MAY DAY TRAGEDY: Scores die in fresh Abuja bombing

...towards a better life for the people VOL. 25: NO. 62135

Iyabo Obasanjo Poverty not writes Boko >8 our problem Haram, blasts — Jonathan Jonathan's men >16

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ONLINE | www.vanguardngr.com

N150

FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

BOOK SERIAL So much has been said and written about the Igbo-Yoruba conflict in Nigeria politics. What are the roots of this conflict?

Does the conflict have anything to do with the Nigerian National Development Party (NNDP), Nigerian Youth Movement (NYM) and emergence of the NCNC? See pages 54 and 55.

MAY DAY TRAGEDY

Scores die in fresh Abuja bombing

BY SONI DANIEL, EMMA UJAH, BEN AGANDE, HENRY UMORU, JOSEPH ERUNKE & VICTORIA OJEME

A

•17 corpses counted at Asokoro Hospital •I saw 20 bodies — Eyewitness

BUJA — EXACTLY 18 days after deadly bomb blasts at Nyanya bus terminal in Abuja killed 75 people and injured 200 others, Nigerians were thrown into mourning, yesterday evening, with another blast, which at press time had claimed at least 17 lives and scores more injured.

Yesterday’s attack took place at Wazobia Park, Nyanya, opposite where the last attacks occured.

As at 9:05 pm, 17 corpses were counted at the Emergency Ward of Continues on page 5

COLUMNIST: Donu Kogbara

Bravo, ladies!

•P.17

Mr & Mrs

THE BLAST —Scene of the blast in Abuja, yesterday. Inset: A bloodied car.

Photos: Emma Ujah & Gbemiga Olamikan.

Abduction: Four battalions for Sambisa forest C M Y K

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2 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

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Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 3

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4 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—5

POCKET CARTOON

BRIEFING—From left: Director of Communication & Strategy, Ndigbo Lagos, Chuma lgwe; President-General, Ndigbo Lagos, Prof Anya O. Anya; Executive Vice Chairman, Techno Oil, Mrs Nkechi Obi and MD, The Niche Newspaper, lkechukwu Amaechi at the press conference, yesterday, in Lagos on the planned grand reception for Ndigbo who left public and private office recently.

CONFAB: North rejects creation of additional state for South-East Insists S/E does not have required landmass, population for state

BY SONI DANIEL, REGIONAL EDITOR, NORTH

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BUJA—EVEN be fore the proposal for the creation of one more state for the SouthEast geo-political zone is tabled at plenary for discussion, the North has rejected the plan, saying

the zone does not have the required landmass and population to warrant the new state.

The opposition of the North to the creation of more states in the country and particularly for the South-East, is contained in a 46-page document, prepared by

LIFEWORDS

BY PASTOR ITUAH

When you encounter rejection, shake it off and move on. Sooner or later you will succeed if you don’t quit. Don’t personalise it; because someone rejects what you have to offer doesn’t mean you are being rejected.

TAKE HEART

BY ELLA RANDLE

Happiness and the state of joy is ever lasting when it comes from within— Take Heart Quotes

U

NHAPPINESS lies in that gap between what we have now and what we think we need. But the truth is, we don’t need to acquire anything more to be content with what we already have. We don’t need anyone else’s permission to be happy. Your life is magnificent not because someone says it is, or because you have acquired something new, but because you choose to see it as such. Don’t let your happiness be held hostage. It is always yours to choose, to live and experience.

And from the experts of wisdom notes, Mack and Angel Hack comes this beautiful saying. “As soon as you stop making everyone and everything else responsible for your happiness, the happier you’ll be. If you’re unhappy now, it’s not someone else’s fault. Take full responsibility for your own unhappiness, and you will instantly gain the ability to be happier. Stop seeking in vain to arrange conditions that will make you happy.” Simply choose to appreciate the greatness that is yours in this moment, and the right conditions will start to line up around the contentment you seek.

the Arewa Consultative Forum, ACF, for all northern delegates to the ongoing National Conference.

The document, which is entitled “Key Issues before the Northern Delegates to the 2014 Na-

tional Conference”, also described Northern Nigeria as the “backbone and strength of Nigeria” and has already been distributed to the northern delegates.

The ACF said it opposed the creation of

more states in Nigeria because too many states have tended to convert them into what it called “mere cost or effort centres” at the expense of socio-economic development.

“It is against this backdrop that the ACF believes that the creation of any additional state at this point in time is counter-productive and therefore, should be kept on hold until the need can be justified in future.

“The argument that creation of states should be on the basis of equality irrespective of population and landmass is inconsistent with the elementary concept of justice, since injustice is not only when equals are treated unequally but also when unequals are treated equally”.

The northern group argued further that going

by the population average per state, each of the 36 states of the federation could be assumed to have an average of 3,888,987 and a landmass of 27,327 square kilometre.

Using its baseline land mass and average population for each of the states, ACF argued that the South-East with a total population of 16,381, 729 and a landmass of 33,664 square kilometres, presents each of the five states in the zone with a population of 3, 276,345 and a landmass of 33,664 square kilometres.

ACF, therefore, argued that the population per state in the South-East is far less than the national average by 612,642 while its landmass of 33,664 square kilometres is not up to 25 per cent of the National Average.

Scores dead in fresh Abuja bombing Continues from page 1 the Asokoro Hospital, while the National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA, ambulances were still rushing to ferry in more of the dead and the wounded.

One eyewitness said he saw 20 bodies at the scene.

The bombers, whose identities were yet to be unmasked, struck at the same transit point they attacked exactly 18 days ago.

No group has claimed responsibility for yesterday’s attack.

At Asokoro General Hospital, 16 dead bodies were on the ground.

Many people, families and friends were in the hospital while many were outside because the hospital gates were shut against the crowd coming into the hospital.

Many people were seen wailing and making phone calls.

The blasts occurred as workers and residents who went for the May Day celebration were returning to their bases.

Initial reports said a number of people have been killed and many more have been injured.

Eyewitnesses said it was caused by a car bomb. The Islamist militant group Boko Haram had previously staged attacks in Abuja. Most of Boko Haram attacks had been in the North-East geo-political zone especially in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states. The April 14 bombing raised fears that the militants could be trying to expand their area of operation.

Unlike the last blast, which was targeted at the major bus terminal, the latest attack was concentrated on the opposite side of the terminal, which is used by commuters.

Security men, who were taken unawares by

the deadly attack, promptly mobilised and blocked all routes leading to and from the scene of the attack.

The development caused traffic snarl on the Nyanya-Abuja-Keffi Road and frustrated many commuters. The road leading into Abuja from Nasarawa State was cordoned off with vehicles diverted through Karu, a satellite town in the FCT. Another report said the incident happened at Wazobia Park, at the foot of the bridge, directly opposite the Nyanya park where the last one occurred.

The corpses were brought from Nyanya to Asokoro Hospital by two Police pick-up vans and a NEMA ambulance.

Doctors were immediately mobilized from their homes to the hospital to attend to those injured, as they were at home because of the pub-

lic holiday.

As at 9.45pm officials of the hospital came out with black body bags to cover the corpses as they were initially brought out from the hospital ward and put on the field outside.

Vanguard gathered that the Asokoro Hospital was short of black body bags to cover corpses.

According to a source, some of the injured persons and corpses were moved to Karshi, Nyanya General Hospital, a private hospital, Panaf Hospital located in Nyanya; Maitama District Hospital and Mararaba General Hospital.

As at 9.50pm, another NEMA ambulance came with one injured man of about 20 years. The ambulance was accompanied by men of the Federal Road Safety Corps, FRSC and the Red cross.

At Asokoro Hospital, stand-by NEMA ambulances increased to three.

6 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Nigerian nabbed for running drug supply ring from Aussie detention centre

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NIGERIAN de tainee at Sydney, Australia's Villawood Detention Centre has been arrested by New South Wales police for allegedly running a major drug supply ring.

The 39-year-old Nigerian, who was not identified, was taken into custody by officers from the State Crime Command investigating the importation of cocaine into Australia.

They alleged he was using mobile phones seized at the detention centre to direct the criminal activity.

His arrest follows the seizure of 5kg of cocaine at Sydney Airport after police stopped a US national who arrived on a flight from Santiago, Chile. It is alleged he was working for the Nigerian.

The arrest follows an ongoing investigation by police into criminal gangs importing and supplying illegal drugs in NSW. Two weeks ago, officers arrested four men and seized more than 140kg of drugs from a storage shed in Campsie.

Detective Superintendent Scott Cook said new technology was aiding criminal networks.

He said: "Everyone is so networked now and connected now that it makes it far easier to commit criminal activities. There is an association and there's certainly connections between these people.

"This investigation is looking at criminal networks operating in NSW, those networks unlike criminal groups in the past, unlike bikies which are hierarchal and organised and a strict structure, what we're finding now is that organised crimes are far more networked.

"Rest assured, we will lock them up, take their assets, and disrupt their business models in every way we can."

4 vehicles burnt as petrol tanker explodes in Lagos

BY EBUN SESSOU

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AGOS— A SIZEABLE stretch of Admiralty Way in Lekki Phase1 area of Lagos got burnt early yesterday morning, following the fuel spilled by a petrol tanker which fell and caught fire.

The explosion occurred close to a place where several car hire cabs were parked, with their owners staying close to them.

It was learnt that the driver of the tanker, who was reported to be sleeping on the wheel, lost control of the vehicle which skidded off its lane, ramped into concrete in the median and fell, spilling its contents The inferno that trailed the crash razed to ashes four vehicles parked close to the scene of the accident and the tanker with foreign registration number, BS 111FR. However, the driver of the illfated tanker was reported to have escaped the fire which destroyed the portion it spilled its contents and there were no casualties.

A boat parked close to the scene of the crash miraculously survived the raving fire, which almost spread to some houses in the area.

An eyewitness, who said the incident occurred about 6 am, explained: "The driver was on speed and lost control but before he knew what was happening, the tanker had already caught fire.

"We then called on the people around to drive the cars out of the scene, unfortunately, fire razed other vehicles."

At press time, the fire had been put out through the com-

bined efforts of Federal and Lagos State Fire Service.

A victim of the fire, 63-yer-old Olu Olowoagbo, whose vehicle was razed by the inferno, lamented that his only source of livelihood had been taken off.

The car, a Toyota Camry, with number plate, GGE 846 GE, he used for car hire service, was burnt with the document of purchase the owner left inside.

He said: “Three years ago, I took a loan of N3 million to buy this car; I am still paying in installment. As we speak, I have N600,000 to pay off the car.

I don’t have other means of survival. ”Right now, I need to speak with my insurance company as well as the person that sold it for me in order to evaluate the damage. Now this car is a waste.

“When I was informed about the incident, I almost passed out.

Scene of the accident I decided not to go and see my car that has been razed by fire.

But my friend advised that I should be on ground to know the next line of action to take. I believe God will help me.”

The scene of the crash was cordoned off by policemen while the burnt tanker which blocked one lane of the dual carriageway was yet to be towed off at press time.

AKALA BOYS LATEST: Arrested kingpin's wife wants yer have not set eyes on him. access to husband "We were told at Area F that the

BY IFEANYI OKOLIE

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AGOS — Mrs. Balikis Ajiboye, whose husband, a Lagos-based businessman, Toba Ajiboye, was arrested by the police in his apartment at Surulere area of Lagos in connection with the latest crisis by Akala boys of Mushin area of Lagos, has called on the Commissioner of Police, Umar Manko, to allow her see the husband.

Balikis, who spoke with Vanguard yesterday in Surulere, said she does not know if her husband is dead or alive, stressing that the police has denied her, Toba's relatives and the lawyer access to her husband.

According to her, Toba is not well as he was beaten and stabbed on the neck and other parts of his body by hoodlums

who accompanied the policemen that arrested him in his apartment.

She also explained that her husband was a former Unit Chairman of the National Union of Road Transport Workers, NURTW, in Mushin, but he went into business after he was removed from office.

She said: “Even after he left NURTW, they wouldn’t let him be. Some people at NURTW in Lagos State, who do not want to see him alive, are bent on killing him. When they are not sponsoring hoodlums in Akala to attack him, they will use the police, all because they want to eliminate him.

"He has relinquished the office they wanted but yet they won’t let him alone. Last week it was a combined team of policemen and some hoodlums from Akala that picked him from

home.

"The armed policemen broke into our house and they found my husband in the living room with his friends. The policemen arrested and handed him over to the hoodlums who smashed bottles on his head and stabbed him in the neck and other parts of his body.

"His friends were also stabbed, after which they were all whisked away. No proper medical attention was given to my husband. I was told he was first detained with robbers at the Special Anti-Robbery Squad, SARS, Ikeja, and later at the Area F Command.

"The next day, they took him to search our houses in Ereko at Mushin and Surulere, where they found nothing incriminating. But ever since, I, his relatives, friends and even his law-

Deputy Commissioner of Police in charge of Operations, Tunde Shobulo, who is handling this case ordered that my husband be transferred to State Criminal Investigations Department, Panti, Yaba, adding that no visitor should be allowed to see him, including his lawyer.

"I thought this was a joke and when we went to Panti, we were not allowed to see him. After pressing hard, they told us that Shobulo has ordered his transfer to Badagry. Where in Badagry?

They didn’t tell us.

"I am not saying that my husband is above the law and he should not be arrested if there is a case against him, but the manner of his arrest was frightening.

"I fear something sinister is at play. If he is dead or alive they should let us know. I urge the commissioner of police to listen to my cries and allow me see my husband.”

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 7

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8—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Confab energy c'ttee summons DISCO owners

BY CLARA NWACHUKWU

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HE national c o n f e r e n c e Committee on Energy has summoned owners of electricity distribution companies, DISCOs, unbundled from the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, to a meeting.

The meeting is sequel to another meeting which held on Wednesday in Abuja, and is with a view to understanding the postprivatisation issues and challenges bedeviling the power sector since the acquisition of PHCN assets last year.

A copy of the committee’s summon, which also contained a brief on the outcome of the earlier meeting obtained by Vanguard read: “Dear CEOs, I wish to bring to your attention a meeting of the Confab Energy Committee, which wanted a representation of the DISCO roundtable to meet with them and present postprivatisation issues.

“The Committee has something to do with the National Conference set up by the President to deliberate on all aspects of the economy.

“Some of you may have read about it in the papers. The Energy Committee is chaired by the former Governor of Oyo State, Senator Ladoja and the Vice Chairman is Engr. Bello Suleiman a former Minister of Power and MD of NEPA. “The Chairman called to request that DISCO roundtable meet with them at such short notice, which was not possible.

“So I, as Mercados, offered to present the issues on behalf of DISCOs. The meeting took place yesterday at about 3p.m.

“A colleague and I tried to present the issues articulated in the presentation attached, but we could not go through it in its entirety.”

Iyabo Obasanjo writes Boko Haram zSays insurgents targeting wrong people zDescribes them as more competent than Jonathan's men

BY EMMANUEL AZIKEN, Political Editor

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ENATOR Iyabo Obasanjo has accused those in President Goodluck Jonathan's inner circle of being a hindrance to the resolution of the crisis posed by the Boko Haram insurgency.

In an open letter to the Islamist sect, whose leadership she credited with "more sense," Senator Obasanjo, however, faulted the insurgents for betraying the true essence of revolutionaries in directing their venom against the lower class.

Dr. Obasanjo in the 860word letter particularly cringed at the abduction of hundreds of school girls from Government Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State, saying their crave for sexual gratification is no excuse for the abduction.

While noting her surprise that more armed groups have not risen against the state given the social and living conditions of the majority of the population, she wrote: "I am moved to write about the current state of affairs in Nigeria. My first inclination was to write to the President but since all letters to him seem to elicit only open derision and even more stupidity from his inner circle, I have decided to address my letter to a group also currently causing Nigerians a lot of pain and agony that may actually have more sense than the country's leadership.

Dear Boko Haram

"The fact that you have taken arms against the Nigerian state is no surprise. The question should be why haven't more young people organised themselves against the state?

“Even the fact that your motto, 'Against Western Education' is in a way reasonable given the fact that your leader, martyred by the Nigerian state had university education and found no reasonable employment but had to resort to thuggery for politicians to survive, as the story goes.

“He, like millions of Nigerian young people and college graduates, seeing a blighted future are doing

Iyabo... the past is a good guide to the future. anything to survive.

“They have become opportunistic desperados, almost sub-human as the stepping on and trampling on each other to death at the Immigration employment debacle indicates.

‘Where you’re wrong’

“Where I think you have gotten it wrong are in two areas, if you can pardon my giving you some unsolicited advice.

“First, your victims are becoming more and more the people you should be attracting to your side. Take the Nyanya bus massacre.

“The people that live in Nyanya are usually the clerks, messengers and other lowly office workers that live out in relative slums compared to the rest of Abuja and take public transportation to work to receive monthly salaries they barely get by on.

“Consult any written work of successful revolutionaries be it French, Russian, Cuban or even the more recent uprooting of communism in Eastern Europe, to succeed you need the people to be on your side. Right now you are not achieving this.

“You are targeting the group you need most. This

does not make for a successful revolution but you are making yourselves into nuisances to the people and in the end while the state, including its military machine may not be able to conquer you, your downfall will be alienating these potential allies, i.e. the oppressed and down-trodden.

“Secondly, the abduction of girls. It must be hard to stay in the bush as all male revolutionaries fending for yourselves with no sexual gratification.

Cuban example

“But again, reading up on past bush revolutionaries like the Cuban, for example, indicates that they were able to convince some women to go voluntarily with them into the bush.

“Somehow, revolutionary zeal does not include sexual abstinence and cooking and cleaning by yourselves.

“Reading must be hard for you since you hate education but the past is a good guide to the future and if you can't read, you are done for in organizing or succeeding in most endeavours as most things have been done before and reading up on how it was done can only serve

as good guidance.

“The parents of the girls you abducted are just trying to give their daughters a chance at having successful lives. Without an education there is very little anyone can achieve in this early 21st century.

“I know living in the bush; it must still seem like the dark ages but the truth is that even with the lack of jobs and opportunities for young people in Nigeria currently, it is still better to be educated.

“An educated university graduate who was selling food from a food cart ignited the Arab Spring which was spread by use of the internet which is hard to use if you are not educated.

“There are writings, videos and stuff you post on the internet which I haven't seen.

But think of it, you can only post and use the internet because some of you have some education.

“But in the end you have no control over the distribution of your advertising and recruiting information because as you may know, the internet is really part of the western system you despise.

Why you’re succeeding

“The truth is that you have succeeded because the Nigerian state has failed to provide jobs and opportunity for its young people who you can now easily recruit. By disrupting education, you are adding to the burden of the people.

“You may say, but how about our religious issue?

Let the truth be told, just as there are indigenous southern Muslims, there are indigenous northern Christians even from your epicentre in Borno State and just as you are zealous for your religion, I don't see them giving up their religion either.

“The reasonable solution to this impasse would be for you to advocate for everyone to be able to practice their religion as they see fit with respect for each other’s beliefs.

“Remember, a couple of centuries ago, all of our ancestors below the Sahara were all animists worshipping various ‘gods.’

“This ‘One God’ — us against them situation — is a relatively recent one in our human history and you will be advised to let the originators fight it out and let your people be.”

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 —9

Women protesting the abduction of school girls in Chibok Borno State, in Abuja.NAN PHOTO.

SCHOOLGIRLS ABDUCTION: 4 battalions mobilise for Sambisa forest

BY KINGSLEY OMONOBI, NDAHI MARAMA, LUKA BINNIYAT & TARE YOUEOWEI

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EVENTEEN days after 234 students of the Government Girls Secondary School Chibok, Borno State, were abducted by Boko Haram terrorists and the public outcry that have continued to greet the alleged uncoordinated approach of the security agents to rescue them, a major military operation is set to commence as four different battalions, a little more than a Brigade of the Nigerian Army, have been mobilised.

Meanwhile, Borno State Police Command and the Department of State Service, DSS, office in the state, yesterday, released new figures of the missing schoolgirls abducted by Boko Haram insurgents, saying 276 students, not 234 were initially taken away.

This has contradicted the earlier claims by parents of the affected girls, who said 234 of their daughters were kidnapped when the insurgents attacked the school.

The state Police Commissioner, Lawal Tanko and the Director of DSS, Ahmed Abdullahi disclosed this at a joint press briefing held in Maiduguri last night.

Tanko said that the new figure was still not authentic as the actual numbers of the missing girls could only be verified when more parents, who were yet to know the whereabouts of the daughters, lodge a complaint.

The CP added that 530 students from Chibok and other neighbouring towns sat for the final examinations, and that 276 were abducted, while 53 others escaped.

This is just as former British Prime Minister, Mr. Gordon Brown, has called for international military assistance, such as air support, to be offered C M Y K

to the Nigerian government in the hunt for the abducted girls.

Nationwide protests against the abduction also gathered momentum yesterday as concerned women and activists embarked on protests in Borno and Kaduna states.

It was gathered that the battalions that will storm Sambisa forest are taking positions around all the access routes into the notorious forest.

Mobilisation

The battalions comprised all formations of the Army, including those from Signals Corps, Armoured Corps, Ordinance Corps, Intelligence Corps, Infantry Corps, Artillery Corps, Military Police Corps and the Medical Corps.

Also, fighter jets of the Nigerian Air Force and Police surveillance helicopters have been mobilised and are waiting for the command to begin the joint security operations for rescue efforts of the girls.

The battalions are said to have been positioned in the North, South, East and West of the Sambisa forest so that when the troops move in from all the angles, there will be no escape route for the terrorists.

Owing to the possibily of encountering bobby traps, land mines, ambush and other unknown traps, it was gathered that Air Force fighter aircraft, helicopter gunships and Police surveillance helicopters would carry out round-the-clock missions.

Aircraft and land equipment including air ambulances, vehicles with mobile medical facilities and a considerable number of medical personnel, are said to have been deployed for the operation to ensure that casualties, if any, are quickly attended to when necessary.

Launching offensive

It was gathered that since the

z276 girls, not 234, were abducted— POLICE NLC, women

z As Gordon Brown calls int'l assistance forest shares borders with towns in Adamawa, Yobe, Borno and Cameroon, the different battalions would each launch their offensive from these locations.

Vanguard was further told under condition of anonymity, that because of the high caliber nature of the arms and explosives in the hands of the terrorists, the Federal Government had made available to the security forces night vision equipment.

In this regards, specially trained counter terrorist units, anti bomb discovery units, the K 9 Dog units of the Army and the Police, the landmines unit of the army and other specialised units of other security agencies are all involved in this operation, Vanguard was told.

Are the girls still in Sambisa?

Speaking on insinuations that most of the girls may have been moved to Chad, Cameroon or abroad by the terrorists, the security source said: “Let us wait and see.

“All I can tell you is that since the incident happened, the borders close to Sambisa have been fortified and a lot of cordon and search operation has been going on.

How they would have moved the girls abroad will be a mystery.”

When Vanguard expressed apprehension that a major military intervention involving air bombardments will lead to killing of the girls, the source said: “It doesn’t necessarily follow.

“On the contrary, the terrorists are afraid. They will be fighting to save their own

lives. Many of them are cowards who cannot stand the army, that’s why they look for soft targets.

“They know they won’t achieve anything injuring the girls. We feel they just wanted to get attention with the girls in their possession. We have strategies in place to get the girls and ensure their safety if indeed they are in the forest.

The plan is to rescue them alive.”

Gordon Brown

Brown has called for international military assistance, such as air support, to be offered to the Nigerian government in the hunt for the abducted girls.

The former UK Prime Minister said he had approached the British government to discuss the possibility of military assistance. Asked if he anticipated a positive response, he said: “I think people will want to help, yes.

The international community must do something to protect these girls.

“We could provide military help to the Nigerians to track down the whereabouts of the girls before they’re dispersed throughout Africa— like air support, for example, if that was thought necessary.”

Brown will meet President Goodluck Jonathan in Abuja next week to discuss the abduction.

He said: “I am not prepared to criticise the Nigerian government. We’re dealing with a group of terrorists who have kidnapped children.

“The sensible way of dealing with this is to help the Nigerian government.”

storm Borno govt house

Meanwhile, in Maiduguri, Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, Borno State chapter, women groups and other civil organisations, yesterday, converged at the Borno State Government House to register their protest over the 234 abducted girls.

Presenting a protest letter to Governor Kashim Shettima in Maiduguri for onward transmission to President Goodluck Jonathan and the Senate President, Senator David Mark, the state Chairman of the NLC, Mr. Titus Abana called on the Federal Government and the military authorities to intensify efforts in rescuing the school girls.

Kaduna

In Kaduna, a coalition of civil groups comprising women, non governmental organisations, students, women lawyers, among others, yesterday, gathered at Murtala Mohammed Square, calling for the release of the abducted girls.

The women displayed placards with inscription such as ‘Bring back our daughters,’ ‘Mama Patience help our daughters,’ ‘Respect the future of Nigerian women,’ ‘Save our girls now,’ ‘FG, save our daughters,’ ‘We want our girls back,’ ‘Reunite us with our girls.’

Apostolic leaders

The Coalition of Nigerian Apostolic Leaders, CNAL, yesterday, condemned the abduction, urging the government to facilitate the girls’ release.

Speaking through its governing apostle, Pastor Wale Adefarasin, the body described Boko Haram as audacious, harping on the need for intelligence and infiltration to end the sect’s activities.

10— Vanguard , FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

NPA takes HIV/AIDS awareness campaign to truck drivers

BY GODWIN ORITSE

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AGOS—THE Nigerian Ports Authority, NPA, has taken its awareness campaign on the HIV/AIDS to truck parks within the port industry with a view to reducing the rate of infection.

The awareness, according to Port Manager of the Tin Can Island port, Mr. Babatunde Longe, said that the project is aimed at increasing access to HIV prevention, basic treatment, support and care services by vulnerable groups but with particular attention to transport workers, migrants sex workers, Customs and immigration officials and the local populations living and working along the West African trade corridor.

Alonge explained that in Africa, long range land transport is a major route for the spread of HIV saying that “drivers and their assistants stay overnight along their way and can spend days at the border crossings waiting to get clearance from Customs and other border formalities.

“These rest stops and delays provide multiple opportunities for sexual encounters that can transmit HIV and other Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs).

“This puts truck drivers, other mobile sex workers and the people who live along the route at increased risk of HIV”.

He disclosed that about 3omillion people live along the West Africa’s main EastWest route, which stretches from Abidjan in Cote d’ Ivoire to Lagos in Nigeria.

He also said that 14 million people travel along the corridor every year adding that the route is essential to the socioeconomic development of the region.

Commending NPA on the development, the TinCan Island Chairman of National Union of Road Transport Workers, NURTW, Prince Adewumi Aderinto said that members of the group are better educated on the menace, and will ensure that they use protection whenever the need arise.

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ASUU issues 7-day final ultimatum to LASU

BY IKENNAASOMBA

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AGOS—THE Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, Lagos State University, LASU chapter, yesterday said it had given the institution a seven day final ultimatum to address its demands.

The ASUU-LASU Chairman, Dr. Idris Adekunle, who made this known in Lagos, said the ultimatum became effective on Wednesday, April 30 and would expire in May 7.

The union had on March 24, issued a 21-day ultimatum, which expired on April 13 and another 14 days from April 15 that expired on April 29.

The union had contended that the hike in fee had accounted for drop in student enrollment in the institution.

The lecturers also expressed dissatisfaction over the “no vacancy, no promotion” policy of the university and the nonimplementation of the 2009 University Miscellaneous Provision Act, already operational in other universities.

In the fresh deadline, Idris said that the lecturers would embark on a comprehensive and indefinite strike if management continued to ignore the union, pointing that the institution’s governing council, which was their employer, had not invited the union for dialogue since the initial trade dispute was declared.

“It was only the Chancellor, Sir

Thomas Okoya, that invited us for a meeting towards the end of the initial 21-day ultimatum issued and he promised to bring the issue to a logical conclusion, we are yet to hear from him. The parents’ forum also met the union on April 29 and promised to discuss with the government not to allow the issue result into a strike,” he said.

Idris said the union had been considerate enough to narrow down its 20 demands to three, “yet the management finds it impossible to meet them”.

He said that the union declared

the trade dispute to fulfill all the regulations of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) by giving the grace for dialogue before opting for strike.

Reacting, the university spokesperson, Mr. Kayode Sutton said: “Of the three issues remaining, two which are the reduction of the tuition and reviewing the retirement age of professors from 65 to 70 are not within the purview of the university or its Vice Chancellor, Prof. John Obafunwa, to resolve.

They need government

legislation. Then, the last issue of ‘no vacancy, no promotion’ did not start with this administration.

“The vice chancellor has appealed to ASUU to come up with proposals on how the terms of service for academic staff would be towards a better LASU. In the 2012/2013 session alone, over 256 vacancies were declared by the university. The vice chancellor had on April 15, issued a bulletin appealing to the lecturers not to down tools but embrace dialogue, because strike would only do more harm to the institution. “

WORKERS DAY: Cross section of Nigerian workers, during the 2014 Workers Day commemoration, with the theme: "Building enduring peace and unity: Panacea for sustainable national development", at Onikan, Stadium, Lagos Island. Photo by Bunmi Azeez.

How to win anti-terrorism war — PATIENCE JONATHAN

BY MONSUR OLOWOOPEJO

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AGOS—WIFE of President Jonathan Goodluck, Patience, yesterday, urged Nigerians to support the federal, state and local governments to address the issue of insecurity in the country, saying “terrorism can defeat anyone including my husband, President Goodluck Jonathan, if he fights alone, because terrorism cannot defeat us collectively.”

Mrs. Jonathan made the appeal at the 44th Birthday celebration of the National Coordinator of the Oodua People’s Congress, OPC, Mr. Gani Adams, held in Ikeja, Lagos.

Prominent dignitaries at the

event include: Mr Joseph Evah, Coordinator, Ijaw Monitoring Group, Chief Shina Williams, Special Adviser on Culture to Governor Kunle Amosun of Ogun State, Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi, represented by Basorun

Akinade.

The first lady, who was represented by Senior Special Assistance to President on Youths and Student matters, Mr. Jude Imagwe, said that addressing the insecurity in the country is a shared

Fire guts Lagos waste transfer loading station

BY MONSUR OLOWOOPEJO

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AGOS—PROPERTY worth millions of Naira were on Wednesday destroyed as fire consumed some section of the Lagos State Waste Transfer Loading Station, TLS, Oshodi Local Government.

