Qwote New Song Release Called “Love Again” Featuring Trina & Rick Ross fourth album Still Da Baddest has been pushed from a February 12th release date to April 1st. The album features production from Jim Jonsin, J-Roc, and Scott Storch and collaborations with Missy Elliott, Keyshia Cole, and Pitbull
Vía Uzomedia http://ift.tt/2kTjsSr
This picture taken on February 22, 2017 and released by North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on February 23 shows North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un (C) visiting the People's Theatre to mark the 70th anniversary of the founding of the State Merited Chorus in Pyongyang. / AFP PHOTO / KCNA VIA KNS / STR / South Korea OUT / REPUBLIC OF KOREA OUT
North Korea denounced its chief ally and diplomatic protector China for “dancing to the tune of the US” after it banned coal imports in apparent punishment for a missile launch.
Beijing and Pyongyang have a relationship forged in the blood of the Korean War, but ties have begun to fray in recent years, with China increasingly exasperated by its wayward neighbour’s nuclear antics.
Last week it announced the suspension of all coal imports from the North — a crucial foreign currency earner for Pyongyang — for the rest of the year.
It came days after a missile launch personally overseen by leader Kim Jong-Un in what was seen as Pyongyang’s first show of force against new US President Donald Trump.
A bylined essay carried by the North’s official Korea Central News Agency slammed Beijing’s move.
It did not identify China by name, referring instead to “a neighbouring country”.
“This country, styling itself a big power, is dancing to the tune of the US,” it said.
“It has unhesitatingly taken inhumane steps such as totally blocking foreign trade related to the improvement of people’s living standard,” it added.
“Righteous voices” had condemned the move, it said, while “the hostile forces are shouting ‘bravo’ over this”.
The format was unusual for KCNA, which tends not to carry editorials or commentaries of its own, preferring to reproduce those of Rodong Sinmun, the official mouthpiece of the ruling Workers’ Party.
The tone was also more akin to Pyongyang’s denunciations of the US.
It was “utterly childish” to think that the North would stop its nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missile programmes if a few pennies of money were cut off, said the KCNA essay.
Its scientists and technicians were “working hard in do-or-die spirit”, it added.
The latest launch — the first since Trump took office — showed some progress in Pyongyang’s missile technology, Seoul’s military said.
The North — barred under UN resolutions from any use of ballistic missile technology — staged two atomic tests and many missile tests last year in a quest to develop a nuclear weapon capable of hitting the US mainland.
Trump has described the North as a “big, big problem” and vowed to deal with the issue “very strongly”.
The KCNA article came as the murder in Malaysia of Kim’s half-brother Kim Jong-Nam, in what is suspected to be a Pyongyang plot, dominates world headlines.
Jong-Nam — the eldest son of the late ruler Kim Jong-Il — died on February 13 after being attacked by two women at a Kuala Lumpur airport, with Malaysian authorities blaming a lethal nerve agent.
The North angrily denied involvement on Thursday, blaming Malaysia for “immoral” handling of the case and for plotting with Seoul to frame Pyongyang.
It did not confirm the dead man’s identity.
Vía The Guardian Nigeria http://ift.tt/2mjwm9s
Labor Secretary Thomas Perez (L) speaking to reporters about the minimum wage for federal contractors at the White House in Washington, DC, on Feburary 12, 2014; and Minnesota Democratic Congressman Keith Ellison (R) during a press conference about Islamophobia at the National Press Club on May 24, 2016 in Washington, DC. US Democrats, licking their wounds from last year's election debacle, will pick a new leader on February 25, 2017 to take the fight to President Donald Trump and his Republicans. The race to chair the Democratic National Committee (DNC) features front-runners Tom Perez, a Hispanic-American and former secretary of labor under Barack Obama who is the establishment pick, and Keith Ellison, a black Muslim congressman from the party's progressive wing who has left open the prospect of pushing to impeach Trump. / AFP PHOTO / Mandel NGAN AND Brendan SMIALOWSKI
US Democrats, licking their wounds from last year’s election debacle, will pick a new leader Saturday to take the fight to President Donald Trump and his Republicans.
With opposition Democrats preparing for crucial 2018 midterm elections and the nation’s next presidential race on the distant 2020 horizon, nothing less than the future of the party is at stake.
The race to chair the Democratic National Committee (DNC) features front-runners Tom Perez, a Hispanic-American and former secretary of labor under Barack Obama who is the establishment pick, and Keith Ellison, a black Muslim congressman from the party’s progressive wing who has left open the prospect of pushing to impeach Trump.
