...towards a better life for the people

N150VOL. 25: NO. 62071

ONLINE | www.vanguardngr.com

MONDAY, FEBRUARYY 3, 2014**

Mr & Mrs

COLUMNISTS:•P.17

Continues on Page 5

Lobby for confabdelegates intensifies

LES LEBA—P.40

•Presidency to write stakeholders this week•World Igbo Congress backs Leaders of Thought•PIB: Lawmakers under pressure from IOCs

OCHEREOMENNANNA

•P.50

Inside tomorrow

BY HUGO ODI-OGOR, CLIFFORDNDUJIHE, PETERDURU, GABRIELEWEPU & CALEB

AYANSINA

ABUJA—FOLLOWING last Thurs-

day ’s release ofmodalities for the pro-posed National Confer-ence, an intense lobbyby politicians and other

BATTERED—A battered Mobile Policeman, Sgt. Samson Ofoyeju attached to Kayriott Hotel, Effurun, Delta State after Navalofficers (inset) moved in to arrest former Delta lawmaker and hotel owner, Efe Afe on Friday evening. Photos: AKPOKONAOMAFUAIRE.

I'm the leader,without me PDP isfinished in OyoState —Alao Akala

ShotNewswatchEditor dies•NUJ, NGE,others react

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CMYK

2 — Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

CMYK

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 — 3

4—Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

Chief Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, formergovernor of Bayelsa State (left) and Hon. KingsleyKuku, Special Adviser to the President on NigerDelta Affairs.

REMEMBRANCESERVICE: Fromleft: Mr. Timi Alaibe,former SpecialAdviser to PresidentGoodluck Jonathanon Niger Delta, MissEbitimi Alaibe,daughter, Mrs. EbiElezianya, daughter,Mr. Okey Elezianya,son in-law, duringthe 5th yearremembrance massservice for late Mrs.Alaere AugustinaTimi-Alaibe, wife ofMr. Timi Alaibe, atChurch ofA s s u m p t i o n ,Falomo, Ikoyi,Lagos, yesterday.Photos: BunmiAzeez.

Alhaji Adamu Mu'azu, National Chairman,Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and Senator UdoUdoma, at the event.

From left: Mr. Greg Uanseru, Vice Admiral DeleEzeoba, for mer Chief of Naval Staff and his wife,Vivivan.

Kalu not an issue in Abia,says Orji's former aide

U M U A H I A — APeoples Democratic

Party, PDP, stalwart andformer aide to GovernorTheodore of Abia State, Mr.Ben Onyechere said,yesterday, in Umuahia thatincessant claims by theformer governor of the state,Dr. Orji Kalu, that hispredecessor is notperforming is the after-thought of a child who atehis cake and wants to haveit back.

According to Mr.Onyechere, the truth is thatnobody really cares how hefeels because in politicswhat counts is the majorityopinion and the extricationof Abia from his grip is totaland therefore, irreversible.

He said: “He is stillenthralled in the same old,and the governor is notlosing sleep about him

because the day one strongman was born in a cityanother was also givenbirth to elsewhere and assuch he should bear inmind that he has nomonopoly of politicalrascality.

“Let it be on record thatGovernor Orji’sdetermination to recover allgrounds of infrastructuredeficit can not be swayedby the diversionary tacticsof one man and his ragtagfollowers.

"The governor is not inany popularity or beautycontest with anybodyneither is he claiming to bean international tycoon, butrather a lamb whose targetsare unambiguous which isto give Abians back whatbelongs to them withoutminding whose ox isgored.”

POCKET CARTOONVanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014—5

TAKE HEARTBY ELLA RANDLE

Lobby for confab delegatesintensifies

Continues from page 1

LIFEWORDSBY PASTOR ITUAH

I suppose there are many reasons we choose togive. But people who enjoy sharing with othersthe most do not share simply because they have aneed to get rid of something. Those who find thegreatest joy from giving have learned to give froma deeper place; they give from their hearts – SteveGoodier

SANTA Claus is becoming a universal symbolof giving. Millions of children write letters to

Santa each year in hopes that they won’t be for-gotten during his annual giving spree. In somecities around the world, they have programmes thatallow people to sort through these hand-writtenpleas, hopes and wishes and become “Santas” toothers in need. They choose a letter and respondhowever they can. Most anyone can play Santa.

“I like to go to their home on Christmas Eve,” onejoyful Santa said. One year he bought presents forfour children and a ham for their mother. Then headded this poignant observation: “The feeling youget is just incredible.”

Steve Goodier says: “ I admit it - I don’t alwaysget that feeling when I give. But then I don’t al-ways give out of untainted motivations. SometimesI give from other places. Sometimes I give out ofsocial obligation or out of guilt. Or I give with anexpectation for receiving back. But I give best whenI give from that deeper place; when I give simply,freely and generously, and sometimes for no par-ticular reason. I give best when I give from myheart.”

And isn’t it true? Opportunities to give from theheart are not limited to a particular holiday sea-son or cultural tradition. We can give it sincerelyand joyously.

Never stop doing little things for others, you willbe surprised that those little things occupy the big-

people, who want to benominated as delegateshas ensued.

To be part of the 492wise men and women tobe saddled with the taskof reshaping Nigeria,some serving commis-sioners are currentlypressuring their stategovernors for a slot. Ac-cording to themodalities, each of the 36

state governors is ex-pected to nominate threedelegates. The presi-dency, which is expectedto nominate about 70 del-egates is also being pres-sured, Vanguard gath-ered. Already, some min-isters considered to be inPresident GoodluckJonathan’s good booksare being bombardedwith phone calls by peo-ple angling for a seat atthe confab table.

The civil society or-

ganisations, politicalparties, ethnic nationali-ties and otherstakeholders are not leftout. Many of them willhold crucial meetings onthe issue this week.

Leaders of the opposi-tion All ProgressivesCongress (APC) willmeet today to deliberateon whether or not to par-ticipate in the confer-ence. APC is one of thefive parties slated tonominate 10 delegates.

The All ProgressivesGrand Alliance (APGA),which is in support of theconference, said it wouldmeet to nominate its twodelegates, once it gets aletter from the FederalGovernment on the mat-ter.

The apex Igbo socio-cultural organisation,Ohanaeze Ndigbo, saidlast week that it wouldconvene a meeting soonto pick its nominees justas the Arewa Consulta-tive Forum (ACF) urgedall stakeholders to sendtheir First Eleven todeepen deliberations atthe conference. Presidentof the South-East, South-South Professionals ofNigeria (SESSPN), Mr.Emeka Ugwu-Oju, whodisclosed that the groupwill also meet this week,to take a position on thedialogue modalities, said“it will be sad if the gov-ernors nominate theirhouseboys as delegatesbecause their states andgeo-political zones willlose out. They must en-deavour to nominatepeople who can repre-sent their states well.”

Meanwhile, to get theproposed dialogue go-ing, the Presidency will,this week, writestakeholders, who areexpected to nominatetheir delegates on or be-fore February 20.

A presidency sourcetold Vanguard, yester-day, that the Presidencywill look at the issue to-day and start writing theletters to drive the proc-ess.

The disclosure came asthe World Igbo Congress(WIC), the apex organi-zation representingNdigbo all over theworld backed the stanceof the Professor BenNwabueze-led IgboLeaders of Thought thatthe modalities releasedby the government didnot meet the expectationsof most Nigerians forconvening a confab thatwill address the multi-farious problems of thecountry.

Asked if APC wouldtake part in the confer-ence, Alhaji Lai Moham-med, the party’s interimpublicity scribe, said:“The party will meet to-morrow (today) to take adecision on it” and de-clined further comments.

Select your del-egates, prepareagenda, FG tellsNigerians

The Federal Govern-ment advised the variousinterest groups in thecountry to prepare theiragenda to be presentedat the conference ratherthan dissipate energy onwhether the PresidentJonathan administrationhad a hidden agenda.

Special Adviser to thePresident on Political Af-fairs, Alhaji Ahmed AliGulak, said “we have toadvise every interestgroup that has the inter-est of Nigeria as itsagenda to go and dotheir home work and takeit to the national confer-ence. We have a feelingthat those attacking theproposed conference arethose who have nothingto offer and would be thefirst to jump up to claimthat the other ethnicgroups have outsmartedthem.”

According to Gulak, theFederal Government hasno other agenda than “tosecure the peace, stabil-ity and unity of the Ni-gerian state. As the gov-ernment in power, theFederal Government,will not abdicate its re-sponsibility and allowanarchists to take reins ofthe country. We are com-mitted to the welfare ofNigerians, the Presidentswore an oath to accom-plish these things. It isan open agenda which isnot the subject of the con-ference.”

He continued: “Wewant people to do theirhome work and presenttheir best team becausewhen they fail to do so,they will not blame thePresident for their fail-ure.”

APGA ‘ll partici-pate –Umeh

Speaking on the con-ference, APGA NationalChairman, Chief VictorUmeh, okayed themodalities and assuredthat the party would par-ticipate in the exercise.

His words: “APGA willparticipate in the confer-ence. We support themodalities released bythe government. We can-not miss this opportunityof helping to save thecountry. The Nigeriansituation is becomingvery serious and the na-tional conference has be-come imperative. Letpeople come together,let’s dialogue, look atNigeria and things thatare making the countryunstable and find solu-tions to them. We arehappy with PresidentJonathan’s commitmentto the National Confer-ence.”

Asked when the partywould nominate its del-egates, he said: “We arewaiting for the letterfrom the Federal Govern-ment. When we get theletter from the FederalGovernment, which isthe official line of com-munication, we will meetand pick our nominees.

“We welcome the pro-gramme for the confer-ence. We urge all Nige-rians to participate. TheFederal Government hasmade it a broad all-inclu-sive conference. All seg-ments of the society areinvolved. Those oppos-ing the national confer-ence are not patrioticenough. We cannot pre-tend we can get our actstogether without dia-logue.”

On whether the re-quirement of 75 per centmajority of delegates toresolve contentious is-sues would not under-mine the exercise, Umehsaid: “The conferencewill proceed with theunity of Nigeria as no-goarea. Other things will bediscussed. There areopen wounds, whichonly the truth and goodconscience will heal.There are issues that willbe tabled and people willsee the glaring injustice.If delegates at the con-ference fail to addresssuch open wounds, itmeans clearly they wantNigeria to divide. Onlyunreasonable people will Continues 0n page 57

oppose good demands.”

Youths seek more slotsMeantime, Nigerian

Youths, weekend, pro-tested 18 slots given tothem, saying if truly theconference is to reposi-tion the future of Nigeria,18 delegates cannot rep-resent over 60 percent ofthe country’s population.

Consequently, a groupknown as Re-OrientationAdvocates of Nigeria(RAN) tasked the Fed-eral Government on thenomination of moreyouths. The President ofRAN, Mr. CharlesFolayan in a statementin Abuja, said the reserv-ing 18 slots for over 70million youths was unac-ceptable.

According to him, “Weagitated earlier for 30-50% representation in ourcommuniqué at the Na-tional Youth Summit onPeace and Security heldin November last year,we are also very muchconcerned on how thegovernment is goingabout it even now thatthe youth council is incrisis as giving priority toany faction of the coun-cil will be out of place.

“The president had ear-lier said that the confer-ence is meant for theyounger generation, sothe selection of theyounger generation mustnot only be credible, butalso significant, we areso much concerned thatthe number stipulated onthe plan for the youth isinsignificant. Youthgroup should be givenup to 100 delegates not18.”

WIC backs IgboLeaders ofThought's stance

Picking holes in themodalities, Engineer ObiBarth Oyibo Thompson,a member of WIC Boardof Trustees, said: “Al-though there are defectsin the modalities re-leased by the FederalGovernment, the WorldIgbo Congress supportsthat Ndigbo should par-ticipate in the proposedNational Conference.”

He advised againstNdigbo boycotting theConfab, but rather

MEETING—From left: SA to the President on Inter-party Affairs, Sen. NdyObi; Gov Peter Obi (Anambra); Gov Theodore Orji (Abia); Gov. Martin Elechi(Ebonyi); Gov. Sullivan Chime (Enugu); Health Minister, Onyebuchi Chukwuand Chairman House Committee on Works, Chief Ozomgbachi at the Igbopolitical leaders meeting in Enugu, yesterday.

6—Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

...NUJ, Lagos govt, NGE, Newswatch reactShot Newswatch Editor dies

BY EMMA NNADOZIE,CRIME EDITOR, SOLA

OGUNDIPE & ONOZUREDANIA

LAGOS — THE Deputy Edi-tor of Daily Newswatch

newspaper, Mr. ToyinObadina, who was shot earlymorning Saturday by un-known gunmen, has died atthe Lagos State UniversityTeaching Hospital, LASUTH,Ikeja.

Police sources said Mr.Obadina, 50, was driving aToyota Yaris car with numberplate AKD 701 CE when he wasattacked along Ijebu-Ode roadby Hypo/Lucky Fibre junctionby five armed hoodlums whooperated in an SUV whosemake and number could not beascertained.

The source said the hoodlumsstole N20,000 from the victimand shot him on his stomachbefore fleeing from the scene.

It was gathered that widow,who was contacted at theirTunde Odewole Crescent,Adamo in Ikorodu, togetherwith other sympathizers rushedthe victim to Lagos State Uni-versity Teaching Hospital,LASUTH, Ikeja where doctorscommenced immediate treat-ment.

However, the story took an-other dimension early morningSunday when news filtered inthat the victim had died fromthe gunshot wound.

Elder brother of the victim,Oluwole Obadina, who spokewith Vanguard said the widowtold him that her husband wentto the office on Friday and af-ter the close of work, he left forhome with two of his col-leagues.

He reportedly dropped oneof them at Agric bus stop inIkorodu and the other personsomewhere else.

According to her, “just a fewmetres to his house, two SUVcars double-crossed him andshot at him. The OPC men thatwere there told us that if theywere thieves, his mobile phonewould have been stolen.

"They immediately took himto Ikorodu Hospital from wherehe was transferred to GbagadaGeneral Hospital and later toLASUTH, Ikeja. He was shotat the abdomen and the lowerpart was shattered. He waskept at the Intensive Care Unit,ICU, where he was being at-tended to but by 2am the nextday, his condition changed andby 3am, he died. The doctorstried their best because theyhad to remove the bullets fromhis abdomen.”

The deceased's brother fur-ther said that the widow andher three children had beentaken to one of their brothers'house at Alagbole in Iju area.

Contacted on phone, the

widow, Biola Obadina, told Van-guard that it was an armed rob-bery attack. According to her, "ithappened around Imota area ofIkorodu. He was coming backfrom work around 11.30 p.m be-cause it was their production day.He was shot and they collectedsome money from him.

"He was to travel the next day,so, he went to the bank to collectsome money and it was stolenfrom him. I don’t know the exactamount that was stolen from him.

“I feel so bad over his suddendeath. He went to work and wasshot on his way back home. Ourfirst son is just 12 years, secondone is nine while the last is fiveyears old.

"We are yet to tell the seniorones who are in boarding housesabout the death of their father.”

Lagos State Police Public Rela-tions Officer, Ngozi Braide, whoconfirmed the development, toldVanguard that the Police atSagamu Road division receivedinformation about the incidentaround 5.30 am, Saturday, andthe Divisional Police Officer mo-bilised his men to the scene.

She said the Police team latervisited the victim at LASUTHwhere he was receiving treat-ment in a stable condition onlyfor information to filter in that hedied the next day.

She said the police had recov-ered the victim’s car, and thatdetectives are combing all nooksand crannies of Ikorodu and itsenvirons for possible arrest of thefleeing hoodlums.

NUJ condemns killingMeanwhile, the National

Council of the Nigeria Union ofJournalists, NUJ, and LagosState council of the union have,in separate statements, con-demned the gruesome murder ofObadina.

In a statement by its NationalSecretary, Comrade ShuaibUsman Leman, the NUJ said the

shooting of Obadina by robbers,leading to his death, “was an-other sad reminder of the vul-nerability of media profession-als and this further heightensour concern for the safety of jour-nalists.

"While the NUJ condemns thecontinued killing of journalistsin the country, it is no doubt thatObadina and many other jour-nalists died because the Nige-rian system over the years hadfailed to protect its citizens.

“The death has, yet again, de-prived the media of one of itsillustrious journalists and it isvery important to call on theFederal Government to takemeasures for effective protectionof journalists because journal-ists, as the conscience of thenation, cannot be subjected toconstant fear and intimidation bysuch impunity.

“While we condole with themedia family, we pray to God togrant the deceased eternal restand the family the fortitude tobear the loss.”