When Vanguard visited the scene, it was gathered that the fire

started at about 6:00 pm from an apartment which housed used tyres collected for recycling and other recycling equipments.

Sources said that the apartment is filled with about a million tyres collected across the state for recycling.

It was further learnt that the fire started as a result of sparks from one of the machines in the section

‘Mad woman’ escapes lynching over alleged kidnap attempt

BY ESTHER ONYEGBULA

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AGOS—A mob stopped a supposedly mad woman from kidnapping a two-yearold girl in Igbonla community, Sibiri area of Lagos, yesterday.

The ‘mad woman’ reportedly walked into a compound on 30 Afolabi Sekoni street, where the twins were in the care of their older sibling.

responsibility.

According to her: “I want to thank all Nigerians but as I appreciate your effort, I must remind you that you all have a responsibility to play in the security challenges facing this country.''

She was said to have offered the babies, a male and a female, identified as Victor and Victoria the sum of N100 each.

Frightened, their elder sister identified as Oluwatobi was said to have quickly carried the children and run inside, with the mad woman following, prompting her to raise an alarm, which attracted residents.

Expectedly, after hearing the older girl's story, the mob descended on the woman.

But for the timely intervention of policemen, who arrived the scene and whisked the woman away, she would have been set ablaze.

A resident, Alahji Abudulazeez, stated that; “We were made to understand that the mad woman attempted to kidnap the twins.''

and before long, it began to spreading.

At the scene, Nigeria Police officers from Makinde station, Oshodi were sighted protecting the premises from being looted by hoodlums.

It will be recalled that TLS was commissioned in September 2011

by Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State.

TLS which also has a medical waste treatment plant, accommodates waste from hospitals and serves as transit camp for waste generated at its environs such as Oshodi, Mushin, Anthony, Mafoluku, Mile 2, Amuwo Odofin, Okota and Ilupeju. As at the time of filing this report, officers of federal and state fire service and National Emergency Management Agency, and its Lagos State counterpart were still battling with the raging fire.

Vanguard , FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014— 11

‘Osoba has no hand in Ogun APC crisis' ...Nobody’s against Amosun’s second term —PARTY CHAIR

BY DAUD OLATUNJI

A

BEOKUTA—CHIEF Isaac Olu Agemo, a factional Chairman of the All Progressives Congress in Ogun state loyal to a national leader of the party, Aremo Segun Osoba said yesterday, that the former governor did not contribute to the crisis rocking the party in the state.

Agemo also said that neither the faction nor the national leader was against the second term election of the state governor, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, urging him not to nurse any fear.

The factional Chairman who spoke with Vanguard in an exclusive interview in Abeokuta , shortly after the inaugural meeting of the executive in the state, described the crisis rocking the party as “an in-house misunderstanding”.

The party which is divided into two factions held parallel ward, local government and state Congresses which eventually produced two state executive councils during the just concluded Congresses.

Both Agemo and Chief Roqeeb Adeniji who were from Ogun West emerged chairmen of the two factions of the party in the state believed to be loyal to Osoba and Amosun.

Speaking on the crisis, the

factional Chairman said “ nobody should be blamed for the crisis. I don’t believe there is crisis in the party, it is an in-house misunderstanding, it is not crisis per se ,but, misunderstanding between A and B. “We are saying that let the governor take care of the governance and the party leaders

take care of the party, so that you will have a lighter load of what to carry simple”, he said .

Speaking on the alleged role played by former governor of the state who is also the national leader of the party, Agemo said “I have not seen Chief Osoba playing adverse role, he has been quiet, gentle in his general

disposition to what is going on in the party and he believes things would settle.

On Amosun’s second term bid, the factional chairman said, “Amosun can seek for second term, we are all together, we are in the same party, we can disagree to agree, that is human nature “, he said.

SERVICE: Mrs. Jumoke Akinjide, Minister of State, FCT, representing President Goodluck Jonathan being received by Rev. Dr. Supo Ayokunle, President, Nigeria Baptist Convention during the special celebration service held for the President in Ibadan by the Baptist Convention. Photo: Dare Fasube.

Osun guber: Aregbesola, Omisore talk tough

BY GBENGA OLARINOYE

O

SOGBO – AHEAD of August 9 governorship election in Osun State, both Governor Rauf Aregbesola, the All Progressives Congress, APC, candidate and his main challenger Senator Iyiola Omisore of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, are talking tough while asking the electorates to vote for them.

Omisore yesterday warned the former governor of Lagos State and National Leader of APC, Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu to steer clear of the state ahead of the elections, stressing that “Tinubu will regret any attempt he makes to cause violence in the state before, during and after the election.”

Also, Omisore declared that Governor Aregbesola lacks the qualities to lead a state like Osun,

hence the need to vote him out.

But APC, in its response by the state Director of Research and Publicity, Mr Kunle Oyatomi said; “At last, Omisore let the cat out of the bag. It is no secret anymore that the PDP at the very highest level has, in Omisore’s own words, ‘concluded arrangement to remove Ogbeni Aregbesola from office’, making the PDP participation in election itself

We will capture South West in 2015 — KASHAMU

BY DAUD OLATUNJI

A

B E O K U TA — T H E People’s Democratic Party has vowed to take over Southwestern states being controlled by the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) before and after 2015 elections.

The Chairman, Organisation and Mobilisation Committee in the South West, Prince Buruji Kashamu stated this while receiving 1500 defectors of the

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APC members led by their leader , Chief Kayode Ajibu into the PDP at Atan, Ijebu North _East local government area of Ogun State.

Kashamu who boasted that though the PDP was not in government, said God has given the party the control and authority in the country .

“I am proud to associate myself with PDP and I can tell you today authoritatively whether they like it or not, not only Amosun in Ogun State but, in the whole South_West, we are set in PDP to take over the South_West. I trust you, I believe in you.

“You believe in action. You believe in struggle. You want honest people. You know for sure when you are looking for action,

there are plenty actions in PDP. “You can see it clearly by yourself, we are not in the government but God has given us the control and authority. If it is like that, we must know that all of us have been working and doing the wish of the people in Ogun State.

“The people can see clearly that there is no any other party that is better than the national party which is PDP”, he said.

The state Chairman of the party, Bayo Dayo, said the party would be fair to the defectors .

He disclosed that the leader of the defectors until his defection, was a political appointee in the APC administration in the state.

only a sadistic formality.

“We are not amused about his boast that the PDP will withdraw security details from Aregbesola in the coming days or weeks. It only tells us the level the PDP is ready to go, in violation of the constitution, to capture Osun.

“Omisore’s declaration that the next election is a war confirmed what the Vice President has said earlier and to garnish this lawlessness, Omisore warned that when they start the war, people of Osun should hide their heads. Is this a man who wants to rule Osun or who wants to destroy it?'

“Everyone should be convinced by now that what the PDP seeks is to assume power undemocratically by any means including murder, violence and any conceivable method deploy by terrorists.”

Omisore, a former Deputy Governor of the state and former Chairman, Senate committee on Finance and Appropriation, who spoke in Osogbo during a special prayer and reconcilatory session organised for him by the state chapter of the PDP, said “Tinubu does not have monopoly of violence and he will regret if he tries to cause crisis in Osun.”

PVCs, not card readers, will be used for Ekiti, Osun – INEC

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HE Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, yesterday said Permanent Voter Cards, PVCs, will be used for the Ekiti State governorship election on June 21, 2014, and the Osun State governorship election on August 9, 2014; but that it will not deploy card readers for the governorship elections.

Rather, the card readers will be used along with PVCs for the 2015 general election.

According to INEC, the clarification is to correct reports that card readers will be deployed for the Ekiti and Osun governorship elections.

The reports misrepresented Acting INEC Chairman, Dr. Ishmael Igbani, as having said card readers will be deployed for the governorship elections.

New vehicle transit regime debuts at Seme border

BY GODWIN ORITSE

F

OR ease of shipment from country to country, the Nigeria Customs Service has commenced a new vehicle transit regime for automobiles being imported into the country from neighbouring countries like Benin, Cameroon, Chad and Niger Republic beginning with Benin Republic and Seme Border as area of pilot implementation.

The new policy which is a fall out of a March 26, 2014 meeting of Directors _General of Customs of the 5 proximate countries held in Abuja, and in line with the Transit Code,will see all Nigerian bound vehicles imported from the affected countries being handed over to the Nigerian Customs by the country’s customs administration after due clearance.

The scheme which has features of accountability, transparency and easy personal evaluation and monitoring will have names of officers responsible for transfers and receipts of manifests/ vehicles from both countries.

12—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Olu of Warri's 27th coronation anniversary kicks off

BY EGUFE YAFUGBORHI

W

ARRI—THE Itsekiri nation of Delta State turned out en mass, yesterday in praise worship to kick-start the 27th coronation anniversary of their monarch, Ogiame Atuwatse II, the Olu of Warri.

Atuwatse II, who ascended the throne on May 2, 1987, is the 19th Olu since King Gimuwa I, was crowned in 1480, in a transition that witnessed an interregnum between 1848 and 1936.

The Christian worship, which opened this year’s anniversary at the Olu's Palace, Warri, featured songs and drama rendition as well as prayers to God for preserving the monarch on the throne in peaceful reign over his subjects.

Chairman, Delta State Civil Service Commission, Chief Emmanuel Tetsola, who chairs the Planning Committee of the 27th Anniversary, told Vanguard that the people have all cause to thank God and celebrate for keeping the monarch in peace with his subjects.

He said: “It is not easy for God to keep our king living happily with us on the throne.

27 years on the throne is no small feat. There is also the joy that the Itsekiri nation remains a unified kingdom under one monarch. There is no doubt we are happy.”

Dr. Mark Erumi, Chaplain of Warri Kingdom, who moderated the praise worship, said: “The recourse to praising God to open the celebration of our king cannot be over-emphasised.

“There is the usual thanksgiving closing the coronation remembrance, but in truth we cannot give enough to thank God for all His blessing upon the throne and the Itsekiri people. The best we can offer is to praise and worship Him for His continued mercy and favour.”

The day one of the event progressed into traditional dances and paying of homage to the Olu as well as a special presentation by Itsekiri representative at the national conference, Chief Isaac Jemide, who gave situation report on his participation at the ongoing confab.

Chief Jemide, who described participation at the conference as strenuous, said he has so far made a case against calls for a liberalised indigenous as well as calls for renewed efforts at protecting minorities interests, including the Itsekiri.

He told the Olu and his people that, “I am in the Immi-

gration Committee. Incidentally, it talks a lot about indigenship. In one of my papers to the committee, I made it clear that indigeneship is a natural thing not artificial. People are born and hold allegiance to their roots where they are buried and it must remain so.

“The idea that a stranger can begin to claim indigeneship in

another land after 15 years stay or so, will not help Itsekiris and other minorities.

I have told them and I strongly believe that the committee is keying into it.”

Other dignitaries at the event include President, Christian Association of Nigeria, Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor; Pastor John Toritsemotse,

palace chiefs and Mr. Daniel Reyenieju, member representing Warri federal constituency, who also gave a brief stewardship of his office to the people.

The 27th Coronation Anniversary of the Olu continues today at Big Warri, with a state of Itsekiri nation speech

by Atuwatse II himself.

SERVICE OF SONGS: From right: Mr. Emeke Iwerebon, Chairman, Learn Africa Plc, son of Late Chief Felix Iwerebon; Mrs Magdalene Iwerebon, wife; Mrs Margaret Onwukwe, daughter and Mr. Kelly Onwukwe, son-in-law, during the service of songs for late Chief Emeke Iwerebon, at the Archbishop Vining Memorial Church, GRA, Ikeja, yesterday. Photo: Lamidi Bamidele.

No going back on competency test —Oshiomhole

BY SIMON EBEGBULEM

B

ENIN—GOVERNOR Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State, said yesterday that the competency test for teachers in the state will hold in the interest of the Edo child.

Addressing workers at the May Day rally to mark the 2014 Workers’ Day at the Samuel Ogbemudia Stadium, Benin City, Oshiomhole said he would not be in-

timidated to give up the idea.

He urged workers to unite in the fight against insurgency in parts of the country, saying that no nation develops under insecure environment.

On the competency test for teachers, he said: “I have a duty to restore the dignity of teachers. I am sure that no matter the bitterness in our minds we must recognise the fact that our future begins today, and that today means

investing in education. I did not start by building an ultramodern Government House as many governors have done in many parts of the country.

“I decided from day one that I should build schools that can compete with many private ones in the state. We have introduced one pupil one desk and I am doing these because proper teaching and learning cannot take place in an atmosphere that is not conducive."

....As Uduaghan promises extra pay for workers

BY AUSTIN OGWUDA

A

SABA—DELTA State governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, has announced the introduction of what he called ‘extra pay package’ for workers at the end of the year to enable them meet the financial strains associated with yuletide season.

Speaking at the May Day celebration in Asaba, yesterday, the governor made it clear that workers deserved to be motivated and appreciated for the roles they are playing in ensuring increased productivity, noting that the extra pay package,

which will be the first of its kind in the state, is to encourage them to always put in their best.

He said: “Let me assure workers that at the end of the year, we will work out something extra, definitely,

there will be extra payment for them.”

He announced that his administration will employ more teachers and health workers within the next few weeks in addition to the ongoing employment into the Delta State Civil Service.

Amaechi urges Labour to close ranks against violence

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IVERS State governor, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, has called on the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, and Trade Union Congress, TUC, to close ranks against inequality and violence in the country.

He said there has been no successful administration in Nigeria without the support of the labour unions actively participating in governance.

Amaechi, who spoke during the Workers' Day Celebration in Port Harcourt, the state capital, explained that social injustice, political and economic violence as well as corruption were the bane behind the activities of Boko Haram in the country.

He said: “I was listening to the TUC Chairman's address, and he took me back to my school days because he was able to analyze the problems of Nigeria. But typical of TUC, NLC in Nigeria, they know the problems, they also know the solutions."

Iwerebon was first MD of Longman —GCUOBA

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OVERNMENT College, Ughelli, Old Boys Association, GCUOBA, Lagos Branch, has said that Chief Felix Iwerebon, one of the pioneer students of the Alma Mater and former President of GCUOBA, Lagos Branch, was the first Managing Director/ Chairman, Longman Nigeria Plc., now ‘LEARN AFRICA Plc.’ and not Guinness Nigeria Plc as advertised in the Vanguard Newspapers of Thursday May 1, 2014.

We apologise for any inconvenience this error might have caused.

—Editor.

Bayelsa workers demand review of pension allowances

BY SAMUEL OYADONGHA

Y

ENAGOA—Workers in Bayelsa State, yesterday, called on the state government to improve the welfare of its state's work force and review of the pension allowances based

on N18,000 minimum wage, as the state celebrated the May Day amidst tight security.

A stop and search was conducted on workers entering the Peace Park, venue of the Workers Day celebration ostensibly to prevent suspected miscreants from infiltrating the place.

The state governor, Mr Seriake Dickson, who made a brief appearance at the celebration, said though workers in the state had done well in the last few years, the success of the current administration in the state was dependent on the shoulder of the state workers.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 13

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14—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

HRH OGIAME ATUWATSE 11, OLU OF WARRI'S 27TH CORONATION ANNIVERSARY

HRH Ogiame Atuwatse, Olu of Warri, during his 27th Coronation Anniversary, in Warri, Delta State. Photos: Barnabas Uzosike

Cross section of chiefs

The Olu of Warri on arrival at the venue of the event

From left, Chief T. Yahaya Pessu; Chief Rita-Lori Ogbebor; and Chief Mrs. P.E.B.Uku

Itsekiri choirs

Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor and Prince Agidotan Yonwuren.

From left, Chief Brown Mene, and His Royal Majesty, Ogiame Atuwatse II.

Her Majesty, Olori Gladys Duroorike Atuwatse, First Lady of Warri king- Cross section of Itsekiri Daughters & Wives Association of Nigeria (Benin Citydom based)

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—15

2014 WORKERS DAY CELEBRATION ACROSS THE NATION

Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ, Rivers State chapter during 2014 Workers Day in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, yesterday. Photo: Nwankpa Chijioke

From left: Special Adviser on Labour Matters to the Kwara State Governor, Comrade Bisi Fakayode; Kwara State Head of Service, Alhaji Dabarako Mohammed; Governor Abdulfatah Ahmed of Kwara State; Chairman, Nigeria Labour Congress, Kwara State, Comrade Farouk Akanbi and Chairman, Trade Union Congress, Kwara State, Kolawole Olumoh cutting the cake to mark the Workers' Day Celebration in Ilorin.

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A cross section of Federal Civil Servants Multi-Purpose Office with Disabilies during their match past in Abuja

Governor Olusegun Mimiko of Ondo State receiving salute from workers during the celebration at Gani Fawehinmi Freedom Arcade, in Akure.

Governor Rauf Aregbesola of Osun State (left) taking salute from Senior Staff Association of Universities, Teaching Hospitals, Research Institutes and Associated Institutions (SSAUTHRIAL), Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife branch, during the celebration in Osogbo, Osun State.

16—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

May Day: Our problem's not poverty, it's wealth distribution –Jonathan .Labour, politicians seek united front against insurgents .As labour berates political class

BY FUNMI KOMOLAFE, VICTOR AHIUMA-YOUNG, OLASUNKANMI AKANI, EMMANUEL ELEBEKE & JOSEPH ERUNKE

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RESIDENT GOODLUCK Jonathan, yesterday, at the National May Day rally, in Abuja, said Nigeria is not poor, but suffering from the distribution of wealth, as the main challenge facing the country.

This came as organised labour berated Nigerian politicians and political leaders for playing politics with the state of insecurity in

the country, with Governors Babatunde Fashola, Adams Oshiomhole and Ibikunle Amosun of Lagos, Edo and Ogun states calling for concerted efforts to tackle the insecurity scourge irrespective of political or religious affiliations.

Jonathan was reacting to the recent World Bank’s report that ranked Nigeria the fifth poorest country in the world at Eagle Square, venue of 2014 workers' May Day festivities.

President Jonathan said he was amazed when he visited Kenya on an official trip, only to discover that

most of the private jets which flew into that country were from Nigeria.

He said: “They say Nigeria is poor, but I was surprised when the World Bank listed us among the poorest nations in the world. Nigeria is not poor, it only has the problem of unequal distribution of wealth.”

President Goodluck Jonathan used the May Day celebration to reiterate his administration’s determination to bring the BokoHaram insurgency to an end, vowing that the abducted secondary

school girls in Chibok, Borno State must be found and rescued.

He also restated his earlier submission that the perpetrators of the Nyanya Bus Terminal bombing in the Federal Capital would be fished out and punished in accordance with the law.

He assured that government was continuously fine-tuning its security strategies to curb insurgency which, he said, perpetrators must never be allowed to succeed in their evil intention.

He, therefore, called for the cooperation of citizens to beat back the threat posed by the Islamic sect to the nation.

He said: “The recent atrocities by terrorists, particularly the Nyanya Motor park bombing of mainly working class citizens, as well as the cruel abduction of some innocent girls, our future mothers and leaders in a very horrific and despicable situation in Borno State, is quite regrettable.

“The government is constantly reviewing and upgrading mechanisms to curb this mindless act and together, with the cooperation of the citizenry, we shall triumph.

"Those who want to redefine our country to be seen as a country of chaos will never succeed. We will continue to work hard to ensure the security of our people.

Speaking on the state of insecurity, Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, and its Trade Union Congress of Nigeria, TUC, counterpart, argued that, “it is immoral to play politics with the lives of people,” insisting that the ruling class should realise that Nigeria was at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred and demanded an end to the unholy dirty pol-

itics over the insecurity in the country.”

Governor Oshiomhole while urging workers to stand and speak for Nigeria in the face of insurgency and ethnic champions, said: “We should be united in the fight against Boko Haram. We should be united against terrorism, because we need a peaceful state for us to do politics.”

Governor Babatunde Fashola suggested: “I think first of all we should agree to fight the scourge of insecurity under one flag, the Green-White-Green Flag.

"Let everyone for now subsume his flag in whatever colour and let us rally together, not as Yoruba, as Ijaw, not as Igbo, not as Hausa, but as Nigerians, who rally under one flag, the Green-White-Green to defeat insecurity.”

Governor Amosun of Ogun State said: “I, therefore, appeal to you all to always take out time to pray for Nigeria and the over 200 students kidnapped in Chibok in Borno State.

"We pray for God’s intervention in securing the release of the students and stemming the tide of violent crimes against humanity in Nigeria.”

The two labour centres while addressing workers and other guests, with theme, 'Building Enduring Peace and Unity: Panacea for Sustainable National Development,' insisted that, “we must all rise in unison, shoulder-to-shoulder and confront this common enemy once and for all. We are almost certain that if anyone was left in doubt about the universality of this war, the Nyanya bomb blast erased all of that.”

....PENGASSAN boycotts rally over students’ abduction

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OWEVER, the Pe troleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, PENGASSAN, yesterday, boycotted the May Day celebration nationwide as a mark of identification with the plights and pains of parents of the over 200 girls abducted by terrorists at Chibok, Borno State.

The association at its National Executive Council, NEC meeting on Wednesday, April 30, 2014, in Abuja, resolved that members stay away from venue of the this year’s May Day Rally at the Eagle Square, in

Abuja, and across the states as a mark of solidarity.

It called on the Federal Government to “without delay embark on appreciable steps in search and rescue of our sisters and daughters that are still being held hostage since April 3, 2014 to date.

The association also insisted that its non-participation was also “to protest the administration by the TUC leadership under Boboi Kaigama as President General and Comrade Musa Lawa as Secretary General.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 —17

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HE abduction of 230 girls from their school in Chibok, Borno State, has shocked Nigerians and made headlines all over the world.

On Wednesday, hundreds of anguished, angry and mostly female protestors took to the streets of Abuja, chanting and brandishing placards.

The heart-rending requests and poignant questions on their placards included: “Where Are Our Sisters?”,“PleaseFindOurDaughters”,“LetPeaceReign”,“CanAnyone Hear Me?”, “Please Protect Us” and “Please Do Something”.

One of the leaders of this laudable and necessary demonstration was Mrs Oby Ezekwesili, a former Minister of Education. She stood shoulder-to-shoulder, like the Amazon she is, with the demonstrators…and joined them as they marched to the National Assemblytopresentaletterinwhich thegovernmentwasaccusedofnot doing enough to secure the release of the kidnap victims.

I have often complained, on this page, about the excessive docility of the average Nigerian. I have pointed out, again and again, that our rulers constantly mess up and take us for granted because we don’t demand respect or progress assertively enough and rarely sustain legitimate protests for long.

IsaluteObyandtheotherwomen

*Some women, led by Mrs Oby Ezekwesili, protesting the abduction of 230 school girls in Chibok, Borno State.

Bravo, ladies! tite” and capacity to tackle enemies of the people.

The Goodluck Jonathan administration has acquired a chronic image problem and is facing a major crisis of confidence, both domestically and internationally, because of its under-performance and arrogant, selfish insistence on ignoring public opinion.

I have always said that those who expected Jonathan to eliminate Boko Haram overnight were being extremely unfair, given that sophisticated Western nations have also not curbed terrorism overnight.

,

I salute Oby and the other women who decided to brave bad weather – it was raining – to make their feelings known; I hope they keep up the pressure

who decided to brave bad weather – it was raining – to make their feelings known. I hope they keep up the pressure.

Crisis of confidence: I am in London at the moment and have just watched a really depressing and seriously embarrassing British TV news discussion about the Chibok disaster.

The foreign commentators were appalled that this kind of thing can happen “in this day and age”, sympathised with the helpless parents of the traumatised teenage captives and expressed the view that the Nigerian government and army lack the “appe-

,

The Americans are still battling with Al Quaeda’s Islamic guerrillas despite their famed military might and their second-tonone global intelligence network.

The Basque Separatist group, ETA, only agreed to a ceasefire this February after waging war on the Spanish state for four whole decades.

When I was growing up in the UK, the Irish Republican Army, IRA, inflicted all manner of outrages on the populace and seemed unstoppable for many years.

The IRA bombed the London Stock Exchange building and a

hotel in which several senior politicians (including the then Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher) were staying. The IRA maimed and killed indiscriminately and even managed to assassinate Queen Elizabeth’s distinguished cousin, Lord Mountbatten, a decorated naval officer, statesman and former Viceroy of India.

If those who run countries that are more well-equipped on every imaginable level struggle for ages to get rid of violent insurgents, it is hardly surprising that those who run a relatively underdeveloped country like ours have yet to whip Boko Haram – which hasn’t been around for long - into total submission!

However, the Jonathan administration is not completely bereft of skilled security personnel, modern weapons or financial resources…and should be confronting this terrible challenge more dynamically and efficiently. Boko Haram cannot be destroyed tomorrow, but it can be MUCH better controlled.

The Jonathan administration should also be A LOT more caring. It was in SUCH bad taste for the President and his cronies to attend a rally in Kano so soon after the recent Nyanya bus station bomb blast. Worse still, they were seen dancing and grinning. How insensitive can any head of state be?!

•President Goodluck Jonathan Given that he was willing to cancel this week’s Federal Executive Council meeting because his Vice, Sambo, lost his brother, why couldn’t he display a similar level of concern for the ordinary citizens who lost their lives and limbs in Nyanya?

Lives and limbs in Nyanya Meanwhile, Mr President has still not sacked Abba Moro, his widely despised Interior Minister…who should have been officially held responsible for the Immigration Service recruitment debacle that led to several deaths last month.

Jonathan also comes across as being reluctant to punish the massive corruption that is making government agencies like NNPC utterly dysfunctional.

The positive moves Jonathan has made – in the power and agricultural sectors, for example - are overshadowed by multiple lapses and failures.

Even on his home turf - the

Niger Delta – where most folks are instinctively loyal to their “Big Brother”, there is increasing disillusionment. I have encountered many Ijaws, Ogonis, Uhrobos, etc, who used to say that they would definitely vote for Jonathan in 2015, but are now bitterly changing their tune.

Nigeria is not a happy place right now and if Jonathan does not get a grip, become more organised/focused, transform his leadership style and discipline his less savoury sidekicks in the coming months, he will only be able to win the 2015 election by force or by fraud.

Responses to: donzol2002@yahoo.co.uk or to 0802 747 6458 OR 0811 675 9752 (texts only).

PLEASE KINDLY NOTE THAT UNLESS YOU REQUEST ANONYMITY, YOUR COMMENTS MAY BE PUBLISHED, WITH YOUR NAMES AND CONTACT DETAILS ATTACHED. C M Y K

18 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 NIGERIANS complaining over poor electricity supply should brace up for tougher times as the confusion over new ownership of the generating and distributing companies continues. If the agitations of electricity workers are sustained, there would be further disruptions that could lower already poor supplies.

The issues would become more contentious now that the new companies that spawned last year from NEPA, as we commonly knew it, were supposed to have taken over the businesses at the beginning of this month.

A six-month transition contract to assist the new successor companies assess NEPA staff to determine those they would keep has ended.

What should be a smooth transition with those not employed disengaged, is brewing a crisis. The Federal Government reportedly paid N380 billion as the entitlement of NEPA workers.

BY FEMI AYELABOWO

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VERYWHERE in the world, there are people who go into politics because they feel a genuine call to service. Others do so, either for self aggrandisement or in furtherance of some ignoble objectives or simply to protect their crooked and morally unscrupulous background. Whatever the circumstances, it is our character that determines the motivation and pattern of our politics.

Anyone who remembers the dying days of military dictatorship in Nigeria and the activities of pro-democracy groups would hardly forget Ahmed Bola Tinubu. Those concerned enough to study his background and personal profile knew how difficult it was to sift the real from the fabricated. It was common knowledge that in Tinubu’s records - from family history, through education and working career to political activities - nothing simply seemed to add up.

Much of what was said or written about Tinubu belonged to the rumour category and was, therefore, of no significance to serious-minded Nigerians. Of what concern, for instance, was Tinubu’s doubtful parentage, whether or not the late Alhaja Abibatu Mogaji was, truly, his biological mother? Why would Nigerians bother, if he did or did not attend Government College Ibadan, whether or not he obtained a degree from Chicago State University, unless the qualifications acquired from these institutions were presented for the purpose of securing appointment?

Nor, was it of relevance to many in the 1990s - when Tinubu came into the political

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More Electricity Challenges The understanding of the new owners was that it would be at their discretion to decide who to retain.

It seems enough questions were not asked about what the Bureau of Public Enterprises did with the privatisation of the electricity sector.

New owners who paid billions of Naira to purchase these power assets cannot recover their investments if they are unable to make critical decisions about the quality and quantity of staff they would engage.

Can the new owners succeed if electricity workers do not allow them to decide how to run their

businesses? Retained NEPA staff would have had the double distinction of enjoying their entitlements and working with the new company.

Electricity workers make their case powerfully too. They have started picketing the new companies. According to them, more than 10,000 of them have not been paid their full entitlements. They fear that if they leave, nobody would pay them. They could be leaning on the experience of former Nigeria Airways staff, who have been denied their entitlements since the business was sold in 2004.

They also claim the new owners

OPINION Challenge Tinubu, If you can limelight - whether or not he grew up as an area boy (the euphemism for social miscreants) in Campus Square of Lagos Island or, indeed, whether or not he was once a political thug? What seemed most crucial to Nigerians at the time was that the man played an active role as one of the founding fathers of the National Democratic Coalition (NADECO) that fought the nation’s military dictators to a standstill. So, when Tinubu ran away on self-exile in 1994-98, it was conveniently interpreted as an escape from military persecution. But, he might have had other reasons for abandoning his fatherland.

Tinubu’s rise, on the political ladder, since his return from exile, has been so meteoric that he appears to have forgotten his humble beginning. Having acquired enormous wealth and power, he now wears the toga of “Asiwaju.” Information has it that he is pressing hard to enthrone himself as the “Asiwaju of Yorubaland”, with or without the blessings of the Yoruba people.

Now, what accounts for the sudden rise of Tinubu’s profile? First, he was Governor of Lagos State, the richest State in the country, for eight years during which he was the Alpha and the Omega. Then, he installed one of his most loyal subordinates who agreed that his godfather must stick around for their mutual benefits.