The race is narrowing — one of the second-tier challengers, South Carolina Democratic Party chairman Jamie Harrison dropped out of the race Thursday and supported Perez — and culminates in a vote Saturday at a DNC meeting in Atlanta, Georgia.
During a debate with several DNC candidates Wednesday night, Perez and Ellison expressed similar views about how they would run the party.
They acknowledged that it needs to take a solid economic message to working-class and middle-class Americans, many of whom said during last year’s campaign that they felt abandoned by Democrats.
Perez, 55, said Democrats need to “get back to basics” by making house calls in all 50 states and establishing a year-round organizing presence to remind American workers that the Democratic Party represents their values and interests.
“When we lead with our message, our message of economic opportunity, that’s how we win,” he said during the debate broadcast on CNN.
– Crisis of confidence –
Perez also warned that Democrats must reform their party’s presidential primary system, which he said has created “a crisis of confidence” because of its lack of transparency.
The current system includes the use of several hundred so-called “super-delegates” — DNC members, party grandees and lawmakers who can vote for whomever they choose in the primary, regardless of how citizens vote in the states.
Ellison, 53, is the insurgent in the race, a supporter of liberal Bernie Sanders during the Democratic primaries who, like Perez, has pledged to reclaim the party’s reputation of standing for fair trade, jobs, infrastructure investment and the preservation of Social Security.
“That’s what we do,” said Ellison, who was endorsed by Sanders. Trump “stole a Democratic message” by constantly reminding working-class and middle-class voters during the campaign that he was the candidate who listened to their concerns.
Trump no doubt is watching the DNC race closely. Earlier this week he tweeted that Ellison’s bid is notable because “he was the one who predicted early that I would win!”
Beyond Perez and Ellison, a dark horse has emerged: Pete Buttigieg, the charismatic 35-year-old mayor of South Bend, Indiana.
He has earned support from former presidential candidate Martin O’Malley, former DNC chair Steve Grossman, and Vermont ex-governor Howard Dean, himself a onetime presidential candidate and DNC chair.
“The wolf is through the gates and eating our sheep right now. We’ve got to take it to the real opposition, which is the Republicans,” Buttigieg said in the debate.
The falsehoods peddled by the Trump White House must be “met with fact and outrage,” he added. But at the same time, the focus has to return to struggling Americans.
“We’ve got to get back to talking to people and about people in terms of their everyday lives.”
The three candidates pledged to remain neutral should sitting Democrats be challenged by more liberal candidates in the 2018 midterm elections in the Republican-controlled Congress.
And they portrayed the Democrats as a party desperate for a reenergizing from the ground up.
Grossman, one of the former DNC chairs, said Trump was far more adept than Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential candidate he defeated, at showing Americans that he could feel their pain.
“He did, and she didn’t, and that was the difference,” Grossman told CBS radio earlier this month, as he said the new DNC chair will be tasked with bringing that message home to voters.
Saturday’s winner needs a majority of the DNC’s 447 members. Roll Call newspaper reported a number of ballots would likely be needed for a candidate to emerge victorious.
Vía The Guardian Nigeria http://ift.tt/2lfVkFx
Labor Secretary Thomas Perez (L) speaking to reporters about the minimum wage for federal contractors at the White House in Washington, DC, on Feburary 12, 2014; and Minnesota Democratic Congressman Keith Ellison (R) during a press conference about Islamophobia at the National Press Club on May 24, 2016 in Washington, DC. US Democrats, licking their wounds from last year's election debacle, will pick a new leader on February 25, 2017 to take the fight to President Donald Trump and his Republicans. The race to chair the Democratic National Committee (DNC) features front-runners Tom Perez, a Hispanic-American and former secretary of labor under Barack Obama who is the establishment pick, and Keith Ellison, a black Muslim congressman from the party's progressive wing who has left open the prospect of pushing to impeach Trump. / AFP PHOTO / Mandel NGAN AND Brendan SMIALOWSKI
US Democrats, licking their wounds from last year’s election debacle, will pick a new leader Saturday to take the fight to President Donald Trump and his Republicans.
With opposition Democrats preparing for crucial 2018 midterm elections and the nation’s next presidential race on the distant 2020 horizon, nothing less than the future of the party is at stake.
The race to chair the Democratic National Committee (DNC) features front-runners Tom Perez, a Hispanic-American and former secretary of labor under Barack Obama who is the establishment pick, and Keith Ellison, a black Muslim congressman from the party’s progressive wing who has left open the prospect of pushing to impeach Trump.
The race is narrowing — one of the second-tier challengers, South Carolina Democratic Party chairman Jamie Harrison dropped out of the race Thursday and supported Perez — and culminates in a vote Saturday at a DNC meeting in Atlanta, Georgia.
