapers.

They are also for an injunction restraining the defendants from further publishing

or causing to be published defamatory words against the plaintiff.

Justice Ashi agreed with the submissions of the Legal Counsels to Akpabio and restrained Mr Ekpenyong from further publication of defamatory statements against Senator Akpabio.

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Seven die, 29 injured in Ebonyi auto accident

EVEN persons were killed yesterday in a fatal auto accident along the Enugu-Abakaliki express road.

The accident, according to

an eyewitness, involved two commercial buses travelling in opposite directions on the ever-busy road.

The source said that one of the buses attempted to over-

take a smaller vehicle going to Abakaliki, and in the process, collided with other bus travelling in the opposite direction.

The source said: “The bus

driver didn’t see an oncoming bus from the opposite direction, resulting in a fatal head-on collision.

“Cars travelling along the road stopped to rescue the

victims. The injured and the dead were evacuated to a nearby hospital.”

The Sector Commander of the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) in Ebonyi State, Mr Charlse Aborchi, confirmed the accident.

He, however, said that only three passengers, who he said were males, died in the crash.

“Our officers responded instantly on receiving the news of the crash and led the evacuation of the dead and injured.”

He noted that the dead and injured were taken to the Annunciation hospital in Emene, Enugu State.

“I advise motorists to shun reckless driving, as it has resulted in needless loss of lives on our roads.”

Delta governorship election tribunal adjourns over uncertified INEC documents

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•Former Anambra State Governor, Mr. Peter Obi, signing the condolence register at the home of late Hon. Ifeanyichukwu Enemchukwu, former Speaker of Anambra State House of Assembly, at Oba... yesterday.

Ogoni clean-up: MOSOP warns politicians against sabotage

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HE Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) has warned politicians against sabotaging the clean-up of Ogoniland, as recommended by a team of environmentalists from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

MOSOP, yesterday in Port Harcourt, through its President, Legborsi Saro Pyagbara, stated that it had uncovered “an evil plot by internal and external politicians” to politicise the planned Ogoni environmental remediation and restoration process, in order to advance some parochial political and economic agenda, capable of thwarting the success of the exercise.

The umbrella organisation of Ogoni people asked the alleged saboteurs to steer clear of the implementation arrangements, declaring that any further attempt at undermining the process would be viewed as an affront against the collective interest of Ogoni people and

Bisi OLANIYI, Port Harcourt would be decisively resisted.

MOSOP said: “We insist that the environmental degradation of Ogoniland, which has compromised our general well-being, is not a political issue. Dragging the fast-tracking actions into the murky waters of politics demonstrates inexcusable callousness that should be condemned by all, especially lovers of safe and clean environment.

“We are warning external collaborators who have, and are providing resources including their platforms for the secret, devious agenda to realise that they are known and sooner than later, they will be exposed.

“We have come a long way, and we urge all Ogoni to come together, irrespective of interest, as we cannot afford to falter at this time of seeming genuine interest of government to redress the environmental wrongs against the Ogoni people.

We urge all Ogoni people to

heed our advice, as we will resist all attempts to frustrate efforts at ensuring environmental justice for our people.”

The umbrella organisation of Ogoni people also stated that the condition in local Ogoni communities, where the people had been reaping deaths and facing crushing livelihoods should bother everybody, insisting that end must come to environmental injustice in Ogoniland.

It will be recalled that UNEP’s environmental assessment of Ogoniland was initiated by former President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2006, as part of efforts to put an end to the many years of pollution, neglect, environmental degradation and marginalisation in Ogoni.

The Ogoni environmental assessment was adequately supported by the late President Umaru Yar’Adua, while UNEP report, containing far-reaching recommendations was released on August 4, 2011 and presented in Abuja to ex-President Goodluck Jonathan on

August 12, 2011.

President Buhari, on August 5 this year, exactly sixty eight days in office, approved the actions to fasttrack the implementation of the UNEP report, with the decision, described by the stakeholders across the globe, as a welcome development.

The UNEP report stated that the water in NsisiokenOgale-Eleme, Eleme (Ogoni) LGA of Rivers state, contained cancer-causing Benzene (carcinogen), which was 900 times the World Health Organisation’s (WHO’s) standards for water contamination, thereby requiring urgent attention.

The report also revealed that the sustainable environmental restoration of Ogoniland would take up to 20 years to achieve and would require coordinated efforts from government agencies at all levels, thereby recommending that the Federal Government should establish an Ogoniland Environmental Restoration Authority.

Anambra APC wants FG to probe DSS over alleged brutalization of member

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HE Anambra State chapter of the All Progressive Congress (APC) has called on President Mohammadu Buhari to probe the Department of State Service (DSS) in the state over an alleged brutal treatment of one of its chieftain, Chief Ifeanyichukwu Nwokoye.

The APC leader, who was Buhari’s presidential campaign coordinator in Anambra state in 2007, was allegedly brutalized and beaten to coma by DSS operatives in the state on April 27, 2015.