The juiciest part of the agreement, it seems, was that Tinubu’s company, Alpha Beta (Consulting) Ltd, would be in charge of the assessment and collection of all taxes and

Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) due, payable and paid, on behalf of the Lagos State Government. In actual figures, the Lagos State Government makes over N40 billion from IGR every month and based on the percentage of commission agreed upon between godfather and godson, Tinubu’s company rakes well over N4 billion belonging to the long-suffering people of Lagos each month. So, in effect, Tinubu holds Lagos State by the jugular.

Tinubu’s rise appears unstoppable, especially after his transformation to the status of national leader, following the merger of the defunct ACN with other parties giving birth to the APC. He now sees himself as Nigeria’s President-in-waiting or, at least, Vice-President to be; which explains why he is desperately seeking recognition as the idolized leader of the Yoruba race. In fact, he made the point abundantly clear the other day when he challenged the Awo dynasty (even with Mama Hannah almost clocking 100 years) for a final determination of who should be the Leader of the Yoruba. No doubt, Tinubu has lost respect for traditional Yoruba values.

Those who may be reading inordinate ambition into Tinubu’s apparent desperation should take serious note of the man’s policy: “If recognition is not willingly given to you, procure it.” It is a policy anchored on the absolute power of wealth. To a large extent, it appears to be very effective, especially in the South West–dominated media where there is hardly any voice of criticism against

are turning down the agreement they had with the workers, which provided for consultations before disengagement of workers.

New electricity companies want to recoup their investments. They also want to be the ones to make the important decisions, especially who works for them. Many had expected that many NEPA staff after their huge payouts would have opted for self-employment or stake their interests in other ventures.

Unless government handles this matter with care – by resolving outstanding issues it has with the electricity workers - it is setting up grounds for the failure of another privatisation exercise. Nigeria Airways and NITEL went similar ways.

The impact of the botched privatisation of Nigeria Airways and NITEL was minimal because existing private enterprises took up their places. How would we manage without even the worse form of NEPA?

Tinubu, no matter what he does. In fact, Tinubu believes that with money, the entire Nigerian media – and politicians too - can be bought.

He may be right, considering the number of accomplished journalists, editors and columnists who sing his praises on a daily basis and would find nothing wrong, even if he commits murder!

As the saying goes, “power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Bola Tinubu believes that he has conquered the South West (almost all the States therein, except stubborn Governor Olusegun Mimiko’s Ondo). In some of the States, he has successfully deployed his army of area-boys.

With Lagos State under his firm grip and the daily inflow of massive funds guaranteed, he believes that he is now capable of raising a military outfit that can defeat the Armed Forces of the Federal Government. That must have been Tinubu’s source of confidence when he recently threatened that “election riggers in Ekiti and Osun States”, during the forthcoming governorship contests in the two States, would be “roasted”, rather than face normal legal processes.

Now back to the critical question: Why is Tinubu in politics and why is he so eager to acquire more powers and resources? The answer is simple: he needs power to cover up his not too pleasant past and mountains of infractions - some purportedly criminal against the people. He also needs the resources, perhaps, to continue to appease the Lagos masses that he has impoverished. *Mr. Ayelabowo,a public affairs commentator, wrote Ibadan, Oyo state.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 19

20 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

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Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014— —21

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ICE Admiral Murtala Nyako (rtd), GCON, CFR, joined the Royal Nigerian Navy in 1963, trained in United Kingdom and returned to Nigeria in 1966, fought in the NigeriaBiafra war. In February 1976, he was appointed Governor of the newly formed Niger State. He became the Chief of Naval Staff in January 1990, the Deputy Chief of Defense Staff two years later and retired from the Service in September 1993.

Nyako entered politics in 2006 and was elected Governor of Adamawa State in April 2007. In February 2008 the Election Petition Appeal Tribunal upheld nullification of his election, and the House Speaker James Barka was sworn in as Acting Governor.

A fresh election was run, and Nyako was re-elected and resumed office on April 29, 2008.

Soon after, the House initiated moves to impeach him, but was dissuaded after the personal intervention of President Umaru Yar’Adua.

In 2012 after the first tenure, he ran for a second term and was reelected. He is sole owner of one of the largest dairy farms in the country, Sebore (EPZ) Farms, and owns the largest mango farm in the country leading to him being known as Baba Mai Mangoro,

BMM.He is the President of the Horticultural Crops Growers Association of Nigeria, the Practicing Farmers Association of Nigeria and the Apex Farmers Association of Nigeria. Nyako, is therefore an accomplished Naval Officer, a very rich farmer and politician. He should be taken very seriously when he speaks.

To ignore the implications of his call to the North, will be to the peril of this nation.

Governor Nyako left the PDP last year to join the APC, and has subsequently changed his thoughts about Nigeria.

In a speech in March this year in Washington D C, he accused President GEJ and key government officials of supporting state terrorism by funding and arming terrorists, adding that “ there is simply no person(s) in the North Eastern zone rich enough to foot the financial and logistic bills on Borko Haram activities, and that “ it was clear there was unhindered coordination between the activities of Boko Haram cells and strategic commanders in Nigeria’s National Defense System”. What a damaging and discouraging accusation to his erstwhile constituency, and who says he cannot foot such bills? He can, of course!

But he continued: “The initial assumption was that Boko Haram

NDIC: 25 years of innovations

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BY BASHIR HASSAN

MPHASIS on innovation and human resource development has been the hallmark of the two and half decades of the founding of the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC). Also, remarkably, the diversity of NDIC’s organisational structure has faithfully reflected the federal character.

It has worked in harmonious partnership with Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and Ministry of Finance since its establishment, a partnership that has become more consolidated in recent years.

The NDIC was established on March 17, 1989. It has withered of the many financial storms that beset not only the country but indeed the world in the last 25 years largely due to the trained and highly motivated staff and innovative services, founded on sound policies and effective leadership in the last decade.

Looking back to March 1989 when the NDIC commenced its operations, many of the odd 100 banks or so in the country had gone through one form of distress or the other - indeed, many had gone out of business! The Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) introduced in the country in 1986 opened a flood gate of new banks. But it soon became clear that the phenomenal increase in the number of banks from 40 in 1986 to 120 within the span of six years was clearly unsustainable as the nation neither had adequate manpower to serve those growing banks nor requisite knowledge of risk management to ensure strict good governance regimes within the banking industry. That was the first challenge of a fledgling corporation.

Luckily NDIC had other country experiences to learn from. Czechoslovakia, for example, which was the first country to establish a nation-wide deposit scheme in 1924, used the scheme to revitalize the

,

was religiously motivated.

Nobody now associates the group with any religion; their targets have largely been within Muslim communities. What therefore, are the motivating factors of the socalled Boko Haram ?” And he provides the answer: “The people in the North have also begun to suspect that the objective of all this is to create enough mayhem for an excuse to deny them their democratic right to vote by cancelling the forthcoming general elections in the region and also reduce the voting power of the people there now and in the future through mass killings of its populace, especially its youth.”

Is this man not fanning the embers of violence among the Northern youth? Nyako, by our Constitution, will benefit by remaining in office if there is no election in his state! But he queries: “Is Northern Nigeria facing another demonic agenda similar to that which wiped away its political and military leaders and killed a number from the Western Region in January 1966 ?” The conjuring up of the horror of 1966 is the biggest harm to the

,

BY CLEMENT UDEGBE

,

Nyako's call and Nigeria's stability

Terrorism has come to roost in the North East because of this type of mindset among their leaders!

country’s banking system after ravages of the First World War. Similarly, the United States of America (USA), which established the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) in 1933, did so in response to a banking collapse and panic.

And, as was the case with these countries, the deposit insurance option came to the rescue in Nigeria, with the establishment of NDIC, as a risk minimiser with the broad mandate of deposit guarantee, bank supervision, as well as provides mechanism for orderly resolution of failure, including bank liquidation. Its history in the past quarter of a century has been to realise this mandate in the most professional manner.

From its humble beginning today the corporation operate from 10 branches across the country with a staff strength of 1141.

Some of the measures taken by our own NDIC back in the 1990s to save many collapsing banks include moral suasion; continuous interaction with bank managers/owners; imposition of Holding Actions on distressed banks to restrict operations and encourage selfrestructuring; and rendering of Financial Assistance to banks. In 1989 alone, for example, NDIC in collaboration with the CBN granted facilities to the tune of N2.3 billion to ten banks with serious liquidity problems.

Takeover of Management and Control was another set of measures adopted by NDIC. Between 1991 and 1996 24 distressed banks were taken over by NDIC. By the turn of the century acquisition and restructuring saw seven (7) distressed banks handed over to new investors in 1999 and 2000.

These different measures adopted were the manifestation of the innovative grounding of the NDIC. And the most innovative period was the last five years, when its current management team came

fragile unity of Nigeria at this time. Nyako is for a split Nigeria!

His New Country is The North.

In his recent Memo to the Northern Governors Forum, he alleged the following: “The protection of life and property of innocent citizens in Northern Nigeria and recognising their Human rights and voting right in the forthcoming general elections is no longer a cardinal principle of the administration (GEJ’s)".His verdict: “The victims of the administration’s evil-mindedness are substantially Northern Nigerians. The administration is bent on bringing wars in the North….There have also been attempts to assassinate the Senate President (Northerner) in Imo State, two Executive Governors of States in the North (the Governor of Benue State and my humble self), two of our most prominent traditional leaders (Shehu of Borno and the Emir of Kano), Senators and others, all from Northern Nigeria. This is in line with the demonic policy of the evil-few in and around the administration that have advocated how Northerners, both Christians and Muslims, are to be so dealt with, ill-treated and oppressed!”

He echoed: “It is a well-known fact that virtually all the soldiers of Northern Nigerian origin recently recruited to fight BokoHaram have been deceived in that aspect. Virtually all the Nigerian Army soldiers killed/ murdered in these operations so

Takeover of Management and Control was another set of measures adopted

by NDIC. Between 1991 and 1996 24 distressed banks were taken over by NDIC

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on board, led by Mr. Umaru Ibrahim, managing director/CEO. Most of the measures taken from 2009 to date were quite novel measures in banking failure resolution, including bail outs; bridge banking; establishment of asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON); assisted merger and acquisition and introduction of financial stability fund (FSF).

T

he bailout measures were not arbitrary, but rather preceded by Special Audit of the DMBs to ascertain the extent to which they were affected by the financial crisis that engulfed the world in 2008. The special audit report revealed that banks were afflicted by large volumes of non-performing loans (heavily exposed to Oil & Gas, Margin Lending), capital erosion, poor risk management, illiquidity and poor corporate governance practices, amongst others. It further revealed that ten (10) out of the 24 DMBs needed close supervisory monitoring out of which eight (8) were in precarious financial condition which required serious supervisory intervention. The audit result showed the market shares of the 8 banks in precarious financial condition in terms of Total Assets, Deposits, Credits and Branch network were 30.08%, 30.72%, 52.70% and 40.32%, respectively. The Supervisory Authorities therefore intervened in eight (8) of the banks with precarious financial condition by sacking their managements and appointing new

far are of Northern Nigerian origin”, adding that: “The NorthEast is under occupation .The North-West is under assault. The North is under occupation.”

If this is not treasonable, then what else is ? When will the FG do something about this type of seditious, and treasonable, conduct? Terrorism has come to roost in the North East because of this type of mindset among their leaders!

He then goofed: “Nigerians, this is the first time we have collectively elected a citizen of this country from the former Eastern Nigeria as a President. Dear citizens of Eastern Nigerian origin please note that this Federal administration under your son is giving you a very bad name! …..If you had condemned the cold-blooded murder of political and military leaders of Northern and Western Nigerian origins in the night of 15 January, 1966 by your sons it would not have led to the subsequent massacre of the innocent and the Nigerian Civil War….Northern Nigeria is on its own.” It is unbelievable that Nyako labours shamelessly under the wrong impression, that GEJ is an Igbo man. No wonder! His types and party cannot live with the Igbo or Southern Presidency.

Let’s wait till 2019. If indeed there are many Nyakos in the North, then the die is cast for Nigeria and the Igbo man once again! But will the Igbo man see? *Mr. Udegbe, a legal practitioner, wrote from Lagos.

ones.

To complete the resolution of the situation of the eight most affected banks, the CBN, injected N620 billion into them as loan capital and liquidity support. The apex bank, working with the NDIC, also gave guarantees for all the affected banks’ interbank takings and foreign credit obligations. In the end the eight banks were bailed out and their depositors and shareholder were saved from the deadly depression that such loss causes.

When it became clear that the three (3) banks (Afribank Plc, Spring Bank Pc and Bank PHB Plc) out of the 10 found to be in grave financial condition in 2009 could not recapitalize, merge nor find an acquirer before a deadline, the bridge bank option had to be adopted by NDIC to address their problems as provided for in Section 39(1) of NDIC Act, 2006. The NDIC adopted the bridge bank option because the three affected banks had attractive franchise, and deterioration in their assets would hamper their sale.

Depositors were protected, thus promoting confidence in the system by ensuring continuity of banking services.

Outright liquidation would have had dire consequences on depositors & other stakeholders.

The adoption of innovative option helped to preserve and sustain daily operations in all the 577 branches of the three failing banks; Safeguarded 6,667 jobs in the affected banks; and depositors had immediate access to a total deposits of N809.4 billion (U$5.58 billion) as against N130.57 billion (U$842.39 million) insured deposits guaranteed by NDIC. The three bridge banks established and which were acquired, through share subscription, by the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) were Keystone Bank, Mainstreet Bank and Enterprise Bank. *Mr.Hassan, a public affairs analyst, wrote from Abuja.

22—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Abandoned economic roadmap scuttled Nigeria’s development — Asiodu

By PRINCEWILL EKWUJURU

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LDER statesman, Chief Phillip Asiodu, said that the failure of the federal government to implement the economic roadmap put in place between 1975 and 1978 to rebuild Nigeria was responsible for the country’s under-development.

Speaking in Lagos at the inaugural meeting of the newly established Philip Asiodu Economic Initiative (PAEI), he said after the civil war, between 1970 and 1975, the economy was growing at 11.5 percent, a development he said would have taken the nation out of poverty if continued.

His words: “In the 1975 economic plan, there was plan to look at Agricultural processing, functional educational system, Agro-chemicals and many issues. But before we could get started, we derailed and abandoned the plan. Our current problem can be traced to the inability to keep to such plan that would have helped us built an industrial vibrant and agricultural independent society.

We started assembling of cars before Korean but we fail to communicate our plan for future into action. At a time, our power generation was more than that of Taiwan, where are we today?”

On the objective of the initiative, Asiodu, who is the Chairman Board of Trustees, said the need to create a platform and ways to communicate with the nation’s decision makers informed the establishment of PAEI. The former federal Permanent Secretary further stated that part of its objective would be to promote and encourage good economic initiatives through lecture series, seminars and workshops.

While suggesting ways to fast-track Nigeria’s development, he urged the

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+41.00

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107.36 99.48 CURRENCY BUYING US DOLLAR POUNDS EURO FRANC YEN CFA WAUA RENMINBI RIYAL KRONA SDR

154.73 260.2249 213.9142 175.3116 1.506 238.9104 24.7231 24.7231 41.2558 28.6548 239.9243

-0.71 -0.26

SELLING 155.23 261.0658 214.6055 175.8781 1.5109 239.6824 24.8034 24.8034 41.3891 28.7474 240.6996

155.73 261.9067 215.2967 176.4446 1.5158 240.4544 24.8838 24.8838 41.5225 28.84 241.4749

CBN Exchange rate as at 30/04/2014

incoming Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), to look at the efficiency of regulatory system in order to encourage investors and long term savings.

He also called on government to create an enabling environment for business owners to be globally competitive.

Earlier, Director General of the ini-

tiative, John C. Nwabueze, enumerated the objectives of the body to include: Sponsorship of entrepreneurship training and economic fellowship programmes in institutions within Nigeria and abroad and; Giving of scholarships and grants to indigent and deserving students. He said PAEI will periodically sponsor, lobby, propose

and present bills to National Assembly and contribute to Nigeria economic policy.

Other members of the initiative are: Dr. Shamsudeen Usman, Ambassador Joe Keshi, Dr. Gabriel Soyoye and Prof.

Femi Kayode, while Dr. Hassan Adamu, (Wakili Adamawa) is the Chairman, Advisory Board.

From left: Comrade Abiodun Agboola, National Coordinator, Peoples Welfare League (PWL); Professor Oyesoji Aremu, Guest Speaker; Comrade Hassan Sunmonu, Chairman of the occasion; Mr. Lekan Sote, Consultant, Poshica Ltd and Mr. Ismaila Jaiyola-Alagbada, Commissioner for Commerce, Industry and Cooperatives, Osun State at the Osun 2014 Economic Summit for all stakeholders in Osogbo, Osun State. Photo Lamidi Bamidele.

India seeks greater ties with Nigeria in non-oil sector

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ndian High Commissioner in Nigeria, Mr A. R. Ghanashyam, has called for greater trade ties in the nonoil sector between Nigeria and India.

Ghanashyam made the call in Abuja during a courtesy visit to the Chairman of Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Mr Ekpo Nta. He said the visit was to identify areas that could be explored to strengthen the already existing trade relations between the two countries. According to him, Nigeria is India’s largest trading partner in Africa with about $18 billion and partnership potentials. “The fact is that we do not want our relationship with Nigeria to be in oil alone, we want to diversify; we want to exploit other sectors. As the relationship is growing, the future potentials of the two countries are also growing considering the fact that Nigeria has the most intelligent people on the African continent,” he said. The high commissioner pledged the commitment of the Indian Government to strengthen the development of real assets of its trading partners. In his remark, Nta thanked the high commissioner for the visit adding that a cordial relationship had existed

over the years between ICPC and the Indian high commission.

He pledged the commitment of ICPC to partner with relevant embassies to ensure that use of forged documents to apply for visa was addressed. Nta said the commission’s partnership with some

embassies in the area of visa scams had started yielding results, adding that 32 suspects had been arrested with about 13 cases already in court. He called on embassies to develop strategies to reduce incidences of people travelling abroad without relevant documents.

Sterling Bank’s shareholders approve share capital increase

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hareholders of Sterling Bank Plc have approved the bank’s plans to raise new capital through a private placement. The private placement when concluded will shore up Sterling Bank’s share capital to N16 billion from the existing N12 billion.

The shareholders gave the approval at the bank’s 52nd Annual General Meeting (AGM) held in Lagos.

According to the shareholders, the private placement should be raised by the creation of an additional eight billion ordinary shares of 50k each. The shareholders also approved the payment of 25k dividend per share declared by the bank.

Speaking at the meeting, Dr Farouk

Umar, President, Association for the Advancement of the Rights of Nigerian Shareholders, said that the shareholders would support the capital raising exercise. He said that the bank needed to increase its share capital to finance value creation projects, adding that enhanced shareholders’ funds would increase the bank’s lending limits.

Mr Sunny Nwosu, National Coordinator, Independent Shareholders Association of Nigeria (ISAN), said that the exercise would improve the bank’s return on investment. He said that the bank would not be able to finance big business with a small capital base.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—23

Lafarge records N8.1bn profit in quarter one

By NKIRUKA NNOROM

L

From left: Mr. Ipoola Morakinyo, Channels Sales Lead, West Africa, Hewlett-Packard; Winner, Mr. Godwin Oteri and Mrs. Gloria Oboh, Assistant Manager, Regulatory and Monitoring, National Lottery Regulatory Commission presenting an ENVY Recline 23 all-inone PC to one of the winners, marking the end the national consumer promo.

AFARGE Cement WAPCO has announced profit after tax of N8.1 billion for its first quarter ending March 31, 2014. This represents 34 percent increase over N6.074 billion recorded in corresponding period in 2013.

Highlights of the financial statement filed with the Nigerian Stock Exchange, NSE, showed that the company’s profit before income tax increased by 20 percent to N8.6 billion compared to N7.2 billion reported in corresponding period in 2012.

Similarly, revenue increased by 16 percent to N27.0billion compared to N23.2billion in quarter one of 2013, while the earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization,

UBA Capital explains rise in revenue, declares N1.5bn dividend

U

BA Capital Plc has explained to its shareholders that its revenue rose by 241 percent to N4.6 billion for the financial year ended December 31, 2013, just as it declared a dividend of N1.5 billion.

The shareholders at the Annual General Meeting, AGM, commended the Board, management and staff for the impressive financial performance during the year under review and equally endorsed all resolutions put before them at the meeting.

Speaking at the first AGM of the company, Group Chief Executive Officer, UBA Capital, Mrs. Oluwatoyin Sanni, said: “We recorded gross earnings of N4.6billion, representing a growth of 241 percent on prior year earnings. The strong gross earnings was driven by fees and commission from execution of various investment banking mandates including power sector transactions and capital market (45 percent), as well as net interest margin income (41 percent ) generated from our various funds under management . Other income contributed 14 percent.”

She, however, assured shareholders that the company would maintain minimal cost of transactions in subsequent financial periods.

“We are mindful of our expenses and will ensure that we maintain minimum cost.

The major cost that we incurred during the year under review was a result of our acquisition of two busi-

nesses. Our acquisition of Trustees and asset management businesses enabled us to diversify our income streams and grow our asset base and revenue line,” she added.

In his own remark at the AGM, Chairman, UBA Capital Plc, Mr. Chika Mordi, commended the shareholders for

the support and promised that the company will always take of care of their interest by declaring better returns.

He disclosed that just within one year of the company ’s operation, it recorded total assets of over N68 billion, stressing that the acquisition of two new businesses contrib-

uted to boost the Group’s assets. According to him “Profit after tax from continuing operation grew by 106 percent to N1.8 billion from N856 million. This is as a result of growth in our various business lines, a more diversified income stream and efficient cost management.”

Dunn Loren Merrifield wins ‘Best Investment Bank Nigeria 2014’

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unn Loren Merrifield (DLM) has been announced as award winner for Best Investment Bank Nigeria in the prestigious Financial Awards 2014 by International Finance Magazine (IFM).

In an official statement released by the editorial board of International Finance Magazine (IFM), Dunn Loren Merrifield emerged winner in the category after rigorous panel screening and voting support from IFM readers worldwide.

Commenting on the award announcement, founder of Dunn Loren Merrifield, Mr. Sonnie Ayere said, “This is an increasing recognition of the work our firm is doing in the development of our financial sector”.

Ayere noted the firm will continue to strive for excellence by continuing to introduce innovative products and models into the country that will positively impact the development of the financial and capital markets in Nigeria.

DLM commenced operation in 2009 and was the firm to struc-

ture the first “AAA” rated corporate bond listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange, independently advised on the first subsovereign debt restructuring transaction in Nigeria and was in 2012 appointed by the Fed-

eral Ministry of Finance as advisers to set up the Nigeria Mortgage Refinance Company (NMRC) which was officially launched by President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan on 16th January 2014.

EBITDA, increased by 12 percent to N10.4billion compared to N9.3billion for same period in 2013.

Also, quarter one EBITDA margin of 39 percent increased by two percentage points as against the 2013 average level of 37 percent.

The net finance cost reduced from N980million to N760million due to lower interest charges following the full repayment of the Naira syndicated bank loans. Investment income simultaneously grew by N160million to N260million.

Commenting on the results, the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Joe Hudson, said: “The good performance in the first quarter is a reflection of the increasing demand for our quality products and an outcome of the implementation of various volume and cost improvement strategies. We are especially pleased that the new line in Ewekoro continues to gain momentum and remain very optimistic about the rest of the year despite the challenging operating environment”. In his remarks, the Chief Financial Officer, Anders Kristiansson, stated that “Lafarge Cement WAPCO further strengthened its financial position during the last quarter and remains committed to delivering value to our shareholders and other stakeholders in 2014”.

Lafarge Cement WAPCO Nigeria Plc is a leading manufacturer and marketer of cement.

A subsidiary of France-based Lafarge SA, the world leader in building materials, Lafarge WAPCO is a premium cement company with innovative drive to provide valued added products and services solutions in the building and construction industry.

Access Bank gets shareholders approval to raise $1bn

BY MICHAEL EBOH

S

hareholders of Access Bank Plc have approved the bank’s plans to raise about $1 billion (N160 billion) from the bond market. The resolution was put forward to the shareholders at the bank’s Annual General Meeting in Lagos.

Mr. Gbenga Oyebode, Chairman, Access Bank, informed the shareholders that the fund will be raised in tranches when needed and will be used in the bank’s priority growth sectors and in market segments that guarantee steady earnings in conformity with the bank’s sustainable growth agenda.

He noted that this is in furtherance of its objective of being ranked as one of the top three banks in any of the markets in which it operates. He said, “Board has considered

a variety of available capital raising options and came to the conclusion that having the option of raising additional financing of up to $1 billion or its equivalent in local currency via the issuance of debt instruments is the most cost-efficient option to meet the bank’s capital adequacy objectives.

“Injection of fresh capital into the bank’s operations w o u l d a c c e l e r a t e t h e attainment of its aspiration of becoming the World’s Most Respected African Bank and help consolidate its position as a leading African financial institution.

“Enhancement of the bank’s capital base is a key imperative for the realisation of its developmental goals and commitment to society.”

The shareholders commended the bank’s management and Board for the performance recorded for the period under review.

24 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Agriculture minister harps on importance of technology

By JIMOH BABATUNDE

T

HE Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Adesina Akinwumi, has said that there can be no real progress in the efforts at providing adequate food for the teeming Nigerians without technology, adding that sound science and proven discoveries will be used to drive the country’s agriculture agenda.

Speaking recently while signing a Memorandum of Understanding, MoU, with African Agriculture Technology Foundation, AATF, on agriculture technology sharing cooperation, Akinwumi disclosed that the cooperation with AATF does not mean the body will be bringing unregulated into Nigeria as the bill on biosafety is still pending at the national assembly.

Said Adesina: “As we use the occasion today to sign the MOU between AATF and my Ministry, it is pertinent to state that, under Agriculture Transformation Agenda (ATA), we place much premium on the use of appropriate technology as key to reversing the low agricultural productivity and unlocking the potential of African smallholders.

“We are therefore happy to have you here and we are mindful of your many efforts aimed towards food security and improved livelihoods of farmers in many countries of Africa.

export opportunities.

“Under ATA, we are focusing on developing hybrid rice with yield advantage. We are encouraged by the remarkable efforts of AATF to improve food security and rural livelihood among African small-scale rice producers, with the programme to create sustainable hybrid rice agro-businesses to support rice farming in East, West and Southern Africa by determining precise relationships between yield, environment and genetics.

These will be an asset to us here in Nigeria.”

Dr. Adesina said Nigeria’s meeting with AATF opens an avenue for collaborative efforts to jointly identify and facilitate the transfer of appropriate technologies that meet the needs of farmers, particularly in

Nigeria, in ways that address and resolve the concerns of technology providers and users.

He stated that under the Agricultural Transformation Agenda (ATA) of the present administration, Nigeria entered the third year of implementation of Growth Enhancement Support (GES) scheme, a programme which depends on a modern technology called electronic wallet,.

Dr. Akinwumi explained that the electronic wallet technology has enabled the Ministry to reach nearly ten million farmers with subsidised farm input support since inception, with attendant increase in farm yield and improved livelihoods for the registered beneficiaries.

Speaking earlier, the Executive Director, African Agriculture

Technology Foundation, AATF, Dr. Denis Kyetere, said that the Kenya based organisation’s mission for Africa agriculture was to access, develop, adapt and deliver appropriate agricultural technologies for sustainable use by smallholder farmers in SubSaharan Africa, through innovative partnerships and effective stewardship along the entire value chain.

Kyetere listed areas of concern for agriculture in Africa as well as crops on which AATF had started working on in Nigeria and West Africa and some of the achievements and benefits so far realized.

Insecticide spraying While appreciating the successes of AATF in different areas they have intervened in Africa agriculture like maize, cowpea and banana, the minister said they will be working in partnership with AATF to develop and test cowpea varieties with a genetic trait that would make the plant resistant to the borer and provide farmers with an alternative to costly and hazardous insecticide spraying.

“As we are determined to increase production and empower farmers, particularly the small-scale, our mechanisation transformation agenda will benefit from AATF’s cassava mechanisation and agro-processing – accelerating cassava harvesting and processing.

“We expect the impact to cover over one million farmers and their families, increase yields from the current average of 9 tonnes per hectare to 25 per hectare, and increasing labour productivity.

Dr. Akinwumi added that the importance of hybrid rice is recognised in the ministry’s efforts towards repositioning rice production in Nigeria to meet local needs as well as create C M Y K

From Left: Minister of State for Agriculture and Rural Development, Mrs Asabe Asmau Ahmed; Minister of Agriculture, Dr Akinwumi Adesina and Denis Kyetere, Executive Director, AATF in Abuja.

Nigeria needs bio-technology in agriculture — Mosanto

By GABRIEL EWEPU

A

S controversy continues to trail the proposed use of bio-technology in food production in Nigeria, one of the world•fs largest seeds companies, Monsanto, had persuaded Nigerians about the benefits of bio-technology and Genetically Modified Organisms, GMO, in food production and its safety for human consumption, as other countries were accepting the technology.

Vice President, International Raw Crops and Vegetables, Mr. Michael Frank, who made the call in Abuja also disclosed that it was the right time for Monsanto to invest and establish in Nigeria following transformation in the nation’s agricultural sector.

Frank said: “Monsanto is a 100 per cent agriculture based company and $50 billion company, and most people around the world know us as seed and bio-technology company. We are focused on four main crops, maize, soybean, cotton and oil seed-grape.

“We have been in Africa for 40 years and never established our presence in Nigeria, but a number of visits had been made, and we feel now that this is the right time to come to Nigeria, to make investments, develop partnerships, and help small-scale farmers here in Nigeria. Especially to increase the yields of maize and we have interest in that.

“A lot of people ask about bio-technology or Genetically Modified Organisms, GMO, and that is definite part of our business. Biotechnology is a technology that helps farmers to farm efficiently and do it environmentally sustainable way.

“A lot of questions is been asked in Nigeria, and that debate and conversations on GMOs are going on right now in Nigeria, and that is a decision the people and the government have to make in Nigeria. And we will support the decision. “If you look at bio-technology all crops are advanced to sophisticated breeding technologies, and there have been zero cases of health problems anywhere in the world. There is no health risk.