During a debate with several DNC candidates Wednesday night, Perez and Ellison expressed similar views about how they would run the party.
They acknowledged that it needs to take a solid economic message to working-class and middle-class Americans, many of whom said during last year’s campaign that they felt abandoned by Democrats.
Perez, 55, said Democrats need to “get back to basics” by making house calls in all 50 states and establishing a year-round organizing presence to remind American workers that the Democratic Party represents their values and interests.
“When we lead with our message, our message of economic opportunity, that’s how we win,” he said during the debate broadcast on CNN.
– Crisis of confidence –
Perez also warned that Democrats must reform their party’s presidential primary system, which he said has created “a crisis of confidence” because of its lack of transparency.
The current system includes the use of several hundred so-called “super-delegates” — DNC members, party grandees and lawmakers who can vote for whomever they choose in the primary, regardless of how citizens vote in the states.
Ellison, 53, is the insurgent in the race, a supporter of liberal Bernie Sanders during the Democratic primaries who, like Perez, has pledged to reclaim the party’s reputation of standing for fair trade, jobs, infrastructure investment and the preservation of Social Security.
“That’s what we do,” said Ellison, who was endorsed by Sanders. Trump “stole a Democratic message” by constantly reminding working-class and middle-class voters during the campaign that he was the candidate who listened to their concerns.
Trump no doubt is watching the DNC race closely. Earlier this week he tweeted that Ellison’s bid is notable because “he was the one who predicted early that I would win!”
Beyond Perez and Ellison, a dark horse has emerged: Pete Buttigieg, the charismatic 35-year-old mayor of South Bend, Indiana.
He has earned support from former presidential candidate Martin O’Malley, former DNC chair Steve Grossman, and Vermont ex-governor Howard Dean, himself a onetime presidential candidate and DNC chair.
“The wolf is through the gates and eating our sheep right now. We’ve got to take it to the real opposition, which is the Republicans,” Buttigieg said in the debate.
The falsehoods peddled by the Trump White House must be “met with fact and outrage,” he added. But at the same time, the focus has to return to struggling Americans.
“We’ve got to get back to talking to people and about people in terms of their everyday lives.”
The three candidates pledged to remain neutral should sitting Democrats be challenged by more liberal candidates in the 2018 midterm elections in the Republican-controlled Congress.
And they portrayed the Democrats as a party desperate for a reenergizing from the ground up.
Grossman, one of the former DNC chairs, said Trump was far more adept than Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential candidate he defeated, at showing Americans that he could feel their pain.
“He did, and she didn’t, and that was the difference,” Grossman told CBS radio earlier this month, as he said the new DNC chair will be tasked with bringing that message home to voters.
Saturday’s winner needs a majority of the DNC’s 447 members. Roll Call newspaper reported a number of ballots would likely be needed for a candidate to emerge victorious.
Vía Uzomedia http://ift.tt/2lMckGS
Late Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe
There is something curious that you might have noticed. Something as strange as it is weird. And it should worry you.
We don’t appear to know who ‘spoilt’ Nigeria.
‘Spoilt’ of course is the colloquial shorthand for all that ails our nation –corruption, poor leadership, stillbirth policy, diving quality of life, and gaping income inequality.
We complain about these things everyday. We moan and point fingers, bitter over the legacy handed to generations that are yet unable to bear them.
We are frustrated because the smattering of best efforts don’t appear to lead us anywhere. The foundation is destroyed.
So we know that Nigeria is ‘spoilt’.
But who exactly ‘spoilt’ the country?
It turns out; no one ever takes responsibility for the state of our nation.
Let’s start from the beginning.
The quartet of Nnamdi Azikiwe, Ahmadu Bello, Obafemi Awolowo and Abubakar Tafawa-Balewa, not alone, who altogether led the team that secured Nigeria’s political independence and ensuring economic decline already escaped responsibility for our state of affairs.
These days it is impolitic to state certain ‘imperfections’ about these legends, as it were. That in 1943, the Sadauna of Sokoto was accused by his cousin Alhaji Abubakar Saddique of misappropriating tax revenue as District Head of Gussau. That Dr. Azikiwe was accused of corruption in 1962 and a panel was set up by the chief whip of his party to investigate the misapplication of two million pounds under his watch as premier, a cloud under which he never emerged.
And of course, famously, that the great Obafemi Awolowo was, also in 1962, accused of diverting the funds of the Western Region’s government to his political party, conduct apparently confirmed by the Justice George Coker panel of inquiry.