Lagos NUJ tasks LASGAlso, the Chairman of Lagos

NUJ, Deji Elumoye, tasked thestate government to live up toexpectations, wondering what ishappening to the billions ofnaira that has been saved intothe state Security Trust Fund.

While appreciating theBabatunde Fashola regime forhis steadfastness against crime,Elumoye said there was need todo more in terms of security oflives and property.

He said: “It seems they havegone to sleep, criminals havegradually found their way backinto the state. And I wonder whatthey are doing with billions ofnaira put in the Security TrustFund.”

He also commiserated withNewswatch and Obadina’s fam-ily, while praying for the reposeof the soul of the dead.

Newswatch reactsIn his reaction, the Editor, Sat-

urday Newswatch, Mr. PatAsonye, lamented that they havelost a perfect gentleman, a com-petent, committed and profes-sional journalist to the core whocannot hurt a fly.

He said: “I find it very difficultto speak about him in the pasttense. That Friday, he workedtill about 11pm, I was in a hurryto go and I left him behind totidy up our stories. I then wenthome and around 4 a.m, I got aphone call but before I could pick,the call went off. I did not knowwho was calling. Much later, thephone rang again and it was nowour Managing Director whocalled to say that Toyin was shot.

"Immediately, I got informationthat he was taken to the generalhospital and I went there and bythe time I got there, I met someof the other friends and col-leagues. By then, he had beenwheeled into the theatre for sur-gery. We were hopeful that hewill make it only to hear that hegave up the ghost this morning.”

NGE asks Lagos CP totrack down killers

The Nigerian Guild of Editors,NGE, while reacting to the inci-dent urged the Commissioner ofPolice, Lagos State to track downthe killers without delay.

In a statement signed by itsPresident, Femi Adesina, theNGE described Obadina’s deathas “sickening,” stating that “allmen of the fraternity of the penare revolted that a man return-ing home from his legitimate dutyis waylaid, robbed and then shottwice in the stomach, leading tohis death.”

It further condemned the pro-liferation of small arms almostthroughout the length andbreath of the country and calledon the relevant authorities to riseto the occasion.

Lagos laments stateof insecurity

In the same vein, Lagos Stategovernment described the deathof Obadina as “painful.”

The Commissioner for Infor-mation and Strategy, Mr.Aderemi Ibirogba, who spoke toVanguard lamented over thestate of insecurity in the country,saying “the central governmentisn’t providing adequate secu-rity for the citizens of the coun-try."

According to him, “it is unfor-tunate that Toyin died in his fa-therland where he is expectedto get adequate security. It ispainful that a young man whomthe country has a lot to gain fromdied untimely. It speaks the factthat the there is need for the Fed-eral Government to increase thefunds allocated to the securityapparatus in the country.”

The late Toyin Obadina

24-yr-oldmancommitssuicide overfailedmarriagebid

BIRNIN KEBBI — A24- year old man,

Abubakar Ahmed, was onSaturday found hanging ona tree in Ganten-Tudu inKaoje Development Area ofKebbi State.

A resident of the area,Malam Tukur Mohammed,said in Birnin Kebbi that thedeceased was believed tohave committed suicideover failed marriage bid.

Mohammed said the de-ceased had been farming toearn a living.

He added that the de-ceased ostensibly commit-ted suicide after failing toproduce N40,000 brideprice for the marriagescheduled for Friday, Janu-ary 31.

The witness said the de-ceased was not happy withan arrangement to post-pone the marriage to Fri-day, February 7 in spite ofassurance from relativesthat the money would bepaid.

The deceased reportedlytravelled to neighbouringBuya village with a friendon a motorcycle to recovera debt but was unsuccess-ful.

He was not seen againuntil his corpse was founddangling on a tree on Sat-urday.

The sole administrator ofKaoje Development Area,Malam Bello Abdullahi,confirmed the incident.

3 die, 15injured inIbadan autocrash

BY OLA AJAYI

IBADAN — THREE per-sons were confirmed

dead and at least 15 othersseriously injured when twocommuter buses collided atBodija area of Ibadan, yes-terday.

During a rescue opera-tion, bottles of beer andwine were said to havebeen discovered by thedriver’s seat of one of thebuses.

The bus with numberplate, Lagos LSR 945 XH,and another Toyota busmarked AJ 91 MNY wereinvolved in the accident.

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014—7

Boko Haram: US, UK advocatenon-military approach

Say it requires new thinking, approaches

From right: Vice President Namadi Sambo; Dr. Olusegun Aganga, Minister of Trade andInvestment and Jeff Immelt, Global Chairman/CEO of General Electric (GE) during Immelt’svisit to the vice-president and signing of the Government-to-company investment partner-ship between GE and Federal Government, in Abuja.

BY HUGO ODIOGOR &VICTORIA OJEME

LAGOS— THE governmentsof United States and the

United Kingdom have advisedthe Federal Government to in-crease its use of non-military ap-proach and regional collaborationto tackle the menace of BokoHaram in parts of Nigeria.

The United States Ambassadorto Nigeria, Mr James Entwistle,and the British High Commis-sioner in Nigeria, Andrew Pocock,disclosed this separately in La-gos and Abuja, where they saidthe incidences of Boko Haram at-tacks in parts of the North re-quired new thinking and ap-proaches beyond military diplo-macy.

The US Ambassador who wasat a media roundtable in Lagossaid: “The Federal Governmentmust look at the social and eco-nomic conditions that gave riseto the insurgency in the North-ern parts of the country.

“The Federal Government mustlook at why did it start in the firstplace? What drew people to thisorganisation in the first place?Was it lack of employment oppor-tunity? Was it education system?I am not sure what the reasonsmight be. Sometimes it is hard todo but we need to ask why is ithappening in our country andwhat can we do better in our coun-try to make sure that this type ofthing does not happen again.

Challenge ofcounter-terrorism

“Part of the challenge of coun-ter-terrorism is that you are fight-ing an enemy who mixes with thepopulation and one of the mostdifficult things for the military isto go into a mixed setting like thatand figure out who is a terrorist

and who are the innocent civil-ians.”

"In my conversation with yourgovernment and military, I haveexpressed these points and Ithink there is a growing concernover finding an enemy who mixeswith the civilian population.

“These are enormously difficultthing to do and that is why weare trying to help the Federal Gov-ernment.”

He also advised Nigeria tostrengthen its regional diplomacy.

According to Entwistle,”there isthe need for your government towork closely with Cameroun andChad because these guys crossthe borders. The only way to dealwith these guys is to collaboratewith your neigbours and relevantinternational organisations.”

Britain to help withsecurity challenges

In Abuja, the British High Com-missioner, Mr. Andrew Pocock,who spoke in Abuja at the wel-come ceremony for NigerianChevening scholars, said: “Wehave already been workingclosely with the Nigerian govern-ment on the security agenda.There is a lot that is going on andwill continue to go on.

“The other thing we are doingis to help promote the view whichI think the Nigerian governmentalready has, that the conflict in theNorth-East, the kind that we see,is not going to be solved easilyand purely by military means.There is need for a co-ordinatedapproach on the political and eco-nomic fronts.

“Our development programme

is very much aimed in assistingin the two aspects in bringing newapproaches to dealing with thedrivers of conflict and secondly,by promoting some of the basicelements that people require,particularly in parts of the north,education, health care, sanitation,elements of infrastructure uplift,helping marginalised people tobecome small entrepreneurs andto have access to the form of fi-nancial systems in Nigeria.”

Pocock explained further thathis government had plans to as-sist Nigeria in dealing with its se-curity challenges but noted thatit was actively engaged in pro-viding training for the Nigerianmilitary on Command and StaffCollege.

Nigeria'll overcomeB'Haram challenges— Onaiyekan

Meanwhile, the Catholic Arch-bishop of Abuja, John CardinalOnaiyekan, however, expressedoptimism that Nigeria would over-come the challenges of BokoHaram insurgents.

Onaiyekan expressed the opti-mism at a mass to conclude the2014 Prayer Project of CatholicCharismatic Renewal of Nigeria,at Papal Ground, Kubwa, Abuja.

He said there was nothing likeBoko Haram 10 years ago and itwould soon become history by thegrace of God.

He said: “Let us continue to praythat God will deliver us from this‘terrible infection’ of Boko Haram.We do not know how God will doit, but as Christians, we needdeep faith and believe that Godwill do it.”

The cleric urged Christians tocontinue to pray for the peace andunity of the country.

Atiku dumps PDP again, defects to APCBY EMMANUEL AZIKEN,

POLITICAL EDITOR &HENRY UMORU

received by the top leadershipof the APC at a rally being or-ganised in Yola this morning.

Party leaders, includingGen. Muhammadu Buhari,Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu,among others, are to witnessthe public defection of theformer vice-president at theYola rally.

Atiku in a statement, yester-day, urged his supportersacross the country to take op-portunity of the APC registra-tion exercise commencingWednesday to join the oppo-sition party.

Reign of impunity

He cited what he claimed as

the reign of impunity in thePDP which, according to him,had led to the unprecedenteddivision in the country alongreligious, regional and ethniclines.

The exit from the PDP wouldbe the second time that Atikuwould leave the party, havingfirst left the party in 2006 atthe time of the crisis betweenhim and former PresidentOlusegun Obasanjo.

PDP keeps mute

The National Publicity Sec-retary of the PDP, Chief OlisaMetuh, did not respond to en-quiries on the exit of theformer vice-president, whowas one of the founders of the

party in 1998.Governor Murtala Nyako of

Adamawa State, who is alsoannouncing his public defec-tion to the APC, welcomedAtiku’s move, yesterday, say-ing he was aware of the inter-nal humiliation that the formervice-president had endured inthe PDP where he had beenstripped of his privileges as aformer vice-president.

Nyako who spoke throughhis director of media, AhmedSajo said: “He is welcome andit has long been expected aswe are aware of the internalhumiliation he had suffered inthat party as he was denied ofhis statutory privileges includ-ing invitation to high levelmeetings of the party.”

ABUJA — ERSTWHILEVice-President of the

country and one of the found-ers of the Peoples DemocraticParty, PDP, Atiku Abubakar,yesterday, dumped the party,alleging a reign of impunitythat has put the party beyondredemption.

Atiku, whose resignation let-ter is to be delivered to thePDP ward chairman in Jada,Adamawa State today, said hewould be joining the AllProgressives Congress, APC.

Sources close to the formervice-president told Vanguardlast night that Atiku would be

Tambuwal,Ochekpeassure onLake ChadBasin

BY FUNMIOLASUPO

ABUJA — HOUSE ofRepresenta t ives

Speaker, Aminu Tambuwaland Minister of Water Re-sources, Mrs. SarahOchekpe, has restated Ni-geria’s commitment to thedevelopment and successof the Lake Chad BasinCommission, LCBC.

They gave the assurance,weekend, in Abuja at theinaugural meeting ofSpeakers/Presidents ofNational Assemblies of theLake Chad Basin Commis-sion, LCBC, member states.

On Nigeria’s support tothe committee of parlia-ments of member states ofthe Basin, Tambuwal saidthe commission’s secre-tariat in Abuja had been“provided by the House ofRepresentatives of Nigeria.I am pleased to inform youthat I have made a prom-ise to facilitate the rehabili-tation of the RPC Secre-tariat to make it fully func-tional and befitting as soonas the agreement issigned."

In her address, Ministerof Water Resources, saidNigeria granted $5 millionout of the $6 million re-quired to carry out the fea-sibility study on the InterBasin Water Transfer fromUbangui River to LakeChad to recharge the re-ceding lake.

Ochekpe spoke throughthe Permanent Secretary,Ministry of WaterResouces, Baba Umar.

8—Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

House of Reps summons Okonjo-Iwealato clarify 50 questions answered

Vice President's wife, Amina Samboadvises women to dress decently

No court order barring 11 Senators fromdefecting to APC — Lai Mohammed

BY EMMAN OVUAKPORIE

ABUJA — THE House ofRepresentatives Committee

on Finance, yesterday, sum-moned the Minister of Finance,Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala for fur-ther clarifications on her answersto the 50 questions the commit-tee sent to her on December 19,last year.

The letter of invitation datedJanuary 31 and signed by theChairman of the committee, Dr.Abdulmunin Jibrin, entitled, 'Ob-servations, Request for AdditionalInformation and Invitation to In-vestigative Hearing,' however,demanded further clarificationson 40 answers to the earlier ques-tions.

The committee asked the Min-ister to appear before it on Febru-ary 20 after when she must haveprovided more information on the40 questions she had earlier an-swered.

The letter read in part: “yourresponse to the 50 questions weraised to ascertain the true stateof our economy dated January 15,2014 was received and carefullyanalysed by the Committee.

”Having gone through your re-sponses, the Committee notedthat some questions were eithernot answered, partially answered,out rightly ignored or completelymisunderstood.

”The Committee noted glaringmissing gaps in the responses,absence of supporting proofs toassertions and lack of relevantdocuments to back up the pres-entation as is the practice in anylegislative oversight or investiga-tion.”

It was stressed in the letter that“many data and statistics pro-vided were inconsistent with sub-sequent information providedwhile answering other questions.

"Also noted were the wide rang-ing comparison you made withother advanced and developingcountries while responding tosome questions but failed to ap-ply the same in some cases thatobviously require such ap-proach.’’

It was further explained in theletter that “ in some instances, youabruptly referred the Committeeto relevant agencies for clarifica-tion.

”The Committee is surprisedthat because of its conviction thatif all the questions raised are be-yond the competence of the Min-ister of Finance, it is certainly notbeyond the competence of theCoordinating Minister for theEconomy to the extent of infor-mation you must have in yourpossession unless you say other-wise.

”In view of the above and aheadof the investigative hearing on thestate of the economy, the Com-mittee is obliged to forward to youadditional observations and re-quests to be submitted to theCommittee not later than Febru-ary 20, 2014."

The 50 questions asked Dr.Okonjo- Iweala then generateda lot of controversies even as theMinister of Finance promptly re-plied them and was commendedfor responding to the questionspromptly.

Here are some of the originalquestions:

1. What should you consider asthe major economic achievementsof this government in the 2013 fis-

cal year and why?2. You have been credited with

many announcements regardingNigeria’s economy as one of thefastest growing economies in Af-rica. If the economy is one of thefast growing economies, what isexactly growing the economy?What role does government playin the said economic growth, es-pecially given that as high as 80per cent of the country’s total an-nual budget spending still goesinto recurrent expenditure?

3. Since your arrival as minis-ter of finance in 2011, you havepublicly announced the need toreduce the recurrent expenditureso that more money would bemade available to capital spend-ing which is critical to growingand diversifying the country’seconomy. How far has govern-ment succeeded in making thesenecessary cuts; and where exactlyhave these cuts been made in thiseffort to reduce recurrent ex-penditure?

4. You are known to be celebrat-ing a single-digit GDP growth.But speaking recently at a break-fast dialogue with some membersof the organised private sector in

Lagos, organised by the NigerianEconomic Summit Group, NESG,you were quoted as saying: “Weare growing, but not creatingenough jobs. That is a very bigchallenge…We need to growfaster. I think it needs to grow atleast nine to 10 per cent to drivejob growth the way we want.”Don’t you agree that a good fi-nance minister managing aneconomy like ours should be cel-ebrating a GDP growth as highas 20 per cent annually? Why isit that our economy cannot growbeyond a single digit? How manyjobs are being created as a resultof these said growths? In whichsectors of the economy are thesejobs created? If in private sector,what contributions is governmentmaking to further assist these pri-vate sector firms?

5. In the presence of Nigeria’shuge infrastructure deficit, whyis it that the country’s debt-to-GDP at about 19 per cent in 2012remains one of the lowest in theworld when compared to nationsalready with world-class infra-structure and industrial econo-mies such as America’s 105 percent, Brazil’s 65.49 per cent, In-

dia’s 67.60 per cent, and SouthAfrica’s 40.9 per cent?

6. Since facts don’t lie, have youany disagreements with the Sep-tember 4, 2013 Global Competi-tiveness Report of the World Eco-nomic Forum for 2013-2014,which ranked Nigeria 120th outof 148 countries ranked in theGlobal Competitiveness Index,including being ranked far be-hind some African countries suchas Mauritius 45th, South Africa53rd, and Kenya 96th?

7. "For the first time in Niger-ia’s 53rd year history, we havesuccessfully privatised the elec-tric power industry,” so said thePresident at a recent meeting inLondon with some foreign inves-tors. As minister of finance shouldyou agree that the recent privati-sation of the country’s power in-frastructure is worth celebratingas a major economic achieve-ment in 2013, when in realitythere is little or nothing to showas an improvement in the coun-try power supply? Also why ourrush to wholesale privatisation ofthe power sector when countrieslike South Africa, generating ashigh as 42,000MW still have

their power sector mostly in pub-lic hands?