World Bank pulls together more fund for FARA’s MDTF

By JIMOH BABATUNDE

W

orld Bank has granted an additional $19 million to Forum for Agriculture Research in Africa (FARA) to extend its MultiDonor Trust Fund (MDTF) grant agreement for a further five years.

The extension paves the way for the Bank to accept new contributions to FARA’s MDTF. The signing of this extension is an important milestone for FARA as it unlocks the resources the FARA Secretariat needs to commence full implementation of its new medium-term operational plan The signing by Forum for Agriculture Research in Africa (FARA) and the World Bank at the latter’s headquarters in Washington, DC recently represents the first contribution to be received from the European Commission.

The signing ceremony was presided over by Dr. Colin Bruce, Director Regional Integration Africa Region, on behalf of the Bank, and by Dr Yemi Akinbamijo, Executive Director of FARA, was witnessed by Dr. David Nielson, Lead Agricultural Services Specialist at the WB and Ms. Bremala Nathan, Senior Operations Officer, World Bank, among others.

Speaking after the signing ceremony, a Lead Agricultural Services Specialist at the World Bank, Dr. David Nielson, said the MDTF for FARA was established about five years ago as a forum of budget support to help FARA take forward some programs.

“It was designed as an instrument of support and very much associated with CAADP, the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Program, as a form of support from outside of Africa for bringing the agricultural transformation to the continent.”

David Nielson said the World Bank recognize the contribution that FARA has made since its establishment and feel it has an important role to play in representing the agricultural research and extension and education community in the CAADP process continent-wide.

He added that at the regional level, the World Bank equally recognized the role of FARA’s support for different programs “and also at the country level providing support to institutional capacity building, providing Africa’s equal agricultural technology programs for Africa.”

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—25

I N Jonathan has S results to show I —Oyibocha-Agbajoh D PAGE 27 E

Peace, politics and the polls

PAGE 28

We'll mobilise youths for 2015 polls — Obiekwe, DYON boss PAGE 27

My ambition is legitimate – Atiku •How they poisoned Obasanjo against me Atiku Abubakar, erstwhile vice-president of the country has been one of the most visible political players since the advent of the Fourth Republic in 1999. With one of the most formidable political organizations in the country, Abubakar has been one of the most persistent presidential contenders in the country’s modern history, having first made his mark in the match-up with the late Bashorn Moshood Abiola for the ticket of the defunct Social Democratic Party, SDP in the 1993 presidential contest.

Abubakar’s preparation for the presidency after the inauguration of the Fourth Republic was helped by the now rested National Democratic Project, NDP, a quiet NGO founded and financed by him to research into virtually every segment of the socio-economic fabric of the Nigerian state. Abubakar’s power of persuasion,

extensive patronage across the political class and his famed deep pockets may have been his staying power as a political prodigy. However, over the years, his surefootedness on the political terrain has turned into an issue. One of the founders of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Abubakar upon an orchestrated campaign against him in that party slipped out to join others in founding the defunct Action Congress, AC in 2006. In 2008 he returned to the PDP and last year again walked out on the party.

Abubakar, however, remains unfazed asserting that his political migrations are underpinned by principles and founded on democratic ethos. Atiku Abubakar recently fielded questions from Vanguard on his mission, message and manner of politics among other issues affecting the nation. Excerpts: government to bring the necessary policies to put your country on the path of progress and development.

As an oil-rich nation, I don’t believe the current level of poverty in the country is acceptable. I have the experience and the passion to give my best to this country.

How would you describe the level of rot in the PDP? I am no longer in the PDP and therefore, I wouldn’t waste time discussing about their current internal problems anymore. I will however say that no forward-looking political party should be so careless about internal democracy and conflict management as to allow its key members such as governors to leave in droves.

At what point did PDP begin to deviate from its formative core values?

It is impossible to tell the story of the rot in the PDP without talking about what transpired in the run-up to the 2003 nomination convention.

BY EMMANUEL AZIKEN, POLITICAL EDITOR & DAPO AKINREFON

Y

OU left the PDP where you were a founding member to join APC. Was that decision influenced by your speculated interest in the 2015 presidential election?

If I had a choice, I wouldn’t have abandoned a house of which I was a key family member. The PDP was founded according to certain democratic principles of internal democracy. If you cannot practice democratic principles within, how do you preach democracy to the rest of the country? Internal democracy was systematically destroyed so badly that the party (PDP) is owned by the president rather than the people.

Internal democracy The President decides who he wants to be party chairman and imposes his choice on everybody. We thought this was wrong and the party as then led didn’t like our opposition to the idea of killing internal democracy.

•Atiku: I was a key family member of PDP such a way that nobody should dare indicate interest to contest

,

The primary reason for my leaving the PDP in 2007, and now was largely influenced by a principle, and not actually my desire to contest presidential elections

Those of us seeking reforms were perceived as obstacles and in 2005, they started the policy of de-registration to get rid of me and my supporters.

The party was restructured in

Control of the party

,

against the President at the primaries. I was so badly treated and consequently had to leave PDP and join AC in 2007. And the lack of internal democracy is still there.

The primary reason for my leaving the PDP in 2007, and now was largely influenced by a principle, and not actually my desire to contest presidential elections.

And if, indeed, I have such ambition, I believe such aspiration is legitimate.

It amazes me when critics accuse of me of being “over-ambitious” as if my own ambition is

criminal while at the same time legitimizing the ambitions of my opponents who are ready to break every basic rule of fair play to impose themselves.

If it is not wrong for others to aspire, I wonder why it should be wrong for Atiku to aspire. I am not in politics to make money, I am in it because I believe, however, rich you are and, however, committed you are to serve the people, you must be in

At that time, courtiers had done so much to poison the relationship between the number one and number two citizens to the point that even when both of us were prepared to patch things up, the damage to the party had more-or-less become irreparable.

Courtiers had convinced the President he had to take 100 percent control of the party or nothing.

Continues on page 26

26—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Why I left PDP again — Atiku Continues from page 25 Since that time, no one who became President wanted to settle for anything less. When we came together in 1998 as G-38, we never envisaged a situation where a President would hijack the party and install leaders at will against basic democratic standards of internal democracy.

As the presidents took over the party, all those married to the idea of reform became onlookers. This reality has not changed.

Do you think political parties and politicians have ideologies considering the rate of defections?

What ideology would you defend when all the elementary standards of democratic practices are destroyed in your political party?

When a political party does not respect fair play, integrity, freedom of choice and systematically destroys the will of the people through imposition, what ideology are we going to defend?

You don’t expect a politician like me to remain in a political party that does not even allow

return it to the original democratic ideals on which it was founded. I didn’t hesitate to return, but some of my friends and associates chose to remain in AC. Therefore, if any rightthinking adult takes decision based on his/her informed self interest, I have no right to castigate the person. It is within their right to change their minds.

Given your experience in the former Action Congress, AC, and the dominance of APC leaders by leaders of the defunct AC, do you think you may have a level-playing ground in APC to realize your ambition?

I don’t want to cross my bridges before I come to them.

Politics is not rigid science where the rule of alliance and re-alliance is constant. You have to build a network of friends across the country.

In fact, I don’t think any former AC leader has any personal grudge against me so much that such grudge would override the larger interest of the party.

Politics is like marketing; you must sell yourself by gentle

,

I want to see APC as a political party with the largest and widest national appeal.

However, as APC expands and sells its programmes across the country, the PDP will do anything to throw a spanner into APC works a semblance of democracy to prevail at its primaries.

Ideology cannot exist in isolation. Rather than blaming the politicians that have defected, blame the political parties that created the hostile environment for their defection. Which ideology would have tolerated the ownership of political parties by individuals rather than the people?

Some of your colleagues in the nPDP changed their minds and refused to follow you to the APC. Was their action a form of betrayal?

As a democrat, I don’t believe in forcing anybody to follow me to any party against his or her convictions. When I decided to return to the PDP in 2008 from AC, some of my friends and associates refused to follow me back to the PDP. I didn’t hold it against them.

I returned to the PDP in 2008 following the late President Umaru Musa Yar ’Adua’s pledge to reform the PDP and

,

persuasion, using your unique qualities such as experience and passion for service as your selling point.

And I don’t think anybody is against me in APC. I don’t see it that way, although some may perceive it as such.

How would you rate the recent registration exercise in the APC? How does it compare with the last registration in your former party PDP? The turnout was incredibly greater than my wildest imagination.

The level of enthusiasm demonstrated by APC supporters nationwide was marvelous. And the simple message in this massive turnout is that Nigerians are desirous of change. As to the second aspect of your question, I don’t want to talk about PDP registration because I am no more there.

What reforms would you like to see in APC? Like any new political enterprise, APC may have its

these problems don’t exist.

What is your current relationship with Governor Murtala Nyako?

We are not enemies. We had political differences, but those differences should not turn us into permanent enemies. My philosophy of politics is one without bitterness.

There are politicians that once cast aspersions on me, but today we relate like brothers. I don’t keep grudges.

Do you foresee the 2015 elections holding peacefully?

By the will of God, Nigeria is going to survive the prediction of doom in 2015.

Once elections are free and fair and people are willing to acknowledge honest defeat, I see no reason why any patriotic politician would want to protest.

Patriotic politician

•Atiku: I pray that the elections will be peaceful own growing pains and challenges and we keep learning and improving every day. I want to see APC as a political party with the largest and widest national appeal.

However, as APC expands and sells its programmes across the country, the PDP will do anything to throw a spanner into APC works.

Desperate tactics It is already launching a propaganda war against APC by calling it the Muslim Brotherhood Party of Nigeria.

And these desperate tactics won’t help the PDP because it is capable of polarizing the country and deepening the religious divide we are working hard to bridging.

I am glad that the APC has refused to be distracted from its focus on the country’s main problems, which include joblessness on the part of our teeming youths, the issue of poverty and the lack of security throughout the land.

Are you worried that party bigwigs such as Attahiru Bafarawa, Ibrahim Shekarau and Buba Marwa have left the APC o the PDP?

This issue is not about individuals leaving to another party, it is about the desire of Nigerians to seek alternative platform for change. People are more concerned about the quality of their lives and that is why they need change.

Therefore, whether some members left or not, the most important thing is the widespread desire for change in 2015.

In your opinion, is the national dialogue recently initiated by President Jonathan necessary?

An agitation for dialogue or national conference is not a new thing and they preceded President Jonathan’s administration.

Possible solutions Any platform for Nigerians to discuss their problems and possible solutions is not necessarily a bad idea to me.

It is part of the democratic process.

These agitations are persistent and I don’t think the coming together of Nigerians to discuss these problems is a bad idea. It is better than pretending that

Let us pray for Nigeria and at the same time appeal to our politicians to abandon their do-or-die attitude to power.

You don’t need to kill the people in order to serve them.

Do you have hope that the 2015 election would hold under peaceful conditions? If not, what are your projections?

I pray that the elections will be peaceful. I, also, along with other Nigerian politicians, must do our best to ensure that the elections hold under peaceful conditions.

What do you make of the claims by the PDP that your assertion at the PDP 2010 convention that those who make peaceful change impossible make violent changes inevitable has fueled the violence in the country?

If you know me and know my antecedents, you know that I abhor violence. I can not be an agent of violence. That statement was originally credited to John F. Kennedy.

The renowned statesman and former president of the United States of America, could not have been instigating violence in his country at the time he made that statement. Our country, Nigeria, has experienced several episodes of violence in the past, especially when people felt that their votes had been stolen or their civil rights trampled upon.

It behoved me as a Nigerian statesman to have called attention, during a party event, to the need for us to avoid any similar recurrence of violence.

When President Kennedy made that classic statement, Boko Haram didn’t exist. Let us stop politicizing security issues in this country.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—27

Jonathan has results to show —Oyibocha-Agbajoh BARRISTER Mary Oyibocha-Agbajoh is a Senior Special Assistant on Special Duties to Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan of Delta State. Oyibocha-Agbajoh studied Industrial Relations and Personnel Management (IRPM) and Law at the University of Lagos and also has professional certificate in Negation and Mediation. A member of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, she describes herself as a progressive, but besides her duties for the governor of Delta State, Oyibocha-Agbajoh is also a strong and passionate advocate for a second term for President Goodluck Jonathan who according to her has transformed virtually every sector of the Nigerian polity.

Oyibocha-Agbajoh was in 2007 appointed chairperson/ national coordinator of the Goodluck Initiatives, a platform that was conceived to propagate the political philosophy of the then vice-president of the country. In this interview she canvasses reasons why Nigerians should support the administration, rebuffs the assertions of the opposition as she points at what she describes as the legacies of the Jonathan administration. Excerpts:

BY EMMANUEL AZIKEN, POLITICAL EDITOR

P

OLITICAL Background We all are politically inclined, perhaps right from our birth. To me, politics is a way of life, it depends on how one views, perceives and plays it. I started playing politics from my very early days in my family.

I was actually born into a home where love and truth is the parameter; a platform I leveraged on towards being part of the process or means

through which I can be part of the policy making and implementation process that will impact on the lives of my people.

Performance of President Jonathan I say it categorically that President Goodluck Jonathan has done extremely well; well above expectation. Even in the face of turmoil and security challenges, he still remains focused to transforming Nigeria.

When did the railway work last in the history of Nigeria? When did ‘Almajiris’ start learning

Jonathan is practically cleaning up the mess of yesteryears and that cannot happen by magic.

Look at the almajiris, he designed a scheme to take little kids out of the street and give them world class education.

On petroleum product supply; President Jonathan has been able to expose those eating the nation dry in the name of fuel subsidy. In the same vein, by maintaining law and order in the Niger Delta and other parts of the •Oyibocha-Agbajoh: Jonathan has done well nation, Nigeria’s revenue has instead of walking or begging increased since oil production skyrocketed from 700,000 on the streets? When last did barrel per day to 2.5million Nigerians stop sleeping in petrol stations? These are barrel per day at present clear signs of a President who leading to a robust economy where other African nations is genuinely committed to his task and his people. Even if are currently using Nigeria as Nigerians are seeking for a a model.

The Goodluck Jonathan sudden change, it will not administration has improved come overnight. President the power generation from

We'll mobilise youths for 2015 polls — Obiekwe, DYON boss THE President, Dynamic Youth Organization of Nigeria (DYON), Chief Elvis Obiekwe has assured Nigerians of fair and transparent general elections, come 2015, as DYON would partner Independent Electoral commission (INEC) to ensure that Nigerians votes count. He also disclosed that DYON is compiling a list of unemployed Nigerian youths through its Youth Intervention Scheme (YUIS), and is also committed in efforts to ensuring that Nigeria never witnesses a situation as was the recent stampede at the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) test centre. Excerpts:

BY VERA SAMUEL ANYAGAFU

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HAT informed DYON? Through DYON, we would ensure fair, transparent and credible elections come 2015, and this we intend achieving by positively mobilizing the youth ahead of the polls to avoid any technical confusion.

It is obvious that the Nigerian government is failing in recognising and or realising the importance of the youth in sustaining national growth and political peace in the country.

DYON intends to empower

youth and make them realize their importance to realising maximized economic growth and political peace in the country.

We are passionate in promoting youth•fs interests and also responsible for ensuring that the youths are well-represented in government, and for fact that the future of Nigeria depends on them, DYON will not relent in efforts to harness the potentials of the youths towards national development, hence the decision to mobilize them ahead of the 2015 general elections.

How prepared are the youths ahead of the 2015 general

elections?

We have already started mobilising youths across the country to participate effectively in the general elections, and arrangement is on to partner INEC and other stakeholders to ensuring the polls are free and fair.

DYON is prepared to encourage youths to vie for elective positions in 2015.

We cannot afford to sit on and watch a few selfish individuals decide the future of the country because the youths are the future of the country.

Nigerian youths have left governance in the hands of the old breed politicians who have continued to recycle themselves since the nation attained independence in 1960, and it is high time a change comes, and DYON is willing and ready to support any candidate or any political party whose manifestos seek to improve the lots of Nigerians.

How long has DYON been in existence?

DYON has been in existence

•Obiekwe: Our plans for the youths

for over 7 years, and is situated in all states of the Federation, and we have been actively involved in the country•fs elections since inception. The organisation has its headquarters in Lagos and conducts a monthly visit to youths who are in various prisons across the country.

In Nigeria today, we have youths who were imprisoned unjustly, and DYON has the capacity to ensure their cases are revisited and accorded fair hearing. One of those who

around 2000 megawatts to 4502 megawatts; the highest since Nigeria returned to democratic rule in 1999.

President Jonathan’s administration set up 14 New Rice Mills with capacity to process 240 metric tons of rice while Nigeria is the largest producer of cassava in the world with 34 million MT produced per annum amongst other achievements.

He is not only a visionary leader; he is also a performing leader. His performances are evident in job creation, power reforms, agricultural transformations, roads construction, aviation, transportation, economic growth, education, water, pension reforms, oil industry reforms, electoral reforms, ports reforms, freedom of information act, legal and judicial reforms.

You see, only a man with a sound academic resume and a clear developmental vision would achieve so much within the limitations of so many factors.

On Jonathan’s second term ambition I say it categorically that President Goodluck Jonathan has done extremely well; well above expectation. Even in the face of turmoil and security challenges, he still remains focused on transforming Nigeria. enjoyed DYON•hs unalloyed support while in prison was the Chief Security Officer (CSO) to late General Sani Abacha, Major Al-Mustapha.

What is the idea behind DYON's compilation of lists of unemployed youths in Nigeria?

The idea is to source for employment for the alarming number of unemployed youths who are roaming the streets, in addition to cutting down on the high rate of crime in the country.

The tragic and or unfortunate incidence which occurred during the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) recruitment test clearly stated that Nigeria has more than half of her population unemployed. This is indeed shameful.

In view of this, it has become imperative for all hands to be on deck to ensuring that youth•fs interests are well represented in the country, otherwise, angry youths may one day declare war against the ruling class.

The situation is so that Nigeria is presently sitting on a keg of gun powder due to the high rate of unemployment in the country, and on our part, DYON is bent on encouraging youths to be selfreliant and less dependent on the government for jobs.

28—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

I

T is a fact that some of the economically advanced nations in the Western World practice and embrace democratic institutions.

They are politically stable and live a peaceful life. It is not that there are no political strives or economic stresses within the environment, but there are recognized mechanism to handle them.

If it is agreed that since Independence in 1960, various governments at different times have made Prosperity (through Peace) one of their main targets, yet insecurity had become the vogue. Peace is often associated with absence of stress, political or otherwise. Prosperity, on the other hand, would require stable economic and political environment to grow. As prosperity would rest on the pillars of macro-economic stability, so peace would survive only in a stable state.

The joy of prosperity through peace is the subtle management of politics and economics. Politicians often talk glibly about the attainment of a prosperous state without giving thoughts to the problems of insecurity. The idea of insecurity to the sixteenth century Englishman was favourably captured in the Hobbesian •gState of Nature•h, where everything including life, was hopeless. It was a state of total confusion where everyone was everybody‘s enemy.

Modern political historians would quickly remember ‘Biafra‘ of 1967 to 1970 and also, the present Borno State where more than two hundred female students suddenly disappeared (through abduction) without trace (at the time of writing this column). It appears like a comical tragedy, or like the Malaysian flight MH 370 which disappeared in the air without any trace till now – modern phenomenon.

The Boko Haram saga has become an intriguing aspect of the present Nigerian political tragedy It is seen as a small case of insurgency which has grown into a fullscale war (whatever name you call it), tying down a division of the Nigerian Army, ably supported by air power. Yet, with heavy losses inflicted on these savage killers, their foot-army could choose targets with precision and effort-lessly too. Nigeria is faced today not by local armed bandits,

Peace, politics and the polls but by internationally armed terrorist groups.

What is the appropriate response to a dangerous situation? The 16th century English Philosopher, Hobbes moulds his political idea into the Contract form. He reminded his generation that people were once unsocial, but that they suffered very intensely from the insecurity of their isolated life that they made a Contract with each other to give up their rights to a sovereign, some men or assembly of men, who should have power to keep the peace and guarantee their security.

Hobbes‘ philosophy is the creation of a ‘Leviathan‘ who has absolute power to crash rebellion and ensure enduring peace. It is from peace that prosperity would eventually flow.

This idea is popular with dictators all over the world, and especially in Africa where individual dictators had thrived.

It is true that Nigeria under dictator Abacha or powerful Obasanjo would brook no opposition or any form of insurgency.

It may be correct to say that not many Nigerians would applaud the pacific traits and the constitutional behavior of President Jonathan in a volatile but dangerous environment. It took sometime before he could declare a ‘State of Emergency‘ in the three States of the North-East – Borno, Yobe and Adamawa (with democratic institutions intact), a situation not favoured by dictators but found attractive to the seemingly foxy

leader of the country. And the costly war rages on.

The admirable steps taken recently towards winning the war against Boko Haram was in widening the Security Committee to include all the ‘executive‘ governors. An advantage of the measure is to make Boko Haram war a national issue rather than a war between insurgents and the ruling party.

It has been for a long time that this columnist has been calling for a joint and united approach to combat the serious problem of Boko Haram insurgency.

Though President Jonathan has taken the first important step of raising the conscience of the almighty servants (turned masters), it is up to the President as a Statesman to induce the governors to work as a united front to crush the menace of insurgency and other vices that tend to destroy the soul of the country.

The ardent democrats of this world believe in the opportunity of enthroning the government of their choice periodically. This is the opportunity given to the people to have a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.

Thus, at a scheduled period, registered citizens go to the polls to elect representatives of their choice from a welter of parties (or two parties). The parties with elected majority of candidates form the government.

An elected government is expected like the Hobbesian ‘Leviathan‘ to guarantee

Tompolo is a force to reckon with — Oluba MR. Timi Oluba is a prominent youth leader in Okerenkoko community, Gbaramatu kingdom in Warri South West Local Government Area of Delta State. Oluba, in this interview, spoke on the prevailing peace and unity among the people of Gbaramatu kingdom and efforts being made by Chief Government Ekpemupolo aka Tompolo towards human and infrastructure development in Gbaramatu. The Ijaw youth leader also spoke on the ongoing reconciliation between Tompolo, Chief Michael Johnny, Chief Mosco Johnny and six others who were recently released from detention over dispute bordering on family affairs. Excerpts:

O

N spate of development in the kingdom It is true that Gbaramatu kingdom is blessed with abundance of oil and human resources, however, the level of development is not encouraging.

We have been agitating for rapid development. Get something clear here, the kind of development that we desire for in Gbaramatu can only be provided by governments and not individuals.

I also believe that someday, with our consistent prayers we shall

get to the promise land. The people of Gbaramatu should thank God for having a son like Chief Government Ekpemupolo aka Tompolo, whose desire is to see Gbaramatu gets it fair share in the distribution of dividends by governments.

Tompolo that I know would do everything possible to attract what he thinks is good for our people to Gbaramatu kingdom, and gradually we are beginning to understand his vision for the kingdom. Though, Tompolo alone cannot provide the desired

•Oluba development in Gbaramatu, but to an extent, he has tried to do what he could to ensure development in area.

On allegations against Tompolo by some Well, sometimes people do disagree to agree. The dispute we had with Tompolo was a family affair. Those allegations were ignorantly made against Tompolo, and it has not changed the fact that Tompolo has good intention for his people and Gbaramatu kingdom.

Truly, some allegations were

peace and stability through which prosperity would eventually flow ceaselessly. Anything short of that standard is generally regarded as a breach of trust between the government (with all its forces i.e. police, military etc) and the people of the country.

In a civilized environment, an elected government with a workable majority would submit its proposals to the local parliament for ratification. The government proposals are normally approved (with the opposition having its say). Each elected government has its program of Peace and Prosperity. It may be a single party government or a coalition of more than one party as now being practised in Britain and Germany. In these two countries, no single party could muster enough votes to rule alone.

However, in many countries where there are strong political traditions of trust and submissive loyalty to great leaders, it is possible to have a government which is respected by all. The leader of such a government, (often a Statesman) would be able to get measures through the parliament and the country without any agitation or protests. Such a leader would be a rallying point in periods of turbulence. In the absence of a statesman as the leader, the country‘s political problems are resolved at the polls. But such polls would be expected to be free and fair.

One of the problems of Nigeria is the electoral system which needs judicious reform in order that the people of the country might have confidence that the elections are true reflections of their choice and that the government of the day is the one they think could solve their various problems. It is, however, believed that a plural society without a very strong leadership would be able to cope with its diverse problems through coalition of forces rather than relying on a single party.

And occasionally where there are severe political crisis like sectional war and economic imbalance (with heavy unemployment) leading to deepening poverty and crime, it is safe to root for a genuine national government.

made against Tompolo, and some of us who had dispute with Tompolo may have been helped

by Tompolo in one small way or the other.

But because of human nature, when the gesture seems not to be coming as expected there is every tendency for misunderstanding and I think that was what happened. I can tell you that Chief Michael Johnny, Chief Mosco Johnny and others have nothing personal against Tompolo, it is a matter of ‘live and let us live’ and everybody would be happy thereafter.

Sincerely, Tompolo is a visionary leader, who has done what most of us have not been able to do in Gbaramatu. To be frank with you, a leader is not measured by the money he gives out to people nor the properties he has, but rather his plans for future generations.

So, I see Tompolo as a generational leader.

For instance, the Tompolo’s Diving School in Kurutie, when operational would boost the economy of Gbaramatu and physical development. Jobs would be created, economic activities and infrastructural development guaranteed. This is Tompolo’s vision that yet unborn

generations in Gbaramatu would benefit from, that is how you classify a real leader.

If it were some selfish individual, they would have preferred to build the School somewhere outside Delta State, or even outside the country, but Tompolo took the wise decision to invest in his community and I encourage other well meaning Nigerians to emulate Tompolo.

Surprisingly, we have discovered that the sitting of the proposed Marine University in Okerenkoko community would not have been possible without Tompolo. Some others would have chosen to collect inducement to have the University relocated, but because Tompolo knew the importance of the University and its viable benefits to future generations of Gbaramatu kingdom, he stood firm and ensure that the University was approved to be sited in Okerenkoko, a community in Gbaramatu.

And that is why as at today, Tompolo is our leader in Gbaramatu and whatever dispute we had with him or allegations made against him has not changed his being our leader and those allegations were mere pretense to get his attention.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 29

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30 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 31

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32—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

BY DAMILOLA SHOLOLA

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t is not news anymore that popular hip-hop star, Jaywon, who was under the record label of Kennis Music has parted ways with the premier record label after buying out his contract. But the otherwise peaceful separation has left more questions than answers, with music lovers wanting to know why.

Though Jaywon refused to state why, saying “Controversy never works for me”.

But in this exclusive interview with Weekend Groove, the artiste gives enough clues and opens up on life after Kennis Mucis. Excerpts: What have you been up to lately?

W

e’ve been going in and out of Lagos for a couple of events and it’s a new team and it’s like a new Jaywon right now. We’re just trying to see how we could get new materials out there. I have Tan Na Wole which is more of a freestyle and I have Madantin remix featuring Phyno, Olamide and May D. Have you released any album this year?

For close to three years now I have not dropped any album but I’m presently working on a collabo album with a friend of mine which is probably going to be out before my own album. But right now, you’re going to be getting a lot of singles back to back from Jaywon The whole controversy

with Kennis music, what started it?

It’s something I really wouldn’t like to talk about. The main thing right now is I’m not with Kennis Music anymore; I’m on my own now. I wouldn’t want to talk about anything that happened. That’s in the past and I don’t want to talk about it.

Controversy is not my thing, it never works for me so I just want to do my work and get the songs out to the people.

I’m not ready for controversy. I just want to do my thing Are there any legal issues?

There’s no legal issue, I’m on my own and I run my own team. I’m not having any issue with Kennis Music- my

Controversy never works for me – Jaywon contract expired.

You say you are now with your own record label. What’s the name?

We have a name already registered but I’m not ready to put it out yet.

It’s just me and my team and you guys would get to hear more.

Do you think that record labels in Nigerian tend to exploit artistes?

Peter Okoye celebrates family reunion with Bentley GT 2014 C M Y K

What I think the record labels should know and understand better is that signing an artiste is a partnership. Once you sign an artiste, there

Laide Bakare’s boutique sealed over husband’s scam saga

should be more of partnership because if both parties are not happy, it won’t work.

Nigerian record labels are trying and I won’t

lie to you, without the likes of Kennis Music in this industry, there possibly won’t be much of these other record Continues on page 33

Social media meets politics as journalists gear up for 2015 elections

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—33

Continues from page 32

labels because Kennis Music is like an inspiration to every other record label. Big But for me personally, I think record labels should know tha signing an artiste is a partnership and ideas should be shared. It shouldn’t be onesided because when it’s onesided, there will always be issues.

What’s your view of the Nigerian music Industry?

The music industry keeps getting better. What we need more right about now is that unity. Let’s just come to realise we are into this business together, we’re in the same race. It’s our industry and if we don’t treat it well, if we don’t love ourselves, we would keep having issues. So I think we just need to love ourselves more, come together and be who we are and let’s not just fake anything. There are so many artistes out there who fake everything; their status, their personality and their image. Some feel too big for their shoes and unjustly discriminate and snub others. For someone like me,I work with everybody. It’s only when I get attitude from someone that I just say ok, I’d rather be on my own because I don’t take that for anything. Apart from all those attitude things, we are doing great. The industry is 3rd biggest industry in the world.

We are good How was it like working with Olamide, Phyno and May D on Madantin remix?

Good people, I would say. I watched them grow from when they started and they are all big now and I appreciate the fact that when I call them, they never said ‘no’, so I appreciate them. They didn’t give any issues at all. As a matter of fact, May D recorded his part the same day Olamide and Phyno did theirs.

Who else do you look forward to working with?

Everybody knows me to be that guy that always works with a lot of people. I’ve worked with Tiwa Savage, Olamide, May D, Phyno, Flavour N’abania. I

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There are so many artistes out there who fake everything; their status, their personality and their image. Some feel too big for their shoes and unjustly discriminate and snub others

have a new song coming out featuring Storm Rex. Storm Rex is one of the biggest female artistes out of Enugu and from the eastern part of Nigeria. I’m working on different videos. I have a 3 video projects I’m working on, so 2014 is a great year already but it’s going to be greater because we’re just getting started and my team is working endlessly to make sure we get the materials out there.

Have you won any awards?

We have a couple of awards. My single Odun Yi won ‘Best Recording of the Year’ at the last Headies awards. We have a couple more of them Who inspired you to go into music?