“Before independence, there have been cases of official misuse of resources for personal enrichment (Storey, 1953),” notes a paper by University of Lagos professor of history, Michael Ogbeidi. “Over the years, Nigeria has seen its wealth withered with little to show in living conditions of the citizens. The First Republic under the leadership of Sir Abubakar , the Prime Minister, and Nnamdi Azikiwe, the President, was marked by widespread corruption. Government officials looted public funds with impunity. Federal Representative and Ministers flaunted their wealth with reckless abandon. In fact, it appeared there were no men of good character in the political leadership of the First Republic. Politically, the thinking of the First Republic Nigerian leadership class was based on politics for material gain; making money and living well.” He is talking about Nigeria’s “founding fathers”.
Instead of being held responsible for the parts that they have played, that they must have played, (since 1 plus 1 is equal to 2) just after independence, in laying the foundations of a squandered promise, in addition to the Civil War that their actions precipitated, they are dealt with as benevolent fathers that bestowed the beauty of this nation unto us – a legacy one must assume the country is proud of since it celebrates them so urgently.
Yakubu Gowon? The one who took after them? This is the president from under whom Nigeria’s oil boon began, where many historians can track the beginnings of our institutional waste and who oversaw a civil war the country has yet to recover from. He does not take responsibility for the state of the nation.
Shehu Shagari was five-time minister from independence in 1960-1970 before he became president in 1979. His government was defined by corruption, and it is to him that we owe the pleasure of the Ajaokuta Steel Black Hole which he spent hundreds of millions in dollars on – with the raw material of rumoured kickbacks.
His programme to encourage mechanical machines in farming was hijacked by friends of the government who were retired military officers, and by the time oil prices began to fall in 1981, the centre could no longer hold.
“It was claimed that over $16 billion in oil revenues were lost between 1979 and 1983 during the reign of President Shehu Shagari. It became quite common, for federal buildings to mysteriously go up in flames, most especially just before the onset of ordered audits of government accounts, making it impossible to discover written evidence of embezzlement and fraud. No politician symbolised the graft and avarice under Shagari’s government more than his combative Transport Minister, Alhaji Umaru Dikko, who was alleged to have mismanaged about N4 billion of public fund meant for the importation of rice.”
Failure heavy enough that when General Muhammadu Buhari took over in a coup on December 31, 1983, the nation breathed a sigh of relief. Shagari was released from detention for personal corruption in 1986, and banned from politics for life.
Has he ever taken responsibility for anything, yet?
Then, of course, there was the legendary Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida, under whose government Nigeria’s made leaps and bounds in corruption, ruining our reputation in narcotics trade and advanced economic fraud and whose government oversaw the disappearance of the $12.4b (or less, but certainly billions of dollars, based on the thorough Pius Okigbo Commission Report) from what we now call the Gulf War Windfall of 1991.
“If anything, corruption reached an alarming rate and became institutionalised during Babangida’s regime,” Ogbeidi reports. “Leaders found guilty by tribunals under the Murtala Muhammed and Muhammadu Buhari regimes found their way back to public life and recovered their seized properties.
“According to Maduagwu: Not only did the regime encourage corruption by pardoning corrupt officials convicted by his predecessors and returning their seized properties, the regime officially sanctioned corruption in the country and made it difficult to apply the only potent measures, long prison terms and seizure of ill-gotten wealth, for fighting corruption in Nigeria in the future.”
Asked, in 2015, how he built his mansion in Minna, Babangida told the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (so that the irony can be complete), that it was generous, benevolent people who will remain unnamed that built it, of course.
“I know what my friends spent. No, my friends contributed,” he said, because we are all fools and reason is dead. “They were friends before we came into government and friends while I was in government. I started building it in 1991, took two to three years so that by the time I finished, I would have a house to sleep in.”
More than once you must have heard Babangida bemoan the state of the nation, complain about the collapse of morals and enjoin Nigerians to work hard and believe in the country.
We have really suffered.
“If what I read in the newspapers is currently what is happening then I think we were angels (in my government),” he said, without falling off his chair and hitting his head on the floor from shame. “My government was able to identify corruption-prone areas and checked them. If you remember in this country, there were things they call essential commodities. These are also sources of corruption. You go and buy ‘omo’ or food or whatever it is and we got government to take its hands off such activities. Let people use their own brains, hands and labour, nobody has to do it for them. I am proud to say that was much more effective. I give you an example; in a year I was making less than $7billion in oil revenue. In the same period, there are governments that are making $200 billion to $300 billion.”
Ahamadu Bello
Not even a dollar of responsibility taken, despite holding leadership of this country for the longest, his irresponsibility costing us the results of a free and fair election and plunging us into half a decade of pure Abacha-rianmadness.