Nwokoye was allegedly

Nwanosike ONU, Awka beaten for refusing a request by the DSS operatives to provide a list of expatriate doctors who were lodged in his Hotel (Mayroses).

The doctors were brought in

by Governor Willie Obiano to the state to treat the less privileged in the various communities, Nwokoye and his wife, Jessie, were allegedly handcuffed and locked up in a DSS cell at Amawbia, where they were left naked like common

criminals.

The DSS men allegedly broke Nwokoye’s shoulders, damaged his scrotum and his retina, leading to his being flown abroad by his family for surgeries.

Since the ugly incident, prominent citizens of the state, including Senator Chris Ngige, Senator Andy Uba and Chief Simon Okeke, among others, had condemned the action of DSS in the state.

The state secretary of the APC, chukwuma Agufugo, called for a probe of the incident.

According to Agufugo, “Nwokoye is not only a chieftain of APC in Anambra State, but a prominent citizen of Nigeria, who has paid his dues in politics, and for him to be treated like a common criminal by the DSS is unacceptable to APC. “Our security operatives should learn how to treat those who are under their care, and not to harass, molest, intimidate and humiliate them. This should serve as a deterrent to others who are planning such evil in a civilized society.”

HE Delta State Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal yesterday upheld an application by the governorship candidate of the All Progressive Congress (APC), O’tega Emerhor, for adjournment of proceedings after it was discovered that INEC did not endorse the documents tendered before the tribunal.

At the hearing in the substantive suit, counsel to APC governorship candidate Thompson Okpoko (SAN), informed the tribunal that he observed that the documents, which were subpoenaed, did not have the signature of INEC’s administrative secretary, Mr Thomas Ongele.

Joined in the suit are Governor Ifeanyi Okowa, 1st respondent; PDP, 2nd respondents; while the 3rd, 4th and 5th respondents are (INEC, REC, and Returning officer) respectively.

He urged the tribunal to grant an adjournment to enable INEC regularise the signatures on the certified true copies of the polling unit by polling unit results.

His said, “In the course of the sorting through the documents by our juniors, I discovered that the INEC official who certified the documents used rubber stamp. He is the administrative secretary, a lawyer who should know what to do. “This can be regularised if the tribunal can make him come to sign the documents in the open court. My application is that the honourable tribunal directs the man to come and sign the documents in court.”

But Okowa’s counsel Dr Alex Izinyon (SAN) objected, arguing that adjournments are not granted as a matter of course.

He said the APC petition was filed about one month ago, arguing that the tribunal has ruled on the use of rubber stamp earlier.

He urged the tribunal to in-

Okungbowa AIWERIE, Asaba voke Order 46 of the Electoral Act and close the case ‘if the petitioner is not interested in the petition’.

Counsel to the PDP, Mr Timothy Kehinde (SAN) also opposed the granting of the application, arguing that the application is meant ‘to overreach the 2nd respondent and to keep this matter from being determined.’

He sad the documents were certified and given back on February 15th by the 3rd respondent, submitting that: “it is an act of bad faith for the petitioner to claim that they discovered some imperfections in the certificate.”

He said the options available to the petitioner was to tender the documents as they are, close the case or call the other witnesses and allow the matter to go on.

He argued that the petitioner cannot enjoy the tribunal’s discretion for any form of adjournment, citing Order 19 rule 5, which prohibits the tribunal from granting more than three adjournments to any party in a case.

INEC’s counsel, Damien Dodo (SAN) also opposed the application, arguing that had the petitioner been vigilant, the error would not have occurred.

But the APC’s counsel argued that “my witnesses will not have the opportunity of testifying on what the documents are for. The endorsement of the documents by the INEC official is the only practical way that justice can be served. If a petition is thrown out because a document was not signed, that will be turning justice on its head. I assure that nothing will be lost if the matter is adjourned.”

Justice Nasiru Gunmi adjourned till September 4th for continuation of the matter.

Okorocha sets up committee to manage bailout fund

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MO State Governor, Rochas Okorocha, yesterday set up a committee to administer the bailout fund from the Federal Government, which he said has been accessed by the state.

Okorocha, who met with workers and leaders of the organized labour in the state, named the Accountant-General of the state, the Chief of Staff, Chief Uche Nwosu, the Principal Secretary to the Governor, Pascal Obi and Head of Service, Callistus Ekenze, as members of the committee.

The Governor directed the committee to ensure that all the salaries owed workers

Okodili NDIDI, Owerri

are cleared and payments are made by cheques, in line with the policy of the state government to check cases of ghost workers.

He also directed that, apart from the arrears of salary owed the workers, the workers should also be paid for the month of September up front.

The Governor also promised that the arrears of salaries owed parastatals will also be cleared, disclosing that he will be meeting with the labour leaders to know how to reposition the parastatals for higher productivity.

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NEWS

THE NATION, SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

Over one million Nigerians suffer blindness —Ophthalmological Society T HE Ophthalmological Society of Nigeria (OSN) said on Friday in Jos that no fewer than one million Nigerians suffer from one form of blindness or the other.