The people I listened to while growing up; the likes of King Sunny Ade and Evangelist Ebenezer Obey. I have a lot of their CDs at home and I still listen to almost all the time.

F

or weeks now, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC

Laide Bakare’s boutique sealed over husband’s scam saga

has declared ‘wanted’ Alhaji Mutairu Atanda Orilowo, the new husband of popular Yoruba actress, Laide Bakare for alleged complicity in a case of criminal conspiracy, obtaining money under false pretences and stealing.

The actress’ husband allegedly conspired with some past executives of MTN’s Employees Multipurpose Cooperative Society(MEMCOS), namely Victor Akintunde and Gani Mustapha to defraud members of the Society through his company, PrimaVera Engineering and Construction Company

a whooping sum of N2.5bn.

Since the Alhaji has failed to show to clear himself of all allegations the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, has declared him ‘wanted’ and recently obtained a forfeiture order on all his known properties. WG reliably gathered, all his properties including his two petrol filling stations in Ajah, his house at Ibeju Lekki, No. 1 OtunbaAdeniyi Street, Papa-Epe, Lagos and the 2014 model of Bentley. boutique he opened for actress wife, Laide Bakare have been confiscated.

34 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

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Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—35 With PRINCE OSUAGWU princeosuagwu@gmail.com 08050498513

Participants at the event

Social media meets politics as journalists gear up for 2015 elections I

BYLAJUARENYEKA

T appears that the 2015 elec tion bug seems to have caught not just Nigerian politicians, but journalists as well who are preparing ahead to give unprecedented reportage to ensure free, fair and transparent elec-

tions through the innovative use of social media.

This was obvious at the recent two-day Editors Lab Hackdays sponsored by Google and organised by Global Editors Network, GEN, in conjunction with Vanguard Newspapers.

The participants were taken

first-hand on the fundamentals of Google applications such as Google search, display ads, knowledge panel, modifiers, conversion, Google scholar, Google translate, Google trends, Youtube, Google maps, Google streaming among others, by Mr. Taiwo KolaOgunlade, Communications &

Four points in favour of the Samsung Galaxy S5 Samsung’s latest flagship smart phone, the Galaxy S5, has been making the news since it was officially launched in Nigeria on April 16. The device comes packed with a new upgraded camera and a heart rate scanner, among other features. Accolades have since been pouring in, with highly-respected gadget display calibrators, DisplayMate, describing the device as having the “best smart phone display ever tested’, even before its global roll-out on April 11. But do these improvements justify discarding your current smart phone for the Galaxy S5? The choice is yours, but there are some unforgettable pointers to guide you along the right path.

A battery that lasts for a whole week with just a single charge The Galaxy S5 features an ultra-power saving mode that shuts down all of the device’s key functions to allow you make the most of your last bit of battery power. When the charge on the device gets low and this mode is activated, the feature automatically transforms the colour display on the device to black and white, reducing background processes and limiting access to many apps. According to the manufacturers, the Gal-

axy S5 can run for up to 24 hours on a 10 percent battery charge when the ultra power saving mode is activated. When it’s 100 percent, you’re talking about a week of ‘uninterrupted power supply.’

Dust and water r e s i s t a n c e You would probably have to buy a new device if you dropped your current phone in water, but with the Galaxy S5 can live to tell the tale after experiencing a dribble or a dip, with absolutely no residual problems.

The device boasts IP67 certification, meaning that it is completely dust proof and can be submerged in up to one metre of water for up to 30 minutes. If you’re a swimmer or water-sport enthusiast you can even take photos under water if you wish.

Control access when sharing the Galaxy S5 with children Nothing beats a smartphone game in quieting down a whining child, but the last thing you want is for an erroneous tap to lead to an embarrassing exchange where you to have to explain those

50 selfies with you in an uncompromising position to your colleagues! With the Galaxy S5, there’s a unique “Kids’ Mode” feature that limits children’s access to just the applications that you label as being child-friendly. Giving up your selfies is now out of the question!

A fingerprint scanner that authorises payment Most smart phones that boast of a fingerprint scanner probably don’t let you do anything interesting with the feature.

Samsung’s fingerprint scanner boasts a partnership with PayPal, meaning you can actually use it to authorise payments on your device. What’s more, upcoming deals with other payment service providers will further expand the scanner ’s utility as Samsung has announced that it is open to working with partners.

Public Affairs Manager for Google in West Africa and Mr. Ameth Sokhna from GEN. They were later asked

to develop digital tools for journalists with the focus on “New ways to cover elections online and through social media.”

Kola-Ogunlade, speaking on the rationale behind the training, said: “We usually bring together developers with people who are not developers to bring technical solutions to problems, problems that digital technology or the internet can help to solve.

“In this particular situation, it is the media, so at this event, we have different media people from different media houses brainstorming about what difference we can bring to the table with respect to reporting the 2015 elections.

I’ve been pretty impressed about some of the ideas that have come up.

“The media has seen that we are no longer competing with one another as media houses, but with individuals on the street. Social media enables literally anyone to become a media person.

“How do we use social media to source for information, and how do we present such information in a way that practically anyone can understand such information.”

The team from the School of Media and Communication, Pan-Atlantic University, SMC-PAU, emerged winners of the competition for developing an application called Verifi, and will represent Nigeria at the Hackathon during the GEN Summit in Barcelona, holding from June 11 to 13.

Here they will get to share ideas people for different parts of the world about how new media is reshaping the world that we live in.

Vanguard developed an application termed Pollswatch and came second with a score of 10.15.

In the mean time, fingers are crossed in anticipation of the 2015 elections; whether or not new social media tools will play a role in changing age-old election habits remains to be seen.

Sony gears up for FIFA 2014 World Cup

S

ONY Mobile is giving its customers the opportunity to play in the 2014 FIFA world cup.

Not on the field however, customers can participate from home and win amazing prizes.

The spokesman of Sony Mobile, speaking to journalist recently said: “Through SONY Mobile FIFA 2014 promotion customers will get a free over the ear headset and premium Roxfit case and stand a chance to win a trip to Brazil to be a ‘Fan Photographer ’ to watch a match at the FIFA 2014 World Cup when they buy any of SONY smartphones (Xperia Z1, Xperia Z1 Compact, Xperia C, Xperia M Dual, Xperia E Dual & Xperia E1).” Fans watching from home will be able to enjoy this fabulous event via Sony videos as it unfolds on the pitch with the same speed, power and the same excitement.”

SONY Mobile stated that customers can also participate in the promotion and get the opportunity for a child to be a FIFA Flag bearer for the Nigeria vs.

Argentina match at the FIFA 2014 World Cup. Customers can buy the “Xperia Z1” and get a free over the ear headset and premium Roxfit case and-

stand a chance to win a trip to Brazil to be a Fan Photographer and watch a match at the FIFA 2014 World Cup. Anyone who purchases the “Xperia Z1 Compact” can get a free over the ear headset and premium FIFA branded gift and stand a chance to win a trip to Brazil to be a Fan Photographer and watch a match at the FIFA 2014 World Cup. Also, buying the “Xperia C” means you get a free over the ear headset and premium Roxfit case and stand a chance to win a trip to Brazil to be a Fan Photographer and watch a match at the FIFA 2014 World Cup. That’s not all. Those who buy the “Xperia M Dual” or “Xperia E Dual” and get a premium Roxfit case and stand a chance to win a trip to Brazil to be a Fan Photographer and watch a match at the FIFA 2014 World Cup. And purchase of the “Xperia E1” attracts a premium FIFA branded gift and a chance to win a trip to Brazil to be a Fan Photographer and watch a match at the FIFA 2014 World Cup.

36 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

OFFSHORE weddings have become all the rage, with the big players of the Entertainment industry intent on outdoing each other tying the proverbial knot overseas.

The trend is by no means a new one, with big boys and girls doing the offshore thing as far back as ten years ago. The Caribbean islands used to be the place of choice. Now, South Africa and Dubai are the places to be, especially for tying the knot, onward to the honeymoon.

Entertainment celebs Staphanie Linus, Tuface Idibia and most recently Tiwa Savage have been roundly criticized for going out of the shores of our beautiful country. A top government aide in Aso Rock who was invited for the wedding reportedly shunned the invitation, retorting: “What is this idiocy about going to wed in Dubai all about?

What is there? You drag guests all the way meanwhile both of you are Lekki or Surulere (Lagos metropolis) based. Some of your kins are below average folks. You abandon them and head for Dubai because you are now an artiste or made some cash? We are so primitive”.

A top travel agency owner also slammed the trend, lamenting that it is bad for Nigerian tourism, saying weddings done outside Nigeria could have positively impacted on Nigerian Tourism sector. “The worst is that our celebs don’t recognize the fact that they have power to ignite a culture in a society. As Tuface and so on have successfully done their wedding in Dubai, France etc, you will be shocked how many ordinary Nigerians will start doing all they can to make sure they wed outside Nigeria just to belong!”

Tourism sector Financially, these wedding ceremonies can heavily impact on Nigeria’s Tourism sector and because it has a multiplier effect, it will spill into other sectors. Imagine if Tuface spent the N20 Million his Dubai wedding gulped in Nigeria? Some Nigerians would have made millions.

But it’s different strokes for different folks, as they say. Another Nollywood diva who wishes to remain anonymous for fear of “being shouted down”, says she chose to exchange her wedding vows in Abuja, where her father was based, rather than in the village as tradition dictates. Announcing that she would be celebrating her tenth year anniversary (if it comes) in the Maldives, she posits that it is a matter of choice.

“I didn’t want the crowd in the

Dubai is too nouveau riche for Tiwa and Annie’s otherwise stunning gowns. Let the environment you are in form the basis for your theme.

Make it a holiday

O

Offshore Wedding?

Why Not? East so I took it there so as to have few and decent crowd. My UK and USA friends still came and had loads of fun. My brothers had their weddings in the East and the crowd was unbelievable.

They all featured in NTA and over 3000 guests is not my way of having fun at a wedding. 90% of the crowds were daddy’s friends and associates and people that want favours from daddy and so on. Abuja to me was my choice”.

Cheaper and warmer Further reiterating her point, she says the trend is by no means limited to Nigeria or celebs, as according to her most UK citizens now do their weddings in the Mediterranean and Africa precisely in safari because it’s cheaper and warmer and they have honeymoon at the

same time there. “Nobody castigates them. It’s their choice dream wedding” You may want a wedding alone or with a few selected guests somewhere special and unknown to many people, costs for weddings abroad are generally more controllable than home equivalents.

Research, research, research

N

ow you’ve got an idea of the type of wedding you want and a shortlist of destinations in mind, it’s time to start consulting more impartial sites and forums to explore every aspect of your upcoming nuptials. Decide on an upper and lower limit to your budget, and then resolve to stick to it.

A Theme

I

ncorporate the theme into the setting, or is it vice versa? In this respect, Stephanie

Linus’dress was a hit, while Tiwa’s and Annie’s was a huge miss. Stephanie’s long trained old school white gown was in complete harmony with the cathedral setting in Paris, while

bviously a honeymoon is bound to come after the wedding and it only makes sense that it all comes in one package. Nudge your sticky friends along back home straight after the wedding so you can have yourselves to yourselves.

The legal stuff

F

inally, don’t forget that you’ll have some extra factors to consider on a more practical level when planning a wedding abroad - and these can vary dramatically depending on your destination of choice. Weddings abroad are usually non religious civil ceremonies. However religious weddings are usually possible in many locations for many faiths including Christianity, Moslem, Jewish, Buddhist, etcetera. As long as the ceremony does not contra-

NCWD tackles violence against

By SUCCESS UZOKWE

A

BUJA – THE National Centre for Women Development, NCWD, had come up with an initiative to reduce violence against women in the country through their mobile phones.

The Director General of NCWD, Onyeka Onwenu, while speaking at the media briefing tagged gender-friendly mobile applications in Abuja said the project was borne out of need to address the lack of access to

information by women.

Onwenu said the initiative was in partnership with Tingo Mobile Limited, as both organizations had agreed to launch the mobile application aimed at reducing the rising security challenges in the country.

Onwenu said: “This is a groundbreaking event that will impact in the lives of women and everyone in Nigeria. It is a process of thinking outside the box. ”The application has a

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

— 37

PSL C mo o unco PSLC movves tto uncovver talent in children with autism

BY JOSEPHINE IGBINOVIA

P

REPARATIONS are in top gear to have Nigeria shine at the 2015 World Special Olympics Game in Los Angeles, USA. Proprietress of Patrick Speech & Language Centre, PSLC, Mrs.Dotun Akande, disclosed this during a preparatory competition organized by PSLC in collaboration with the National Olympics Team, Guarantee Trust Bank Plc and Blazing Trails International Centre recently in Lagos.

Speaking at the contest which was in commemoration of the annual April Autism Awareness Campaign, Akande recalled that one of the centre’s pupils who represented Nigeria at the

vene with the marriage laws of your own country the wedding will be completely legal and you can register the marriage when you get home.

Normally you will require formal proof that you are free & able to marry plus proof that you are who you say you are.

Be sure to study documents covering issues such as necessary documentation (and whether or not you’ll need to have it translated), legal advice and where to get it, as well as each country’s stance on same-sex marriages. If it applies, that is.

Autism- Mrs.Dotun Akande, Proprietress, PSLC(3rd right) flanked by the US-based Blazing Trails International team shortly after the competition in Lagos

Use an Expert

T

here are those wedding and event planners who specialize in who specialize in offshore weddings. Familiarize your planner with your destination and get involved with sourcing everything.

The planner’s job is to organize.

Arranging and planning weddings abroad has become much easier as get away weddings become ever more popular. Attend one, then maybe if you like it you can use the same planner, or get a referral.

women through mobile phones feature with which by pressing a digit, a woman who is being subjected to violence or assault can contact security agencies in her vicinity. ”You all know the security situation in the country and even before that, we have recognized that violence against women is on the increase ”Most times, we accept violence and do nothing about it, well with this application you can do something now because you can link with that protection you are seeking at any given

2011 World Special Olympics in Greece returned with two gold medals.

Expressing hope that helping children living with autism discover talents in sports would shield them from leading dependent and redundant lives, she implored parents and caregivers to continue in their show of love and support while also looking forward to overcoming autism.

Speaking at the event, Mr.Richard Eniefiuk, Sports Officer, Special Olympics, noted that molding children with special needs in sports was crucial since most of them could only do little academically.

“When it comes to sports, they can showcase certain talents which could really impress their parents, themselves and the

time,Onwenu explained.

“With this application, the security challenges will not only reduce but will also connect women to information, regarding government programmes designed to better their lives,”DG added.

Earlier the founder, Tingo Mobile, Dr Dozy Mmobuosi in his address said, “had it been the application was in place the abduction of the school girls in Borno State wouldn’t have been successful.”

nation as a whole. I advise that the federal government, as well as more corporate bodies, come in to support Special Olympics because it is really bringing out the talent in special children. Unlike in time past when parents would prefer locking them indoors rather than expose them, because of programmes like this these days, they are happy to bring them out to be celebrated”, Eniefiuk said.

Autism spectrum Encouraging parents to strengthen support for children with special needs, US-based speech pathologist and consultant, Blazing Trails International Centre, USA, Rachael Johnson Cromwell, reiterated that sustaining hope was paramount.

“I want parents to know that the children God has given them have potentials. All they need do is unlock those potentials. I have a grandson who is 18-year-old and on the autism spectrum. He had language problem and was given a speech therapist but right now, he is about to graduate from high school and move on to college.

That’s the hope everyone must hold on to.”

Autism is a neuro-developmental disability that slows down brain development in children, and currently, 1 in 88 children is estimated to be on the spectrum worldwide.

Leave your comfort zones, YWCA tells women

BY ANINO AGANBI

W

omen around the globe have been enjoined to desist from being complacent and work towards restoring sanity in the world by pioneering transformative leadership.

Making this call during the Young Women Christian Association- YWCA of Nigeria’s World Membership Day celebration in Lagos, the g r o u p lamented that women had for too long assumed a p a s s i v e attitude to the plethora of u n r e s t presently troubling the world.

Tagged ‘Bold a n d Transformative Leadership’, every bit of the event which

brought together women from all walks of life challenged women to live up to their Godgiven role as mothers, teachers and leaders.

According to Chief(Mrs)Ayo Akideinde, ExVice President, YWCA Nigeria, “When leadership is innovative, truthful and loyal, the people feel fulfilled. It is known globally that we are able to influence others, including men, very easily. Therefore, women should learn to be frank at all times. Only then will the world be a better place”.

YWCA- R-L Mrs. Sussie Metu,Mrs Oyeyemi Tinubu,Chief Mrs. Ayo Akideinde,Miss Busola Bankole at the YWCA Membership Day in Lagos

38—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Battle for the soul of AGN

Ejike Asiegbu, Segun Arinze back Ibinabo for re-election ...condemn Clarion Chukwura’s action

B

BY BENJAMIN NJOKU

ARELY five months to another general election of the Actors Guild of Nigeria,AGN,the battle to succeed Ibinabo Fiberesima as president of the Guild hots up.

Ibinabo’s administration which assumed office in 2012, is expected to expire in September this year. Already, the atmosphere is tense as some members are warming up to challenge the fair actress, in her bid to seek re-election. Notable among the members, is Clarion Chukwura, who recently declared her intention to vie for the guild’s top position.

In a recent report, the veteran actress scored Ibinabo’s administration ‘zero’, maintaining that “I cannot see what it is she has achieved in the past 19 months.” But, it was actor Emeka Ike, who has been laying claim to the presidency of the guild since 2009, that first fired back at Chukwura. He said, given the circumstances that brought Ibinabo to power, after Segun Arinze, as the former president of the guild breached the court order not to conduct any election, ‘Chukwura is not eligible to contest in any election considering the matter on ground.”

Meanwhile, two former presidents of the guild, Ejike Asiegbu and Segun Arinze have thrown their weights behind Ibinabo’s re-election. In a telephone chat with WG during the week, Ejike Asiegbu said, “She’s doing very well. I will continue to support Ibinabo. We should pray for her as well as give her our support.”

Incessant criticisms Scoring Ibinabo’s administration very high, the bulky actor frowned at Clarion Chukwura’s incessant criticisms of the leadership of the guild. Reacting in respect of her recent attack on the leadership of the guild, Asiegbu revealed that when he was the president of the guild, the same Chukwura did not spare him.

“On the issue of criticising the incumbent president, when I was the president of AGN, the same Clarion Chukwura criticised me. She has the right to contest for the presidency of the guild. But she should do so without pulling another person down. I read with great disappointment, Clarion Chukwura’s recent attack on the leadership of AGN. There’s nothing wrong in paying a courtesy visit to Mr. President. It’s a plus on the part of Ibinabo and her executives.

When I was the president of the guild, I made efforts to visit Mr. President to no avail.”

“However, it’s a minus on the part of Clarion Chukwura, having used the pages of newspapers to run down the leadership of the guild,” Asiegbu stated.

Ibinabo’s predecessor, Segun Arinze said, he’s strongly in support of the reelection of the Rivers State-born actress.

According to him, “I am strongly behind Ibinabo. She should vie for her second C M Y K

tenure in order to complete what she has started 19 months ago.”

Arinze, however, advised Ibinabo to be focused on her goals, and ignore any form of distraction. He said, “I am not against anybody criticising the leadership of the guild, but they should do so constructively.”

Also, Prince Ifeanyi Dike, the Chairman, Board of Trustees of AGN believed that Ibinabo should seek for re-election. In his view, as the first female president of the guild, Ibinabo has not only succeeded in uniting the actors since she assumed office 19 months ago, but has also ensured that peace reigns in the guild which had been plagued with crises for several years.

Recently, Ibinabo took stock of her stewardship, where she has put smiles on the faces of members of the guild through her open door policies and re-structural developments. She has also restored sanity in the body which was once riddled with complaints, corruption, neglect and dejection.

Ibinabo was sworn- in as the first female president and the 7th president of AGN in September 2012, which had herself, Emeka Rollas and Steve Eboh as contestants for exalted office. She started by bringing unity

O

I am not against anybody criticising the leadership of the guild, but they should do so constructively and a sense of participation among its members with seminars, workshops and above all, celebrating some of their own who had made the industry proud.

She also ensured that their departed colleagues were all duly honoured even in death. One of such persons is veteran actor, Peter Eneh. She led a group of movie stars to the tribute night which turned out to be a carnival night of celebrations.

Notably, Ibinabo’s tenure drew the attention of the Nigerian government to Nollywood as uncountable are the numerous rewards the AGN has been getting from President Goodluck Jonathan lately, ranging from donations to grants. Recently, she led a group of movie actors to Aso Rock to honour President Goodluck Jonathan with the title of Grand Patron of AGN. During

ne of the singing duo of P-square, Peter Okoye, who was recently reconciled with his brothers, Paul and Jude, has celebrated the Peter reconciliation and Okoye reunion with a gift to pamper himself.

The dashing singer and husband of Lola Omotayo acquired the 2014 model of Bentley GT for a whooping sum N30 million to show all hard feelings are gone and no doubt set to ride around in his new luxury acquisition

the visit, Mr President donated a plot of land for the building of the guild’s secretariat in Abuja and promised to assist them in building a befitting secretariat.

Ibinabo who was recently appointed into the board of the National Council for Arts and Culture (NCAC), has also bridged the gap between the English and Yoruba actors to a reasonable extent as she not only attends most events organised by Yourba actors, she also includes them as part of her delegation whenever the need arises.

However, despites the achievements recorded by her administration in the past 19 months, most industry operators believed that Ibinabo is using her position to advance her own interest.While describing Ibinabo’s tenure as ‘a failed one’, Clarion Chukwura accused AGN boss of using her position to enrich herself. “I want to know what specifically she has done that has moved the actors forward in areas like their pay, health, and other vital concerns about their jobs. She secured an appointment to see the President on behalf of the guild but that opportunity was sacrificed on the alter of selfish interest and myopic objectives which has for a while now heightened the selfish interest in the state chapter levels.”

Peter Ok oye Oko celebrates family reunion with Bentle T 20 14 Bentleyy G GT 201

Peter Okoye Bentley

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—39

Amaka Igwe: A little song for a Nollywood Matriarch TRIB UTE TRIBUTE

BY OKOH AIHE

LIKE you said, I am a young filmmaker, quote and unquote.

I have not started thinking about footprints because I am not going anywhere for now.

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HAT was Amaka Igwe speaking to this writer a few years ago. On Monday night, April 28, 2014, Amaka died! Once more death has ambushed the fate, fortune and determination of a brilliantly resolute woman to hold on to life and reach her heights. It is difficult to trace the point of intersection, the creative confluence relationship that would grow into some kind of blood relationship, metaphorically. She was and will always remain a sister, no matter the distance and difference in tribes and languages.

Dazed into incomprehension when the news was first broken to me by Dr. Don Pedro Obaseki, I am speaking to Charles now, which is the way she would even call her husband.... Charles, no ceremonies and no pretensions about those pet names laced in bemused love packages...but she was the big sister.

“Tell me what is happening.

Your sister is gone. Your sister is gone. Your sister has left us.” It is a whisper. The voice is fading and becoming inaudible. The eyes are getting blurred and the tears are welling up. Soon they begin to rain and in very big drops as the heart begins to question the transiency of life and always the untimely departure of those who mean well to the society. Amaka was well endowed - large in size, large in brain and large in influence and commitment to society.

Mr. Ken Nnebue gave

Amaka Igwe crew is an opportunity to be subjected to some teaching and training. And my God, did many people loathe that. The movie industry could sometimes come with bloated images and stardom that do not allow some industry players already with some vestige of visibility to stoop, learn and conquer. No way, life would rather revolve around them. For this reason, Amaka would rather grow her stars, build her crews and release something refreshingly appealing anytime she was hitting the screen or the market.

Yes, I was there. Amaka was a star maker by choice and detailed commitment to, and an understanding of an industry that still remains an esoteric mystery to even the practitioners, not to talk of the business community.

Her concern always was to build capacity for Nollywood so that Nigerian moviemakers can do their work and not feel inferior or be ashamed of their trade. “So

,

Amaka was a thorough professional, one of the few that was very friendly with critics, and it was part of her strength and matriarchal dominance

commercial vision to Nollywood.

Amaka supplied the intellectual capacity that fired the industry to greater heights and provided benchmarks for others to follow.

What she did for television she surpassed in Nollywood.

Checkmate and Fuji House of Commotion are axiomatic of some of the greatest works for television in the country, but what do you say of Rattlesnake, Violated and Forever, three great movies that would always rate as highest end of creativity in Nollywood. It wasn’t just the simplistic narrative style of her stories but the cast and ordinary characters that grow into real life and become some kindergarten psycho-babble among children. Remember Toyin Tomato in Fuji House of Commotion!

While the TV programmes and the movies are the visual manifestations of her creative proclivity, there is the other side of her that is not much appreciated. Amaka was more of a teacher than a movie maker or TV producer. Being in her cast or

,

why can’t we leave America and do our own thing,” she once asked me. “I think we would be masters of our people. My greatest joy was at Sithengi 2001, in South Africa, when I heard a Tanzanian say that on the bus travelling for six hours from one part of Tanzania to the other, they were playing a Nigerian movie which has to do with witchcraft, but which had people struggling to buy copies of the film after the screening. So if the Nigerian movie that is made here in Lagos or far away Aba or Enugu is making waves in Tanzania, that means there is an African story,” she concluded very emphatically.

She would teach young actors how to act for TV which is quite different from stage, especially for those coming with degrees from theatre schools, and teach young minds the art of directing for the screen. Her programmes were like a school and some people who went through them bear the testimony of success. In the early days it took so much boldness and commitment to creativity to

produce a movie not commissioned by the marketers and not be singed in the market place. With Rattlesnake, Vi o l a t e d a n d F o r e v e r, Amaka, goaded by h e r husband, forced the marketers to come to her.

There were some people who looked at the future of Nollywood and knew that something good could come out of the industry.

Some people looked at the strength of content and projected that it would be king in the future.

Some of these residual projections were far before the coming of African Magic. I am looking at Gab Okoye (Gabosky), Mahmood Ali-Balogun, Emeka Mba, and Charles Igwe whose wife has gone to join Mr. Justus Esiri, who was also a member of the group (May God keep them in good abode). This small group had great plans and vision for the movie industry and must be very happy today as the industry has grown beyond individual aspiration and imagination.

Amaka was a thorough professional, one of the few that was very friendly with critics, and it was part of her strength and matriarchal dominance.

She would do a script and pass it round to her colleagues and critics to look at.

Oftentimes, the script would already be a great one but there is a l w a y s something to add, a little flaw in the characters here and there to be deracinated, some credulity to be added to the story line, and what you have is a stunning outing like Rattlesnake, Violated or Forever or if you are from a

polygamous home, you do a character attestation for Chief Fuji in Fuji House of Commotion.

This was the kind of openmindedness that gave birth to Movie Half Hour, a pioneer television programme focusing on Nollywood; nothing about the razzle dazzle of stardom or the splash and dash of the movie industry but a serious programme aimed at contributing to the building process of the nascent movie industry. What most other producers and other industry players couldn’t even tolerate Amaka supported with the facilities of her studios. Amaka Igwe Studios even with little or no cash in the pockets of the journalist cum producer.

Thanks to Wale Obadeyi, Lillian Agbeyegbe, Chris Otaigbe and Ralph Ezeoke who were ready to work for very little pay, that is when it was coming at all. It is difficult to represent your collective grief in this little piece.

Some people see the coming of Best of the Best TV (BoBTV) as an enterprise or even a prestige project. They miss the point. This yearly exhibition and capacity building programme was carefully structured and nurtured to provide an avenue for the deregulated broadcast sector to source content for its stations and provide opportunities for capacity building.

The University Challenge which encouraged Nigerian

universities to do short movies for competition was a major step in this direction. The University Challenge attracted entries from numerous higher institutions and the students in attendance were given the opportunity to attend master class addressed by local and international filmmakers.

BoBTV was a financial drain. It never made money.

Those behind it borrowed to keep the concern going. But it was a huge success and contributed immensely to building human capital for Nollywood. It was Amaka’s resilience that kept BoBTV going and she primed the resource persons that their contributions, even without pay, was for the good of the industry and to the glory of the country which today enjoys the appellation of a top movie making country.

My sister, I told your sister with the beautiful smile last night that you were gone. That ended her day and drew a pall on the dark hours. We are unable to tell the children that you have gone on this journey from which you will never return. We are not allowing them to watch TV at the moment for them not to chance on the news. If they do find out, and that could be very soon, we shall ask them to say a prayer for Ruby, Bobby and Danny. Above all we shall continue to pray for Charles whose business imprimatur was resplendent on all your creative masterpieces. Sleep well.

•Okoh Aihe contributed this material from Abuja.

40—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Workers Day: We won't shortchange workers — OBIANO

BY VINCENT UJUMADU

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W K A — GOVERNOR Willie Obiano of Anambra State yesterday assured the state’s organised labour that his administration would not shortchange any worker, saying the journey to the great future of the state should begin with them.

Addressing the workers at Alex Ekwueme Square to mark the annual workers’ day in Awka, Obiano thanked them for voting massively for him during the last gubernatorial elections.

He assured that by doing that, the workers had demonstrated their wish to accelerate the pace of socioeconomic development of the state.

Obiano said: “In voting for me, you voted for peace and industrial harmony in Anambra State because you people are the government of Anambra State in flesh and blood."

Don’t ignore cyber terrorism, don cautions FG, security agencies

A

don has warned of dire consequences if the Federal Government and security agencies failed to put proactive measures in place to checkmate what he described as budding cyber terrorism in the country.

Boniface Alese, an Associate Professor of Computer Science, stated this while delivering the First Bank Professorial Chair in Computer Science lecture at the Federal University of Technology, Akure, FUTA. He said the country’s quest for technological development should put cyber crime and cyber terrorism into consideration to properly secure its citizens and polity.

He described cyber terrorists as those who engaged in conducts that constituted cyber crimes for the purpose of effecting political change through the intimidation of a substantial portion of the civilian population.

Oko communal crisis deepens as youths threaten to dethrone monarch ...Town union exco insists on removal of poly rector

BY NWABUEZE OKONKWO

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NITSHA—THE communal crisis currently rocking Oko in Orumba-North Local Government Area of Anambra State appears to have deepened, with the two warring factions involved still threatening hell and brimstone against each other.