Babangida too does not know who spoilt Nigeria.
Olusegun Obasanjo, who oversaw the democratic transition that led Nigeria into Shagari, apart from playing his own questionable part in the carnage against the citizens of Biafra, and whose grand gestures as temporary president in the 70s did not translate into positivity for nation, would also say he is not part of those that spoilt Nigeria.
Then he returned to leadership and (though I consider him the most impressive Nigerian leader in my lifetime) left the country at the end, deliberately, in chaos – first by the damaging desire for an unconstitutional third term in office and then by arrogantly inflicting on all of us a sick man who transferred his illness to the nation’s soul and rolled back the small inches of progress we had made.
He too, who has led Nigeria twice – for almost a decade in total –would claim that he bears no responsibility for the state of our nation.
Not to speak of Muhammadu Buhari. He could previously claim, and indeed that claim held currency for 20 years, that he (much like the canonised Murtala Muhammed) spent too little time in office to be assessed responsible.
But on his second coming, we have had two years to interrogate his capacity and his legacy, two years during which we have seen fortunes decline, and citizens lose hope, without the cushion of leadership that inspires.
Even as he sits in the office and holds the ultimate responsibility for the state of affairs as I write, even he is not taking responsibility.
Buhari (whose candidacy I vigorously supported as, vastly, the better of our two options in 2015) points to everyone but himself. He points to all of those who held the office before him, he points to the government of Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, he points to the opposition that won’t give him breathing space, he points to civil servants working hard to sabotage him, and he points to that most significant of Nigerian bad guys: ‘the system’.
It is not just our ex-presidents that have this affliction.
You see your friends whose fathers and mothers led this country at the highest levels, even those whose names have been demonstrably involved in corruption or at least negligence, and even they complain about the state of Nigeria.
They insist on presenting themselves as decent, reasonable people who had no part, magically, in the Nigeria that we have today.
Ask them who we should blame, and they point at others: ‘them’, ‘they’.
Who are these ‘they’?
The faceless ‘they’ who always stand against change. You’ve heard every government speak about them, this unnamed powerful, omnipresent people who frustrate every good intention of the government but are never held accountable; these indeterminate group of people who sit like gremlins in Aso Rock and take over the brains and hearts of those who lead. Every president has pointed to them as the problem with the country.
Those indeterminate ‘they’ are so resolute that they were even there fighting against Diezani Alison-Madueke, despite her consolidation of oil administration power, the distribution of the wealth across questionable characters, and the ostentatious display that allegedly powered the obscene spend of the 2015 elections.
But despite all of the circumstantial dodginess, even our former oil minister says she was also victim of this indeterminate set of people who keep spoiling Nigeria – people who she, like those many innocents before her, did not name, did not shame, and did not hold accountable.
Of course, there is Jonathan, whose presidency accelerated an atmosphere of permissiveness and corruption, ceded large swaths of Nigeria to terrorists and lost 276 girls under his watch for which he yet has shown no remorse, at all. The less about him to be honest, the better for us all.
Ask the good doctor for who spoilt Nigeria – and he and his triumphal supporters who insist on crying over the spilt milk of a man who deserved to be voted out, will take no ounce of responsibility. No hoots give. If you don’t like it, they appear to say to us, go and die.
The truth is that Nigeria has been an unfortunate (‘oloriburuku’ as the Yoruba excellently would put it) country.
We have been a desperately unfortunate country for so many years, the unfortunateness springing from our classless, clueless successive set of leaders.
And lest the point is lost in subtlety and euphemism: they are the people that spoilt Nigeria.
The question really is simple: if our succession of leaders were so sterling, so high achieving, and so distinguished – then how exactly did our country collapse?
The so-called founding fathers, the super permanent secretaries, every single person who has been president of this country, a vast majority of ministers and commissioners, governors and local government chairmen, and the dirty pack of colluding traditional rulers. Heads of parastatals, and members of boards, business leaders who have benefited from ungodly monopolies and the oppression of an unprotected competition, those who helped politicians funnel and launder illegal monies that they then deployed to set up banks, insurance companies and a hodge-podge of now ‘respectable businesses’, defence chiefs who allowed our arsenal to be depleted and outdated, putting all our lives at risk, each and every one of the inspector generals of police as far as we cannot find anyone whose legacy stands apart or possesses a highlight, who ruined the country if not them?
It’s time for us to have the clarity of intent and purpose to say to them, especially now – you did this; you caused this, take some responsibility for heaven’s sake.