According to Prof. Sebastin Nwosu, OSN President, the

figure was based on a research conducted in 2008.

Nwosu, who read a communiqué issued at OSN general and scientific conference in Jos, said that 50 per cent of the number were caused by cataract alone.

He said that glaucoma, and

several other factors were responsible for the remaining 50 per cent.

The OSN president said that three million Nigerians suffer partial blindness, a sit-

uation that could be corrected if proper treatment was done.

He revealed that 42 out of every 1,000 Nigerians are

blind, pointing out that the distribution varied from one geographical area of the country to the other.

While cataract is age related, genetic factors, as well

I’m running open govt receptive to ideas, others' input —Ganduje ANO State Governor, Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje yesterday in Kaduna reiterated his administration’s commitment to running a government that is open and receptive to ideas and other inputs aimed at moving his state forward.

This is also as he emphasized his resolve and further commitment to total transformation of Kano State through continuation of the ongoing projects, fine tuning of some programs and introduction of more people oriented projects, policies and programs.

Ganduje stated this in his address to declare open the 2015 commencement retreat for political office holders, top government functionaries and directors in the state holding at Hotel 17, Kaduna.

The retreat which commenced on the 27th August is to end on the 30th August, 2015.

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According to the governor, the fundamental objective of the retreat was informed by the desire to ensure synergy and common understanding by all stakeholders on the best means of accomplishing government’s policies, programs and projects for the overall socio-economic development of Kano state.

“In this vein, we have embarked upon various reforms aimed at ensuring a result oriented state public service.

These measures include among others streamlining MDAs by reducing ministries from 19-14 for effective and efficient performance while we are committed to the implementation of SERVICOM concept aimed at improving service delivery in line with international best practices.

He tasked participants on the need to pay keen attention presentations and dis-

... pledges to complete ongoing projects Abdulgafar ALABELEWE, Kaduna course on topical issues critical to governance, adding, “the retreat will undoubtedly provide you deeper understanding of our collective responsibilities and obligations as key stakeholders in the conduct of government busi-

ness.

Earlier in his welcome address, the Head of Civil Service, Kano state, Muhammad Awwal Naiya whose office put together the retreat, corroborated the governor on the idea of convening the retreat, saying, is to provide a platform for relevant stake-

holders in governance process to understand the policy thrust of the present administration and the need to ensure synergy in the formulation and implementation of government policies, programs and projects for overall socio-economic development of the state.

as human life styles, also result to blindness in some cases, he said.

Nwosu said that this year’s theme of the conference, `Building Partnership for Eye Care’ was strategic in placing and repositioning eye care.

He said that partnership was strategic in placing and repositioning eye care in the front burner in respect of the priority agenda of both Government and the NGOs. The OSN president said that the body had developed an alliance with the media to gain a platform to raise public awareness on the problem of visual disability, with a view to alleviating the problems. (NAN)

Benue earmarks N6.4bn for school infrastructure ENUE State Governor, Samuel Ortom, today disclosed that the state government would commit N6.4 billion to the provision of infrastructure in its primary schools.

He made the disclosure while receiving officials of the Nigerian Union of Teachers, NUT, who visited him at the Benue Peoples House.

Governor Ortom stated that the Universal Basic Education Commission, UBEC, has provided a grant of N3.2 billion for the purpose while he had already included the same amount as counterpart fund in the N5.6 billion approved by the State Assembly for payment of counterpart funds across the board.

He assured the teachers that the amount would be committed to the provision of infrastructure in primary schools across the state adding that he would also ensure that teachers were no longer maltreated.

The Governor said the treatment of teachers in the past was a sad story and apologized for their ill-treatment on behalf of leadership.

According to him all monies meant for provision of infrastructure, equipment, and welfare would be judiciously applied describing primary education as the most important level as it forms the foundation upon which the future would be built.

Leader of the delegation and NUT chairman in the state, Comrade Godwin Anya commended Governor Ortom for commencing the implementation of minimum wage to teachers in the state.

“The teachers of Benue State are happy with you,” he stated, adding that they were also in support of the steps he had taken so far with regard to security and welfare of workers.

He listed delay in the payment of salaries, lack of promotions, nonpayment of leave title grant, retirement and death benefits as well as poor environment in schools as problems.

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•Residents of Wurno Town fetching water from a borehole provided by Wurno Local Government Area of Sokoto State Photo: NAN

Kebbi State govt begins purchase of wheat from farmers HE Chairman Wheat farmers Association in Kebbi ,Alh. Abdullahi Maigandu disclosed that the Kebbi State government has already started purchase of hundreds of tonnes of wheat from farmers in the state. He stated this in Birnin Kebbi yesterday while displaying some tones of the wheat purchased from farmers.

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Atiku condoles with El-Rufai over foster father’s death ORMER Vice a former Secretary to the Tony AKOWE, Abuja President and Kaduna State Governchieftain of All Progressives Congress ment, was a distinguished educationist (APC) Atiku Abubakar has condoled whose services to Nigeria would never be Kaduna state governor, Mallam Nasir el- forgotten.