At the centre of the crisis are the traditional ruler of the area, Igwe Laz Ekwueme, executive members of Oko Peoples Union, OPU, on one hand, and the rector of Federal Polytechnic, Oko, Prof. Godwin Onu, and some concerned youths of the area on the other.

According to sources, the crux of the matter is that while the

royal father and his subjects are calling for the removal of Prof.

Onu as rector of the institution for allegedly sponsoring crisis in the area and at the same time allegedly making secret moves to relocate the institution to his hometown, Ezira, in the neighbouring Orumba-South Local Government Area, Onu and his loyalists among the youths are gunning for the dethronement of Ekwueme for allegedly standing against Onu’s second term bid as rector.

Although the state police command has just issued a warning against any group embarking on any form of protest in the area without police permit, tension still pervades the entire community at the moment.

A recent visit to the area

showed that the atmosphere was calm, since after the April 19 invasion of the palace of the traditional ruler of Oko, Igwe Laz Ekwueme, and setting ablaze of his vehicles by some irate youths but the next line of action from both parties cannot be predicted for now.

However, investigations showed that the crisis may no longer take the shape of violence, rather, it may be restricted to petition writing, accusations and counteraccusation by both parties.

Speaking on the development, the National President of OPU, Mr. Cyprian Nwammuo, and Legal Adviser, Uchenna Okonkwo-Okom, insisted that Onu’s tenure expired on March 4, 2014, adding that any renewal

AGM: From left — Mr Adeyemi Adeola, Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Sterling Bank Plc, Alhaji Suliamon Adegunwa; Chairman, Board of Director; Mrs Justina Lewa, Company Secretary, during the 52nd Annual General Meeting of Sterling Bank Plc, held at Eko Hotel, Victoria Island, Lagos, yesterday. Photo by Kehinde Gbadamosi.

Sacked Abia workers disrupt Workers' Day celebration in Imo

BY CHIDI NKWOPARA

O

WERRI—THE May Day celebration in Imo State nearly turned sour yesterday as people disengaged from Abia

State stormed the venue in red attires and complained bitterly about their plight.

The sacked workers, numbering over 1,600, were particularly irked that they

Traditional healers seek separate hospitals for practice

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EMBERS of the Nigerian Union of Medical Herbal Practitioners, NUMHP, Lagos State chapter, have called on the state government to support their members towards building separate hospitals for the practice of traditional medicine.

The herbal practitioners stated that their clamour for separate government-backed general hospital and maternity centres for the practice of traditional medicine would offer government the

opportunity to regulate their practice, confirm the efficacy of their medicines and complement the practice of orthodox medicine in the state.

The union, in a statement by their leaders, Dr. Ayoka Ogunpeju Oguntokun, Iyalode-General, Dr. Sabir Adeokin, Lagos State Chairman, and Dr. Funmilayo Salami, State Secretary, asked the governor to allocate land to their members for the purpose of building the traditional hospital which, they said ,was the practice in the other climes as India and

were yet to be absorbed into the state civil service or recalled

by Abia State government, despite Okorocha’s previous promises.

They expressed disgust that their previous representations to government on the need to absorb them into the service had remained a mirage, while a number of their colleagues had died out of frustration and starvation.

The Coordinator of Aba Zone, Mrs. Angela Madu-Okoli, who spoke jointly with her counterpart from Umuahia Zone, Mr. Peter Oluigbo, told journalists in tears that none of the callously sacked Imo indigenes had been paid a kobo.

They debunked the recent news that filtered in from Government House, Umuahia, that the sacked workers should come for reinstatement, stressing that the official document to the effect was not signed by anybody.

of his tenure for second term would be regarded as a nullity.

Also in a petition to Governor Willie Obiano of Anambra State, signed on their behalf by Nwammuo and Igwe Ekwueme, the community called on the authorities concerned not to renew Onu’s appointment for a second term because he had failed woefully to manage himself peacefully and operate harmoniously within his work environment.

They said their grudge against Onu started in 2011 when they stumbled on his promise to his Ezira kinsmen that he would not leave Oko until he brought a campus of the polytechnic to his village, adding that they discovered that he had already procured the management's approval for the Ezira offer.

They, therefore, urged the state government to set up a judicial commission of inquiry to be headed by a high court judge, serving or retired, with men and women of proven integrity, traditional institution as members to unravel the whole truth about what was happening in Oko. But in his own reaction, the Public Relations Officer, PRO of the polytechnic, Onuchukwu Obini, told newsmen that the relocation of a federal institution like Oko Polytechnic was a legislative matter, which was instituted by law and must be changed or adjusted through the same process.

He said: “In other words, Prof.

Onu, as the rector, does not have the constitutional empowerment to relocate the institution, and besides, does it make sense that the Rector wants to relocate it from Oko to Ezira, which is less than 10 kilometer distance?

“If he is relocating the institution, he asked, why would he be interested in developing the campus by erecting no fewer than 17 different structures of not less than two floors each?”

He said Oko indigenes constituted about 60 percent of the entire work force in the institution, contrary to allegations that they were being marginalized, adding that at all times, they were given concession at both employments and admissions.

On the second term bid, Obini noted that Onu had already commenced the implementation of his second term agenda with last week’s flag off of a two-storey building project for the Wing ‘B’ of institution’s medical center.

He therefore appealed to the community to sheath their sword and close ranks with the institution to encourage further development of the area, even as he described Onu as a selfless person who not only just determined to develop the area, but to make a name and his career because peace and development go pari-pasu. He added:”we shal continue to respect the traditional institution, our founder and mentor, Dr. Alex Ekwueme.

VANGUARD, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—41

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Sacking of two nurses Narrating how it happened, Mrs Lawal said she accepted the offer based on the circular of Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria prescribing a shoulder length hijab which she expected the hospital to comply with.

When Vanguard contacted the Medical Director, NOHIL, Dr. O.Odunibi on phone for comments, he declined saying “the matter is already in court and we have been told not to comment on the matter.”

A senior Muslim nurse in the hospital who crave anonimity told Vanguard that they were not wearing hijab merely because no circular was given to them to that effect. She maintained that the development was an eyeopener to other Muslim nurses in the hospital.

The Nursing and Midwifery

Orthopaedic hospital sacks two nurses for wearing hijab •Muslim lawyers, MUPAC react Council of Nigeria is a parastatal of the Federal Government of Nigeria established by Act Cap. No143 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004, and the Council is the only regulatory body for all cadres of Nurses and Midwives in Nigeria.

How it happened “I assumed duty on February 25, 2014, at the commencement of the one month orientation, I was told to remove my hijab but I insisted presenting a copy of a circular from Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria to the head of Nursing Department, Mrs Adebowale, hence I was allowed to do the orientation wearing hijab.”

“I completed the orientation on March 23, 2014 and resumed duty fully in uniform on Monday March 24, 2014 and I was told that I was not properly dressed as I was using hijab and not a nurse cap.

"On April 8, 2014' I wrote a letter of protest to the Medical Director copying Minister for Health, Minister for State for Health and Board Chairman, National Orthopeadic Hospital Igbobi Lagos and Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria."

"On April 9, 2014, I was given a query dated April 8, 2014 to explain why disciplinary action should not be instituted against me for insubordination by not wearing Nurse uniform which I replied with a letter dated April 9, 2014 and since April 10, 2014 I have not been allowed to work or even sign the attendance register, we were told to stay outside the

From left: Alhaji Abdul-Hafeez Abou, Baba Adinni of Lagos; Sheikh Ahmad Jilanni from Saudi Arabia; Alhaji AbdulJeleel Animashaun (Al-Hujjaj) and other guests during the commissioning of Al-Hujjaj Central Mosque in Lekki, Lagos.

Director of Administrator ’s office by the Chairman of National Association of Nigerian Nurses and Midwife (NANNM).

“On April 11, 2014, we were given two letters, one from the Director of Administration summoning us to a disciplinary committee on Monday April 14, 2014 and another from the Assistant Director of Nursing calling our

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WO female nurses of National Orthopaedic Hospital, Igbobi Lagos (NOHIL) have been sacked for wearing hijab while on duty.

The nurses Mrs Fasilat Olayinka Lawal and Miss Sekinat Sanusi, relied on the prescription of their regulatory body, the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria which says nurses should either wear nurse cap or shoulder lenght hijab as contained in a circular dated February 11, 2002 (reference number N&MCN/CMF/721/1/ 3).

The circular which was signed by P. N. Ndatsu, Secretary General/Registrar was said to have been sent to all Directors of Nursing and their deputies, chief Medical Directors, chief Executives, and Principals.

Vanguard gathered that Muslims nurses in other government and teaching hospitals in other states wear shoulder lenght hijab. Some of them include Kwara, Osun, Oyo in the South West and most states in the north of the country.

The victims in anticipation of the hospital management weilding the big stick, approached the court to obtain injunction against further actions by the management of the NOHIL, But this did not deter the hospital management as the two nurses were sacked a few days ago.

Director by our Lawyer informing him of the implication of their actions of not allowing us to work and if the situation persists a contempt proceeding would be commenced against them.

The situation continued that way without been allowed to work until April 23, 2014 when we were given a memo to appear before the Hospital Management Board by

,

We were asked if we were ready to retrace our steps by removing our hijab and we responded that we cannot remove our hijab

attention to some so called facts.

On the April 14, 2014, we were at the panel/ disciplinary committee and was told to have a rethink of removing our hijab within 24hrs and get back to the committee the following day at 10:00am to avoid a disciplinary action taken against us.”

“We immediately sort a legal advice since we were determined not to remove our hijab and decided to proceed to court to stop any diciplinary actions taken against us and also seek redress on the violation on our fundamental human rights and be allowed to work and wear our hijabs without hindrance as permitted

by Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria, the only body permitted by law to regulate the Nursing Profession in Nigeria.

“We were further prevented from entering the ward and carrying out our official duty, we wrote another letter to the Medical Director in the afternoon of April 15, 2014 notifying him of the situation.”

“On April 17, 2014, a letter was written to the Medical

10:00am.”

“We met with the board and was told that by not removing our hijab we have committed an act of insurbodination and disobedience which is punishable by the law of public service.

We were asked if we were ready to retrace our steps by removing our hijab and we responded that we can not remove our hijab and moreso the matter is in court and we cannot take any further step without informing our lawyer.

Later that day ( April 23, 2014) we were issued a letter of termination of service,” she narrated.

Muslim Lawyers react The Muslim Lawyers Association of Nigeria, MULAN, has described the termination of employment of the two muslim nurses as ‘wrongful dismissal’.

The Chairman of the association, Barrister Musadiq Adunni Sanni said the nurses have right to complain and also have the right to institute legal

From left: Alhaji Abdul-Hafeez Abou, Baba Adinni of Lagos; His Eminence, Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa'ad Abubakar; and Commissioner of Home Affairs and Tourism, Alhaji Oyinlomo Danmole during the commissioning of Al-Hujaj Mosque in Lekki, Lagos.

action if their fundamental human rights were infringed upon.

“It is wrongful dismissal.

What I think they should have done is to wait on the court before taking a decision.”

Sanni continued: “this is a labour matter and if the institution allows it, then the court will have to decide who is wrong.”

“I also think they don’t have respect for the rule of law and we are not happy that a Federal Institution like that would go that way.”

On similar case of hijab involving a student who was punished because she wore hijad while in school, Barrister Sanni stated that although there is a proposal for out of court settlement, but maintained that the condition was not in favourable to the Muslims.

He said: “Just last Tuesday, the state maintained that it only limited the use of hijab to the Mosque on Fridays during Jumat and also during Zhur and Asr prayers, but we are not happy with that; our interest is total use of hijab. We are still on it and we are going to argue our case insha-Allah,” he stressed.

MUPAC cries foul The Muslim Public Affairs Centre (MPAC) also expressed deep concern over the escalation of the case, saying the two nurses are yet another victims of discrimination. In a statement sent to Vanguard’s Facing the Kaaba, the group said the Muslim nurses could have been subjected to cruel and degrading treatments simply because of their choice to wear the hijab at work.

“By its latest action, NOHIL and the hospital management have continued to show aggression against the victims and unrestrained and unaccountable hostility towards the Islamic faith. The Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria (NMCN) prescribes a standard uniform for all nurses in Nigeria and in its circular of February, 11,2002 (reference number N&MCN/CMF/721/1/ 3), it unambiguously specifies that “female nurses” may “wear either a Nurse cap or a shoulder length hyjab”.

“The sisters will continue to demand justice, and the resolve of the Muslim community to stand by them will only strengthened them against this latest act of aggression.”

“Tyranny of employers, public and private, highlights the need for our lawmakers to do the right things and make laws that will criminalise discrimination on the basis of religions.”

MPAC urged all Islamic organizations, mosques, Imams, human right groups and individuals who cherish and value the collective aspiration to lend their prayers and support to these Muslim nurses.

42—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Dwindling federal revenue affecting state wage bill —Yuguda

BY SUZAN EDEH

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AUCHI— GOVERNOR Isa Yuguda of Bauchi State, yesterday, lamented over what he described as huge wage bill being paid by his administration, saying salaries of workers had taken the greater percentage of statutory receipts from the federation account by the state government.

Yuguda lamented that the problem was further being compounded by decline in the revenue accruing to the state from the centre in recent months.

This was even as the Chairman of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, in the state, Comrade Hasimu Gital, has commended civil servants in the state for their understanding and loyalty demonstrated when they sacrificed 10 per cent of their salaries for a period of four months due to the dwindling resources of the state.

The governor who spoke in Bauchi during the Workers Day celebrations at the Abubakar Tafawa Balewa Stadium, noted, however, that the situation was not peculiar to Bauchi State, but a nationwide phenomenon.

He was represented on the occasion by his deputy, Alhaji Aminu Sagir Saleh.

According to him, some states had already downsized their workforce while others were unable to pay salaries as at when due.

“At this time of dwindling resources, workers are expected to appreciate the situation and identify with the government by making necessary sacrifices to enable government sustain monthly salary payments and proceed with rendering socioeconomic services.

Taraba crisis: Northern Christian forum faults NGF

By SAM EYOBOKA

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STATEMENT credited to the Nigerian Governors' Forum (NGF) dismissing claims that the ongoing crisis in Taraba State was religiously motivated, has attracted reaction from a Northernbased Christian organisation, saying that Christians in the state are indeed being targeted.

Northern States Christian Elders Forum (NOSCEF), in a statement jointly signed by Sunday Oibe and Emmanuel Subilim, voiced its astonishment at the denials coming from the NGF following recent reports of conflict between Islamic militants and other predominantly Christian ethnic groups.

According to the forum. "For the NGF to suggest that the conflict in Taraba State is not religiously motivated is in complete contradiction to what members of NOSCEF have been telling us for several months.

"Approximately six months ago, NOSCEF members began to raise concerns following a sudden and

unprecedented influx of people from outside of the state who gave the appearance of cattle herders. Unlike the cattle herders they are accustomed too, this new group travelled without family, arrived outside of the normal seasonal movements and were armed with sophisticated weaponry.

"Our members complained that shortly after their arrival, Christians in the state began to report an increase in conflict with this new group, which included armed robbery and confrontations.

"Since January this year, there have been many reports of violence in Taraba State against the predominantly Christian Tiv population at the hands of Islamic extremists. Hundreds of members of the Tiv community have been murdered and thousands forced from their homes.

They destroyed their villages, their farms and their churches.

"Although many in the media have reported these fracas between 'farmers and herdsmen',

our members tell us that the basis for these attacks is purely religious. After attacking the Tiv community, the Islamic extremists attacked the predominantly Christian Jukun ethnic group.

"The NGF should ask themselves why the attacks around Wakuri, which consumed so many lives, including many NOSCEF members, came just weeks after a ceasefire was agreed upon between the communities? Our members have given us the answer.

"NOSCEF would therefore urge the NGF to follow our call for the Federal and State Governments to provide the necessary resources so that our security services bring a swift end to the violence. We must keep our nation united and protect the rights of every Nigerian B regardless of ethnicity, religion or region. We must not hide from the root cause of the violence, but admit the truth so we can understand the violence and bring it to an end."

Governor Gabriel Suswam (3rd left), his wife, Yemisi and Deputy Governor of Benue State Steven Lawani and his wife, Magareth and others cutting a cake to mark Mrs. Suswam's 47th birthday in Makurdi, yesterday.

Adenuga bags Grand Commander of Business Award

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LOBACOM Chairman, Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr. (GCON), has bagged the award of Grand Commander of Business.

Dr Adenuga received the award at the 17th City People Awards for Excellence 2014, held in Lagos over the weekend.

Dr. Adenuga sits atop a chain of businesses in the telecommunications, aviation, real estate oil, gas and other sectors.

His companies include telecoms firm, Globacom, upstream oil and gas company, Conoil Producing, and downstream oil marketing firm, Conoil Plc. He also has massive investments in the real sector and banking.

Mrs Fashola said, "On behalf of the organisers of the 17th City People Awards for Excellence 2014, I present the award of the Grand Commander of Business in Nigeria and Africa to Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr. the chairman of Globacom."

In his citation, the judges acknowledged that Adenuga is a shining symbol of the irrepressible spirit of the quintessential African entrepreneur, passionate, committed, resilient and extremely hardworking.

"Each of his businesses in these sectors plays leadership roles, helping to set the pace and contributing to the growth of the Nigerian economy.

These companies provide direct employment to thousands of Nigerians and people from the international community, as well as millions of other indirect employment."

Receiving the award, Adenuga said the award was a confirmation of the appreciation of the people for his contributions towards the economic development of Nigeria and Africa as a whole.

He attributed his success to the help of God and thanked City People for the recognition.

Former Kwara gov Adamu Atta, Wash Pam die I

LORIN — Two power brokers during the Second Republic, Alhaji Adamu Atta and John Wash Pam are dead.

Attah, 88, first civilian governor of old Kwara State, died in his home town in Kogi State, while Wash Pam, 73, died at the National Hospital, Abuja at about 1.25pm as a result of complications from prostrate cancer.

Wash Pam hailed from Plateau State.

Attah won the election on the platform of the defunct National Party of Nigeria, NPN, while Wash Pam was elected on the platform of the defunct Nigerian People’s Party, NPP, which had an accord with the ruling NPN.

Adamu Atta hailed from Ebiraland in present Kogi State.

He was son of warrant Chief Ibrahima Atta, whom the British granted wide powers under the Native Authority system.

He became the first civilian governor of the state, although he came from a minority ethnic group. In January 1967, he was permanent secretary at the Federal Ministry of Finance.

Atta contested election against Obatemi Usman for a seat in the Constituent Assembly in 1977, beating his opponent. Late stronman of Kwara politics, Dr. Abubakar Olusola Saraki supported Atta in his bid to become governor of Kwara State in 1979.

Atta was responsible for establishing the Obangede Specialist Hospital.

The former governor was a polo enthusiast, and owner of the Fifth Chukker Club and Resorts, Kaduna.

Reacting to his death, the immediate past governor of Kwara State, Senator Bukola Saraki and a former Aviation Minister, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, said they were saddened by the death, describing Attah as a statesman of repute.

In a statement in Ilorin yesterday, Saraki said: “I am saddened over the death of His Excellency, Alhaji Adamu Atah, the first Governor of Kwara State; a statesman of repute and a stakeholder in

the Nigeria project whose records and antecedent are clear in the history of Kwara and Nigerian politics. ”The impact of Alhaji Attah cannot be under estimated in Kwara politics and apparently his role and contributions in the administration of the state. His departure is painful, but the fact that his wealth of wisdom in the history of Kwara state administration will be missed is more painful."

In his own condolence message, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode said he was “deeply saddened by the passing on of Alhaji Atta."

According to him, Attah "was not just a close friend and political associate of my late father

during the days of the NPN but he was also the father of my first wife, Saratu, and the grandfather of my first child Folake."

However, Wash Pam's death was confirmed by his first son, Mr. Ganan Wash Pam and his Special Assistant, Mr. Williams Chieshe (Jnr) in Jos yesterday.

His Special Assistant said: “Baba has died, he has been battling with prostrate cancer for a while now.

Senator Pam was a prominent Berom elder from Foron in Barkin Ladi Local Government Area of Plateau State and is survived by two wives and 18 children.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 43

JTF destroys 9 illegal refineries

Police call for information on insurgents

BY GABRIEL ENOGHOLASE

BY SAMUEL OYADONGHA

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HE Joint Task Force, JTF, in the Niger Delta, has said that it destroyed nine illegal refineries and impounded a barge laden with suspected stolen crude in multiple raids on oil thieves.

A statement by Lt.-Col. Mustapha Anka, Media Coordinator of JTF, in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, yesterday, said that the raids were carried out within the last 10 days.

It stated that the barge, Dera 1 intercepted on Brass Creek, Brass Local Government Area of the state, was in the custody of JTF. The JTF spokesman said the vessel and crew would be handed over to the prosecuting agency after preliminary investigations were concluded.

In another raid, JTF troops destroyed eight illegal crude oil distillery camps on Tebidade Brass Agip pipeline in Gbamatoru Community, in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of Bayelsa State.

The statement said that five crude oil and Automated Gas Oil, AGO, dumps filed with suspected stolen crude and illegally refined AGO were destroyed during the operation.

Group flays kidnap of school girls in Borno

BY FESTUS AHON

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GHELLI—A GROUP, Urhobo Democratic Assembly, UDA, has described as ungodly and barbaric, the abduction of over 100 school girls in Borno State by suspected Boko Haram insurgents. It also condemned the recent Nyaya bomb blast in Abuja.

The group, in a statement by its National President, Chief Arthur Akpowowo, urged the Federal Government and security agencies to investigate the incidents and ensure that the perpetrators and their sponsors were brought to book.

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PRESENTATION: Chairman Peoples Democratic Party, Akwa Ibom State, Obong Paul Ekpo, presenting a communique of Akwa Ibom State PDP to the National Chairman, Dr. Ahmed Mu'azu, at Legacy House, Abuja.

Court orders Edo HIV/AIDS Control Agency to declare financial statements

BY EGUFE YAFUGBORHI

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ARRI—AN Edo State High Court sitting in Benin, has ordered the state Agency for Control of HIV/ AIDS, SACA, to make its financial statements available to a civil society group, Foundation for Good Governance and Social Change, FGGSC. The order of court was sequel to an application by FGGSC, brought pursuant to the Freedom of Information, FOI, Law by the group.

FGGSC had asked the court to compel the Edo SACA to disclose information on funding received including those from non-governmental organizations, donors and how the funds were being disbursed, to whom it is being made availa-

ble and other issues concerning transparency and accountability in the running of the SACA. The suit followed SACA’s refusal to honour the complainant’s letter asking the agency to furnish it (FGGSC) with the required information.

Edo State Solicitor General and Permanent Secretary of the state Ministry of Justice, Mr. Oluwole Iyamu who led the defence team, had argued that the plaintiff could not invoke the provisions of the FOI Law in forcing the demanded information from SACA on grounds that the law had not been domesticated in Edo State.

Prest Aigbokhan, lead counsel for FGGSC, countered, contending that it does not require any domestication be-

cause the Freedom of Information Law flows from the right to information, right to be heard and make public demands on public agencies for information guaranteed by the constitution.

Trial judge, Justice Idada Ikpomwen, who granted the prayers sought by the plaintiff, gave SACA 14 days to disclose all the information it had refused to divulge.

The court awarded N100,000 as cost in FGGSC favour.

“This is victory for Nigeria. It shows that laws are not just made, but made to be implemented and this one will be enforced,” Mr Austin Osakwe, Executive Director, FGGSC, said while reacting to the judgment.

Ex-militant leaders condemn call to scrap Amnesty programme, NDDC egates at the confab are in-

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UNDREDS of ex-militant leaders and their boys, yesterday, described as provocative, a statement from Northern delegates at the ongoing national conference calling for the scrapping of the amnesty programme, Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs and the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, as a way forward for the country.

The ex-warlords, who converged in Bomadi, Delta State, analysed the opinion paper circulated to various committee members at the confab, noting that it was obvious that the North does not have the interest of the South-South or care for the wellbeing of its people and environment.

Chairman, Phase II Amnesty Programme, Mr. Preye Ekpebide, who spoke to journalists, advised delegates from the South-East, South-West and South-South to reject the position of the North, noting that the South-South region was yet to realise the full potentials of the establishment of MNDA and NDDC. Ekpebide condemned the Northern delegates for not commending the Federal Government for granting amnesty to the ex-warlords, noting that the idea had paid off, making Nigeria the largest economy in Africa and one of the fastest growing economies of the world.

He said: “The Northern del-

sensitive to the plight of the oil producing states, who face the brunt oil pollution, devastation of the ecosystem and gas flaring that are hampering the lives of the inhabitants of these areas. The 13 percent derivation is inadequate and should be reviewed upward.

“If every individual who has land in the North hands over same to the Federal Government, then the SouthSouth will be willing not to lay claim to the oil resources on their land. In the history of revenue sharing in Nigeria, the North and the SouthWest in the 60s enjoyed 50/ 50 with the Federal Government."

ENIN—EDO State Police Commissioner, Mr. Folusho Adebanjo, has called on citizens in the state not sit on the fence, but should be watchdogs in their different communities, following the security challenges facing the country.

Meanwhile, no fewer than 33 suspected criminals were paraded before newsmen by the Command, amongst them were suspected armed robbers, rapists, child traffickers.

He enjoined the citizenry to give useful information to the Police and other security agents on activities of suspected criminals.

Adebanjo, who addressed newsmen in Benin, yesterday, noted that while the security agencies were doing their best to arrest the situation, “there is the need to create a robust partnership and synergy with members of the public, so that together we can achieve a high level of safety and security in the state.

“This we can do by taking more interest in what is happening in and around our immediate environment."

Eket monarch passes on

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HE Paramount Ruler of Eket, and Clan Head of Ekid Afaha, Edidem Nathaniel Oduonyi is dead, a family source said yesterday.

Chief Oduonyi ascended the throne as a paramount ruler of Eket in 2011 after the demise of Edidem Timkingiko Enodien, the former Eket traditional helmsman.

Meanwhile, consultation has already begun for the selection of the new Paramount Ruler of Eket.

Late Chief Oduonyi

44—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Bayelsa Speaker, Majority Leader commended

Delta teachers embark on strike over colleague's kidnap

BY FESTUS AHON

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GHELLI— WORRIED by the threat to the security and safety of teachers in Ughelli North Local Government Area, Delta State, occasioned by the kidnap of their colleague, Mrs Elizabeth Urevbu, the Nigeria Union of Teachers, NUT, in the area has embarked on a week warning strike, demanding the unconditional release of their colleague.

Mrs Elizabeth Urevbu was reportedly kidnapped five weeks ago at Awhire Secondary School, AwirheAgbarha-Otor during school hours alongside an engineer, whose identity was not known at press time.

The engineer, according to a dependable source who does not want his name in print, was released few days after the incident.

The union, in a communiqué at the end of its emergency meeting, said: “The branch council in session, equally frowned at

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E N A G O A — MANAGING Director and Chief Executive Officer of Anderson Zipamor Construction Company, AZCC, Engr. Anderson Zipamor has commended the Bayelsa State Speaker, Mr. Benson Konbowei and the Majority Leader, Pastor Akpe for their quality representation and legislative experience in the state House of Assembly.

Zipamor told newsmen in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital, that Konbowei has since his appointment as Speaker, pursued popular bills for the advancement of not only Bayelsans, but the Ijaws in general.

He added that the Speaker ’s wealth of experience in legislative duties has brought a new spirit amongst the Bayelsa lawmakers, who now have the interest of the people at heart.

Describing the Speaker as unassuming and detribalised, who he said was steering the state to the promised land through quality legislature, he applauded the harmony between the executive and the legislature.

He said the understanding between the two arms of government had brought rapid transformation to the state.

He said: “The Speaker, Konbowei and Governor Seriake Dickson are a good blend for the state.”

the way and manner the Delta State security operatives are handling the matter,

HE Anglican Diocese of Ughelli, Delta State, has appealed to political leaders to exercise tolerance in their quest for power, urging them to concentrate on stabilising democracy and achieving good governance.

In a communiqué at the end of the second session of the sixth synod, the Diocese said such a paradigm shift would gain the confidence and support of the electorate.

Held at St John’s Anglican

BY SIMON EBEGBULEM

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ENIN— HUNDREDS of youths of Edo State, yesterday, barricaded the gate of Benin Airport, protesting the non-appointment of a representative for the state on the Board of Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC. The youths, who described the failure to appoint a state representative to the board as unconstitutional and a setback for NDDC projects in the state, gave a 21-day ultimatum to the Federal Government to announce the appointment or activities of federal establishments in the state would be disrupted.

Meanwhile, the choice of a representative might be difficult as Governor Adams Oshiomhole; Chairman,

Church, Okpare-Olomu, Ughelli South Local Government Area of the state, the synod also lamented the high rate of unemployment.

The communiqué, signed by the Bishop, Rt. Revd Cyril Odutemu and the Synod Secretary, Clerical, Ven Diakeleho Edjere, commended the Federal Government on the same-sex marriage law, but condemned the abduction of young school girls in Borno State.

Board of Trustees of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Chief Tony Anenih and Senator Ehigie Uzamere, all submitted nominees for the position.

The protesting youths, led

by Mr. Iyamu Osaro, disrupted activities for over two hours at the airport.

Some of the placards they carried read: “Edo youths says no to marginalisation,”

“We want NDDC Commissioner,” “President Jonathan should appoint Edo NDDC Commissioner,” “Stop playing politics with our lives,” among others.

Osaro said: “We urge President Jonathan to give us Edo State NDDC commissioner within 21 days.

Failure to do so will result in the barricading of all federal parastatals in the state.”

Hotelier slams N1bn suit against Naval officers

BY AUSTIN OGWUDA

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SABA—FORMER Delta State House of Assembly member and proprietor of Kayriott Hotel and Suites Limited in Delta State, Mr. Efe Afe, has dragged some Naval officers, who allegedly invaded his hotel, before a Federal High Court sitting in Warri, Delta State, claiming N1 bilion as damages.

Afe is contending in the suit that during the invasion, property were damaged, while mobile police officers attached to the hotel and staff were assaulted.