On the first of January this year, I was invited alongside a respected academic and a former defence chief to the Nigerian Television Authority to speak about ‘Making Nigeria Great Again’.
This tragedy – of our unfortunateness – was again on display.
Every word this military chief (one of our points men in the fight against Boko Haram) uttered was grounded in vapidity. His responses to questions were devoid of reflection, strategy, or philosophy.He simply didn’t have anything useful to say.
And I panicked: This is the man who has been making decisions for our country? This is the man we trusted to keep us safe? This is the mind that informed the president?
“The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership,” Chinua Achebe already informed us. “There is nothing basically wrong with the Nigerian character. There is nothing wrong with the Nigerian land or climate or water or air or anything else. The Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability of its leaders to rise to the responsibility, to the challenge of personal example which are the hallmarks of true leadership.”
Think about it:if all the leaders of our journalism from the past were credible and competent, then who holds responsibility for the decay in our journalism? Who ruined the Nigerian Television Authority and made it a carcass of the greatness we are told that it once had? If all the people who ran businesses in Nigeria in the past were heroes and visionaries with the capacity for transformative ideas, then, please, sorry, where are their businesses? If all the leaders in our health sectorhad been such healthy, sterling examples of wisdom and brilliance, then please who is responsible for the state of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital or that of the University College Hospital?
These guys have a lot of experience, but as political economist, Pat Utomi has said, it is bad experience. It is the experience that comes from simply existing and being rather than from achieving, excelling and improving.
They are the ones who mouth the inanity about Nigeria’s “strength in diversity” and that its “unity is non-negotiable” as if all of us have not been living in this same country since 1960 and seeing that if there is one thing that we have always had, it is certainly not strength.
The people who have led us have not been the best of us. Veterans only of bureaucracy and form, their experience is useless, their relevance is overstated, and their capacity is, at best, questionable.
To be sure, we have seen evidence of brilliance in Nigeria. We have witnessedcitizens build the creative industries into a system to be admired. We have seen young people recreate the music industry and push its significance across a global market. We have seen technology innovators recreate an entire system from scratch.
We have seen brilliance in politics too; Anambra’s Peter Obi and Lagos’s BabatundeFasholabeing two contemporary examples, as well as the sterling system of succession that Lagos has modelled.
Unfortunately – as will be the same if my generation doesn’t significantly reboot Nigeria and set it on the path to truly transformative growth (and we still have an abundance of time to make this right) – it will be fine for the next generation to look at them; to look at us, and to say that for the most part, we were failures, and we bear responsibility for the state of our p nation.
It will be fine for them to look back at the long past of Nigeria’s desolate history and for them to curse the darkness, thoroughly.
Yes I know that come 2019, because of the terrible fault lines of democracy, we may yet be so unfortunate that one of these will yet be the only option for president of Nigeria – because, where are the alternatives on the scene today? And it will sadly fall to us, agan, to perform a civic duty and support the least of the bad options.
But at least let us be clear that we are drinking gutter water, and not coconut juice.
What is the reason it is so important to correctly locate the provenance of Nigeria’s problems?
a) So that the responsibleparty approaches its duties to make amends with sobriety and perspective.
b) So that a new generation leaders understands the urgent need to unlearn from the past and to be discriminatory on the conventions and traditions it chooses to perpetuate.
“Permanent secretaries, diplomats, vice chancellors have been here over the past two days telling us about how government can work for the people,” I said in a speech February 2016 at the Ibadan School of Government and Public Policy, to an audience of these ex-leaders. “We have spent the past days hearing these leaders tell us what to do, when they had ample opportunity to show us what to do – an did not do so.
Obafemi Awolowo
“One wonders as a generation if we have a lot to learn from these people, or if indeed we have so much to un-learn.
“Do you guys really have anything to teach us? Who were the permanent secretaries who stole billions in the 70s, the soldiers who ruined Nigeria in the 90s, the ministers who stole us blind after 2000? Are they the same ones still talking to us today? If things were so great in those days, then how did Nigeria get to this sorry stage where corruption was once only a cankerworm, but now has gone viral?
“There are too many billionaires whom we don’t know how they made their billions and too many politicians who used to win with landslides that disappeared when card readers emerged.
“We must be honest in noting where you people have failed and where you presented insurmountable obstacles for our generation: gerontocracy that didn’t exist in 1956, a collapsed education system, institutions that were interrupted and then declined, a lack of authentic moral fibre and no workable models of businesses that succeed or governance that works for the people.”
Of course these vestiges of the past can still be part of building the future – that, after all, is a model we have seen work in many places across the world. But, first, they have to repent.