Rufai over the death of his foster faHe described the deceased as one of the ther, Mallam Yahaya Hamza. finest public officials, and that his demise In a statement from his media office in has robbed the public service of a humble, Abuja, the former Vice President said he but patriotic and dedicated public servant. was grievously touched by the death of the The former Vice President prayed to former Permanent Secretary in the Federal Allah to grant the deceased eternal rest in Ministry of Education. peace and strength and comfort to the elAtiku said Yahaya Hamza, who was also Rufai family to bear the loss.

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Ortom, Suswam meet ENUE State Governor, Samuel Ortom, yesterday night met with his predecessor, Dr. Gabriel Suswam, at the Presidential Lodge of the Benue Peoples House, in Makurdi.

The former Governor was accompanied to the meeting which he requested and was held behind closed doors, by Catholic Bishop of Katsina-Ala Diocese, Bishop Peter Adoboh,

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and chairman Ashitech conglomerate, Dr. Terkula Suswam.

The current and former governors discussed state matters for several hours.

It was their first meeting since the inauguration of Governor Ortom which the former governor didn’t attend.

The meeting ended in the early hours of yesterday.

Khadijat SAIDU and Ayo AJOGE, Birnin Kebbi According to him, the move was to encourage wheat farmers in the state to embark on large scale production of the crop so that the state will supercede its second position and become the highest producing state in Nigeria just like in rice farming.

"At this level, 400 tonnes of

wheat have been purchased at #15,000 per bag. I got the assurance of state government to support our farmers through accessing loans and other incentives. It is our hope that farmers will utilise this opportunity to cultivate wheat on the over 600,000 hectares of Fadama land in the state,” he said.

The Chairman has also allayed farmers fears on the sus-

tainability of the scheme by announcing that the Federal Government had released funds to the association towards that regard.

The Speaker Kebbi State House of Assembly, Alh. Abdulmumin Kamba represented Governor Atiku Bagudu at the event. He assured the farmers of the state's government continuous support to meet the target.

…as gov’s wife seeks good working relationship with journalists IFE of Kebbi State Governor Hajiya Aishat Atiku Bagudu has appealed to working journalists in the state to support her husband’s administration in the state.

Mrs Bagudu made this appeal last week in an interactive session organised for the working journalists in the state describing the importance of information dissemination in the society as a very important aspect mostly in making peace and ensuring unity among the people and the government.

The meeting which was held at the Banquet Hall of the Government House in Birnin Kebbi was aimed at

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increasing good relationship between the journalists and her husband’s administration.

Hajia Aishat Bagudu who founded what is known as Mass Literacy for the Less Privileged and Almajiri Initiatives(MALPAI) said that she is also seeking the support of the media to advocate the issue of child abuse and the cases of rape in the society adding that it is the responsibility of the media houses especially the electronic media to fight the menace in order for them to know the danger inherent in the act.

"I’m worried about the cases of rape now; please you people should help the society in passing across the in-

formation and looming danger in it. Parents should caution their daughters," she said.

She said that arrangements had been concluded through her NGO to establish maternal and Child Mortality Insurance scheme which would be established across the 21 local government She said further that the insurance would cover pregnant women and children under five years as they would have free medical treatment.

She explained that 1000 women would benefit from the scheme in the state,adding that the scheme would last for one year based on batch by batch.

THE NATION SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015

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SPORT EXTRA BATTLE OF DAR ES SALAAM

Oliseh picks six NPFL players • Gbolahan Salami, Adeniji miss cut • Coach impressed with Eagles performance against academy

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HE Nigeria Football Federation released the list of 6 NPFL players picked for the Tanzania qualifier after Day VII at their Abuja camp on Friday.

The list includes Ikechukwu Ezenwa (Sunshine Stars), Solomon Kwambe (Warri Wolves),Chima Akas (Sharks), Austin Obaroakpo (Abia Warriors), Usman Mohammed (Taraba) and Prince Aggreh (Sunshine Stars).

The surprise omission from the list is captain of the team, Gbolahan Salami who is reported to have Passport issues with the Norwegian embassy.

"After impressing playing for Warri Wolves, Salami submitted his passport with the embassy of Norway as his agent reportedly secured him a contract with a club in Norway’s elite division.

However, despite the fact that he should have been either given a visa or had his passport returned over three weeks ago, there has been no additional contact from the embassy.”

The now select 6 will await the

• Salami • Adeniji 18 foreign pros invited by Sunday Oliseh from the week commencing August 31.

Sunday Oliseh is expected to lead his players from Abuja for Tanzania via a chartered flight on Thursday September 3, 2015.

After the Dar es Salaam mission the team will move straight to Port Harcourt from Tanzania to continue preparations for the Sept.8 international friendly against Niger Republic.

However, Oliseh has expressed satisfaction with the outcome of his NPFL-based players’ performance following Yesterday’s 30 win in a practice match against Amakson Academy in Abuja.