The plaintiff, in the suit by his counsel, Mr. Oghenejabor Ikimi, is contending that “I know that the hotel lost the patronage of guests and customers for three weeks after the incident

and the claimant lost over N200 million as guests and customers avoided the hotel.”

Defendants in the suit are Mr. Ndubuisi Akalieze, Lieutenant Uche Akalieze, Lieutenant Ibrahim Yohana, Commodore Garba Mohammed, Chief of Naval Staff and Attorney General of the Federation.

The plaintiff want the court to declare that the unlawful damage of the claimant’s automated glass doors and shooting within the claimant’s premises on January 30 by Naval ratings under the control, supervision and command of the defendants at the instance of the 1st and 2nd defendants is unconstitutional, wrongful and ultra vires the powers of the defendants.

By Bartholomew Madukwe

PEOPLE SPEAK

08102479985

up effort towards securing the immediate release of Mrs Elizabeth,” adding that the strike was in obedience to the directive of the state wing of the union.

Protesting youths barricade Benin airport over appointment of NDDC rep

Politicians tasked on tolerance

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especially the Delta Police Command, five weeks into the kidnap of our colleague.”

The union urged security operatives in the state to step

(nwamad@yahoo.com)

On confab and security

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HE confab is laughable. It cannot do anything about insecurity. In which capacity would the confab solve the security situation in the country? We do not have the logistics to fight the insurgency and the confab is just there to talk.— Ms. Abia Bassey, Lawyer.

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HE security challenges have been here before the advent Boko Haram. Even after the confab started, bombings and killings still continued. Leaders with the fear of God, and not national conference, is what Nigerians need.— Mr. Koku Yomi, Lawyer.

Security is not an issue to be discussed by lay men. It is must be handled by experts home and abroad. All hands must be on deck to fashion out a better strategy. It is a new dimension and should be tackled specially.— Mr. Ranti Thomas, Journalist.

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HE confab is supposed to fashion out a better Nigeria for Nigerians. Among the delegates are various classes of persons and religions. So all we can do is hope for a better plan at the end of the day.— Mr. Chinedu C h i n w e o d a , Businessman.

I

T cannot solve the security challenges in the country. However, beyond solving security challenges is the issue of acceptability.

Will Nigerians accept whatever comes out from the ongoing national conference?— Mr. Peter Fowoyo, Journalist.

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must appreciate the fact that the House of Representatives has asked service chiefs to quit if they fail to produce the kidnapped school girls in Bornu State. That is one step to tackling security. But nobody thinks of resignation.—Mrs Maris Igwe, Businesswoman.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 45

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46 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

VISIT: From left, General and Neuro Surgeon, Kwara State Association of Nigeria, North American Chapter, KSANG, Elizabeth Rawls; Health Committee Chairman, KSANG, Wale Adeoye; Kwara State Governor, Dr. Abdulfatah Ahmed; Health Committee Member, KSANG, Ayo Ojulari; President, Moses Lake Medical Team, Lateef Olaniyan; Vice President, (finance), Moses Lake Medical Team, Irwin Frances, and others, during a courtesy visit to the governor by KSANG Medical Team, at Government House, Ilorin.

AWARDS: From left, former Executive Vice Chairman, Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, Engr. Ernest Ndukwe; guest lecturer & Managing Director, Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority, Mr. Uche Orji; Group COO, Globacom, Mr. Mohammed Jameel, and the Editor-in-Chief, Nigeria Communications Week, during Beacon of Information Communications Technology lecture and awards, at the Eko Hotels and Suite, Victoria Island, Lagos.

TAKE-OVER: From left, Chaminda Boteju, BDC Manager/Compliance Officer; Leon Shaier, Senior Travel Consultant, Retail Sales (UK & Europe); Andrea Fearon, Global BDM (UK & Europe); Keith Lloyd, Travel Manager (UK), and Aare Segun Phillips, Group Executive Chairman, Peacock Group of Companies, during the official take-over of Edwin Doran Travels by Peacock Group at Twickenham, Middlesex, UK.

AWARD: Managing Director, Noah’s Ark Communications Limited, Mr. Lanre Adisa, receiving Outstanding Young Agency of the Decade Award, from Mr. Jimi Awosika, Managing Director Insight Communications Limited, during the Marketing Edge Magazine 10th Anniversary and Award ceremony.

UNVEILING: South African musical duo, Theo Kgosinkwe and Nhlanhla Nciza Mafikizolo, a.k.a Mafikizolo, performing, during the unveiling of MTN’s new brand ambassadors, and premiere of a collaboration between Mafikizolo and Davido, in Ikoyi, Lagos.

VISIT: From left, Mrs. Isedua Obiodiaka, Project Manager, Customer Service Practitioners Association, CUSPA; Mr. Ernest Orji, Chairman, Southern Sun Hotels, Ikoyi, and Mrs. Uloma Umeano, President of CUSPA, during a sensitisation visit by CUSPA Executives to Southern Sun Hotels, in Lagos.

PRESENTATION: From left, Rhema Chapel International Church Pastor, Abiola Ajadi; Managing Director, Ifako-Ijaiye General Hospital, Dr. Ibironke Sodeinde; Pastor' wife, Folake Ajadi, and President, Chrisgate International, Christopher Alabi, during the presentation of Neonate Phototherapy Equipment, to Ifako-Ijaiye General Hospital, in Lagos.

CLOSING: From left, Director, Centre for Research in Leadership and Ethics, Lagos Business School, Dr. Franca Ovadje; Principal, African Capital Alliance, ACA, Mr. Segun Adebanji; President, VIMP Class of 2014, Ojutayo Lanre; Director, Programmes and Operations, Junior Achievement Nigeria, JAN, Mrs. Efe Adefulu, and Regional Programmes WEDDING: From left, Engr. Tajudeen Lawal, D. Segun Demuren; Ms. Victoria Otubu (who just got married); Professor Joseph Otubu, and Dr. Israel Akinadewo, Coordinator, JAN, Mr. Adegbola Abiodun, during the closing ceremony of Venture in Management Programme,ViMP, seminar, sponsored by ACA foundation, in Lagos. at the wedding ceremony of Ms. Victoria Otubu, in Lagos.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 47

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V anguard Vanguard anguard,, THURSDAY, MAY 2 , 2014 — 51

Protests greet May Day globally

BY EMEKA AGINAM, with agency report

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ENS of thousands of people yesterday took to the streets around the world to mark International Labour Day, including in Turkey, Hong Kong, Moscow, Jakarta, Nigeria among others.

In Istanbul, police yesterday dispersed hundreds of protesters who tried to defy a ban on demonstrations on the city’s Taksim Square on the anniversary of clashes that prompted a nationwide protest movement.

After giving a final warning, hundreds of riot police backed up by watercannon moved in on protesters in the Besiktas district as they tried to breach the barricades leading up to the symbolic square, an AFP reporter said yesterday.

Rallies also took place across Asia, including in Hong Kong, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Taipei and Seoul, where the annual protest was expected to take a sombre tone in the wake of the South Korean ferry disaster.

In Nigeria for instance, workers and activists in different states across the nation used the occasion to protest unfair labor practices and worsening condition of living as well as insecurity in the country among other issues.

Russian workers, meanwhile, paraded on Red Square for the first time since 1991 - the latest Soviet tradition to be revived as a wave of patriotism sweeps the country.

May Day was a key date in the Soviet calendar, with

elaborate celebrations involving ranks of marching athletes, soldiers and workers on the Moscow square, but in recent years the annual demonstrations have been relegated to a city highway.

In Cambodia, security forces armed with sticks and batons forcibly dispersed dozens of May Day protesters near Phnom Penh’s Freedom Park, according to an AFP photographer. Several people were beaten.

“We are sad that we could not mark May Day properly. Workers’ rights have been thwarted,” said Ath Thorn, president of the Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers Democratic Union.

Tens of thousands of Moroccans also demonstrated for higher minimum wages.

The government on Wednesday announced a 10 percent hike in the private sector monthly minimum wage from $287 and an increase in the public sector monthly minimum wage to $369, but the country’s labour organisaitons issued a joint statement, saying the changes were not enough.

Indonesian police said about 33,000 workers were set to rally across the capital Jakarta.

Unions said up to two million workers would be out in force to demand better working conditions in Southeast Asia’s most populous nation, although in previous years the numbers have come in much lower than such forecasts.

“Demonstrations will be held nationwide but the biggest will be in Jakarta, with around 33,000 workers,” Rikwanto, police

Missing flight MH370: Relatives told to return home

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ALAYSIA Airlines has asked relatives of passengers on board flight MH370 to leave the hotel accommodation it is providing and return to their homes.

It is closing the family assistance centres set up after the plane vanished on 8 March with 239 people on board.

The airline promised to keep relatives up to date on the search operation.

Meanwhile, a report

by Malaysia’s transport ministry has recommended the introduction of

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real-time tracking of commercial air transport.

The ministry’s air accident investigation bureau said there had now been two occasions over the past five years when large passenger planes had gone missing and their last position was not accurately known MH370 and Air France Flight 447 in 2009.

“This uncertainty resulted in significant difficulty in locating the aircraft in a timely manner,” the report noted.

spokesman, told AFP, adding that 18,000 police officers would be out on the streets.

He said workers were planning further rallies on Friday.

In Hong Kong, union organisers said some 5,000 people were set to join their march from the city’s Victoria Park to government headquarters, with better working hours top of the agenda.

In Seoul around 5,000

Istanbul’s Taksim Square was the scene of new protests yesterday workers were expected to rally outside Seoul railway station in the afternoon but this year’s traditional May Day trade union gathering

has been overshadowed by the ferry disaster that has claimed the lives of hundreds of people, many of them school children.

The workers were to march to City Hall and pay their respects to the victims of the April 16 disaster at a temporary memorial.

52 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

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2014 WORKERS DAY CELEBRATION ACROSS THE NATION

Pelumi Olaide-Gold delivers a speech on abducted girls of Chibok in Borno State, during the 2014 Workers Day celebration in Onikan, Stadium, Lagos, yesterday. Photo: Bunmi Azeez

Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan of Delta State (left) taking salute during the May Day celebration in Asaba. Photo: Henry Unini

Agriculture and Allied Employees Union of Nigeria during the celebration at MKO Abiola Stadium, Kuto, Abeokuta. Photo: WUMI AKINOLA.

From left: Mr. Chidi Ezeoke, Head of Service, Anambra State; Governor Willie Obiano of Anambra State and Prof. Joe Asike, Chief of Staff at the May Day celebration in Awka.

54—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 VANGUARD'S EXCLUSIVE BOOK SERIALS Zik, Ndi-Igbo and their southern neighbours:

Charting a new political direction for Nigeria (4)

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OOTS of Igbo-Yoruba conflict in Nigerian politics The first point to be noted is that the appearance of ethnic conflict in Nigerian national politics especially as it relates to the Igbo and the Yoruba actually masked a more complex struggle between interests that were non-ethnic in nature.

In this study, it will be shown that although the political mechanics of anti-colonial nationalism first ignited tension and defined the parameters of Azikiwe’s face-off with the leadership of the Nigerian Youth Movement (NYM), in the end, class and personal interests became the dominant factor that deepened that face-off and have foisted the persistent Igbo-Yoruba conflict in Nigerian politics.

Before I delve into the issue or origins of the said Igbo-Yoruba conflict, I would like us to ponder over these general observations about politics and its nature; 1. In every clime, political leaders exercise authority and dispense patronage to build support for themselves and discourage or repress opposition.

2. In liberal democratic theory, the interests of a class are represented in different ways by rival political parties. Conversely, every party represents a variety of class interests and hence its membership will be drawn from different classes.

Social deference 3. Party leaders and many of those who benefit from the party’s activities usually become part of a privileged class that enjoy social deference, power, and wealth regardless of the party’s official doctrine and programme.

4. Many people who espouse or practice ethnic solidarity in politics are not traditionalistic and may adopt ethnic-based strategies in their pursuit of personal and class-based goals.

5. Finally, while class interests may be asserted by electoral means, party competition, as such, should not be mistaken for class struggle—See, R. L. Sklar, Op cit.

For a fuller appreciation of the above assertion and its applicability in the analysis of the roots of Igbo-Yoruba conflict in Nigerian politics, let us go a little way back to historical developments in Nigerian politics starting from the time of Herbert Macaulay.

The era of the NNDP: Herbert Macaulay founded the Nigerian

•Herbert Macaulay: Founder of the NNDP

National Democratic Party (NNDP) on June 24, 1923. The party was basically for the propagation and defence of the interests of the residents of Lagos notwithstanding its “Nigerian” appellation.

The NNDP was until 1938 the major force in Lagos political life.

Its candidates were victorious in the Legislative Council elections of 1923, 1928 and 1933, always winning all the three legislative seats allocated to Lagos.

Educated elements The chief sources of Macaulay’s strength were his newspaper, the Lagos Daily News; the party; the support of the highly organised Lagos market-women, the House of Docemo and its supporters; and his unique ability to fire the imagination of the semi-literate and illiterate masses of Lagos.

Macaulay was reputed to be ruthless in vilifying his opponents in his paper and on the rostrum. For nearly four decades he did more than any other person to divide and polarise the educated elements of Lagos leaving deep and unhealed wounds that definitely influenced later developments within the nationalist movement.

But whatever his motivations for the different actions and political battles he fought, he consistently espoused and defended the cause of Africans and was therefore regarded as a great nationalist.

Two currents of opposition to Macaulay and the NNDP in the 1920s are discernible. One was a group of conservatives led by Dr J K Randle which revived the Peoples Union, a political association that was formed in 1908 and became defunct in 1916.

The Peoples Union expired after the death of its founder, J K Randle, in 1928. Ernest Ikoli was its last secretary. The other was a

group of young progressives who organised the Union of Young Nigerians in 1923. It was led by Ayo Williams, Dr J C Vaughn and Ernest Ikoli. Although the party expired after only five years, it may be regarded as the forebear of the Nigerian Youth Movement (NYM).

The NYM era: In 1934 however, leading young critics notably, Ernest Ikoli, Samuel Akinsanya, H O Davies and Dr J C Vaughn—formed the Lagos Youth Movement, which in 1936 changed its name to Nigerian Youth Movement (NYM) upon the advice of the editor of the Lagos Comet. The highly intellectual H O Davies became its General Secretary (19371941). According to Coleman, apart from occasional outspoken criticism of government policy by individual members, the policy of the movement was moderate: Long live our Prince and Long Live their majesties. The Nigerian Youth Movement will never fail to cooperate with . . . the governor. (Coleman, Nigeria, p.218)

Newspaper editor In 1937 the NYM was strengthened by the return of Nnamdi Azikiwe, after nine years sojourn in the United States and three years as a newspaper editor in the Gold Coast. In the same year, H O Davies also returned from overseas studies in England and re-joined the organisation. With the hyperactivity of these two, NYM became within the next three years the first Nigeria-wide multiethnic political organisation in Nigerian history. Events during these three crucial years however laid bare certain underlying factors which were to shape the subsequent course of nationalist movement in Nigeria.

Coleman writes, during the fifteen-year period 1934-1949,

Nnamdi Azikiwe was undoubtedly the most important and celebrated nationalist leader on the West Coast of Africa, if not in all tropical Africa. To the outside world “Zikism” and African nationalism appeared to be synonymous. (Coleman, op. cit., p. 220) A brief review of Azikiwe’s background and the influences that shaped his ideas is essential.

Azikiwe was born in Zungeru in northern Nigeria in 1904, the son of an Ibo clerk in the Nigerian regiment.

He attended mission schools in Onitsha, Calabar and Lagos and lived in Accra briefly before sailing for America in 1925 for further studies. “Azikiwe spent his first seven years in America at segregated Negro colleges in the Southern atmosphere of discrimination and caste.

Profound changes were occurring in the character of protest activity among American Negroes; the growth of a militant press, the emergence of a ‘Negro Renaissance’ with a new emphasis upon the rediscovery of Africa, the ‘Black Nationalism’ of Garveyism . . . As a result of his experiences in the United States . . . Azikiwe was determined to be a leader, with the West Coast of Africa as his arena, in the world-wide struggle to emancipate the Negro race”.

(Coleman,op. cit., p. 222) His first two books, Liberia in World Politics and Renascent Africa, were written with the basic preconception that the struggle of the future was going to be racial, between black and white.

,

Yesterday, we presented in detail how Awo stopped Zik from going to the Central Legislature via the Western Region. Today, we publish the origins of Igbo-Yoruba conflict in Nigerian politics and linkages to the NNDP, NYM and NCNC. Read on...

largest tribes of Nigeria, the Igbo, which until then had had no spokesman. Azikiwe brought three new elements to Nigeria and the Nigerian Youth Movement: militant racial consciousness; an expanding sensationalist press; and a large number of educated Nigerians that were previously politically un-mobilised or excluded. With H O Davies, they enlivened the NYM. In the 1938 elections, the NYM defeated the NNDP, winning all the three seats in the Legislative Council as well as those of the Lagos Town Council.

Restrictive property franchise But it should be noted that the results did not reflect popular opinion because of the restrictive property franchise used in compiling the voters’ list. Only 792 persons voted in the elections, but the result did reflect the political inclinations of the upper strata of the Westernised Lagos elite.

However, because the old established leaders of the movement were conservatives and moderates, and were more inclined to ‘cooperating’ with the colonial government of the day

The appearance of ethnic conflict in Nigerian national politics especially as it relates to the Igbo and the Yoruba actually masked a more complex struggle between interests that were non-ethnic in nature

Given this background Zik tended to think and act along Universalist and racial lines.

He was just as much at home in Accra, Lagos, or Onitsha. The sensationalism and pugnacity of American yellow journalism also helped shape his outlook and journalistic style, particularly the obsessive race-consciousness of American Negro newspapers. In his Renascent Africa, Zik advised that “there is no better means to arouse African peoples than that of the power of the pen and of the tongue”.

Azikiwe arrived Nigeria in time to carry on the traditions of Jackson and Solanke (two strong ideological firebrands and activists of bygone era). And he came properly equipped for the task. Thus when he arrived, he found waiting not only a large number of young Yorubas and non-Yoruba Lagosians who were dissatisfied with the conservatism and moderation of their traditional Lagosian leadership, but also all the educated elements of one of the

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to effect ‘mundane’ reforms for the betterment of the society at large as well as creating lucrative opportunities for its members and leadership, they did not quite welcome Azikiwe’s militant and uncompromising tactics. They certainly found Azikiwe’s extremely impetuous, highly personalised militant attitude and incessant attacks on the British unpalatable.

How NYM leadership saw Zik: The NYM leadership probably saw Zik as a radical and feared that he could put all of them into trouble with the British or colonial authorities or perhaps frustrate their individual and class interests that were partly dependent on the goodwill of the colonial government. They therefore began to distance themselves from Zik. The first outward sign of this resolve was the NYM’s tactical decision to distance itself from Azikiwe’s West African Pilot newspaper, which was the main organ of Zik’s apparently worrisome attacks. Although Azikiwe’s Pilot Continues on page 55

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—55

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Charting a new political direction for Nigeria (4) Continues from page 54

Zik resigns from NYM Shortly afterwards, Zik resigned from the executive committee of the NYM citing preoccupation with business affairs. In February, 1941, the Legislative Council seat held by Dr Kofo Abayomi, then president of the NYM, became vacant following his resignation from the Council and ultimate appointment to the governor’s Executive Council.

Abayomi’s resignation precipitated within the movement’s leadership - and ultimately within the membership - a struggle over the selection of his successor. The principal contestants for the office were Ernest Ikoli (Ijaw) and Samuel Akinsanya (Ijebu Yoruba).

The selection of Ikoli by the leadership led to allegations of intra-tribal discrimination.

Akinsanya and Azikiwe charged that the former (Akinsanya) had been rejected only because the dominant group of Lagos Yorubas who formed the bulk of the movement’s leadership would not want an Ijebu Yoruba.

This was how the ‘Ijebu ke’ C M Y K

•Azikiwe: Succeeded Macaulay as NCNC president

syndrome or slogan was coined and used to attack those that rejected Akinsanya.

Richard L. Sklar had this to say of the episode: Certainly there had been a tendency on the part of the Lagos elite to look down at their brethren from the provinces, a kind of snobbishness that elicited resentment.

But Ikoli was an Ijaw, not a Lagos Yoruba, and his candidature was supported by another prominent Ijebu Yoruba, Obafemi Awolowo, then secretary of the Ibadan branch of the NYM and assistant (to Akinsanya) of the Motor Transport Union. Adamantly Azikiwe and Akinsanya insisted that anti-Ijebu prejudice was the underlying motive at play, and they resigned from the movement. (Sklar, op. cit., p. 54) A press war between the West African Pilot and the Daily Service ensued. Akinsanya contested against Ikoli as an Independent, with Azikiwe’s backing, and lost. Of course you can see that the old quarrel between Ikoli and the other leaders of the movement on one hand and Azikiwe on the other was taking a deeper shape and must have contributed to Azikiwe’s response.

Tribal tension James S. Coleman offered a more detailed insight. His words: The Akinsanya crisis was the first major manifestation of a tribal tension that affected all subsequent efforts to achieve unity [in the NYM]. From the beginning the mass membership of the Youth Movement was predominantly Yoruba in origin.

Because of certain historical factors many Yorubas were prejudiced against the Ijebu Yoruba. The Ijebu had never come completely under the old Yoruba kingdom at Oyo. During most of the nineteenth century the Ijebu controlled the main trade routes into the interior, and they had acquired the reputation of being the Jews of Yorubaland.

•Awolowo: Founded Action Group

Situated as they were on the edge of the Lagos Lagoon, they had supplied most of the middlemen in the slave traffic. Yorubas from Oyo, Ibadan, and the Egba kingdom tended to look down upon or dislike the Ijebu.

Akinsanya, an Ijebu, felt that he had been discriminated against on the basis of this prejudice when Ikoli won over him. It mattered little that Ikoli was an Ijaw. It is not known whether Azikiwe quit the movement because of intertribal antagonisms, or because he was dissatisfied with his role.

(Coleman, op. cit., pp. 227-228)

Complete break Well, I personally think that Azikiwe’s resignation must have been informed by the later reason. He had resigned from the executive committee in 1939, I imagine, because his aggressive militant approach in the fight against colonialism was frowned at by the NYM leadership. This was a deep matter that suggested very serious ferment as would exist when strange bedfellows cohabitate. His remaining a member of the movement at the time meant that he only adopted a wait-and see attitude. His next line of action no doubt would depend on how the leadership’s attitude to his style, tactics and overall anticolonial philosophy developed.

If he perceived a change or a more accommodating attitude from the leadership, he would have stayed. But this never happened nor did Zik want to mellow down and become another middle roader in order to fit in. A complete break with the group was therefore inevitable, if Zik was to continue the anti-colonial struggle in his own way. Otherwise, he risked being sacked from the group for ‘incompatible or anti-NYM’ stance. Of course, if the leadership began to imbibe his methods, even after his resignation, a rapprochement would or could happen. And this

was why Zik continued to parley with the NYM leadership all through the years, even after the formation of the NCNC, as you would see below. I think the Akinsanya crisis only served as the last straw in Azikiwe’s decision to quit the Nigerian Youth Movement.

Sklar was right when he wrote thus: It is not at all likely that a nomination controversy alone could have produced as grave a consequence as actually followed. The NYM was a turbulent party and controversy among the leadership was nothing new. Thus Dr K. A. Abayomi, President of the Youth Movement after its reconstruction in 1938, was replaced a year later and is reported to have resigned from the Legislative Council partly as a result of having fallen from favour within the party. In 1941 the split might easily have been averted since the death of

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newspaper espoused the cause of the Nigerian Youth Movement (with obvious embarrassing radical and militant colouring from Zik) the NYM leaders decided to publish an official organ. In June 1938, they launched the Daily Service newspaper, advertised as “the official journal of the Nigerian Youth Movement”, with Ernest Ikoli, Vice President of NYM and acknowledged dean of Nigerian journalism, as publisher and editor, and H O Davies as business manager.

From that moment Azikiwe’s enthusiasm for the movement reportedly cooled. The action was perhaps a confirmation to Zik that his contributions and apparent attempt to alter the vision of the NYM, however devised, were not appreciated or welcome to the NYM leadership.

Azikiwe’s critics alleged that he bitterly resented the competition from the Daily Service.

But the Daily Service was not the only newspaper competing with the West African Pilot; there were others. In an editorial, according to Coleman, Ernest Ikoli rejected the suggestion and accused Azikiwe of being a megalomaniac. That accusation in itself was a confirmation that Ikoli and his peers in the organisation were not exactly well disposed to Azikiwe and his contributions in the movement; in fact that they must have regarded him as an upstart.

In any event, you can well imagine the fierce counter-attack that must have come from Azikiwe’s West African Pilot!

Thus began a breach within the NYM which was never successfully closed.

joined the governor’s Executive Council in 1943; H O Davies, the General Secretary withdrew to serve as a government marketing officer; Akinsanya went home to his village and became the Odemo of Ishara, a chief; and others drifted away.

The one exception to the process of disintegration of the movement was a development in the period 1941-1944 in Ibadan.

Under the leadership of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, then an Ijebu cocoa trader, a group of traders and intellectuals made efforts to reform the movement.

Indeed, Awolowo had become wary of the lethargy in the NYM during this period. He organised two Western Regional conferences of the NYM between 1942 and 1944 in Ibadan, where he was based, to rejuvenate the organisation.

Provisional committee According to Coleman, the last of the conferences which held before Awolowo’s departure for London for further studies passed a resolution of no confidence in the Lagos executive of the movement, and established a provisional committee to conduct the affairs of the movement during the interim period before the planned All-Nigeria

Azikiwe’s break with the NYM leadership set the stage for the political fusion of the Igbo, southern minority elements and the Yoruba masses of Lagos, which took organisational form in 1944.

Olayinka Alakija had created a second vacancy in the Legislative Council that was contested that same year. Obafemi Awolowo has [in his The Autobiography of Chief Obafemi Awolowo (1960)] reviewed the controversy from a partisan standpoint and attributed the fall of the NYM mainly to the tactics of Nnamdi Azikiwe. (Op. cit., p. 54f) In any event, Azikiwe’s break with the NYM leadership set the stage for the political fusion of the Igbo, southern minority elements and the Yoruba masses of Lagos, which took organisational form in 1944.

Post-Akinsanya crisis and the emergence of the NCNC: Shortly after the Ikoli-Akinsanya episode of 1941, most of the leaders of the NYM became disenchanted or distracted by war-time changes and turned to other things. Azikiwe had resigned, of course. Dr Abayomi

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Representative Council scheduled to hold in June 1944.

Before the council could meet however, Awolowo left for further studies in England, and the movement for reform and rejuvenation of the NYM which he started was largely abandoned.

It should be noted however that until 1938, although the various political organisations that emerged frequently referred to “Nigeria” in their names and stated objectives, their activities hardly went beyond Lagos. But between the period 1938-1941 when H O Davies and Azikiwe were active in the NYM, branches were established in Ibadan, Ijebu-Ode, Warri and Benin City in the west; Aba, Enugu, Port Harcourt and Calabar in the east; and among southern expatriate groups in Jos, Kaduna, Zaria and Kano in the north.

56 — V anguard, FRID AY, MA Y 2, 2014 Vanguard, FRIDA MAY

Private jets: House probe, and matters arising

By LAWANI MIKAIRU

T

HE recent upsurge in the acquisition of private jets by individuals and government officials has attracted the attention of Nigerians with the ongoing probe by the House of Representatives of the alleged unofficial use of chartered planes by the Petroleum Minister,Mrs Diezannai Alison-Madueke.

Mrs Madueke is alleged to have “expended more than N10 billion on charter and maintenance of a Challenger 850 aircraft.” Findings revealed that more than 42 private jets land at the Muritala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, everyday.

One report said “private jets acquisition has cost wealthy

Nigerians more than one trillion naira in five years. The luxury trend actually rose by 650 per cent between 2007 and 2012. This has increased the rate of private jet acquisition from 20 in 2007 to more than 150 in 2012 which has placed Nigeria and China as the fastest growing private jets markets in the world.”

The Regional Vice-President, Sales, Middle East, Africa and Turkey, Bombardier Business Aircraft, the Canada-based aircraft manufacturing firm, Mr. Khadar Mattar, who spoke on the sidelines of Nigerian Economic Summit organised by London-based Economist in Lagos was quoted as saying that his company delivered 88 out of the 138 aircraft currently flying in Nigeria.

According to Mattar “In Nigeria, we are looking at another 60 to 70 new business aircraft within the next five years; that is about 10 airplanes a year. There are 138 airplanes in Nigeria at the moment.

Bombardier is currently leading the market in Nigeria and Africa. Twelve new ones should be delivered this year.

Medium and large size private jets “Most medium-size and large-size private jets currently go for between $30m and $65m. Taking an average price of $40m per aircraft, the 12 new private jets slated for delivery in Nigeria this year are expected to cost about $480m (N76.8bn).” The Bombardier

senior official also said he expected the 138 private jets currently in the country to double to 276 in the next 10 years because of the manner the business aircraft market was growing in Nigeria.

Former Governor of Anambra State, Peter Obi, was quoted as saying during the opening ceremony of the Second Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria held in Umuahia in September 2012, “that more than 123 private jets were registered in the country in that year alone.”

According to Adeniyi Kolawole, Secretary, Concerned Citizens of Nigeria “ Some of the most modern jets are owned by serving and former governors, even governors of poor states that hardly afford to pay the salaries of their workers.

Something is definitely wrong with our value system. It is sad that this is happening in a country where more than 70 per cent of the people live below poverty line.”

He further said, “ But that is not all, several Nigerians, especially those in public offices, have equally resorted to the hiring of private jets for regular trips within Nigeria and around the world often at astounding costs to the country.

According to findings by Transparency Action Group, those who regularly hire private jets include private and government officials.”

It is interesting that some members of the House are also flying chartered jets regularly.

And it is believed that this may prevent the House from carrying out a holistic probe of the alleged N10 billion the Petroleum Minister is said to have expended on the maintenance of the chartered plane.

It will be recalled that the House of Representatives has been probing the Petroleum Minister over an allegation that she “has expended over N10 billion on charter and maintenance of a Challenger 850 aircraft.”

However, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, has denied the existence of a chartered aircraft for exclusive use of the Minister .