8. What was your reaction to theNovember 12, 2013 statementcredited to the World Bank Coun-try Director for Nigeria, Marie-Francoise Marie-Nelly, who saidthat over 100 million Nigeriansare today living in absolute des-titution, representing an un-heard-of 8.33 per cent of theworld’s total number of people liv-ing in destitution?

9. Nigerians are increasinglyperplexed that these days noth-ing happens without governmentborrowing. And for most Nigeri-ans, it is frightening how thosemanaging the economy are justdragging us into excessively un-productive debts. More worri-some is the fact that every effortis being made to hide the detailsof the country’s debt stock fromNigerians. Where are the factsthat the country’s current highrate of borrowing is productive,let alone have the ability to berepaid without having to resort tomore borrowings?

10. Is prudence in our borrow-ing simply reduction in borrow-ing or simply constructive borrow-ing with government putting nec-essary measures in place to en-sure that domestic debt profile isproperly supervised and utilisedby curbing corruption?

11. From Debt Management Of-fice (DMO) 2012 Annual Report,the total public debt outstandingbetween 2008 and 2012 for exter-nal stock rose from $3.72bn to$6.53bn, while domestic stock rosefrom $17.68bn to $41.97bn. Thetotal debt service the same periodsaw the percentage of externaldebt service drastically reducedfrom 11.46 per cent to 5.96 percent while the percentage of do-mestic debt servicing grew from88.54 per cent in 2008 to 94.04per cent in 2012, drastically in-creasing the cost of the total debtservice since the cost of domesticborrowing is atrociously higherthan the cost of external borrow-ing. How could your debtsustainability analysis rationalisethis without seeing some narrowinterests being the overriding rea-son? Could this be the explana-tion why commercial banks in thecountry are declaring unheard-of three digit profits and the highForeign Portfolio Investment andlow Foreign Direct Investment?

12. It’s an established fact thatthe willingness and ability to bor-row do not automatically translateinto economic growth. If you agreewith this fact, how productive arethe country’s recent borrowings?

13. Why should our internaldebts continue to represent morethan two-thirds of Nigeria’s ex-ternal debt profile, when the costof servicing domestic debts is ri-diculously far more expensivethan servicing external debts?Why should government continueto borrow internally when in sodoing results in insufficient funds,skyrockets the cost of borrowingand above all, crowds out the realsector from the money market?Shouldn’t the high cost of domes-tic borrowing override whateverare the assumed benefits? Sinceboth London Interbank OfferRates (LIBOR) and the US Treas-ury Bonds rates offer far betterinterest rates for sovereign bor-rowings, why have we continuednot to take advantage of cheaperinterest rates?

THE ALL Progressives Con-gress, APC, yesterday, said

that there was no court order bar-ring the 11 former PDP Senatorsfrom defecting to the APC, con-trary to the misinformation being

peddled in some quarters.This was contained in a state-

ment issued in Ilorin, KwaraState, by the National InterimPublicity Secretary of the party,Alhaji Lai Mohammed.

Mohammed said that the onlyexisting court order was to theeffect that the Senate President

and the Speaker of the House ofRepresentatives should maintainthe status quo concerning defect-ing lawmakers.

According to him: ‘’What thisorder means is that neither thePresident of the Senate nor theSpeaker of the House can declarevacant the seats of the defectinglawmakers. It does not mean theletter of notification from defect-ing members cannot be read onthe floor of the chambers.

’’We are not asking that the is-sue of the defection should bediscussed or debated on the floorof the Senate. All we are sayingis that the Senate Presidentshould read the letter of notifica-tion.’’

APC said that in view of this,the argument that the defectingletter could not be read on thefloor, so as not to contravene theSenate’s Standing Rules that pre-cluded the upper chamber fromdiscussing any matter that was al-ready in court, did not apply inthis case.

ABUJA — WIFE of the VicePresident, Hajiya Amina

Sambo, has called on women toimbibe the use of hijab (headscarf) and dress decently to un-derscore their chastity.

Sambo made the call in Abuja,weekend, at the maiden 'WorldHijab Day' in Nigeria organisedby the Coalition of Nigerian Mus-lim Women.

“The essence of hijab is to pro-mote the dignity of women in mod-esty, which had been the norm inhistory, up until the later part of

the past century.“Modesty is a component in

several world religions, particu-larly in Judaism, Christianity andIslam.

“It may come as a surprise tomany that it was not Islam thatinvented modesty or hijab; it ex-isted in the laws of religions re-vealed before Islam,” she said.

She added that it was very in-cumbent on Muslim women touse the hijab “because it’s a com-mand from Allah."

HAND-OVER: From left, Group Managing Director, Dangote Sugar, Graham Clark; Chair-man, Panafrican Group, Andrew Scott; Deputy Group Managing Director, Dangote Sugar,Abdullahi Sule, and Group Managing Director, Panafrican Group, Scott McCaw, at the Dan-gote Sugar Backward Integration equipment hand-over event.

BY EMEKA MAMAH

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 — 9

Fashola wants continuoustraining for legal practitioners

BY ABDULWAHABABDULAH & ONOZURE

DANIA

Police nab 22-yr-old for cloningEgba monarch's facebook

BY IFEANYI OKOLIE

FACILITIES' TOUR: Lagos State deputy governor, Mrs. Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire (2ndright), Chief Medical Director, Gbagada General Hospital, Dr. Adekunle Dauda (right),presenting baby products to new born babies, during the deputy governor's tour of the hospitalfacilities and interactive session with health workers in Lagos.

Amosunlaments Ondoghastly crash

Lagos seals23 firms overtax default LAGOS—GOVERNOR of

Lagos State, BabatundeFashola, SAN, has stressed theneed for judges and legalpractitioners to seekcontinuous legal training andscholarship to promote thecause of justice in the country.

Fashola’s call was coming asa former Justice of the supremecourt, Justice EmmanuelAyoola, who was a formerChairman of the IndependentCorrupt Practices and otherrelated Offences Commission,ICPC, regretted the depletionin the knowledge of law,arguing that the time is nowfor stakeholders to establish afund for legal scholarship.

Fashola who was speakingas a special guest at the publicpresentation of a bookentitled, 'Civil Litigation- AQuick Reference Guide toSubstantive Law andProcedure’, written by a Lagoshigh court judge, JusticeOludotun Adefowope-Okojiesaid most often times hewondered about differentdecisions emanating from theappellate courts in the country,especially on issues ofobjections filed by lawyers incourts.

He expressed surprise onthe attitude of lawyers whoprofited on technicalities todelay cases in court, saying tohim such attitude is basic lackof the knowledge of law.

He said: “Filing unnecessaryobjections or relying ontechnicalities does notadvance the cause of justice.We should consider theobjections we file in courts.

“That is why we must

As Ayoola regrets depletion in the knowledge of law

continue to emphasise thenecessity for continuoustraining and legalscholarship. I thinkcontinuing legal educationwill help us to see what theyare doing in otherjurisdiction.”

Speaking on the efforts ofthe sitting judge to write the530-page book, Fashola saidhe never doubted the integrity

and legal astuteness of JusticeAdefowope-Okojie, whileencouraging others toemulate the author and saidthe government wasconsidering the establishmentof a legal institute to competewith the Nigerian Institute ofAdvanced Legal Studies,NIALS.

He advised judges andlegal practitioners to update

themselves with the workingsof the profession in order toeffectively and efficientlydischarge theirresponsibilities.

The governor also reiteratedthe administration’scommitment to continue toreform its laws, adding that therevised edition of the LagosState Laws would soon bepublished.

LAGOS—THE LagosState Internal Revenue

Service, LIRS, has sealed23 companies over thenon-remittance of N326.6million personal incometaxes of workers inJanuary.

Mrs. Folasade Coker-Afolayan, the Head ofDistrain Unit, saidyesterday in Lagos that thetaxes were the personalincome taxes for a periodof one year to six years.

She restated that taxpayment was a civicresponsibility of everycitizen, adding that theproceeds were being usedby the government to provideinfrastructure.

She said: “Tax is a majorsource of governmentrevenue. It enables it toprovide infrastructure andimprove the citizens’standard of living.”

Coker-Afolayan said thatLIRS would continue tosanction tax defaulters andadvised companies to remittaxes promptly to avoidembarrassment.

She said that it was acriminal offence to breakgovernment’s seals on sealedcompanies.

LAGOS—A middle-agedman, Gani Akinmade, has

been arrested by operatives ofthe Special Fraud Unit,Milverton, Ikoyi, Lagos, forallegedly cloning the identityof the Alake of Egbaland onfacebook, with an attempt todefraud unsuspectingmembers of the public.

The Commissioner of PoliceSFU, Tunde Ogunsakin, in astatement said the unitreceived a complaint on July22, 2013, where it was allegedthat between May 3 and 22,2013, a frausdster with phonenumber 08096897566 openeda facebook accountwith the name ofHRM Oba MichealAdedotun AremuGbadebo, theAlake of Egbalandand attempted toswindle oneO l u b u k o l aAwofeso, a UKresident whom hemet on socialnetwork facebook,

of N300,000.00.The suspect was also said to

have attempted to lure thevictim to partner in a businessof supplying 300 transformersvalued at more than N1billion.

The said Gani Akinmade is22-year-old and a native ofOdeda Local GovernmentArea of Ogun State. A drop-out of Tai Solarin College ofEducation, Ijebu-Ode.

He confessed to the crimebut stated that he conspiredwith one Seyi Lewis andIfeanyi to perpetrate thefraud.

ABEOKUTA—OGUNState governor,

Senator Ibikunle Amosunhas sympathised with thegovernment and people ofOndo State as well as theNigerian Union ofJournalists, NUJ, over theghastly road accidentwhich occurred along theAkure-Ondo expresswayin Ondo State at theweekend.

He said the accident,which happened atAponmu village andinvolved the deputygovernor, Alhaji AlliOlanusi and theOsunmakinde of IfeTuntun, Osun State, ObaObawure Taofeek Olaposi,claiming four lives,including the Chairman ofthe NUJ, NTA, Akurechapel, Mr. Alex Akinwaleand some of his familymembers, was very sad.

In a press release by hisSenior Special Assistanton Media, Mrs. FunmiWakama, Senator Amosun,who condoled with thefamily of the deceased,also described the accidentas lamentable.

10—Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

Why I was framed up over Ige's death—OMISORE

Ogun LP exco sues Daniel over purported removal

BY GBENGA OLARINOYE

Novenavarsity holdsseminar onaccountability

BY INNOCENT ANABA

N O V E N AUNIVERSITY

Ogume, will hold aseminar on public sectoraccounting at theuniversity’s conference halltoday. The seminar, ishosted by theDepartment ofAccounting and Finance. Professor Sulaiman A. S.Arewa, Director ofGovernmental andFinancial AccountingResearch Centre,Newswatch stateuniversity, Kofi, will be theguest lecturer.

The renowned scholarand publisher of 53 peerreviewed national andinternational journals,among others will in hislecture dwell on newdevelopments ingovernmental accountingsystem, procedure andissues in public accountingand accountability.

O S O G B O — F O R M E Rdeputy governor of Osun

State and a chieftain of thePeoples Democratic Party, PDP,Senator Iyiola Omisore,yesterday, explained why he wasframed up on the death of theformer Minister of Justice andAttorney General of theFederation, Chief Bola Ige.

Chief Ige was on December 23,2001, murdered in his Bodijaresidence in Ibadan by a yet tobe identified gunmen.

But fielding questions fromnewsmen in Osogbo, SenatorOmisore who was the primesuspect in the murder case alongwith some of his associates statedthat one of the reasons was tocover up the murder of a formerHouse of Assemly member, Hon.Odunayo Olagbaju who waskilled few days before Ige.

According to him, anotherreason was the second termambition of the then governor ofthe state, now chairman of AllProgressives Congress APC,Chief Bisi Akande.

Looking back, Senator Omisorewho was persuaded in 1999 tostep down for Chief Akande bytheir party then, the Alliance for

Democracy, AD, stated that hehad no regret for obeying theparty’s directive.

Omisore, one of the leadingPDP governorship aspirants inAugust this year’s election inOsun State also noted that there

were no progressives again inany of the parties.

He said: “We don’t haveprogressives again in thiscountry. It is mere deception andpropaganda. PDP, APC and anyother party are the same thing.

It is just a matter of politicalconvenience.”

Omisore called for theimmediate redeployment ofOsun State Resident ElectoralCommissioner, REC, AmbassadorRufus Akeju from the statealleging that he cannot conducta free and fair election.

ABEOKUTA—LABOURParty, LP, executive

committee members in OgunState, have dragged formergovernor, Otunba Gbenga Danieland the Independent NationalElectoral Commission, INEC,before a Federal High Courtsitting in Lagos over theirpurported removal without avalid congress.

The plaintiffs want the court todeclare that they and otherexecutive committee members atthe state, local government andward levels are LP’s authenticleaders and officers.

The plaintiffs, Mr. OlabodeSimeon, Oginni Olaposi andArabambi Abayomi, who sued forthemselves and on behalf of thecommittee, also joined theInspector-General of Police; theDirector-General, Department of

State Services, DSS; LP and itsnational chairman, Chief DanNwanyanwu as defendants.

Other defendants are LPDeputy Chairman, South, Dr.Joseph Akinlaja; John Olaleye;Michael Adegbola; LadiAdebutu; Sarafa Tunji Ishola;Senator Lekan Mustapha;Kayode Amuson; Isiaq BiodunAkinlade; Gboyega NasiruIsiaka and Adeshina Kawonise.

The plaintiffs are contending

that their tenure ought to haveelapsed in 2013, but that at theparty’s National ExecutiveCommittee, NEC, meeting heldon November 20, last year, it wasunanimously resolved that thetenure of all occupants ofexecutive offices at all levels beextended pending the holding ofcongresses and a convention toelect their successors.

They want the court todetermine whether the LPexecutive committee in OgunState can be removed from officewithout elections at a valid statecongress, or a convention held tooverturn the NEC resolution.

The plaintiffs urged the courtto hold that Akinlaja and Danielcannot unilaterally handpick andappoint anybody of their choiceas LP officers in Ogun State intotal disregard of the 1999Constitution and the party’s 2009Constitution, and that INECcannot recognise such officers.

Ekiti PDPflaysFayemi'sinvolvementin RTEAN'spolitics

ADO EKITI—THEEkiti State Peoples

Democratic Party, PDP,has berated the stategovernor, Dr. JohnKayode Fayemi overinsistence on retainingMr. Rotimi Olanbiwonu,aka Mentilo, as the statechairman of RoadTransport EmployersAssociation of Nigeria,RTEAN.

According to a pressstatement issued in AdoEkiti yesterday by theparty’s state PublicitySecretary, Pastor KolaOluwawole, the PDP saidit has uncovered thatFayemi has planned touse Mr. Olanbiwonu tocoordinate certainmembers of the driver’sunion to rig and causemayhem during nextgovernorship election inthe state.

Whereas members ofthe union had kickedagainst GovernorFayemi backingappointment ofOlambiwonu as caretakerchairman after expirationof his tenure leading towild protests by themembers.

RLG commissions $50m technology city in Osun

ILESHA—WEST Africa’sbiggest ICT and phone

manufacturing company, RLGhas increased its foothold in theindustry with the commissioningof a 50 million US DollarsTechnology City in Ilesha, OsunState.

Called the RLG/AdulawoTechnology City, the world-classfacility which is alreadyoperational will be involved in thetraining of youths in the assemblyand repair of the variouselectronic devices as well as alsoproduce thesedevices from itsfacility. In addition, itis expected to createover 10,000 jobs bothdirectly andindirectly.

Speaking at theofficial launch of theCity, Mr. RolandAgambire, GroupChairman of RLGnoted that gone are

the days where oil was themainstay of world economy, thatICT was the new money spinnerand the RLG/AdulawoTechnology City is an ambitiousproject that will play a major rolein the technology revolution thatis sure to come to Nigeria.

He noted that the dream ofsetting up such a facility waspropelled by the leadership andvision of the state Governor,Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, whomhe stated supported the idea fromthe outset especially because it

LAUCHING: From left: Osun State deputy governor, Otunba Titilayo Laoye-Tomori,Chairman, RLG, Mr. Roland Agambire and Osun State overnor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola,during the official launching of Adulawo Technology City, at Ilesha, Osun State.

has as its main goal the creationof jobs and the transfer oftechnology.

He stated that although theAfrican continent is thewealthiest, it has not been ableto maximise its potential andRLG as a Pan-African company hasthe ambitious dream of creating wealthfor African youths and leading themout of poverty through technology.