Sunshine Stars and the current League season’s top goal scorer Tunde Adeniji got a first half brace against the academy team and Wikki Tourists’ Godwin Obaje completed the easy win.

Eaglets to face hosts Korea on Wednesday

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HE U-17 National Team, Golden Eaglets, will play hosts Korea Republic in their first match at the 4-Nation Suwon International Tournament, on Wednesday next week.

Arrangements have been finalized by the Nigeria Football Federation for the Golden Eaglets to depart for Korea on Sunday for the 4-Nation invitational competition which was shifted in July due to the outbreak of MERS in the Far East.

Hosts Korea Republic would be joined by Brazil, Croatia and Nigeria, and the teams will play one another in a round-robin basis between September 2 and 6 to determine the tournament winners.

The Golden Eaglets would open their account against the Baby Taegu Warriors on September 2 and would complete their schedule against Brazil and Croatia on September 4 and 6 respectively.

Organizers said the tournament is a good test run for the four teams heading to the FIFA U-17 World Cup Chile 2015, where incidentally, Nigeria and Croatia are drawn together along with host Chile and USA in Group A. Brazil and South Korea are also in the same Group B along with Guinea and England.

Meanwhile, Golden Eaglets’ squad of 18 players and officials are expected to leave their closed- camping site in Katsina

on Saturday en route to Lagos through Abuja where they are expected to fly out for the tournament, and are expected in Suwon on Monday, August 31.

They are due back in Nigeria on September 8.

Ahead of their trip to Suwon, the Golden Eaglets continued their preparation for the tournament with a 4-1 win against Katsina State Football Club Owners' Selected Team at the Karkanda Stadium in Katsina on Thursday.

"This was a very difficult match and a good test again for our team," Golden Eaglets' assistant coach, Kabiru Baleria, said afterwards. "The most important thing is that the boys are showing what they are learning in training."

Dream Team IV beat Abuja College 3-0

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IGERIA’S Dream Team defeated Abuja Football College 3-0 on Friday in a test game ahead of next month’s All Africa Games in Congo Brazzaville.

Oghenekaro Etebo put the Nigeria U23s ahead from the

• Etebo

penalty spot in the first half.

Junior Ajayi doubled the Dream Team’s advantage in the second half with Christian Pyagbara completing the scoring late on.

Flying Eagles Mustapha Abdullahi featured for the Nigeria Olympic team and now looks set to join the team for the trip to Congo.

The leftback will fill in for Chima Akas who is with the Super Eagles squad preparing for an AFCON qualifier in Tanzania.

The Dream Team are due to fly out of the country on Monday.

They are drawn in Group B alongside defending champions Ghana and Senegal. Egypt have pulled out of the competition.

Uzochukwu, Omeruo confirm Monday arrival

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EWLY invited midfielder Izunna Uzochukwu and Turkey-based Kenneth Omeruo have told AfricanFootball.com they will join the Super Eagles training camp in Abuja on Monday.

Nigeria play Tanzania on September 5 in Dar es Salaam.

"I will be in Eagles camp on Monday by God's grace," the Amkar Perm of Russia midfielder told AfricanFootball.com.

The 25-year-old player has played four games for his Russian club this season.

Kasimpasa defender Omeruo also told AfricanFootball.com he will meet up the deadline set for the foreign pros to hit camp.

"Hopefully, I will arrive camp on the arrival date set by the coach," he said.

The Eagles are due to fly out to Tanzania on a special flight on September 3 from Abuja.

Iheanacho poised for Man City debut today

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ITH Ivory Coast international Wilfried Bony definitely out of the Manchester City squad for their Premier League clash against Watford due to injury, Kelechi Iheanacho is expected to be the main beneficiary.

The Citizens coach Manuel Pellegrini confirmed as much in his pre - match conference, stating that the Flying Eagles star is in the squad list.

“For today we have three young players in our squad, because we have a few players who are injured so we have Pablo Maffeo, Patrick Roberts and Kelechi in the squad list,” Manuel Pellegrini told mcfc.co.uk.

The 18 - year - old Iheanacho has made each of the 18 - man squad announced by Pellegrini for City’s first three games of the new season but is yet to make his official debut.

In the last two games in the EPL, Bony replaced Agüero in the closing stages.

Raheem Lawal joins Besiktas

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• Amuneke

EAGLETS’ SUWON TOURNAMENT FIXTURES 2nd September: Nigeria Vs. Korea: Kick Off-20:00 4th September: Nigeria Vs. Brazil : Kick Off- 17:30 6th September: Nigeria Vs. Croatia : Kick Off- 20:00

LLNIGERIASOCCER.COM has been informed that Istanbul side Besiktas are in advanced talks with Eskisehirspor over the signing of Raheem Lawal.

The central midfielder is optimistic that the deal will be wrapped up before the end of this weekend, with Eskisehirspor expected to shred the contract binding them with the Nigeria international for a fee of 2.5 million euros - 3 million euros.