Based on what we have seen over the past 16 years, and what we are looking at today, first they must have the humility to take responsibility for the part that they have played in bringing us to this sorry state – and then to commit to making amends.
Either that or, as my people used to say in Ijeshatedo where I grew up:abegmake them comot, make we for see roadpass.
•Jideonwo is co-founder and managing partner of RED (www.redafrica.xyz), which brands including Y!/YNaija.com and governance communication firm, StateCraft Inc. Office of the Citizen (OOTC) is his latest essay series.
Vía The Guardian Nigeria http://ift.tt/2kT9eS9
Suspected kidnappers have abducted two sand dredgers at Eleko Village in the Ibeju-Lekki Local Government Area of Lagos State. Sources revealed, yesterday, that the victims were kidnapped on Tuesday.
It was gathered that the gunmen, who came through the lagoon around 9a.m., shot sporadically before they took the two dredgers away in their speedboat.
It was gathered that those abducted were the dredging company’s manager and the machine operator. According to a source, one of the workers was hit on the arm by bullets, while trying to escape.
The source said: “We were in our various houses when we heard gunshots. After the dust had settled, we went to the scene. Unfortunately, we found one of the workers in a pool of his blood.
“We took him to a private clinic in the community, after which we then reported the matter at the Akodo Police Division.
“It was when we got to the clinic that we realised it was kidnappers that invaded the dredging site. We call on government and the security agencies to come to our aid.”
It was further gathered that the dredging company was said to have started operation in the community in January.
The Lagos State Commissioner of Police was called upon to deploy marine police personnel to the riverine areas of the state.
“On that fateful day, if some marine police personnel were stationed in the coastal area, the gunmen would probably have been arrested,” another source said.
The post Gunmen abduct 2 dredgers in Lagos appeared first on Vanguard News.
Vía Vanguard News http://ift.tt/2kT3zLB
Chairman of the Media and Publicity Committee of the Nigeria Football Federation, Hon. Suleiman Yahaya-Kwande on Thursday cleared the air on the Federation’s mandate to its President, Amaju Melvin Pinnick, with regards to the forthcoming election into the presidency of the Confederation of African Football.
“The issue of which of the two candidates the NFF should support came up during our last Board meeting in Abuja, on Tuesday 7th February 2017. Every single member of Board spoke on the issue and expressed support for the NFF President, Mr. Amaju Melvin Pinnick, to use his discretion and vote for that candidate who will best serve Nigeria’s interest during the election. This support was given based on the fact as the NFF President and a Member of the CAF Organizing Committee for the Africa Cup of Nations, he is fully in tune with the political play at that level and knows what would be best for Nigeria.
“There was not a dissenting voice in the room that day. Everyone agreed that Mr. Pinnick should go ahead and cast his vote for the candidate he feels would support Nigerian Football to grow the way we want it. It is not correct for anyone to say the matter was not discussed.”
“The Board spent good time discussing the CAF elections and the importance of Nigeria having someone on the CAF Executive Committee, considering the huge role that our nation has always been playing in peace –keeping and sundry noble programs on the continent.
“There is no division in the NFF Board. We are giving full and unconditional support to Mr. Pinnick to stand for the elections and for him to cast his vote for that candidate whose presidency of CAF would serve the interest of our great nation.”
Yahaya-Kwande, who is a ranking member of Nigeria’s House of Representatives, stated that the Federation remained grateful for the support that the Federal Government continues to give to the body towards the execution of its programmes and activities.
The 39th Ordinary Congress of CAF, at which the elections would take place, comes up in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in exactly three weeks’ time.
The post CAF Elections: Pinnick has mandate to dump Hayatou – NFF appeared first on Vanguard News.
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By Emeka Aginam
LAGOS — Despite the challenges arising from the N330 billion fine imposed on it by Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, last year, MTN Group said, yesterday, it had so far injected over $16 billion in its operations in the country.
Chairman/Chief Executive of MTN Group, Mr. Phuthuma Freedom Nhleko, disclosed this when he led a high level delegation to NCC headquarters in Abuja.
Nhleko, who was received by the Executive Vice Chairman, EVC, of the commission, Prof Umar Danbatta, and his team, said the group had faith in Nigeria and would be willing to invest more in the sector in the years to come.
“We had challenges in the past, during the period of the fine, and we are grateful for the role the commission played towards an amicable resolution,” he said.
Nhleko, whose visit to the NCC management was a valedictory one as he steps down as Group Chairman in March, said: “We have a very long way to go and so ask for spectrum which is the oxygen and life blood to navigate this long and tedious investment journey. Without spectrum, the sector will suffocate.”