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014—11

Nine govs, more senators to decampfrom PDP —RIVERS APC

BY JIMITOTAONOYUME

PORT HARCOURT—ALLProgressives Congress,

APC, has said that nine Peo-ples Democratic Party, PDP,governors and more senatorswould defect to its fold beforethe end of March.

Congratulating the 11 sen-ators that decamped to theAPC from the PDP last week,Chairman of Rivers Statechapter of the party, Mr. Dav-ies Ikanya, charged the Sen-ate President, David Mark, toread their letters of defection

on the floor of the House.The party described the

senators as truly progres-sive minded, adding thatthey had come to wherethey truly belonged.

He said: “We are awarethat by March, 2014 moresenators and nine PDP gov-ernors will cross over toAPC from PDP by whichtime the arrangement forthe formal burial of thedoomed PDP will com-mence."

In the case of SenatorsMagnus Abe of RiversSouth-East and Wilson Ake

of Rivers West, the partyhailed their dumping thePDP for APC as a big boostto the party and a manifesta-tion of the fact that APC wasnow well rooted in the state.

“APC is now in full controlof Rivers political space andready to deliver the statewholly to APC in the 2015general elections. RiversAPC welcomes Senators Abeand Ake. Progressives adoreyou, Rivers people are proudof you; democrats saluteyour courage, your constitu-ents are behind you,” hesaid.

CENTENARY:Govt barstelecom firmsfrom SMSpromotionallotteries

THE National LotteryRegulatory Commis-

sion, NLRC, has orderedall mobile telecommunica-tions service providers inthe country to suspend allforms of short messageservice, SMS, promotionallotteries in order to allowthe Federal Governmentconduct its CentenaryGames Lottery on their plat-form.

NLRC, in a statement inAbuja by its Director Gen-eral, Mr Joe Ekpe, said thatthe suspension of multiplelottery schemes on telecomplatforms began in Januaryand it will remain in effecttill further notice.

The Centenary GamesLottery is part of the activi-ties lined up by the Feder-al Government to mark thecountry’s 100 years of theamalgamation of the North-ern and Southern protec-torates by Nigeria’s firstGovernor-General, Sir Fre-drick Lugard in 1914.

The centenary lottery, ac-cording to NLRC, will runon MTN, Airtel, Globacom,Etisalat and Visafone plat-forms.

Government has alreadyappointed Secure Electron-ic Technology Plc, SET, itscentenary lottery operatorto carry out the lottery onthe five telecommunicationoperators’ network plat-forms.

UGBORODO: Community rejectsUduaghan's choice of EPZ interface Chair

BY EGUFE YAFUG-BORHI & AKPOKONA

OMAFUAIRE

WARRI—MOVES to amica-bly resolve the crisis

rocking oil-rich Ugborodocommunity in Warri South-West Local Government Area,Delta State, suffered a majorsetback, weekend, with thecommunity rejecting the ap-pointment of Mr AustineOborogbeyi as Chairman ofyet to be fully reconstitutedEscravos Processing Zone,EPZ, Interface Committee.

The state governor, Dr. Em-manuel Uduaghan, had an-nounced Oborogbeyi, a law-yer and Delta Internal Reve-nue Board member, as thenew Ugborodo EPZ InterfaceCommittee Chairman follow-

ing his nomination by theOlu of Warri, Ogiamwe Atu-watse II. The committee wasearlier dissolved over fac-tional differences in thecommunity.

At a meeting in Ode-Ug-borodo presided over byOlaja-Orori (SpiritualHead), Benson Omadeli,Eghare-Aja, elders and in-terest groups unanimouslyrejected the state govern-ment’s choice of Oborog-beyi as the new committeechairman, describing himas an imposition.

At the meeting, whichwas not attended by theThomas Eriyitomi’s faction,Olaja-Orori Omadeli said:“The Olu and GovernorUduaghan cannot decidefor the Ugborodo people.Even under military dis-

pensation, government nev-er meddled in Ugborodo af-fairs. We reject the impositionof Oborogbeyi on us.

“Ugborodo has no faction-al leadership. The fifth col-umnist created it. You can seethe traditional authority in-cluding myself, the Eghare-Aja, Wellington Ojoghor andthe Registered Trustee, PaEworitsemogha Shebi, are incharge of our affairs. Thecommunity will choose itsEPZ committee and deal withthe Federal Government onthis laudable EPZ projectceded to us.”

The community said itwould sanction embattledleaders, who mastermindedthe arrest and arraignment ofthe Spiritual Leader and oth-ers in court over sundrycharges.

Sanusi urgesstates to tapinto CBN’sN220bn MicroFinance FundBY SIMON EBEGBULEM

BENIN—GOVERNORof Central Bank of Ni-

geria, CBN, Mallam LamidoSanusi, has urged state gov-ernments to tap into the bank’sN220 billion Micro FinanceIntervention Fund in order toalleviate poverty in theirstates.

The CBN governor, in Be-nin City, Edo State, when hepaid a condolence visit toGovernor Adams Oshiomholeand the palace of the Beninmonarch, Oba Erediauwaover the death of Queen Es-ther Erediauwa, said the CBNwill continue to engage the rel-evant state finance ministriesto avail themselves of the op-portunity offered to assistsmall and medium scale en-terprises access the fund.

DEFECTION:Mark meetswith 11aggrieved PDPsenators today

BY JOHNBOSCOAGBAKWURU

A B U J A — S E N AT EPresident, David

Mark, will today meet withthe 11 former Peoples Demo-cratic Party, PDP, senators, whodefected to the opposition AllProgressives Congress, APC,last week.It was gathered that the Sen-ate President was making ef-forts to make the affected sen-ators change their minds andreturn to the ruling party. Some of the senators whospoke to Vanguard on tele-phone, yesterday, expressedtheir preparedness to attendthe meeting, adding that theywere too old to be influencedby anybody. One of the senators, AliNdume, said he, as a person,has great respect for SenatorMark, who he described as agood leader and that he wasready to honour invitationsfrom him (Mark) any time be-cause of his excellent leader-ship qualities, adding, “Ofcourse we are still together assenators, so, I think he is do-ing what he is supposed todo on his part. What he is do-ing is normal. I think it is goodfor him as a leader and not tosay okay, you are going, bye.” On whether they wouldchange their minds, if pres-surised by Mark, Ndume,said: “We cannot predict whathe is going to do and I hon-estly, cannot predict what isgoing to happen till tomorrow( t o d a y ) .”Naturally if the Senate Pres-ident wants to see me, I can-not ask why before going tosee him. It may not necessar-ily turn out to be what hewants, but as a leader, he hasdone what he should do.” Another senator also saidthat not minding the respectthey have for Mark, “we areadults that can take decisionswe know are good for us.”Attempts to speak to the lead-er of the defecting SenatorBukola Saraki was unsuccess-ful, as he did not pick his calls.Senator Aisha Al-Hassan didnot pick her calls either, nith-er did she reply to the textmessage sent to her phone. Meanwhile, among thethings the Senate Presidentwould discuss with the defect-ing members include his rea-son for not reading their let-ter during the last plenary,why they should drop theirdefection plan as well as thepending court case institutedby the national leadership ofPDP to stop them from defec-tion, among others.

BURIAL: From left: Chief of Army Staff, Maj-Gen. Tobiah Minimah, with the son ofthe deceased, Mr. Gari Akpobire, during the burial of late Pastor Jacob Akpobire, inEnwhe, Isoko South Local Government Area of Delta State, weekend.

12 — Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014—13

My political future depends on God, mypeople — Ekweremadu....Ezeagu constituents endorse him for 2015

BY TONY EDIKE

ENUGU — DEPUTY President ofthe Senate, Ike Ekweremadu,

has said his continuous stay in theNational Assembly was at the mercyof God and the people that electedhim, noting that his political futuredepended on them and not on any sin-gle human being

Apparently reacting to speculationswithin the PDP circle in the state thatsome powerful politicians in the statehad plotted to retire all the currentNational Assembly members from thestate who are doing second term andabove, Ekweremadu expressed hap-piness with the quality of representa-tion and achievements by the federallawmakers representing Enugu Westsenatorial zone

He said the two members of theHouse of Representatives, TobiasOkechukwu (Awgu-Aninri-Oji Riverfederal constituency), and OgbuefiOzongbachi, Chairman, House Com-mittee on Works (Udi-Ezeagu federalconstituency), had given a good ac-count of themselves by the number andquality of projects they had attractedto the area.

The Deputy Senate President andSpeaker of ECOWAS Parliament, whomade the remarks when stakeholdersand leaders from Ezeagu Local Gov-

ernment Area of the state, com-prising 20 wards and over 40 au-tonomous communities, paid hima solidarity visit in his residencein Enugu, said nobody wouldchange a winning team.

The stakeholders had duringthe visit, pledged to supportEkweremadu in whatever ambi-

tion he chose to pursue in2015, saying he had distin-guished himself as a Senatorof the Federal Republic of Ni-geria.

The Deputy Senate Presi-dent said all they were askingfor was a level-playing groundin any election, so the people

could decide the fate of any as-pirant or candidate

He noted, however, thatanytime the people said he hadrepresented them enough andhe should come back, he woulddo so immediately and joinhands to support whoever theywanted.

FAAN gives concessionaires 6-monthdeadline to develop airport lands

BY KENNETH EHIGIATOR

THE FEDERAL Governmenthas set a deadline of six

months for concessionaires todevelop lands leased to them fordevelopment at airports acrossthe country.

Failure to develop the landswithin this period may result inthe concessionaire losing theproperty to the government.

Managing Director of the Fed-eral Airports Authority of Nigeria,FAAN, Mr. George Uriesi, whodisclosed this at dinner to roundoff the Aviation Investment Fo-rum Stakeholders OpportunityBuy-in of Aviation Master Planin Lagos, weekend, said the new

template was necessitated byrecent controversies betweenhis agency and ACI Limited.

ACI was leased land at theMurtala Muhammed Airport,Lagos, to build a hotel butfailed to do so decades after,which prompted FAAN to ter-minate the concession andtake over the land.

This, however, resulted in alegal battle between both par-ties still pending in court.

To avert a recurrence of this,Uriesi said aside from havingsix months to start develop-ment of leased lands,concessionaires must also beable to complete project in notmore than two years.

This, according to him, wasalso to ensure airport environ-ment across the country was notlittered with abandoned projects.

“From now on, land conces-sion at airport will not be morethan six months for developmentwhich must be completed in notmore than two years.

“The era of not developinglands leased to concessionairesyears after they were leased outare over. This is in line with thetransformation agenda of thepresent government,” he said.

Uriesi added thatconcessionaires must also showfinancial capacity to developland before any deal would besigned.

BY ANAYO OKOLI

DPR sealsNNPC megastation, othersfor underdispensing fuel

UMUAHIA — FOR under-dispensing petro-

leum products to the public,the Department of PetroleumResources, DPR, in Abia State,weekend, sealed the NigerianNational Petroleum Corpora-tion, NNPC, mega station inUmuahia.

The DPR also sealed sevenother filling stations operatingin the state for the same of-fence.

Some marketers had, lastweek, created artificial scarcityof petrol in parts of state, es-pecially Uzuakoli where a li-tre of petrol was sold for asmuch as N150 per litre inblack market.

The action of DPR followeda routine surveillance it car-ried out during which it dis-covered that some of the af-fected stations were cheatingtheir customers with as muchas two litres per every ten li-tres dispensed.

Seven of the sealed petrolstations include NNPC megastations located in Umuahiaand Aba.

CMYK

14—Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

FG attributes success of power sector reform to stablepolity 'Transparency of 2011 polls makes Nigeria attractive to foreign investors'

BY CHRIS OCHAYI

ENUGU — THE FederalGovernment, weekend, at-

tributed the huge investments re-corded in the power sector, fol-lowing the successful privatisa-tion of the sector, to political sta-bility in Nigerian since the con-duct of 2011 general elections.

Chairman of Nigerian Electric-ity Regulation Commission,NERC, Dr. Sam Amadi, who dis-closed this while speaking at theBiennial Keyman dinner ofEnugu Chamber of Commerce,Industry, Mines and Agriculture,ECCIMA, at Nike Lake Hotel,noted that the influx of foreigninvestors in the sector was madepossible by free, fair and trans-parent 2011 polls, which restoredconfidence in the polity.

Dr. Amadi stressed that despitedivergent political views, the op-position did not oppose the powersector reforms embarked on by thegovernment of Peoples Demo-cratic Party, PDP, because of its ben-efits to the country.

He said the insecurity in someparts of the country notwithstand-ing, Nigeria remained attractiveto foreign investments, with eco-nomic growth, because of stable

polity, noting that economicgrowth could not be achievedduring political instability.

He said: “Nigeria’s politicalscene has experienced stabilitysince the 2011 elections said tobe most transparent in the his-tory of our elections.

“We have stabilised politicalenvironment and that is why in-security is insignificant to eco-nomic growth. But we can’t saythis under unstable polity.“

Dr. Amadi, who was guestspeaker on the occasion, spokeon the new power sector regime

as a panacea to stable and qual-ity electricity supply to unleashand prime industrial and eco-nomic activities in Nigeria.

He said with the successfulhanding over of power assets, thenation had entered the secondphase which had to be with effec-

tive and reflective pricing system.”The politics of pricing is such

that it is difficult asking people topay for a product that is undersupplied. Most Nigerians house-holds and businesses are starvedof electricity.

N7bn confab bill, a waste —Bishop KukahBY VICTORIA OJEME

CATHOLIC BISHOP ofSokoto Catholic Diocese,

Bishop Matthew Kukah, week-end, described the N7billion ear-marked for the proposed nationalconference as a waste of re-sources, insisting that the exer-cise would not result in any fun-damental difference in the con-dition of the country.

Bishop Kukah, who was Secre-tary of the National Political Re-form Conference in 2005, alsodescribed the planned proposedconference as another forum forpolitical noise-making.

He spoke on the occasion of thesigning of Tripartite PartnershipAgreement among the AmericanSpecialist Hospital Limited, GEHealthcare (USA) and Edifice

Capital (France) for the $73 mil-lion American Specialist Hospi-tal for Women and Children.

In the 2005 National PoliticalReform Conference which BishopKukah was Secretary, N932 mil-lion was proposed by PresidentOlusegun Obasanjo for the con-

ference.In his reaction to the N7billion

proposed by President GoodluckJonathan for the conference,Kukah said in an interview withjournalists in Abuja: “N7 billionis just pocket money, it is chickenfee by Nigerian standard, con-

sidering how much money havebeen stolen from this country.

"Frankly, even if they are goingto commit N10 billion for peopleto stay in hotels in Nigeria, themoney is not the issue, buildinga nation is a serious matter.

Chuka Odom set to join Imo guber raceFORMER MINISTER of

State for the Federal Capi-tal Territory, Chief Chuka Odom,may soon declare interest in thegovernorship election in ImoState, on the platform of the Peo-ples Democratic Party, PDP, fol-lowing the release of 2015 elec-tions timetable by the Independ-ent National Electoral Commis-sion, INEC.

Investigation revealed that thecampaign team of Chuka Odom

currently operating under theaegis of the Chuka Odom Foun-dation, had been laying theground work of a western-stylepolitical campaign unprec-edented in Imo State.

According to one of the co-coordinators, Chief MikeEjeugwu, “Chuka Odom repre-sents the hopes and aspirationsof Imo people today who are tiredof politicians who make so muchnoise, assault their sensibilities,

promise everything and delivernothing. He is untainted andcomes with little political baggagebut huge political and adminis-trative experience.”

Chief Ejeugwu pointed out thatthe lack of inspirational leader-ship that had bedeviled Imo Statewas wrong choice of leaders atevery election and declared thatthe "emergence of the likes ofChuka Odom is a good and en-couraging development."

CMYK

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014—15

2015 polls: INEC not under pressure —Jega

Ugborodo indigenes held meeting in Ugborodo town, WarriSouth West Area of Delta State, weekend. Benson Omedeli, theOlaja-Ori of Ugborodo being greeted by Mr. David Tonwe. From Right; Pa John Afigbin, Eghara-aja Wellington Oiogor and Pa Weston

Omadeli. Photos: Akpokona Omafuaire

BY OKEY NDIRIBE

CHAIRMAN, IndependentNational Electoral Com-

mission, INEC, Professor Attahi-ru Jega, yesterday, said that the

commission was not under anypressure when it designed thetimetable for the 2015 generalelection. He said the time-tableand election schedule were fixed

based on reasonable factors.A statement signed by Kayode

Idowu, Special Adviser to Jegaquoted the INEC chairman asstating while fielding questions

from the audience after apresentation he made at theChatham House, London,weekend, that "the Commis-sion was mindful of its ownoperational effectivenessand global best practice ingrouping national electionstogether on one day, andstate elections together onanother.”