“The transfer is almost done. By the grace of God, this weekend we should close the deal, ” Raheem Lawal told allnigeriasoccer.com.

“I have been offered a three year contract by Besiktas.”

The 25 - year - old was sensationally linked with a move to Roma earlier in the summer but the proposed shift did not come to pass.

Lawal had stops at Atlético Baleares, Adana Demirspor and Mersin Idmanyurdu before joining Eskisehirspor in 2014.

Rebranding Okagbare <<<<<<Continued from back page through visuals and pep isn’t a continuum. She needs talks, preparatory to big more enduring structures to tournaments. She has the succeed. It has taken the talent to be the greatest League Management woman athlete, only if she has Company (LMC’s) threat to backroom staff to school her deduct points from Warri on events she should attend wolves’ league matches before and those she shouldn’t. the Delta State government Okagbare appears to be reacted. Warri Wolves never interested in what she can get lacked under Uduaghan’s for herself in all the races administration. largely because we don’t care Okagbare didn’t appear for for her, not what she would the 200 metres race – no be remembered for after she thanks to a hamstring injury. would have left the game.

Is anyone surprised? I’m not Okagbare doesn’t need to because she has been compete in all the races participating in too many seasonally. races in the last two years. It She has no point to prove could also be that she was in the sprint business, having devastated by the laughable beaten all the top runners in last position she took in the the past. Yet she needs to 100 metres finals despite ponder why those she dusts in clocking one of the best times smaller races embarrass her in in the semi-final race. the big races. Except Okagbare Okagbare has behaved like gets a renowned manager the proverbial masquerade who would plan her races who danced himself lame based on the athletics before the real dance. She calendar, she won’t get any must learn from Usain Bolt, big title (World Athletics who stylishly dodged small Championship and the races this season to be fit for Olympics). the big ones, such as the World The World Athletics Athletics Championships.

Championships and the I won’t join the motley Olympic Games signpost how crowd deriding Okagbare for athletes are rated for other shunning the 200 metres race. meets. Equally important are I’d rather ask AFN chiefs to sit the Commonwealth Games, down with her to discuss her the All Africa Games etc. But problems. Okagbare can be the Olympics and the World the poster girl for Nigeria at Championships determine the Rio’2016 Olympic Games, how athletes are rated for the but she needs to be handed new season. over to a new team of experts It is laughable for anyone to to repackage her training. blame Okagbare’s poor show Let Mikel be at the Beijing 2015 World Athletics Championships on I didn’t want to dignify John the lane in which she ran.

Mikel Obi’s refusal to pick Okagbare is exposed enough Sunday Oliseh’s calls with a to know that how you finish comment. I honestly felt that in the semi-finals determines Oliseh had done the right your lane for the final race. thing by dropping Mikel. The What this means is that coach didn’t need any Okagbare should strive at all prompting to know that times to be placed in-between Victor Moses would have told those tipped to beat her in the Mikel that he got a call from finals. Their presence will the Eagles coach. Besides, galvanise her to explode out of Moses would have told Mikel the blocs. Being on her marks that he was attending a in-between her rivals will meeting with Oliseh. pump her adrenalin to match I maintained stoic silence on them as they leave the starter’s Mikel’s tantrum, until I read bloc. his manager John Ola Shittu It is unfair for people to confirm that Mikel indeed saw insinuate that her marriage Oliseh’s text message. I didn’t could be affecting her. have any doubt that what Okagbare has been in the Mikel did was deliberate. I relationship with her appreciate the uncanny husband for over one decade. manner in which Oliseh has Interestingly, her husband is a moved on without making it sportsman who certainly met an issue. her during a sports Oliseh should leave Mikel competition. He has been alone. If he wants to play for Okagbare’s pillar. They must Nigeria, he can pay his way have agreed on the future, down to the country to show including making babies. We us that he truly wants to have also seen female play. Mikel should be athletes give birth and return ignored in subsequent to the sports to continue from invitations to the Eagles, where they stopped. more so if Oliseh wants Today the Jamaicans are Nigerians to take him the benchmark to measure seriously on his vow not to athletics. They didn’t sit at invite benchwarmers, home in Jamaica including those who sermonising like some of our perpetually come into administrators are doing. The matches as dying minutes’ Jamaican authorities took substitutes. Any Nigerian their team to the United who plays less than one hour States to understudy the regularly for his European side Americans, who were the shouldn’t be invited to the kings and queens of the Eagles. tracks. It took the Jamaicans time, resources and support from their government to replicate an improved template of the US model.

Today, the Americans watch in awe as the Jamaicans stride ahead of them on the tracks.

We must commend former Delta State Governor Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan for supporting Okagbare.

Uduaghan has left office. It appears Okagbare has been marooned. Governance here • Mikel

SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2015 TRUTH IN DEFENCE OF FREEDOM VOL.10, NO. 3321

TOMORROW IN THE NATION PUNCHLINE Ben Nwabueze has suggested that the long delay in Buhari’s announcement of the members of his cabinet is nothing other than the manifestation of a lingering holdover of autocratic predilections from the time when the President was a military dictator. This may or may not be true. Definitely, there are other rather more mundane explanations for this long delay

—Biodun Jeyifo

For want of a nail, the shoe was lost.