Nhleko specifically solicited more spectrum allocation and a release of the one that belonged to Visafone, which equity shares MTN acquired in 2015.
In his response, Prof. Danbatta said: “I like to state that our word is our covenant. When we take decisions, we are concerned about the stability of the industry and there is no way we can guarantee it without considering the dominant status of MTN and its obligations.
“If the dominant status is becoming stringent, we are open to engagement, we will be guided by what is happening in the market to ensure the growth and development of the sector.
“The sector has contributed very well to the National Gross Domestic Product, GDP, and has shown remarkable resilience in this recession.”
Danbatta said the NCC made a case for relaxing fiscal policies towards the sector to the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, adding that the CBN governor was favorably disposed to request and further engagement, especially towards major players who desired to import equipment to aid deployment of broadband infrastructure services and others.
The post We’ve injected over $16bn into Nigerian operations —MTN Group appeared first on Vanguard News.
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More than 300 million people of all ages suffer from depression, which is the leading cause of disability worldwide, and is a major contributor to the overall global burden of disease, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
WHO, in a global estimate published yesterday noted that at its worst, depression can lead to suicide and close to 800 000 people die due to suicide every year, which is the second leading cause of death in 15 to 29-year-olds.
The body said that although there are known, effective treatments for depression, fewer than half of those affected in the world (in many countries, fewer than 10 per cent) receive such treatments.
It noted that barriers to effective care include a lack of resources, lack of trained health-care providers, social stigma associated with mental disorders, and inaccurate assessment.
According to the WHO, in countries of all income levels, people who are depressed are often not correctly diagnosed, and others who do not have the disorder are too often misdiagnosed and prescribed antidepressants.
Indeed, the burden of depression and other mental health conditions are on the rise globally. A World Health Assembly resolution passed in May 2013 has called for a comprehensive, coordinated response to mental disorders at country level.
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PHOTO: Pinterest
More than 300 million people of all ages suffer from depression, which is the leading cause of disability worldwide, and is a major contributor to the overall global burden of disease, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
WHO, in a global estimate published yesterday noted that at its worst, depression can lead to suicide and close to 800 000 people die due to suicide every year, which is the second leading cause of death in 15 to 29-year-olds.
The body said that although there are known, effective treatments for depression, fewer than half of those affected in the world (in many countries, fewer than 10 per cent) receive such treatments.
It noted that barriers to effective care include a lack of resources, lack of trained health-care providers, social stigma associated with mental disorders, and inaccurate assessment.
According to the WHO, in countries of all income levels, people who are depressed are often not correctly diagnosed, and others who do not have the disorder are too often misdiagnosed and prescribed antidepressants.
Indeed, the burden of depression and other mental health conditions are on the rise globally. A World Health Assembly resolution passed in May 2013 has called for a comprehensive, coordinated response to mental disorders at country level.
Vía The Guardian Nigeria http://ift.tt/2lQFXam
Internet
An alleged imposter who claimed to be Ernest Erowo with a facebook account opened in the name of Prophet Ernest Erowo Untouchable of City of Faith Ministries Int’l Inc., also known as The Untouchable Family, aimed at defrauding unsuspecting members of the public, has been arrested at Ozoro in Isoko North Local Government Area of Delta State.
The suspected internet fraudster, who opened an account with First Bank PLC in the name of Abada E. Best with account No. 3043867593, was linked to his facebook account in the name of Ernest Erowo, asking members of the public to pay money into his account with intent of providing spiritual providence, thereby defrauding them.
The suspect, while confessing to the crime at the Area Commander’s office of the Nigerian Police Force, Delta Central Command, Ughelli, said he is a pastor and intentionally opened the facebook and First Bank accounts to source for money to finance a programme he planned to execute. Meanwhile, huge and undisclosed amounts of money has been paid to him by unsuspecting members of the public.
Earlier, the Prophet, through his lawyer, A.E. Erakpofuke Esq. had appealed to the Area Commander, in a January 16, 2017 letter, to arrest and question the said impostor using the duplicate facebook account Ernest Erowo, to prevent him from carring out further acts of fraud and impersonation.
The cleric’s media director, Pastor Success I. E. Udogidi, also the Regional Head Pastor (South South region), City of Faith Ministry Int’l Inc, confirmed the arrest. He said the imposter had hacked into the facebook account name “Ernest Erowo” of the prophet and duplicated it with a changed picture.
“The fake duplicate account is what he used in defrauding the unsuspecting members of the public,” Udogidi stressed, urging members of the public to be vigilant and watchful as internet fraudsters are everywhere.
Vía The Guardian Nigeria http://ift.tt/2lBOvPK