The timetable announcedtwo weeks ago by INECschedules National Assem-bly and Presidential elec-tions for February 14, 2015,and Governorship as wellas State Assembly electionsfor February 28, 2015.The statement said, “Pro-fessor Jega dismissed sug-gestions that INEC wasunder external pressure indesigning the electiontimetable the way it did.”The Chatham House eventwas a public forum at theinstance of Africa Pro-gramme unit of the organ-isation, which invited Pro-fessor Jega to speak on"2015 Elections in Nigeria:Expectations and Chal-lenges."

Jega said, “As far as weare concerned, the presi-dential election is not posi-tioned first. What we did isthat we combined the na-tional elections, so youcan’t say that presidentialelection is placed first. SomeNigerians wonder why wecan’t have all the electionsin one day.

"It is true that in somecountries, they conduct alltheir elections in one day.From our own assessment,the enormity of challengesassociated with that is suchthat we are not prepared inthe electoral commission todo all the elections in oneday. But then, we felt thatinstead of having threeelections, let us have two.

" In 2011, we had three:we did the National As-sembly elections first; then,the Presidential; and then,the Governorship as well asState Assembly elections.But we felt that (in 2015),let us have two electionsrather than three.

”So, rather than have thePresidential and Governor-ship elections together, orthe National Assembly withState Assembly elections;we said, let us have all thenational elections together,and then the state elections.You hear politicians makeall manners of allegations,because in their own calcu-lation, some people wantcertain elections to comefirst, others want it to comelater."

OPINION

16 Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

BY CONSTANCE OKECHUKWU

*Mr. Okechukwu, a commentator onnational issues, wrote fromAbuja.

202020202015 elections: Nor15 elections: Nor15 elections: Nor15 elections: Nor15 elections: Northern elderthern elderthern elderthern elderthern elders as sacre mongers as sacre mongers as sacre mongers as sacre mongers as sacre mongersssss

IN African culture, elders are thecustodians of truth. They are the moral

guide to the society and they do all in theirwisdom to engender peace and preserve theinterests of the larger society.Unfortunately, the various elders’ groupsin Nigeria–in the East, West, South-South,Middle Belt or North -are different; theyobserve this rule in the breach. The mosttypical of them is the Northern Elders’Forum (NEF) which has been in the newsin recent times, for its strident pursuit ofsectional and parochial interests to thedetriment of the well-being of the largerNigerian nation.

The elders, at the end of its meeting inKaduna last month, alleged that theimmediate past Chief of Army Staff, Lt.General Azubuike Ihejirika and some othertop military officers were involved in extra-judicial killings and strangulation ofcivilians by soldiers in Bama and GiwaBarracks in Borno State, using anunderground detention centre. TheForum’s threat to drag the former Armychief to the International Criminal Court(ICC) in The Hague, is not only seen as acampaign to fan the embers of ethnic discord–with its potentialities in Nigeria-it is also acampaign to diminish Nigeria before theinternational community. More grievous isthat it is a malicious attempt to portrayPresident Goodluck Jonathan as a violator ofhuman rights.

At a different forum, the group and theNorthern Traditional Rulers Council (NTRC)accused the President of masterminding themass redeployment of heavy military weapons

from the North to the South. As if the issue isnot worrisome enough, their meetingchaired by no less a personality than theSultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa'ad AbubakarIII, in Kaduna, alleged that the reason forthe arms relocation was to aid the plan torig the 2015 elections. Weighty accusations,I dare say. However, they are allegationsthat are as curious as they are baseless.

While the spokesman for the first group,Professor Ango Abdullahi, did not mentionthe six other persons he alleged wereinvolved in the Borno human rightsviolations, the Sultan’s group did not in anyway substantiate its allegation on armsrelocation. The questions that arise aremany, but only two will suffice here: Whydid they hide the allegations in their largebabanrigas, until shortly after Ihejirika wasremoved as Army Chief? And where werethey when Odi, Katsina-Ala and Zaki Biamfaced worse action, or are Katsina-Ala andZaki Biam no longer part of their North?

While several groups have denounced theNorthern Elders Forum (NEF), for openlydiscouraging the military’s efforts incontaining terror -- for that’s what its postureamounts to-prominent Igbo leaders say itis an attempt to tarnish the image andsterling performance of General Ihejirikaas the nation’s army chief. My worry is thatthe attack on the former army chief is ill-conceived, coming at a time that themilitary, and indeed the nation, wascounting the losses in human and materialterms of the war on Boko Haram.

According to Ihejirika himself, in theentire command chain of the Army,

directives are issued from highercommands down to the issuance ofoperational orders, but at every level ofadherence, the rule of engagement isemphasised with special emphasis on thepreservation of human rights. Therefore, toaccuse the army, such a highly organisedinstitution that does not condoneindiscipline, of human rights abuses withinthe Nigerian territory, is to be uncharitable,considering the challenges they have hadto face and the risks they have borne in theBoko Haram ‘war’. Besides, to single outIhejirika for accusation, smacks of hiddenagenda, and fuels the belief by OhanezeYouths, that it was an attempt to blemishthe records of their kinsman who broke allrecords to rise to the top position of theNigerian Army.

We have always known the Northern EldersForum (NEF) as the modern version of theold Kaduna Mafia, but when did theytransform to military tacticians? Their taleon relocation of military hardware musttherefore be seen as unnecessary scare-mongering. To allege too that it was part of agrand design to rig the 2015 elections is utterclaptrap coming from hawkish politicians outto score some cheap points. NEF mustappreciate the impact of the ongoing reformsin our electoral system, for which PresidentJonathan has received acclaim andcommendation from local and internationalorganisations. Such glib allegations aresenseless in a country that has increasinglywidened the democratic space and movedaway from shambolic elections.

We must get something clear here. The

NEF stand on Ihejirika, has revealed theother side of the Northern Elders who haveall paid lip service to the war on terrorwhich Boko Haram presently symbolises.Here, we have politicians who mask undersome amorphous groupings to further theirregional agenda, regardless of the cost toour nation’s development. While it is stillwithin their democratic rights to opposePresident Jonathan and oppose hisadministration’s policies, we must insistthat they pursue their regional politicalagenda within the limits of decency. Whateverybody must frown at is their insistenceover time, in stoking the fire of sectionalinterests, and denigrating of the institutionof the presidency. The question must indeedbe asked: where truly lies their sympathy?

Like Senator Uche Chukwumerije saidwhile adding his voice in condemnation ofthe elders’ indiscretion, their statement hasrevealed the depth of resentment of thecampaign against Boko Haram.Chukwumerije, who said the threat wascapable of unleashing ill-will on thefederation, further described it as highlyprovocative to the sensibilities of all, whodesire the unity and stability of Nigeria.While he described the NEF as biased, hebelieves they had opened doors into theworld court for not only the Ndigbo, butalso the people of Odi, Zaki-Biam andKatsina Ala, saying they would all dust theirfiles and head for The Hague. I cannotagree any less.

THESE days Nigerians fight overanything. A disputed bus fare, amisunderstood word at a communitygathering or the better known incidents ofcult rivalries or the more celebrated casesof land disputes are reasons for Nigeriansto go at each other.Casualties could be high. In some

instances, combat is postponed to anotherday and could last for months. No part ofthe country is spared the scourge of unrest.The causes could be as ridiculous as thekilling of a hunter’s dog in Ilorin, KwaraState.A police corporal, Mr. Agboola Joachim,

who was among policemen sent to quell thecommotion, died from bullet wounds. Angryyouths of Abayawo and Dada communitieswere engaged in the fatal confrontation aftera dog of a hunter in one of the communitieswas killed.What is the worth of a dog compared to the

life of the policeman? What was the valueof the dog that its killing could enrage thecommunities? How could the fight escalateto one where firearms were used? Were thepolice surprised that the warring groups

Killing A Dog ToKill A Policeman

were armed?Little about this incident is surprising.

Communities in many parts of the countryare armed. They go to war at the slightestprovocation. Sometimes they do notrequire a reason, other than to test thefiring power of their acquisitions.Any incident is enough to re-ignite

unsettled quarrels among thesecommunities. The confrontations are alsooccasions to frighten opponents withexhibitions of arsenals that could scaresecurity agencies.In rural communities, where poverty is a

daily companion, a hunter’s dog is a majorasset in the economics of hunting. Its death

is a setback without immediate remedy.The hunter is not worth much without hisdog.Yet, this could not be a good reason for

the confrontation, during which 50motorcycles, again the riders’ source ofsustenance, were destroyed. The anger thatresulted in this extent of destruction andthe killing of a policeman could not all havebeen over a dog’s death.It is becoming more important by the day

that security agencies have a presence thatwarring communities respect. The killingof security agents has gone unpunished fortoo long.Last May, the Ombatse group in

Nasarawa State killed 100 security agents.The chief priest Ala Agu defended Ombatsethus, “The governor asked the policeofficers to arrest me, cut my head and takemy head to him. When they came, becausethey were themselves drunk, my god didnot allow them to come to me and they diedon the way.”Agu and his men are still free. Others who

act like them expect similar treatment.

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 — 49

50—Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2013

OPINION

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*Mr Emmanuel is the General secretary of the VGN,Lagos State chapter.

BY AYISIRE EMMANUEL

FOLLOWING the recentretirement of

military service chiefs, theNorthern Elders Forum (NEF)threatened to take former Chief ofArmy Staff, Lt General AzubuikeIhejirika and six other unnamedofficers to the InternationalCriminal Court (ICC) over allegedextrajudicial killings by soldiers inBama and Giwa Barracks in BornoState.

This threat stirred political dustand verbal exchanges betweenProfessor Ango Abdullahi andIhejirika’s kinsman, Senator UcheChukwumerije. NEF said it set uptwo committees to “investigate”the alleged abuses and that itwould take the end product of itsprobe to the ICC. Apparently, theNEF does not believe in the dictumthat charity begins at home. If itdid, it would have started byreporting the matter to our ownNational Commission on HumanRights (NCHR), which isentertaining a similar complaintover the shooting of alleged BokoHaram members in Apo, Abujalast year.

It would, indeed, be sad andunpatriotic if it is true that soldierssent to crush the Boko Haraminsurgency engaged in extra-judicial killings of innocentcivilians, even though it will onlyfollow in an ugly tradition that wasrampant during the Biafra-Nigeriawar. Northern soldiers regularlyand freely engaged in the massacreof civilians. Some of themsurrendered and accepted “OneNigeria” only to be lined up andshot simply because they wereIgbos. Northern elements in thefederal armed forces did this incontinuation of their revenge

NEF’s irresponsible ICC threatkillings and pogroms whichfollowed the first military coup.While these happened, none ofthese so-called Northern eldersraised a voice of protest. Ifanything, most of them have beenon record justifying this evil andboasting they would do it again ifthe circumstances presentedagain. In fact, they invoke this uglyepisode in our nation’s darkhistory as an instrument ofintimidation against those whocall for true federalism, sayingwhat they did to Biafrans duringthe war would be a child’s play forthose calling for Nigeria’s “break-up”.

With the advent of the BokoHaram Islamic insurgency fuelledmainly by these disgruntled“elders” and their local andforeign financiers due to powershift to a Niger Delta president, andthe coincidental emergence of anarmy chief who happened to beIgbo, these “elders” suddenlyturned into “human rightsactivists” who would petition ICCwith unproven cases documentedonly by them. It was the same NEF

under the late AlhajiAbdulrahman Okene who, duringthe bloody reign of General SaniAbacha, applauded when Abachaunleashed the Joint Task Force(JTF) on Ogoniland, killinghundreds and staging a kangarootrial that led to the hanging of KenSaro-Wiwa and eight other Ogonileaders on November 10th 1995.

These were the same people whoprevailed on the late PresidentUmaru Yar’ Adua to order MajorGeneral Sarkin Yaki Bello, as theCommander of the Joint TaskForce on the Niger Delta, toexterminate Ijaw communities inan all-out war over their militantagitation for the control of theirGod-given resources just aboutfour years ago. These chaps hadalso supported Abacha to declarewar on Yorubaland and eliminateleaders of the NationalDemocratic Coalition (NADECO)with sniper squads for mountinga campaign for the revalidationof the presidential mandate ofChief Moshood Abiola between1993 and 1998.

Following the death of PresidentYar’ Adua, these northern “elders”after failing to prevent theinstallation of the then VicePresident, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan,launched a feral campaign tosnatch power back to the Northby all means in 2010/2011. Theywarned that unless Jonathanstepped down to enable the Northreclaim power, they would makeNigeria ungovernable. WhenNigerians ignored them and votedJonathan into power in the April2011 presidential election, fromnowhere, a dead Boko Haramresurged across the North andstarted killing Christians andSoutherners, mostly in churchesthrough bombings and suicideattacks. Later on, the terrorists

PRESIDENT Goodluck Jonathan is set to empanel “The NationalConference”, which will set a new national record with 492

nominated delegates, conclude sittings within 90 days and gulpseven billion Naira! It will discuss everything under the sun exceptanswer the two most important questions of (a) are we ready tocontinue as one nation after a century of blood-soaked historycharacterised by dysfunctional nationalism and (b) what are thebases for living together and make progress as a people? Andhere is a conference that will not produce a constitution but submitits agenda for the future to the national and state assemblies fortinkering!

Still, we must go to the conference, if only to satisfy our curiosity.For me, there is nothing in it that is likely to change anythingexcept waste our time and resources, and divert some qualityattention.

Here comes a ‘confusional'conference!

President Jonathan and Ihejirika should beheld as heroes of the North. They havehelped to save the North from itself. Theyhave risked a lot to contain the saboteurs inthe military, the government and thepolitical class

NIGERIA with a population of about 160 millionpeople has a Police Force of less than 300,000 men.

The abysmal ratio of one poorly motivated policemanto over 500 disgruntled and discontented Nigerians ispitiable and a far cry from the average.

The fact that our country is grossly under-policed isjust a facet of the multi-dimensional structure of theconstraints that affect efficient policing in Nigeria.

The historical root of the Nigerian police as a colonialforce of oppression of the people has made it absolutelyimpossible for the Force to transform into a peoplefriendly outfit. Worse still is the fact that it is almostimpossible for the Nigerian police to break down thebarriers of apathy and mistrust that have characteriszedthe relationship between them and the Nigerian public.Mutual trust is the prime value that should form the basesof the partnership between the police and the public. Afirm foundation of trust enables the police form a closerelationship between it and the people that will producea result -oriented policing. No wonder Sir Robert Peel,founder of the London metropolitan police set a numberof principles one of which is that “……The police are thepublic and the public are the police”.

There is no doubt that for a number of reasons, thePolice in several third world countries including Nigeriahave lost sight of this fundamental relationship as acentral organising concept for police service.

The concept of community policing is an attempt torevive this principle. The central feature of it is the

Police/VGN collaboration:Panacea to security challengesacceptance of the fact that the police is no longer thesole guardians of law and order as in the past. There isthe need for a genuine police-public collaboration withmembers of the community becoming active allies in theeffort to support and enhance public security and safety.

The Vigilante Group of Nigeria is the first systematiceffort to galvanise a broad based grass root CommunityOriented platform for Nigerian Public partnership andcollaboration in the area of security.

According to Ali Sokoto, the founding Father andNational Chairman of Vigilante Group of Nigeria (VGN),his vision is that every family or household should besecurity conscious enough to keep watch over the nextdoor neighbour. VGN is firmly established in all the 774Local Government Council Areas and the 36 states of theFederation including the FCT, Abuja. Registered with theCorporate Affairs Commission in 1999 as an NGO, VGNexist in all nooks and crannies of Nigeria as a vanguardof patriotic men and women, whose sole objective is toassist the Police in securing lives and properties in theirrespective Communities.

There is no denying the fact that the level of crime haschanged in Nigeria; from illegal drugs to rape, gangviolence to murder, burglary to armed robbery andkidnapping to terrorism.

The nature of crimes like kidnapping and terrorismcannot be adequately tackled by the present conventionalPolice structures and modus operandi. Even the concept

of centralised management of the Police Force has onlyhelped to isolate it further from the public it is serving.In many cases, Police officers posted far away from theirlocalities are ‘strangers’ in the community where theyserve. It has been commonly observed that these“criminals” are not ‘spirits’, indeed they are not. Howeveronly bonafide members of the communities canunderstand their environment, terrain and even identifyand monitor suspected ‘strangers’.