For want of a shoe, the horse was lost.

For want of a horse, the rider was lost.

For want of a rider, the battle was lost, For want of a battle, the war was lost.

For want of a war, the kingdom was lost.

And all for the want of a horseshow nail!

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HERE is no doubt that opponents of the on-going fierce anti-corruption stance and actions of the emergent President Muhammadu Buhari administration would readily commend for his perusal and contemplation the humorous but anonymous poem quoted above. Why must PMB, they have privately and publicly asked, be expending so much time, energy and resources towards the recovery of looted funds, that constitute no more than a microscopic ‘horseshoe nail’, in a vastly resource-endowed country like ours?

As far as these critics are concerned, the PMB anti-corruption campaign is sheer rhetoric to divert attention from the All Progressives Congress (APC)’s alleged’s unpreparedness for serious governance. They call on PMB to focus on governance and his promised development agenda, rather than the current seeming hounding of former Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) public office holders of the former President Goodluck Jonathan administration, by various anti-corruption agencies.

There is, of course a subtle and mischievous sleight of hand in this argument. It assumes that fighting the anti-corruption war and pursuing a credible and productive development agenda are mutually exclusive objectives. First of all, it was because of the sheer brigandage, impunity and outright venality particularly of the Jonathan years that we have found ourselves in the current ditch of unprecedented fiscal distress. For a PMB administration that inherited a near insolvent country with governments at all levels finding it difficult to meeting their obligations, including workers' salaries, it would be grossly irresponsible to allow a few Nigerians to keep the billions and trillions of scarce resources stolen from the public purse, all in the name of some nebulous and meaningless peace agenda. Furthermore, the APC presented an expansive progressive manifest to the electorate. It needs all the funds it can get, especially the stolen funds, to meaningfully pursue its objectives.

Ironically, those who argue that the PMB administration is expending too much energy on looking into the financial malfeasance that assumed a contagious dimension during the Jonathan era, are also the ones who canvass that PMB’ anti-graft war be extended to the beginning of this dispensation in 1999. It is obvious that this is simply a ploy to cripple the anti-corruption war and render it useless and meaningless. For one, the phenomenal cost of such an exercise would have dysfunctional economic implications. Again, the pressure on our already overburdened judiciary

A tale of three revolutions

•Buhari

•Ambode

would be practicably unbearable. In any case, the pro-Jonathan critics who canvass this position do not bother to explain why the antigraft agencies practically went to sleep in the Jonathan years. The truth of the matter is that no administration will ever be humanly possible to completely wipe out corruption. But the menace can be drastically reduced from its present epidemic level, once we have administrations that allow the anti-corruption and other anti-crime agencies to function with a relative degree of autonomy from the other arms of government particularly the executive.

In many ways Buhari is an ideological and political enigma. He cannot in any way be described as a revolutionary. His past and present political exertions were geared towards strengthening the system rather than overthrow it as a revolutionary would aim at.

It is obviously his historic mission to help transform the Nigerian socio-economic and institutional system; to spearhead change as a way of sanitising and stabilising it. Buhari has clearly not come to overthrow the system but to save it through stabilising change. Is this a case of the ideological conservative as involuntary advocate of radical change? Even though his political steps are still tentative,

•El-Rufai through his sheer body language, there is palpable change in the air. The kind of sheer impunity witnessed in the pre-Buhari era has seemingly dissolved into thin air.

Organisations and institutions of state are run more transparently and responsibly. Revenue generating agencies are duly remitting due amounts to the Federation Account, unlike the recent past. We have been spared the insulting spectacles of imperial First Ladyism gone rampant. Federal Government accounts have been streamlined and harmonised for greater accountability and monitoring.

Like PMB, Governor Akin Ambode is an unlikely revolutionary who within a short time is bringing about radical changes in Lagos State-building on the solid work of his illustrious predecessors. Just as PMB is a product of the military as a professional soldier, Governor Ambode, a Charted Accountant is one of the most experienced civil servants in the country rising to the apex of his profession. Interestingly, both the military institution and the civil service have similar professional attributes of discipline, respect for authority, institutional rigidity, and hierarchical bureaucratic among others. Both men are thus unlikely revolutionaries who, nevertheless, are spear-

heading far reaching changes in their spheres of influence. In Lagos the Akin Ambode hurricane is gaining momentum by the day. He has merged ministries to reflect new areas of emphasis as well as reduce duplication and enhance efficiency. He has shaken up the civil service top leadership to renew organisational efficacy. He has been proactive in responding to emergencies in various parts of the state.

Near revolutionary reforms are being implemented across diverse Ministries, Departments and Agencies, which this writer gathered are already having salutary fiscal and other effects in the state of Excellence.