The former NNPC Acting Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Dr. Omar Farouk Ibrahim, had in a statement said that “contrary to the information being peddled is some quarters, Mrs. AlisonMadueke has not chartered any aircraft for her personal use or the use of her family.” Dr. Ibrahim also insisted that the Corporation is empowered to own or charter airplane to ensure prompt discharge of its activities in line with global best practice He said, “NNPC, however, notes that in consonance with the legal instrument which establishes the Corporation as a commercial entity to engage in the oil and gas sector, the NNPC in course of discharging its statutory and commercial functions engages third parties for the provision of services outside of its core business.”

What observers are saying is: If the House must probe the minister, the probe must be extended to all government officials who are using public money to take chartered flights instead of going on scheduled commercial flights which are cheaper.

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—57

AMAKA IGWE:

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Igbo film makers declare one week mourning •as Gov. Sullivan Chime condoles family

By BENJAMIN NJOKU

F

ILM makers from the eastern part of the country under the aegis of Ohanaeze Ndigbo Nollywood, ONN, yesterday, declared one-week to mourn the demise of a frontline film producer and director, Amaka Igwe who died on Monday night at the age of 51.

Mrs Igwe who produced the popular TV series, ‘Checkmate’ and ‘Fuji House of Commotion’ passed on in Enugu, Enugu State on Monday following an asthma attack.

In a statement by its president, Nze Harris Chuma, the body directed its members to observe a week mourning period in honour of the deceased which commenced since Wednesday, April 29, and is expected to end on May 6, 2014.

According to Nze Chuma, “Amaka Igwe was instrumental to the success of Nollywood brand that we are feeding on. From the fillers I have gotten so far, film makers from the Igbo extraction are complying with the directive, especially those of them who are based in Port Harcourt, Enugu and Asaba.”

Film producers and directors In the same vein, Governor Sullivan Chime of Enugu State, yesterday, expressed shock at the sudden demise of one Nigeria’s best known film producers and directors.

The Governor, in a statement signed by his Chief Press Secretary Chukwudi Achife, described the late Mrs Igwe as an icon and pacesetter in the Nigerian movie industry whose pioneering works had inspired many and brought glory to the nation.

He said, her death at the prime age of 51, will leave a huge vacuum in the industry where she had excelled with uncommon vigour, creativity and diligence.

Chime extended his sympathies to the deceased family and the nation’s entertainment community asking them to take solace in the enduring legacies that she left behind.

58—Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

How voluntary blood donation saved my life — Pharmacist

BY SOLA OGUNDIPE

V

ERA Nwanze woke up one morning in 2007, feeling rather unwell. She had gone to bed hale and hearty the previous night, but the next morning, there was a sharp, throbbing pain in her lower abdomen. Instinctively, she knew something was wrong.

“I was feeling dizzy, feverish, and sweating profusely,” she told Good Health Weekly.

Although Vera, a pharmacist, and today, the Country Group Head, Novartis Pharma Services, English West Africa, did not know it at that time, her condition was an emergency.

Pregnancy: “I was pregnant but didn’t know it. It was my 5th pregnancy. Few days earlier, I felt weak. I had called in sick and my boss gave me the day off. My doctor gave me pain medication and I also took antibiotics. But I felt no relief. By the time my husband decided to take me to the hospital, I could no longer stand or move my arms and legs. My limbs were heavy; my stomach was slightely swollen and painful to the touch.”

nor. We mark every April 26 to commemorate the merger in April 1996 of Ciba-Geigy and Sandoz to form Novartis Pharma. The event this year coincided with World Malaria Day. This year, we decided to go on a blood donation drive because of the need to have availability and sustainability of blood banks in Nigeria.

Blood is vital to the body. The target is to save 120 lives through voluntary blood donation of 120 units of blood.

Blood keeps the body alive.”

All Novartis staff joined in the initiative to donate blood in Nigeria across major cities, and in health institutions in Ghana as well, similar activity held.

The ultimate message from the donation drive was to encourage the community to regularly be part of the initiative and to donate blood voluntarily to enable hospitals have a sustainable blood bank, so that when patients need blood, it will be readily available to save lives.

Non-availability of safe blood has long been identified as one of the major challenges of the nation’s healthcare system.

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If there was no blood to save my life at that point, I would have been dead

Although Vera and her spouse are medically inclined, could not interpret what was happening. On arrival at the hospital, she had gone all frail.

“All my blood had leaked into my stomach, and I was diagnosed with ectopic pregnancy.

More than three quarters of my blood had drained out of my body. But not a drop leaked out. I was lapsing in and out of consciousness.” Vera was rushed into the operating theatre and immediately transfused with four pints of blood to keep her alive.

Safe blood: “If not for availability of safe blood, I would not be here today. Assuming there was no blood to save my life at that point, I would have been dead,” she recounted.

Vera who related her personal experience last week at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, LUTH, Idi-Araba, Lagos, during the Novartis Pharma Community Partnership Day, said the experience has forever changed her perception about the essence of voluntary blood donation.

“It was one of the motivating factors that compelled me to become a voluntary blood do-

C M Y K

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Lamenting the challenge of obtaining safe blood in hospitals in the country, Head, Haematology and Blood Transfusion, LUTH, Professor Sulaiman Akanmu, said the whole idea is to encourage regular volunteer blood donation.

No donors, no blood: “The way we do it in Nigeria is not acceptable. We do not have volunteer blood donors or family replacement donors. Families refuse blood donation, yet if there are no blood donors, there will be no blood to transfuse. In emergencies, there is no emergency greater than loss of blood.

“When a patient is losing blood, that person’s life can be measured in minutes. When people get involved in a ghastly road accident, many will bleed to death at the spot.

A number will get Good Samaritans to take them to the hospital where several more will also expire during transportation and at the hospital.

“What is painful, usually, are those lives that are lost when they have been taken to the hospital. Those lives get lost because the blood bank cannot salvage them since blood is not

• A donor during the voluntary blood donation drive by Novartis Pharma at the LUTH last week.

always there. And there is nothing you can do when an individual is rapidly losing blood other than to replace what is lost. So we need regular blood donation.”

Lamenting that this is one of the major issues in healthcare delivery today, Akanmu said volunteering to donate blood is relevant because it is going to save a lot •Pharm Vera Nwanze, Country Group Head, Novartis Pharma Services, English West Africa, being checked before donating blood during the exercise. of lives.

He related an emergency scenario of blood. is no transfusion, therefore it in which a pregnant woman The World Health Organisa- behoves on those of us in the could bleed into the space betion, WHO, recommends that 5 transfusion mechanism practween the placenta and the percent of the population of a tice to ensure the welfare and uterine wall. community must have donated safety of the blood donor. blood at least once in a year, or Donor safety: Donor safety Serious 10 percent of the eligible blood has been designed in such a emergency donors of that population, must way that it is safe. To donate have donated blood at least blood, a person must have suf“An obstetrician calls it abrup- once in a year. Estimates say ficient blood and be in good tio placenta; it is an internal in Nigeria, 7-8 million litres of health. A voluntary donor, bleeding, but requires that par- blood should be collected per Otshemona, who donated for ticular obstetrician who is annum. the first time described the exhighly suspicious to observe “I congratulate Novartis au- perience as a noble way of givthat the uterus and placenta thorities on this decision. This ing back to society.” I’m glad have separated. This is a very is indeed the way to go if we I’m giving out my blood to serious emergency. A woman want to impact on health indi- someone who will need it. in this situation requires blood ces in Nigeria. The most im- When you think about the soul transfusion otherwise the portant person in transfusion you are going to save it is a woman would bleed to death. mechanism is the blood donor. thing of joy.

“This is one of the reasons we If there is no blood donor, that insist that all husbands of pregnant women must donate blood in anticipation of complications during the pregnancy. Luckily, 90-95 percent of women do not have this complication. But the 5-10 percent that will require transfusion services and whose life span is hanging in the balance, except under the watchful eyes of the competent obstetrician and in a hospital setting where blood is readily available.”

Voluntary donation: A survey of the total blood collected in hospitals nationwide conducted by the Federal Ministry of Health in 2005-2007 showed that Nigerian hospitals collected 1.2-1.3 million units

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014—59

Bamidele is too ambitious — Adebayo

BY EMMANUEL AZIKEN, POLITICAL EDITOR

F

ORMER governor of Ekiti State, Otunba Niyi Adebayo has described the Labour Party candidate, Mr. Opeyemi Bamidele as too ambitious and a man who should not be trusted with power.

Adebayo who is from Iyin Ekiti, the base of Bamidele spoke at a campaign rally for Dr. Kayode Fayemi when the Fayemi campaign carnival touched ground in the town.

Adebayo told the home crowd that it would be a mistake to vote for Bamidele whose aspiration he said does not represent the collective will of the people.

“I am the one who introduced my brother Opeyemi to you and appealed to you to vote for him when he wanted to become a legislator. But less than three months after he was elected into the House of Representatives, he came to tell me he wanted to become governor.

“I sat him down and told him the futility of his aspiration. Because one, he has not done anything to justify the confidence of the people that put him in the House. Two, I told him Iyin Ekiti where we both come from had less than ten years ago produced a governor that Ekiti people will see us (Iyin Ekiti) as greedy and unreasonable

people if we now want to produce another governor while other towns have yet to do so.

“I then advised him to delay his aspiration till the time it would be okay for an Iyin man to come out.

But he refused and said he must be governor at all cost and that he could do it alone with or without the support of the people.

“Iyin Ekiti has benefited tremendously from the Fayemi administration in terms of people-oriented projects and number of appointments. Iyin alone has about three commissioners and other strategic appointments under Fayemi, and given the quality of work he is doing, I want you to vote massively for Fayemi,” Adebayo added.

HILE former Gover nor Adebayo is clearly pushing for his party man, Fayemi, the inclinations of former Governor Segun Oni remains in the realm of speculation.

Engr. Oni’s inclinations nonetheless, local government chairmen who served under his administration, yesterday came out to throw support for the PDP candidate, Ayo Fayose.

Led by Chief Obafemi Falayi, the former council chairmen said that their motive for pledging their support was for the PDP to win, stressing that their prayer was for the best candidate to win to push out the Fayemi Administration.

A press statement issued by Fayose’s spokesman, Mr Idowu Adelusi quoted the former council chairmen as describing the PDP candidate as the best thing that has happened to the Ekiti PDP. They therefore promised

The campaign train which included, the deputy governor, Prof Modupe Adelabu, Speaker of the House, Dr Adewale Omirin; Secretary to the State Government, Alhaji Ganiyu Owolabi; APC Chairman, High Chief Jide Awe; Commissioner for Environment, Dr Eniola Ajayi; Commissioner for Works, Mr Sola Adebayo among others had earlier visited the palace of the Oluyin of Iyin, Oba Ademola Ajakaiye.

APC, LP in war of words after Fayemi’s rally in Iyin Ekiti

BY GBENGA ARIYIBI ADO EKITI

T L-R: Ekiti State Deputy Governor, Prof. Modupe Adelabu; Chairman, All Progressives Congress, APC, Ekiti State, Chief Jide Awe; Governor Kayode Fayemi; former Governor of Ekiti State, Otunba Niyi Adebayo; and Chief of Staff to the Governor, Mr. Yemi Adaramodu, during the Fayemi Re-Election campaign tour at Iyin-Ekiti, in Irepodun/ Ifelodun LGA... on Thursday.

Ex-Council chairmen back Fayose W

Fayemi on his part hailed Adebayo for being a true leader who is not given to primordial sentiments, as he promised to do a lot more for Iyin people if voted in for a second term.

Throwing shots at Bamidele and Ayo Fayose, the PDP candidate, described them as bad products saying while “one is inexperienced and not trust worthy, while the other is reckless and had made a ship wreck of his first assignment.”

to work for the victory of the PDP candidate in the forthcoming election.

Responding, Mr Fayose welcomed the former council officials and promised to conduct local government election as soon as he becomes the governor. Fayose told them that he was not out to discrim-

inate against anybody, saying PDP in Ekiti State was one and the leaders were more united.

He appealed to the followers to be mindful of their actions and inactions that can divide the party, stressing “ Adeyeye, Olubolade,

Omoyeni and other leaders are with me to win this state for the PDP. ” When I was governor then, I tried to be impartial in handling party matters. I will not pay evil with evil but pay evil with good.

I want the PDP to be strong like the way I left it.”

I will remove your yoke, Fayose tells Ekiti workers

T

HE PDP candidate, Ayo Fayose has promised to remove the yoke he claims the incumbent government has placed on workers of the state.

Fayose stated this yesterday while saluting the Ekiti workers on the occasion of Workers’ Day during his visit to Ward 9 in Ado Local Government Area of the state in continuation of his campaign tour of wards in Ado Local Government.

A press statement

issued by Fayose’s spokesman, Mr Idowu Adelusi said: ” F a y e m i ’ s administration chastised the workers with scorpion and placed heavy yoke on their necks, the incoming PDP government under Fayose will remove the yoke, heal all your bruises and put smile on your faces. ”The PDP governments under Segun Oni and Ayo Fayose conducted local government elections, but the AD/

ACN/APC governments under Niyi Adebayo and Kayode Fayemi failed to conduct local government election. ” Nothing good but suffering can come from APC government because they are full of deceit. If you workers should return Fayemi, the teachers should expect mass sack through political test, and delay of salary due to zero allocation and /or huge debt hanging on our neck incurred by the Fayemi administration,” the statement deposed.

HE APC and Labour Party were yesterday drawn into a war of words after eight LP supporters were arrested in Iyin Ekiti, the hometown of the LP candidate, Opeyemi Bamidele.

While the APC described the men as thugs, LP described them as local folks who protested after “cultists” allegedly invaded the residence of the LP’s candidate’s father, Pa Ogunjuyigbe Bamidele.

Eight hoodlums were yesterday arrested by men of the Ekiti State Police Command at Iyin Ekiti Ekiti, Irepodun/Ifelodun Local Government Area of the state for allegedly blocking the Ado-Iyin road and preventing free vehicular movement

Vehicular movement According to the police image maker in the state, Mr Victor Babayemi , some of the Weapons recovered from the hoodlums include two cut lasses ,axe , catapult and other dangerous weapons.

Babayemi added that the hoodlums were arrested for engaging in conduct likely to cause breach of public peace.

He ,however, fell short of mentioning the name of the political party the hoodlums were associated with.

“They barricaded the highway and prevented other party members and other road users from pass-

ing. They were arrested at about 9.30am this morning”, he said.

“Tension was mounting through their actions and under such situation we have a duty to perform. We have to ensure that there is no breakdown of law and order” The hoodlums, according to PPRO are now being detained at the Police headquarters in Ado Ekiti, the Ekiti State capital.

But a statement emanating from the Kayode Fayemi Campaign organization alleged that those that were arrested were members of Labour Party.

In the statement signed

by Director of Media of the outfit, Dimeji Daniels, alleged that “they besieged the palace of Oluyin of Iyin,Oba Ademola Ajakaiye, with the intent of preventing the monarch from receiving Governor Kayode Fayemi who visited six towns, including Iyin-Ekiti, hometown of Opeyemi Bamidele, the LP gubernatorial candidate in the June 21 election, in the Local Government” However, a statement signed by Bamidele’s Media aide , Ahmed Salami blamed the APC for the violence in the town, saying some suspected cult members numbering about twenty at about 9.15pm on Wednesday stormed the private residence of Pa Ogunjuyigbe Bamidele, the 85 year old father of Hon Bamidele, Salami said."

60 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

C M Y K

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 61

Delta Federation Cup: Warri Wolves tackle Bobbies FC in final T

HERE will be fireworks at the Warri Township Stadium this Sunday, as Warri Wolves take on Bobbies United Football Club in the final of the 2014 Delta State Federation Cup. Kick off time is 4 pm.

Apart from the football artistery expected to be on display, the stadium will also witness series of podium celebration as the Delta State FA is set to host a galaxy of personalities during the grand finale of the federation cup.

Highlight of the grand finale to be beamed live on Supersports Channel would be the presentation of awards to deserving individuals which include His Excellency, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, the Governor of Delta State (DFA Emerald Award), Prof. Amos Utuama, SAN, the Deputy Governor (DFA Platinum Award), Dr. John Oganwu (DFA Platinum Award), Larry Izamoje

(Football Personality of the year Award), Jibril Aku, Managing Director, Ecobank (DFA Lifetime Achievement Award), Ade Ojeikere (Football Media Excellence Award), Pius Origho (Post-humous Football Fanatic Legend Award) and Solomon Ogba (DFA Special Recognition Award).

The Delta State Football Association has raised the stakes of private sector participation in football activities, having secured the longest sponsorship in Africa’s football history with Ecobank Nigeria Limited for an uninterrupted 15th year running.

According to the Delta FA Chairman, Mr. Amaju Melvin Pinnick who is also the helmsman of the Sports Commission in the State, “this is an anniversary edition of an FA Cup final, which would by no means less glamorous, entertaining and exciting.”

Adebayor Continues from B/P whether the girls are still alive, Tottenham’s Emmanuel Adebayor has joined those calling for their release. He expressed concern on his Instagram account.

The Togo international’s heartfelt message read: “Over 200 girls have been kidnapped in a school in Nigeria over 2 weeks ago. This needs to end

Continues from B/P gathered that in the last meeting Keshi had with the NFF bigwigs he was congratulated over his reconciliation with Stoke City forward, Osaze Odemwingie but was made to sweat over his hard stance on Ike Uche.

Speculations were rife during the week that Keshi’s list would be dominated by the Afcon 2013 winning squad with a few additions that have featured in some of the friendly matches the team has played so far.

Some of the players who were not part of the 2013 Afcon squad like

now.

“As a father it breaks my heart knowing that the kidnapping of these girls hasn’t been resolved yet and they are still missing.

“As the whole world can search for a plane that is missing, they certainly can help out bringing these school children home. Bring back our girls home.”

Brazil 2014 Osaze Odemwingie and Germany based Leon Balogun are heavily favoured to be part of the preliminary squad expected to assemble in England May 26, ahead of the international friendly against Scotland at Craven Cottage on May 28.

If there are going to be any new faces, these might include Belgium based duo Michael Uchebo, Imoh Ezekiel, Spain based Ramon Azeez and Chinedu Ogbuke Obasi based in Germany.

A member of the NFF technical committee,

•Egwuekwe: Wolves skipper.

Ogba to flag off Okpekpe Race

P

RESIDENT of the Athletic Federation of Nigeria,Evangelist Solomon Ogba will flag off the 2nd Okpekpe 10km road race tomorrow in Okpekpe,Edo state.

Disclosing this in Auchi yesterday,the race’s technical manager,Yusuf Ali said Ogba is a fitting choice because of his position as the leader of the athletics family in Nigeria and a lover of sports.

‘There was no hesitation over the choice of chief Ogba,’’said Ali who assured all arrangements for a very successful event have been concluded.

‘We have some of the best personnel on ground to oversee the race and ensure everything complies with the standard set by the International ‘We have

NBBF names 24 All Star players

T

HE Nigeria Basketball Federation, NBBF, has released a list of 24 players and six officials from the Atlantic and Savannah Conferences of the Dstv Premier League for this weekend’s All Stars game scheduled for the University of Lagos indoor hall in Akoka, Lagos.

According to the NBBF/ DStv League Director, Agboola Pinheiro, 12 players and three officials each were selected from the two conferences for the game holding in Lagos on Saturday with Kano Pillars and Mark Mentors dominating the Savannah Conference list.

“The Savannah Conference will be handled by coaches Peter Ahmedu (Mark Mentors) and Abdulrahaman Mohammed(Gombe Bulls) with former international, Lawal Garba

Paul Bassey had promised news men after their April 22 meeting that the list will be released this week. He explained that the reason was to allow for more consultation so as to be able to come out with a list of players that Nigeria would be happy with.

as Team Manager while Coaches Adeboye Aderiboye (Oluyole Warriors) and Chris Nomingo (Dodan Warriors) will handle the Atlantic Conference team with former international, Deji Jaiyeola as Team

Continues from B/P parade in Brazil and predicted a good outing for Nigeria at the World Cup. He said that he was proud of the job Keshi is doing with Nigeria, adding that he expected nothing less going by the leadership qualities Keshi displayed as captain of the Eagles.

On the players he said that they could surprise the world and repeatedly mentioned a “terrific player in Spain”among others. Asked if the player he meant was Ike Uche, he screamed ‘yes’.

He has watched a couple of games Uche has played this season and said that the Villareal striker has been in great shape.

Westerhof was disappointed when he was told why Keshi may be reluctant to invite Ike Uche to camp.

Manager,” Pinheiro disclosed in Lagos.

Coach Sani Ahmed of Kano Pillars is Head coach of the Savannah All Stars team but has some family commitments while Head coach of the Atlantic Conference.

one of Nigeria’s most accomplished coaches and former Nigeria middle and long distance runner,Tony Osheku in our team. He is the Route manager while the only statistician recognised by the ATFS (Association of Track and Field Statistician) in Nigeria,Samuel Fatunla will be the Finish manager while retired Colonel Jaiye Abidoye who was in Nigeria’s Olympic team in 1972 in Munich will be the Start manager,’revealed Ali.

Ancelotti:

Continues from B/P Madrid, people are happy that the great final will be a Madrilenian one. In a final there is no favourite. Atlético is having a very good league; it will be anyone’s final”, he said on Sky Italia.

The Italian was very happy with what was achieved at the Alianz: “Obviously, I’m delighted. We have to enjoy these positive moments because sooner or later the bad ones will come.

Westerhof Uche was reportedly said to have continuously campaigned against Keshi’s tactical approach and was said to have even complained to senior authorities about this during the last Nations Cup. Incidentally, Uche played badly during the Nations Cup. He played as support striker but was said to have bluntly refused to fall deep to mark in the games that he played. And Keshi, apparently feeling that it was unwise to invite a player who did not believe in his approach, left him out during the qualifying games for the World Cup. He was scared of sabotage and has repeatedly said that team spirit mattered so much that he would make it a strong consideration for the invitation of players to the World Cup

camp.

“It is bad if Uche behaved like that. If a player did that to me off he goes, I tell you. But sometimes a coach is a father to the whole team.”

Westerhof said that Nigeria had the potential to reach the semifinal of the World Cup if “they make good selection and prepare the team very well.”

He is in town with a Dutch television crew doing a documentary on Nigerian football in his era and how he was able to earn Nigeria number a 5th place in fifa ranking.

Tomorrow will be special as he marks his birthday in Lagos. Keshi, Aloy Agu, Austin Eguavoen are among those who will gather in Ikeja to wish him well when Hotel Diplomat hosts him to celebrate his birthday.

62 — Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 ANI Ndanusa has been the President of Nigeria Tennis Federation for over a decade.

He has served as sports minister during which he became the President of Nigeria Olympic Committee, a post he holds till date.

He has one regret today.

As sports minister he could not realise one dream. He had planned to use his position to influence mass participation in sports from the local governments to the state and national levels.

In a chat recently, Ndanusa said that the story of Gokana Local Government, in Rivers of mass State, which he read on type this column on January participation that will 10 this year brought him produce world beaters. I mixed feelings. He was strongly feel that we can extremely excited about still do it and must not the achievement of the give up. His Excellency, Local Government and the Governor of Delta at the same time sad that State, Dr. Emmanuel had other local governments Uduaghan in the country have not promised to take me to taken such giant strides the Governors’ Forum so that I would be given in sports development.

I picked Gokana as my few minutes to address Local Government of the them and sell the idea to Year and commended them. The idea was for their chairman, Demua State Governors to local Ledee Demua, for his encourage vision for sports. Gokana governments in their commissioned an 8,000 states to embark on such capacity stadium with projects by providing a facilities for track and certain percentage of the field , tennis courts and cost. You can imagine a swimming pool. It’s a what sports will be like small sports complex if we have sports which the local facilities in many local government built areas. The effect will be without any funding tremendous. In years to from the state come Nigeria would be government. They won among the best in the my heart. And I told world because we have them so. I do know that talents and would have if not for the culture of produced stars. The corruption in the country problem is that we lack many local governments the facilities to nurture would be on the same them into stardom. I page with Gokana for commend Gokana Local they have the capacity to Government. I commend build similar structures you on your columns and and engender some I feel we should kind of sports revolution continue to pursue the in the country. Such objective of mass facilities will lead to the participation in sports. kind of mass Construction of sports participation that facilities will encourage Ndanusa was talking that. Other Local about. And that’s some Governments should kind of revolution. Such emulate Gokana ” Well, Ndanusa spoke facilities in our local government areas will well. I’m sure that his certainly attract people seeming short stay as to use them and minister of sports (and organise programmes the inability to execute that could produce the lofty idea) may not talents. The lack of such be his only regret. He facilities is denying us cannot be celebrating potential world the state of the Tennis champions in many Federation and Nigeria areas. Ndanusa said this Olympic Committee which he heads. But the to me: “I read your column system is partly to on Gokana and it made blame. The National me recall my plan when Olympic Committee of I was sports minister. England and many My plan was to meet other countries have state governors and get huge budgets from the federal government which they grow sports. to encourage them to It is different in our build such facilities all clime. NOC is so poor over the country. The that they lack resources

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08053068728

Ndanusa’s regret!

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C M Y K

I feel we should continue to pursue the objective of mass participation in sports

,

to run a decent office what more growing sports. The structure does not favour them.

And they lack the will to radicalise their status.

Our NOC depends on the sports commission for survival. And it has been an uphill task for them. How can such a body then develop sports like they do in some other climes? And how far is the NSC doing? In August Nigeria will participate in the Commonwealth Games. As I write, only track and field appears to have a programme and they have camped their athletes. The NSC is waiting for budgetary allocation to start preparation. We cannot grow sports this way.

And I’m more interested in real development programmes and not just participation in games.

The states have the responsibility to produce athletes for the sports ministry, National Commission or NOC as the case may be. But they do not. Rather, the national bodies try to produce athletes for the states. We will never develop well this way.

The mass participation Ndanusa is dreaming about may never be realised if the states do not change and start taking sports seriously. I have mentioned Delta, Lagos and Cross River as the flag bearers in sports development but I don’t see what others are doing. Anambra, by appointing Tony Nnachetta sports commissioner, has sent a signal that something could be in the offing.

But that’s still far from it. Let’s hope the governor, Willy Obiano, will, materially and financially, support the former NFA Vice Chairman to succeed.

The buck stops on his table.

C M Y K

Vanguard, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014 — 63

C M Y K

VANGUARD, FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2014

Boko Haram: Adebayor appeals for global attention on abducted girls

I

Westerhof arrives, speaks on Keshi, Ike Uche •Adebayor

BY ONOCHIE ANIBEZE

C

•Keshi

•Westerhof

L E M E N S We s t e r h o f, arguably, Nigeria’s best ever foreign coach, arrived the country Wednesday night and continued to speak on

Nigeria’s chances at the 2014 World Cup. He spoke on the qualities of Stephen Keshi, Eagles current coach who captained the Eagles of his era, the players Nigeria could

Continued on Page 61

Brazil 2014: NFF, Keshi to release provisional list May 6

BY JACOB AJOM

S

UPER Eagles coach, Stephen Keshi is expected to meet with the technical committee of the Nigeria Football Federation Tuesday, May 6 at the Glass House, Abuja.

•Ike Uche

TODAY'S

PUZZLE

The meeting will dwell on the long-anticipated 38-man provisional list of the Nigerian squad for the Brazil 2014 World Cup. Insiders hinted that the list will be made public after the meeting which is expected to be brief.

The meeting which is

YESTER DAY'S YESTERDAY'S

ANSWERS

coming on the heels of an earlier one held April 22, that failed to yield expected result as Nigerians were kept to wait longer for the list which has been shrouded in controversy.

Sports Vanguard

Continued on Page 61

•Yobo

T’S been almost two weeks since more than 200 Nigerian schoolgirls were kidnapped by Islamist group, Boko Haram.

The sect members abducted the girls from their dormitories, loaded them onto trucks, before setting the boarding school ablaze.

The girls are aged between 13 to 18.

With no news on

Continued on Page 61

Ancelotti: Atlético deserve to be in the final

A

NCELOTTI has given his first impression of his club’s rival in the Champions League final: “Atletico deserve to be in the final because they played better than Chelsea. In Continued on Page 61

Eight pages of Sports Vanguard inside

QUICK CROSSWORD ACROSS 1 Throng (5) 5 Broadcasting (6) 8 Perch (5) 10 Save (6) 11 Otherwise (4) 14 Customer (6) 15 Compete (7) 18 Enclosure (3) 19 Scull (3) 21 Expensive (4) 23 Remedied (5) 24 Skin (4) 27 Fixed (3) 29 Fish (3) 31 Aloof (7) 32 Trader (6) 34 Insect (4) 35 Harmony (6) 38 Crawl (5) 39 Ordain (6) 40 Cogs (5)

DOWN 2 Fish-eggs (3) 3 Garland (6) 4 Rabbit (3) 5 Pace (4) 6 Squandered (6) 7 Store (6) 9 Threatening (7) 12 Circuit (3) 13 Sea-eagle (4) 16 Formerly (4) 17 Challenged (5) 20 Train (7) 22 Soon (4) 24 Cushioned (6) 25 Petal (4) 26 Cashier (6) 28 Band (6) 30 Shelter (3) 33 Tribe (4) 36 Entrap (3) 37 Abroad (3)

YESTERDAY'S SOLUTIONS ACROSS: 1, Clutch 5, Ship 8, Aisle 9, Aft 10, Miss 11, Iris 12, Scope 13, Career 16, Leer 18, Eddy 20, Boa 22, Mad 23, Red 24, Harp 25, Item 28, Demure 30, Gouda 32, Drip 33, Idea 34, Ire 35, Bound 36, less 37, Tennis.

DOWN: 1, Chance 2, Ulterior 3, Compel 4, Discarded 5, Slipper 6, Here 7, Pass 8, Ass 14, Reminding 15, Odd 17, Eat 19, Delusion 20, Ban 21, Apropos 26, Menace 27, Recess 29, Idol 30, Gibe 31, Add.

How to Play Sudoku

P

lace a number (1-9) in each blank cell. (No line can have two of the same number).

Each row (nine lines from left to right), column, (also nine lines from top to bottom) and 3 X 3 block within a bold block (nine blocks) contains number from 1 through 9. This means that no number can appear twice in any block, column or row.

No mathematics is involved – no adding, subtraction, division or multiplication, just plain logic and your imagination.

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