Pertinent and useful information will not beforthcoming from the public where the Police is perceivedas total ‘strangers’ and the relationship of mistrust andsuspicion persists between them and the public they serve.

The argument is not to support the proponents of StatePolice. In fact, any student of Nigerian history will alludeto the fact that the call for State Police like that of ethnicmilitia is a call to anarchy and the total fragmentationof the Nigerian Nation. Consequently, Police /VGNpartnership and collaboration is the panacea to ourpresent security challenges.

All well meaning Nigerians including the Federal,States and Local Governments should assist VGN inbringing all mushroom vigilante groups andneighbourhood watchers under the umbrella of VigilanteGroup of Nigeria for easy organization, direction andco-ordination to achieve a crime - free society.

,

started killing everyone withoutdiscrimination.

Soon, the Al Qaeda Islamicterror network bought into theinsurgency and expanded theattacks to governmentestablishments, military facilitiesand crowded places. When theJonathan administration startedserious military operations and setthe terrorists to flight, the NEF andvociferous pro-Boko Haramactivists accused him of “declaringwar against the North”. However,majority of the patriotic Muslimpopulation in the North startedrealising that, contrary to therantings of the NEF and theircohorts, Boko Haram was, indeed,the enemy of Nigeriansirrespective of religion and creed.They joined the war against terrorand the insurgents fled into remoteforests in the North East. The

want “their power back” by allmeans.

I fully welcome the idea ofapproaching the ICC to look intothe conduct of the Army underIhejirika in the war on terror in theNorth. The whole world knows thatBoko Haram is one of the deadliestterrorist groups operating today.We are waiting for the NEF tomake a cast-iron case againstIhejirika and other military chiefs.We will also be meeting the NEFand other past military chiefs ofnorthern extraction who havecarried out genocides againstinnocent civilians; from the civilwar to Ogoni, from June 12 to Odi,from Zangon-Kataf to Zaki-Biamand from the Niger Delta to thePlateau. Let the ICC settle all thesealleged human rights violations bythe Nigerian military forces onceand for all! We will be meeting theNEF and their collaborators withthe details of the Oputa Panel andother reports.

On a more serious note, let usbear in mind that the NigerianArmy and the armed forces arethere for our protection. Withoutthe armed and security forces,Boko Haram would have overrunthe North. The South, in self-preservation, would have taken uparms to keep them and their look-alikes at bay, thus fulfilling MajorGideon Orkar’s vision. Nigeriawould thusly have disintegrated.We must be grateful andappreciative of the sacrifices of our

attacks tricked down to isolatedincidents, and the economic, socialand political livelihood across theNorth markedly improved.

President Jonathan and Ihejirikashould be held as heroes of theNorth. They have helped to savethe North from itself. They haverisked a lot to contain thesaboteurs in the military, thegovernment and the political class,including some of these misguided“elders”, who are bent ondestroying the North because they

now re-professionalised armedforces which are no longer underany ethnic or regional thumb.

We must expose all those enemy“elders” and “youths” in our midstwho are promoting anarchy andbloodshed, pitting Nigeriansagainst one another in their selfishpursuits to grab power at all cost.We must consign them to the trashbin of history and move on to builda united nation where no expired,frustrated and screaming “elder”can trouble us anymore.

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014—————5151515151

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CMYK

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,

,

BY BENEDICT IJOMAH

BY SUNNY IKHIOYA

*Mr. Ikhioya, a commentator onnational issues, wrote fromLagos.

*Prof. Ijomah, Wrote from the Centre forPolicy Studies and Research, Asaba, DeltaState.

Our politicians and us: Whois the fool?

THE beauty of science is that, itis empirical - smell, touch and

see - so, we can deduce from oursenses and observations. It is alsological. The science of Politics isnot different; based on what weobserve, we can reach conclusions.It is so everywhere, polls areconducted and most times, theresults of the polls turn out to bethe true position.

Look at the situation in theNigerian politics of today, thebehavioural patterns of ourpolitics, can you reach conclusionon what the outcome of 2015election will be?

Already, the Americans areprognosising Hilary Clinton andChris Christie for their nextelection, what are we in Nigeriadoing? Even, when you try toobjectively assess, based on whatis happening, our - all too know -critics punch holes in one'ssubmissions, based on sentimentsand other bias.

We will not stop making ouranalysis known to the majority ofNigerians, who deserve to be trulyinformed, instead of theabracadabra, that we now witness.

The Daily Post of January 25,posted a comment by Shekarau,ex-governor of Kano state, withBafarawa, ex-Sokoto stategovernor in attendance; " A fewmonths ago, we were calling the

PDP evil, and now, we are callingon the same set of people we calledevil to come and join us".

It is clear that our politicians aretaking the gullibility of Nigeriansfor granted, If not, why do thepeople who constitute the newAPC, expect us to look at them froma perspective different from thePDP, when the antecedents of thenew APC memberships are wellknown? We were used to an ACNparty, with very radical views;focussed, disciplined and peoplefriendly. The performance of theirgovernors - first Fashola and laterOshiomhole - also helped to placethe party as a true beacon of hopefor Nigerians. In fact, Fashola'sgovernment was a reference point,for all states in the federation,Delta state, a PDP state, sentrepresentatives severally, to Lagos,to learn a thing or two about howLagos state run its governmentsuccessfully. And, this brings me tothe point that; you do not need tobe at the centre before you canpositively impact on the people.Awolowo did it with the ActionGroup of the western region,Ahmadu Bello did same in thenorth with NPC. Presently, Fasholais doing it in Lagos, same withOshiomhole in Edo state. What Ihad expected from the ACN party,is a vigorous push - using itsstrength in the media and networking advantage - for a trulyfederated state, where each statecontrols its resources and give a

percentage to the centre. I expectedthem, to fight for the shrinking ofthe over bloated federalgovernment port-folio, and theywould have gained more supportfrom the truly progressives acrossthe country but now, thatopportunity is lost, with theuncalled for merger with otherreactionary parties. We do notknow what the ACN stands forthese days, surely not a progressiveparty. The situation is even madeworse, when we consider the factthat the ACN was graduallygaining follower ship, from statesoutside the core western region;Delta, Anambra, Kwara, Kogi, andBenue were already buildingreasonable support base for theACN, all the gains have come tonought.

The CPC party, from the waythey operated, did not hide

their ethnic and religious bias.They presented someone as

presidential candidate, who didnot consider it crucial to visit thesouth for campaigns. A party thatis populated by, very extremetribal and regional bigots, proneto violence at the slightestprovocation, as they did during the2011 elections, who felt that thestate must burn if they do not winand which turned out to be theirgreatest undoing. How do youreconcile the ACN, with its bandof intellectuals, with such a party?

The third leg in the APC alliance,that is the ANPP, has never beenknown for progressive politics,they have always been there,conservative in the manner of theNPC of the 60s. Their strongholdshave always been in the north, theydo not command any nationalfollower ship. Bafarawa tried tomove it to another level, but he wasfrustrated out of the party and hehad to move to DPP, where he also,has been short changed.

That was and still is, the situationin the APC. We were still figuring,how they can make a success ofthis union, when the situation inthe PDP imploded.

It was therefore a surprise, to seethe APC that is still battling withthe challenge of integratingdiverse interest groups, runningafter dissidents of the PDP. It isunbelievable. The people you havepresented to us, as not goodenough, you are going in theirmidst to fish for membership, someof them are even being wooed, tobecome leaders and topcandidates, for the new party. It isa shame! Our politicians are allthe same. It is a pity, that innocentNigerians have been brain washedand are now made to hold extremeviews. In the buses, along the

streets, anywhere people gathered,you witness arguments andfightings, over nothing, because ofthe activities of our politicians.Look at the number of people, thathave been wasted or killed, howmany of them are real politicians?So many innocent lives are beinglost daily and our politicians donot seem to care, the other day, oneof them - Senator Abe - was hurt,the whole world was forced to takenotice. He was flown abroad sameday. The people are dying, whileour politicians are smiling to thebanks, who is the fool?

Sahara reporters tweeted Hon.Gbajabiamila on saturday 25thJanuary, saying; " I have about 20different allowances". When itcomes to their allowances, thepoliticians forget the party, eachone of them belong, they are allunited - like cultists - in this.

This is a man who was ' dye inthe wool' ACN and now APC,angling to be the majority leaderamongst the representatives. Notone of them, has come out toappeal to their colleagues, to stepdown on the bleeding, the NationalAssembly is causing the nation,even career workers in both thegovernment and private sectors, donot have half the number ofallowances our politicians haveappropriated to themselves.

It is time for us - the people - tosee through the wool. If you followthese politicians without thinking,you will end up like the foolish fly,that followed the dead body to itsgrave. Let us not play the fool anymore.

I AM compelled to caution our politicians.I have been in politics in this country, from

my days in the university in 1960. I haveparticipated in the elections during theNCNC/Action Group period. I have followedthe politics of Nigeria from the first electionbefore independence. I have witnessed thetragedy of the Western region. I havewitnessed the tragedy of the Civil War. I amold enough to know the events that led tothe series of massacres of the Igbos and theYorubas in the Northern region. I have alsowitnessed the various coups and counter-coups of the Northern military generals whoconsolidated power in the Northernoligarchy and misruled this nation for years.I am constrained to caution young andinexperienced politicians that are crossingfrom one party to the other as if goodgovernance depends on only numericalstrength in the House of Representatives andin the Senate. Let us learn from the lessonsof history.

It is clear to me that most of the peoplethat are crossing from PDP and creating afalse image for the opposition were veryyoung in the 1960s; they must have beenvery young to witness the Western Nigeriacrisis. They are creating scenarios that aresimilar to what happened in the Westernregion. Let me caution Nigerians, includingmyself, that we must give Jonathan a chanceto run this country before we declare himincompetent. Let us not create a situationwhich is similar to calling a dog a bad namein order to hang it. It is clear to us thatimmediately Buhari lost the election manysouls were lost in the crisis that followed theriots in the North. He appeared to be a sacredcow that could not be questioned for thecrisis he instigated because he lost a simpleelection. He has now joined the oppositionto make sure that Jonathan is in a difficulttime, and if possible, to see that he is

Enough is enough, let PresidentJonathan be

impeached.People who move from one party to another

have nothing to offer the country. A goodpolitician is one who has developed his areanot a politician that canvasses to overthrowduly elected Governors and Presidents. I amwriting this paper at exactly midnight and Iam led in spirit to caution Nigeria that theevents in the Western region under Akintolaand Awolowo that gave rise to unnecessarycoalitions of UPGA and NNA could not savethis country and will not help us at all.Akintola formed the coalition with theNorthern Peoples Congress, Awolowoformed the coalition with the NCNC. Wehad two mega political parties, the UPGAand NNA. It was a clear demonstration ofthe incompetence and ineptitude of thepolitical leaders. It did not save us fromgradually moving into a civil war. I want toappeal to all Nigerians that the way thingsare going, we are gradually moving towardsdisaster. We will continue opposingJonathan until Jonathan by defaultbecomes dictatorial in order to save hisgovernment. We will blame the oppositionfor forcing the Federal government to adoptmethods that anybody in opposition wouldnot like; they must hold themselvesresponsible. The President cannot fold hishands and watch the opposition destroy hisgovernment in the name of democracy. It isalso democratic for an elected president todo everything possible to save the countryfrom being thrown into chaos by theopposition. For every action begets areaction. Every action by the opposition todestroy the government will stimulate areaction from the government in order tocontain the opposition.

Jonathan has had the greatest oppositionfrom those who failed elections to those whowant to stop him from contesting theelection that he is entitled to. It is very clearthat what is happening in this country is notgovernance the way it should be. Jonathan

is spending a lot of his time trying to containunnecessary oppositions from people wholost to him. This is not my idea of genuineopposition.

Let us look at the American system oreven in the civilised world. When you

lose an election you bid your time until anopportunity comes again, if you feel youshould rule the country. General Buhari hasnot hidden his disdain for Jonathan sincehe lost the election to Jonathan, and thePresident would become a coward if heallows Buhari to pull him down withoutshowing that he is the President. I appeal toall politicians to realise that when thepoliticians were fighting in the Westernregion, and when the UPGA and NNAemerged, we had two major mega partiesthat could not govern this country. We mustnot allow history to repeat itself. The variouscoalition groups whose stock-in-trade is tostop Jonathan create the impression that theyhave nothing to offer this country. ThePresident, inspite of the opposition beingmounted against him has tried to recordmajor achievements. It is therefore clear tome that if people do not deliberatelyconstruct opposition to pull him down, if hehas a free hand to run this country, Nigeriawould be a much better place. All those whohave deliberately gathered themselves intoformidable opposition just to stop Jonathan,as if that is the only thing Nigeria needs,send the message to Nigerians that they havenothing new to offer Nigeria except todestroy the result of a democratic election.

Therefore all those who are gatheringthemselves into oppositions to stop Jonathanshould ask themselves whether they have anyother thing to offer Nigeria except to createopposition. Oppositions that buy membersto carpet-cross from one party to the othermake democracy unstable. Youngerpoliticians who did not witness the eventsthat led to the crisis in Western region, orthe events that led to the Civil War, the eventsthat led to Aburi Conference, should learnthat we cannot relive unwholesomesituations a second time within thisgeneration.

Is Jonathan qualified to contest electionin 2015? The answer is yes, he is qualified tocontest. All those who are now moving intodifferent unwholesome alliances just tomake sure that Jonathan does not contestelection should give us their manifestos, orwhat they will do for Nigeria if they succeedin removing Jonathan. Nigerians want toknow. What will Buhari offer Nigeria otherthan gathering people together to stopJonathan? Let me caution that stoppingJonathan from contesting election in 2015does not make Buhari to win. Nigerians haveseen how many people were slaughtered inthe election results which Buhari refused toaccept, and Nigerians are waiting for himto come out again. Only a fool will look atthe destruction that followed his refusal toaccept the result of the election and still goback to ask him to rule Nigeria. Let me makeit very clear, whether anybody likes it or not,Jonathan is entitled to contest in 2015.Jonathan will contest in 2015.

I also want to warn the PDP to put its housein order. Dumping the PDP and crossing overto an untested political party is not thealternative Nigerians are looking for. It isclear that inspite of the deliberate oppositioncreated for Jonathan, Jonathan hascontinued to record major achievements.And it is also clear that if Jonathan is givenan opportunity to finish his eight years, hewill create a great nation out of the crisesthat are being crafted for him.

Continues tomorrow on pg 18

All those who havedeliberately gatheredthemselves into formidableopposition just to stopJonathan, as if that is theonly thing Nigeria needs,send the message toNigerians that they havenothing new to offer Nigeria

It was therefore asurprise, to see theAPC that is stillbattling with thechallenge ofintegrating diverseinterest groups,running afterdissidents of thePDP

52 — Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 — 53

54—Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

PIB: Lawmakers admit to pressure from IOCs

L- r: Mr. Sri Krisman Ahuja, Chief Executive, Sunflag Group, Mrs. Joy Chinwokwu, Chief ExecutiveOfficer of Best of the World Promoting Fashion & Textile addressed guests during the Sunflag Group andBest of the World Business Forum with the theme, curbing the patronage of substandard school uniformproducts in Nigeria in Lagos

BY GODWIN ORITSE

LAWMAKERS in theHouse of Representatives,

have admitted to being underpressure to scuttle the passage ofthe Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB,from International Oil Compa-nies, IOCs, operating in the coun-try. This will be the first public ad-mission by the legislators as towhy the PIB has remained at theNational Assembly for about a de-cade.

Specifically, the House Commit-tee on Environment, last week,promised to proceed with the pas-sage of the bill notwithstandingpressures from the IOCs. TheCommittee, which made the dis-closure at a public hearing on theBonga oil spill said, “What you(IOCs) do to stop the passage ofthe bill will not stop us from pass-ing the bill into law.”

The Committee Chairman, Mrs.Linda Ekwunife, accused Shell ofleading the pressure against thepassage of the bill, adding thatthe bill will be passed no matterwhat. The Committee’s declara-tion was quite comforting as Ni-gerians had begun to wonderwhy the legislators were dillydallying on the passage of the billinto law.

The IOCs have constantly crit-icised the PIB, saying it is the“harshest in the world” becauseof the fiscal terms which requirethem to give up some more oftheir profits and give more mon-ey to the Federal Government toprovide essential services for thepeople. The Chairman, Oil Pro-ducers Trade Section, OPTS, thetrade group of the IOCs, Mr.Mark Ward, had predicted asharp decline in current oil andgas production from 63 percentto about 25 percent.