Perhaps the most restless and excitable of the public officers elected on April 12, is the Kaduna State governor Mallam Nasir El- Rufai who remains as controversial as he was when he was Minister of the Federal Capital Territory. Yes, he has taken some commendable steps as governor. For instance, El -Rufai has employed one or two non-Kaduna State indigenes as his political aides. Again, he has been applauded for announcing that all Local Government funds will be fully released to them.

But the governor must first of all take the trouble to ascertain that the grassroots units of government have the executive capacity to maximally and efficiently utilise the level of their current funding.

Just as he did as Minister when he forced okada riders off the streets and massively undertook a massive demolition of structures partly to create room for urban renewal in the Federal Capital Territory, Nasir El- Rufai is at war against beggars in Kaduna State. He wants them off the streets. El-Rufai has certainly not learnt any meaningful lessons from his experience at the FCT. He is still the same old El-Rufai enamoured of neo-liberal socioeconomic policies utterly indifferent to the plight of the vulnerable and poor in society.

This is the verdict of renowned sociologist, Professor Patrick Wilmot, on the Kaduna State governor in his book ‘Nigeria: The Nightmare Scenario’. His words: “El-Rufai the minister of the capital territory was at ABU when I lectured there but certainly never listened to what I had to say. His and previous governments failed to provide poor citizens with public transport forcing them to risk their lives and health in Danfos and Okadas. Yet, without building trains, subways or trams he threatens to get rid of Okadas, provoking the people further to rebellion, and feeding inflation by raising the price of all forms of transport”.

P.S. Let me apologise dear reader for the several errors contained in last week’s column. I had sent in the first, uncorrected draft and by the time error was discovered, it was too late to do anything about it. I will re-publish the article at the earliest possible time.

Kindly accept my regrets once again.

Ade Ojeikere on Saturday talk2adeojeikere@yahoo.com

Rebranding Okagbare

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LESSING Okagbare needs help. She must be educated on the traits that distinguish winners from losers. She needs a psychologist, a starter’s bloc expert, a career advisor and a sprint great to repeatedly take her through the rudiments of winning the sprints.

For Okagbare or any other Nigerian to stand on the podium at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games, the government must stop giving cash to sporting bodies. In other climes, they operate a four-yearly budget meant to train athletes, sportsmen and women the moment one major competition ends. If we continue to operate the yearly budgetary system, which most times don’t turn to cash until the middle of the year, no Nigerian will be an Olympic Games medalist, except he or she goes the way of Chioma Ajunwa, who was guided to glory by Segun ‘Mathematical’ Odegbami. Odegbami took Ajunwa on a guided training session in

London after which Ajunwa won the gold medal in the women’s long jump event at the Atlanta’96 Olympic Games.

It is about time we asked the government what happened to all the funds sourced by the sports lottery body. Elsewhere, cash from this kind of initiative goes a long way in helping sportsmen and women achieve their dreams of being kings and queens of their sports.

Countries that plan for big events identify models that they think can help their athletes improve. They either send their wards, coaches and officials to such countries to be trained or get the good coaches to come to their home countries to prepare their teams.

I always laugh whenever Nigerian athletes promise us medals before big competitions. I pinch myself to find out the type of facilities that they train with. I wonder how athletes who train with obsolete facilities expect to beat the others. It was a big shame watching our boxers at the London Olympics being taught the new

rules of the game. They lost the bouts even before the fights began. Boxing officials stood morose as their wards fell to the modern tricks of the game which they would have known, if they had attempted to undergo refresher courses.

Sadly, our attempt to model our National Institute for Sports (NIS) after what the Australians have has failed. We have been unable to raise the level of the NIS to achieve the goals set for it – train our coaches etc.

Coaches from the NIS have been highly handicapped because of the deplorable conditions of facilities around the country. Need I talk about the state of facilities at the National Stadium in Surulere, Lagos, which houses the NIS? With coaches whose studies are restricted to theoretical work, it shouldn’t come as a surprise when our sportsmen and women lack the basics of their sport. For instance, we have been talking about Okagbare’s poor start since ‘God knows when.’ Nobody has provided the panacea. Nor has anyone been able to get

Okagbare a coach whose specialty is teaching athletes how to explode from the starter’s bloc.

I digress.

Branding Okagbare, I dare say, doesn’t have to be through the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN), that is if Nigerian firms don’t trust the body. They could deal directly with her manager which is the norm. Of course, Okagbare and her manager come from a system where contracts are respected.

Loading Okagbare with huge government cash without the requisite technical support won’t help her grow. Sports business is big with global acceptance. Okagbare’s antecedents are such that would attract corporate partnerships, if companies are told the benefits to them. Such private sector support for athletes such as Okagbare should not be restricted to Nigerian firms. Let Nigerian companies face the embarrassment of watching Okagbare celebrate her gold medal wearing foreign firms’ colours.

May be that will be the elixir to push Nigerian firms to support sports.

The former sprint star in Okagbare’s support team would share his/her experiences with her

•Continued on Page 63

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