Ward, who is also the Manag-ing Director, Mobil Producing Ni-geria Unlimited, said current fis-cal proposals in the bill couldtranslate to loss of investments ofabout $185 billion in new projects.But the IOCs criticisms were lastyear set aside by the World Bank’sindependent assessment of the

bill. The International MonetaryFund, IMF, the investment armof the World Bank, declared thePIB as, “One of Nigeria’s mostimportant pieces of legislation,because it proposes massive in-dustry reform.”

The Fund, however, noted thatthe bill was “… at risk of beingpicked apart by opponents,” andadded that it “… looked forwardto an early passage of the Petro-leum Industry Bill, which wouldboost investment, governmentrevenue, and fiscal transparen-cy.”

Similarly, an industry consult-ant, Dr. Pedro van Meurs, had de-scribed the IOCs criticismsagainst the fiscal provisions in thebill as one induced by the desireto make more profit for theirshareholders. Meurs, who inci-dentally is from the Netherlands,the home country of Shell, arguedthat there is nothing in the pro-posed law that will scuttle futureinvestments in the industry.He said, “There is no truth in theallegation that the PIB fiscal sys-tem is the harshest in the worldor that it will halt investment. Ihave been advising governmentsall over the world for over 40years, and I know that this is abattle whereby the oil companieswill try to get out of the parlia-ment the highest possible share.So they make loud noise thatmaybe somebody out there mightbe listening to them. But the roleof the government is to make surethat the country’s interest is pro-tected by insisting on a fair share.

“I can tell you that for every onecompany that is planning toleave, I know of 50 new ones thatare planning to come in once thedoor is open.” On the allegationthat the fiscal system in Angolaand other climes are friendlierthan what is proposed under PIB,Van Meurs reeled out statistics ofcomparative government take tobuttress his position. He stressedthat “whereas the PIB allows in-vestors in small fields to start de-ducting cost of production onceproduction begins so that fundscan be available for re-investment

in other fields, in Angola you canonly do that from future produc-tions. So tell me which is moreinvestor friendly?”He described the PIB as an in-dustry friendly legislation whichhas a fair deal for the companies,the host communities and the gov-ernment.

The Managing Director, ShellNigeria Exploration and Produc-tion Company, SNEPCO, Mr.Chike Onyejekwe, could not re-act to the allegation of master-

minding oppositions against thePIB, but rather said that Shellcould not discuss the issue of theBonga oil spill because the casewas in court. Recall that on De-cember 20, 2011, an oil spill ofmore than 40,000 barrels occurredfrom the Bonga oil field operatedby SNEPCO, the production armof the Nigerian unit of Anglo-Dutch Shell Group.

The spill had resulted in an oilslick 115 miles (185 km) long offthe Nigerian coast, widely report-

ed as “the worst spill in the areafor a decade.” Incidents thereaf-ter, probably made one of theCommittee’s member, AkpanMicah Umoh, to criticise Shell,saying that the oil company’s at-titude over time has been suchthat it can compromise the sys-tem to have its way.

He said, “Shell has been op-erating in the Niger Delta forover 50 years and it has takentime to study and understandour sensibilities and weakness-es. As such, Shell has perfectedthe art of deceiving us; it has per-fected the art of buying one ortwo persons amongst us…”

Anti-gay law: Nigeria accuses US, UK,others of double standards

THE Federal Governmenthas accused western nations

of double standards over a newlaw banning same-sex marriagesin the country. Acting Minister ofForeign Affairs, Viola Onwuliri,said such criticisms stem from the“double standards” of the West.

Speaking to the News Agency

of Nigeria, NAN, in Addis Ababa,Ethiopia, on the sidelines of thejust concluded AU summit, Ms.Onwuliri said President Jonathansigned the law in the interest ofNigerians and democracy.

She said, “What happened inNigeria is democracy in actionand it will really be unfortunatethat people who are talking about

democracy when they now seedemocracy work, they want us togo against democracy. Isdemocracy for pick and choose?When it suits them they want usto do good governance anddemocracy, but when it does notsuit them they want us to goagainst the democracy that hasbeen put in place. The NationalAssembly took a decision, theNational Assembly is the face ofdemocracy in Nigeria, they arethe representatives of the people,they form the voice of the peopleand they have spoken.”

The European Union, Canadaand the United States havecriticised the new law, saying itnegates the fundamental humanrights of individuals enshrined inthe Nigeria constitution.

On the situation in SouthSudan and the Central AfricanRepublic, the minister saidNigeria strongly backs the AUand regional groups’ role indemanding the return of peaceand stability in the regions.“Nigeria has taken a position onthe need for peaceful resolutionsin conflict situations in Africa,safety of lives and property andensuring that women andchildren are safe in conflictareas,” she said.

Boko Haram murdered 250in Borno in 2 weeks

ABOUT 250 people havebeen killed in Borno State

alone within the last two weeksof renewed attacks and coldblooded killings by the BokoHaram sect. The high humancasualty figure was first of suchrecorded deaths within a veryshort period in Nigeria since theyear 2000 episode in the NigerDeltan village of Adeje in whicha damaged oil pipelineexploded, killing more than 250people.

The only difference between theAdeje episode and that of Bornowas the time frame. Someresidents even believe the Bornocasualty figures could be higher.“Some of the attacks may not have

been reported if they occurred invery remote locations, or did notcarry a very significant numberof casualties”, said Mr. LawanMusa, an official of the Civilian-JTF in Kawuri village.

The latest harvest of deathshappened early Friday morningwhen seven passengerstravelling to Gwoza town in an18-seater Toyota Hilux masstransit bus were killed after theirvehicle got bombed by anexplosive device believed to havebeen planted on the highway bythe Boko Haram terrorists. It isnot certain if three of thepassengers who survived withserious injuries would eventuallysurvive, as their situation wasvery critical in hospital.

YOUR LUCK TODAYYOUR LUCK TODAYYOUR LUCK TODAYYOUR LUCK TODAYYOUR LUCK TODAY

ASTROLOGICAL COUNSELLINGASTROLOGICAL COUNSELLINGASTROLOGICAL COUNSELLINGASTROLOGICAL COUNSELLINGASTROLOGICAL COUNSELLINGSend ySend ySend ySend ySend your datour datour datour datour date and place of bire and place of bire and place of bire and place of bire and place of bir th tth tth tth tth to the Aso the Aso the Aso the Aso the Astrtrtrtrtrologicalologicalologicalologicalological

Counselling, PCounselling, PCounselling, PCounselling, PCounselling, P.M.B 1.M.B 1.M.B 1.M.B 1.M.B 100000000007, Apapa, Lagos7, Apapa, Lagos7, Apapa, Lagos7, Apapa, Lagos7, Apapa, Lagos

THOUGHT FOR TODATHOUGHT FOR TODATHOUGHT FOR TODATHOUGHT FOR TODATHOUGHT FOR TODAYYYYY

VIRGINIA

KAPTAIN AFRIKA in “Princess Shii’ By Andy Akman

dadadekola@yahoo.com

TERROR MUDA in “Never say goodbye” By Lanre Kehinde

HOME & ABROAD By Lawrence Akapa

Vanguard, MONDAY, Vanguard, MONDAY, Vanguard, MONDAY, Vanguard, MONDAY, Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3,FEBRUARY 3,FEBRUARY 3,FEBRUARY 3,FEBRUARY 3, 2014 —55 2014 —55 2014 —55 2014 —55 2014 —55

By Richard Eromosele

By Joshua Adeyemo Phone 08056180139

TAURUS: Although matters-of-the-heart may give youcause to smile broadly, if care is not taken, you would causefriction that can’t help you r case at work. This is thewrong time for unnecessary scheming within your work-ing arena.

GEMINI: Those of your who are red-blooded for romancemay have an exciting and satisfying day. Happenings with-in your social circles must be taken more seriously.

CANCER: Confrontation may come your way in the circlebut the heavens are working favourably for you. Some dos-es of romance is not too much for you on a day like this.

LEO: Provided you don’t allow your innate ability to be asdiplomatic as necessary desert you, things work favour-ably for you to the betterment of your finances.

VIRGO: Many of you will be in sentimental mood andexhibit strong romantic desire openly. But then, if care isnot taken, you may be carried away to the detriment ofyour finances. Serious minded lovers are in for happy day.

LIBRA: Whatever anybody says or does, you will haveboth your say and way. Venus and Jupiter may tempt someof you to embrace illicit (or secret) romance within yourbase of operation.

SCORPIO: Venus and Jupiter at positive angles may temptyou to join some of your friends who are already onboard ofmerry making train. Watch your health.

SAGITTARIUS: Good luck will smile at many and inducelove of luxury merry making and romantic liason. Genuinelovers will need to be on guard against deceit from newadmirers.

CAPRICORN: Both financial success and emotional satis-faction are closed to you than before. Those of you travel-ling because of maters-of-the-heart are in for an excitingromantic day Those ambitious career-wise will succeed af-ter few struggles.

AQUARIUS: Many members of your opposite sex will goout of their ways to attract your romantic interest. This isthe wrong time to engage on unnecessary argument.

PISCES: If you priority is love, much of it would come yourway as desired. But here is a better day for more ambitiousin the business world. Don’t allow anybody to deceive youover money.

ARIES: Those of you with secret admirers within yourworking area will have the needed opportunities to makethe needed moves. Resist the temptation to deceive oth-ers.

What’s my horoscopeDear Joshua,I am a middle aged lady born on September 13, 1962. Al-though I am fairly successful, I want you to give me mycomprehensive horoscope, especially what my special giftis.Which day of the week was I born? Where were my natalplanets and their meanings? Who am I?Ganiyatu, Jos.

Dear Ganiyatu,There is no space for comprehensive horoscope but whatyou’ll have here -under is answer to your questions/ Youwere born on a Thursday and your special gift is LEADER-SHIP quality.YOUR HOROSCOPE DATADate of Birth: Thursday, September 13, 1962Sun Sign: Virgo: Sun in 20th Degree of VirgoMoon Sign: PISCES: Moon on 10th Degree of PiscesMercury in 16th Degree of LibraVenues in 5th Degree of ScorpioMars in 13th Degree of CancerJupiter in 6th Degree of PiscesSaturn in 5th Degree of AquariusUranus in 2nd Degree of VirgoNeptune in 11th Degree of ScorpioPluto in 10th Degree of VirgoNorth Node in 6th Degree of LeoSouth Node in 6th Degree of AquariusQuality and ElementCardinal and air star signs hosted two planets each fixedand earth three each, no planet in fire while mutable andwater star signs hosted five planets each.Push-full influence = 20%Non- push-full element = 80%Final dispositor = Lucky Jupiter

General AnalysisJust 20 per cent of push-full influence in your chart candeceptively present you to others as a soft (or even timid)person but practical Virgo that hosted nothing less thanthree heavenly bodies when you were born and Astrologi-cal aspects between Mercury (mental focus) and aggres-sive Mars in you r chart are pointers to the contrary.Yes! You are highly intelligent and your mind works thesame way detective’s minds do. It is true, there are littlecontradictions between your inner self and your emotion-al being as indicated quality, water element and Virgocharacteristics.One moment, you can be very emotional, exhibitingtemper with stinging tongue but a few hour later you areamiable, easy going, friendly and compassionate. You arethe adaptable type who will see changes as sources ofgood opportunities.LEADERSHIP quality is one of your greatest gifts fromGod. placement of your natal sun (basic-selfhood) andmoon (your emotional being) in Virgo and Pisces respec-tively mean that characteristics of both Virgo and Piscesare highly pronounced in your inner-self.

A New Beginning (2)SO you are… alive? All thesuicide bombing oflast year did notconsume you:What about theeconomic hard-ship? All the re-trenchment of lastyear did not affect

you? What aboutthe business youstarted part-time,did I hear you sayit is now a full timebusiness? Fine! In-spite of the chal-

lenges of last yearyou are still alive.There must be areason why the au-thor of the uni-verse still keepsyou alive. Find outwhy.

Ask yourself whatkind of result do Iwant to achievethis year? Why didI not make it lastyear? What lessonscan I take with meand invest it in mynew project?Where and whatcan I improve on?

56—Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

, ,

Continues on page 57

IT seems as if the PDP iswaking up after the crisis

instigated by the controversiesaround Bamanga Tukur.

Yes, the new national chairmanof the PDP is an experiencedman who will take the party tothe next level. It is just like afootballer who is put on a reservebench watching others play.When he is eventually broughton to the pitch, he would playlike a coach. The man has beenbrought in to do damage controlwhich I believe he is going to doeffectively. He has started. Heknows what to do. He knows howto tackle it. PDP will be there.What is happening now isnormal especially whenelections are drawing near. It isnot new to people like us.

Do you have confidence in hisability to bring back those whohave left the party?

Oh yes. It may not be all them.He would bring back some ofthem.

Participatoryleadership

Most of those who havedefected are not those who cancontest election constitutionallywith the exception of my brotherin Kwara. Those who havedefected would come back.

Why were you not at the OyoPDP stakeholders’ meetinghosted by former Minister ofJustice, Chief RichardAkinjide(SAN). Did you haveany reservation against themeeting?

No, I don’t have anythingagainst the meeting. It is onlythat I enjoy participatoryleadership where everybodywould be involved in moving theparty forward. So, if you feel somepeople who were expected to bethere were not there, so be it.

Some of your loyalists like Dr.Saka Balogun were there. Didyou send him to represent you?

No, I can’t send an adult to thatkind of meeting. He is an adult,he knows what to do.

Does that mean you were notrepresented at the meeting?

I did not need to berepresented there. I just said Ibelieve in participatoryleadership. everybody is free to

Oyo: I am leader, without me PDPis finished — Alao-AkalaFORMER Governor Adebayo Alao-Akala of Oyo State is a strong pillar of the Peoples Democratic Party in Oyo State andbeyond. Though he lost his re-election quest he was not disgraced as Oyo State became the only state in the Southwestregion to return a PDP senator and members of the House of Representatives in 2011.In this interview in Ibadan, he addresses issues on the PDP structure in Oyo, his political future and his position in Oyopolitics. Excerpts:

BY OLA AJAYI

•Adebayo Akala••• If I leave no one would remain

do what they like. I am not adictator.

Another meeting has beenfixed for that same venue. Willyou be there.

Where?At Chief Akinjide’s residence.I don’t know. If I am around,

may be.Do you belong to Chief Bode

George’s faction in the party.I don’t belong to any faction. I

don’t encourage factions. I am inPDP and I am not in any faction.What do you mean by a faction?I am a PDP man. Chief BodeGeorge has not got any faction.Chief Bode George is above thatkind of thing. Anybody who tellsyou that is a mischief maker.There is nothing like that. I knowChief Bode George and ChiefAkinjide are above that kind ofthing.

But there is a group that is loyalto Buruji Kashamu.

(Cuts in….) what do you meana group is loyal to Kashamu. Youcan’t be loyal to an individual butshould be loyal to your party. Iam loyal to PDP and that is all. Ican’t be loyal to an individual. Iwill never be above the PDP. Whatyou should have done is that youshould have interviewed somestate chairmen and let them saythey are loyal to Kashamu.Loyalty should go to PDP. That iswhat I said. So, what do you

mean some people are loyal toKashamu. What makes somebodya politician? It is just joining apolitical party. It is how usefulyou are to that system. WouldKashamu go to Ekiti and votethere or would he come to Oyoand vote here?

Many people assume that thestructure of the PDP in this statehas been given to Teslim Folarin

You don’t know what you aresaying. You are beingmischievous. If you are not beingmischievous, am I not here inOyo State? If I leave the PDPtoday, would anybody remain inthe party? Why are you deceivingyourselves? We know who is whoin Oyo State. If they asked youto ask that question, it is wrong.

But, it is the reality on ground(Cuts in…) what is the reality

on ground? Am I out of the state?Where did you seeeverybody that you did not seeme.

But, recently, Dr. Saka Balogunsaid the names of people yousent to Abuja were removed.

I am not complaining. Did youhear me complain? Dr. Balogunis older than I in every respect.So, he knows what he is saying.He was talking in his owncapacity like Dr. Saka Balogunwhich he is entitled to. He is anelder and one of the leaders ofthis party. You people (media)

cause problems when there is noproblem. We know ourselves andour limits. If some of us are nottalking on pages of newspapersbecause of our experience, ageand position, it is not that we arestupid. But, we don’t just wantthings to deteriorate. If you givebig head to someone who has asmall body, you would just makehim collapse.

Can you confirm whether youwould be contesting the 2015gubernatorial election as wehave seen posters to that effect.If yes, on what platform?

Where do you want me to startfrom. Posters are beyond me. Ifyou love me, you know what youwant me to do. You can as wellput posters. It is my admirers whopasted those posters. I have notbeen in Ibadan for quitesometime. I was in Abuja, so thereis no way I could have done it.

But there is one thing about theposters, they are not printed inthe same colour. That means theyemanated from different groups.When the time comes, we shallsit down and discuss it. We areyet to sit down and agree on it. Iwant to follow due process.

When we get to the bridge, weshall cross it.

Some people are looking atyou as the leader of the PDP inthis state….

What do you mean by somepeople? When you came in here,you saw many people here. Bythe grace of God, I was once agovernor of this state. There isno way they would talk about thisstate without my name beingmentioned. You cannot take thatfrom me. Not that some peopleare saying I am the leader. I amthe leader of the party in this state.

But you still romance withSenator Rashidi Ladoja who isthe leader of Accord. There wasa time that a committee was setup by the two of you?

Do you want to say that becauseI am a PDP man, I should notrelate with my former boss? PDPis how many years old now andsince when have I been in goodrelationship with Senator Ladoja.

Would you support anothercandidate if PDP presentsanother gubernatorialcandidate?

You heard what the nationalchairman of the party said thatinternal democracy would beobserved. If you heard that whythen are you asking mehypothetical questions?

So, if the primary comes uptoday, you are sure of securingthe ticket of the party.

I am a politician. I don’t haveto tell you my tactics. If I tell you,it means I am selling away myjoker.

Are you aware of a poster inIbadan that contains your

picture and that of Ladoja withthe inscription two wrongs don’tmake a right?

That poster is insulting to thetwo of us. You don’t need to putour pictures. That is very wrongand that is part of what we aretrying to correct. Address issues,don’t attack personality. It is onlybecause of my position. I don’twant to be seen as causing thebreach of peace in Oyo State. Ifnot, why should somebody putour pictures with suchinscription? I didn’t use my

If it were possible for those who voted mein 2007 to get me there, it is also possiblefor them to get them out in 2015

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014—57

Oyo: I am leader, without me PDPis finished — Alao-Akala

Continues from page 56

posters to abuse anybody.But, there is counter one that

says, two good heads are betterthan one.

Those people who counter itdon’t know how to go about it andI am not ready to incite anyone. They thought they shouldrespond and that it what theydid. I did not send anybody todefend me because that hasbecome personal. They shouldhave allowed us to see whatsteps we should take. We shouldplay politics without bitterness.Look at the people that did myposter, they sent the messageout. “Ajumobi o kan taanu, eniOlorun ba ran si ni ni s’eni loore”meaning (coming from the sameparental background does notqualify one getting favour buthelp comes from someone whois God sent). Nobody abusedanybody. It is food for thought.People have been ponderingover it.

But, somebody bears thatname

Uuuuhhhn. No. that is not thename o. Those who call him thatname do not know what they aresaying. Those who printed theposters are speaking to Yorubafor Yoruba people to understandand we have understood.

Towards the end of last year,you went to Oyo town to see theAlaafin of Oyo. Were you ableto meet him?

That is a forgone issue. I haveover-flogged it. Don’t let us goback to it. Papa belongs to all ofus. Nobody can have monopolyof him. He is not papa of Oyoalone, he is our father.

In the spirit of reconciliation,how do you think factions in thePDP can be brought together tomake the party moreformidable.

When the time comes, we willall come together, we will

reconcile those who arereconcilable, and those who feelthey are bigger than the PDPwould be allowed to go.

You say it with emphasis thatPDP will win the governorshipelection in this state. How do youthink this is possible bearing inmind that when you were thegovernor, it was this same partythat defeated you in the 2011elections?

If it were possible for those whovoted me in 2007 to get me there,it is also possible for them to getthem out in 2015. Don’t forget thefact that the stronger ourdemocracy, the more educatedare the electorate. It is not yet timefor campaign.

In the state, APC is ruling..Cuts in…..People are even

confused about the name. Howmany times they have changednames now.

Peacefulatmosphere

They were AD, AC, ACN andAPC. Can you remember? Andsome people just joined themsaying they are ANPP, CPC andso on.

What do you think the rulingparty is not doing right now thatcan be corrected?

You want me to tell them? No,leave them, let them continue tofumble. We don’t want to tellthem. We have not startedcampaigning. Let them blow thewhistle.

How do you think violence canbe avoided in the 2015 elections?

If you allow violence as aleader, I don’t know who youwant to govern. We shall continueto talk to our people to bepeaceful. It is in peacefulatmosphere that we can getthings which are wrongcorrected.

We learnt that a senatorial

•Akala: Accord is mishievous to reserve Senate ticket for me

ticket has been reserved for youin Accord. Is it true?

People say it in Yoruba that, Idon’t want is superior to I gaveyou. If they are not somischievous, why should theyreserve ticket for me? I have saidit several times that I don’t belongto Accord and I can never becomean Accord member. Can’t peoplejust take simple no?. I can nevergo to Accord.

What party can you go to?I will not go to any party. I am

a loyal member to PDP.Irrespective of what happens,PDP remains my party. It is theparty that made me what I amtoday. Why then would I abandonit? I can never do that. If PDPmade somebody like me, it wouldnot like losing somebody like me.

People say that your aides likePrince Dotun Oyelade havemoved over to Accord toprepare the ground for you?

They are not my aides.You mean now?Even before. They were not my

aides.Even Prince Oyelade?Dotun has never been my

political associate. He onlyworked for me as a professionaljournalist.

Can we refer to those inAccord now as your lost politicalchildren?

They were never my politicalchildren. They were employed byme and they have gone there foranother employment. Don’t youknow that in every government,there are those we call technocratswho are always looking formoney. They have applied to thatplace and they have employedthem.

Like prodigal son, if they comeback for re-employment. Wouldyou consider them?

I would consider theirapplications based on merit.

Lobby for confab delegatesintensifies

Continues from page 5should go there and insist on

the terms of association ofNdigbo with other nationalitiesas articulated by the ProfNwabueze–led Igbo Leadersof Thought. “The Igbo predica-ment in Nigeria is a challengeto the conscience of all ethnicnationalities and geo-politicalzones or Regions in Nigeria.It is a moral wound, inflictedover a long time by injustice,that must be cured. What is im-portant is the quality ofNdigbo representation andthat is why Igbo Leaders ofThought are going ahead tocomplete the task of articulat-ing the Igbo position. There isnothing absolutely sacrosanctas to how an existing Consti-tution may be replaced by anew one.”

Obi Thompson advised that“although nobody should go tothe conference to seek disso-lution of Nigeria, it should beemphasized that the right ofself determination is a funda-mental sacred human right.The Conference should there-fore be about discussing con-ditions whereby it is attractivefor each stakeholder to happilyand freely exercise this rightwithin the framework of onesovereign Nigerian nation.”

On selection of South-Eastdelegates, Obi Thompson said“nobody is contesting the col-lectively cherished ideal ofNdigbo speaking with onevoice through Ohanaeze” butsince the issue of leadershipof Ohanaeze appeared cur-rently subjudice, a better ap-proach might be a conciliatoryprocess whereby all othersocio-political cum culturalgroups come together with allfactions within Ohanaeze forthe purpose of selecting theirdelegates.

On Igbo support for Presi-dent Jonathan, he said: “If theConference successfully givesbirth to a new Constitution forthe Federal Republic of Ni-geria, President Jonathanwould have built for himself aformidable and appreciativeconstituency across the lengthand breadth of Nigeria whosesupport will overwhelm thecombined opposition of APCand PDP and sweep him intoland slide second term victory.The President should note thatour objective is to ensure thathe succeeds in this undertak-ing. If he achieves this, he be-comes the undisputed father ofmodern Nigeria, thus sharingthe same spot of honour in ourhistory as accorded to SirHerbert Macauley and Rt. theHon. Nnamdi Azikiwe, as thegenuine protagonists and pa-triots of a true and sincere OneNigeria.”

This is another jambo-ree –Tsav

Speaking on the confab inMakurdi, the Benue StateCapital, former Lagos StateCommissioner of Police, AlhajiAbubakar Tsav, said it is “an-other jamboree by the federalgovernment that would serve

no useful purpose.”According to him, the con-

ference will serve as a conduitpipe for wastage and siphon-ing of the nation’s scarce re-sources.

His words: “The proponentsof the conference are only do-ing it to distract Nigerians fromthe avalanche of challengesthat we face as a people. Asfar as I’m concerned, the con-ference is a misplaced prior-ity. The critical problem fac-ing the country and derailingits growth and development isnothing but corruption whichis the reason why we are alllamenting and crying in thiscountry.

“How can anyone suggestthe convocation of anotherconference in Nigeria whenthe recommendations of pre-vious ones that were held bypast governments in thiscountry have not been imple-mented. The bane of the de-velopment, peace andprogress of this country is cor-ruption, if this is tackled everyother thing will fall into place.

“How can a government thatencourages high level corrup-tion convince Nigerians thatit is sincere with its policiesand programmes when we allknow that people who havebeen declared wanted for cor-ruption charges are beingdaily celebrated by this ad-ministration. As far as I amconcerned, the Jonathan’sconference will not be differ-ent from the previous ones,nothing new will come out ofit. In fact, it will provide a ba-sis for looting and another rea-son for wastage and drainageof the nation’s scarce re-sources.”

Ex-minister advocatessix-year single term

Ahead of the conference,former Minister of Scienceand Technology, General SamMomah, has advocated for asix-year single term in officefor the president and gover-nors.

Noting that after every fouryears the government spendshuge sums of tax payers’money to conduct elections atthe expense of the neededsocio-economic developmentby the people, he said apartfrom huge costs of conductingthe elections, the “ four-yearterm does not give any execu-tive enough room to completeor conclude any programme itstarts. In Africa, no incumbentloses an election, even thoughit happens, it is difficult, be-cause he makes sure hespends state money to winthat election. So, if he knowshe has a single term he doeshis best and leaves.”

He further stated that issuesthe national conference wouldaddress had overtaken theconstitution amendment bythe National Assembly, sincethe constitution amendmentwas temporal, but he urgedthe National Assembly to con-tinue with what they were do-ing as it was their assign-ment."

58 — V58 — V58 — V58 — V58 — Vanguardanguardanguardanguardanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014NEWS BRIEFNEWS BRIEFNEWS BRIEFNEWS BRIEFNEWS BRIEF

THE Chairman ofHouse of Represen-

tatives Committee on Di-aspora, Hon Abike Dabiri-Erewa has advocated Ni-geria-Ghana educationalpartnership.

Abike-Dabiri who statedthis during her commit-tee’s visit to NigerianHigh Commission in Gha-na last week stated thatthere was need for moresynergy between the twocountries for the develop-ment of West African sub-region.

While frowning at the

Abike-Dabiri seeks closer Nigeria, Ghana tiesway Nigerian businessmen are being treated inthe country especially theissue of $1 million requiredfor the opening of businessby foreigners, she notedthat Nigerians should betreated fairly consideringthe immense contributionof the country to Ghana.

She commended the in-terventionist effort of theNigerian ambassador tothe country, AmbassadorAdemola Oluseyi Onafo-wokan, who she said hasbeen proactive in respond-ing to fusillade of com-plaints by Nigerians.

Accompanies by other

members of the committeeincluding HonourableHon Innocent Tirsel, HonAkinlaja Joseph and HonKhabeeb, the lawmaker,during courtesy call to theUniversity of Ghana’s ViceChancellor, while appreci-ating the academic excel-lence of the University ofGhana, said the citadel oflearning has distinguisheditself in learning and char-acter hence the intellectu-al gravitational pull to theuniversity from Africannations, not only by Afri-can best students, but alsobest brains all over theworld.

BY EMMANUELELEBEKE, Abuja

THE United NationsSecurity Council

has tasked Nigeria andCameroon to tightentheir border postsagainst cross-bordercrimes, terrorism andmaritime piracy to actu-alize the ultimate goal ofthe Greentree agree-ment between them.

The Special Represen-tative of the Secretary-General of the UnitedNations for West Africa,Said Djinnit, made thecall during the weekendat the opening ceremo-ny of the 32nd Session ofthe Cameroon-NigeriaMixed Commission,CNMC held in Abuja.

The UN envoy, said itis imperative for bothcountries to enhancecross-border confidencebuilding measures thataddress the well beingof the populations affect-ed by the judgement of

UN tasks Nigeria, Cameroon on terrorism,cross-border crimes

the International Courtof Justice in October 10,2002.

Djinnit also called onNigerian and Came-roonian governments tointensify their fight

against the scourges ofcross-border and organ-ised crime,terrorism and maritimepiracy within their terri-tory.

The Envoy, who com-

•The Flag Officer Commanding Naval Training Command Rear AdmiralGoddy Anyankpele presenting a sourvenier to the Director of Training Gha-na Navy Captain Emmanuel Kwafo during a courtesy call on the FOC inLagos on Wednesday.

mended the two coun-tries for their commit-ment in ensuring apeaceful completion ofthe transfer process inBakassi that was con-cluded in August 14,2013, in accordance withthe terms of GreentreeAgreement, said he wasdelighted by the re-markable cooperationdisplayed by Cameroonand Nigeria to fightagainst the scourge oforganised crime, terror-ism and maritime pira-cy.

“The United nationsencourages the twocountries to furtherstrengthen this cooper-ation with a view to en-suring an integrated, co-ordinated, and pragmat-ic approach to deal withtransnational threat af-fecting the region,” hesaid.

ELECTIONS in Thailand passed off peacefully yesterday , but anti-government pro-

testers made their presence felt in the voting,blockading polling stations across the country.

Polling was disrupted in about a fifth of thecountry’s constituencies, but no major violencewas reported, despite armed clashes betweensupporters and opponents of embattled PrimeMinister Yingluck Shinawatra.

Voting ended yesterday but no results will beannounced. Further voting is already scheduledfor February 23 after problems with advance poll-ing last Sunday, while the ballot in some south-ern areas may not happen for weeks.

Protests mar Thai polls

BY EMEKA AGINAM

A court in Egypt hasacquitted more

than 60 supporters ofousted President Mo-hammed Morsi whowere arrested during aviolent protest last year.

Judges also cleared acameraman working forthe broadcaster Al-Jazeera.

Egyptian court frees pro-Morsi protestersThe men, most of whom

have links to the bannedMuslim Brotherhood,had been accused of at-tempted murder and ri-oting following deadlyclashes in Cairo.

They were demon-strating against Mr Mor-si’s removal from powerby the military in July

2013.Egypt’s first democrat-

ically elected presidentis currently facing fourseparate trials on variouscharges.

Islamists have stagedregular protests de-manding his reinstate-ment, but have been metwith a heavy crackdownin which hundreds havedied.

The interim govern-ment has declared theMuslim Brotherhood aterrorist organisationand arrested thousandsof its members since lastyear.

SOUTH Sudaneserebels accused gov-

ernment forces yesterdayof razing the hometownof their leader Riek Ma-char, violating a ceasefire,and said the army wasdrawing support from for-eign fighters now in thecountry.

Rebel spokesman LulRuai Koang said govern-ment SPLA forces andfighters from theSudanese Justice andEquality Movement - arebel group from north ofthe border - had de-stroyed the northern townof Leer on Saturday, mas-sacring women and chil-dren as they fled.

An army spokesmansaid he had not receivedany reports of fighting inLeer, where the medicalcharity Medecins SansFrontieres (MSF) said

S/Sudan rebels accuse govtforces of violating cease fire

last week more than 200of its staff had beenforced to flee because ofgrowing insecurity.

UKRAINE’S embattled president announced he would return to work after

four days’ sick leave, as protesters filled Kiev’smain square on Sunday demanding he give uppower.

Opposition leaders, addressing the crowd ontheir return home from meeting European andU.S. officials, said they hoped for internationalmediation in negotiations with the governmentand for constitutional change to limit presiden-tial power.

Calling for a complete change of leadershipafter weeks of crisis that have divided the coun-try and set the West against Yanukovich’s Rus-sian allies, opposition figures who attended asecurity conference in Munich told supportersthey would secure international economic aid ifthey were able to take power.

Ukraine's opposition demandschange

CAMPAIGNING for the presidential elections in Afghanistan has begun, stained

by the deaths of two aides for the front-runnerin a gun attack.

The men, working for for Doctor Abdullah Ab-dullah, were killed in the Western province ofHerat.

The attack follows an attempted assassinationlast month on Mohammad Ismail Khan, a vicepresidential candidate for Abdul Rasul Sayyafand former water and energy minister.

In Kabul yesterday, billboards began appear-ing as the candidates prepared their first cam-paign conferences.

Afghans begin campaign amidviolence

US Secretary of State John Kerry is holdinga gun to Israel’s head in peace talks with

the Palestinians by warning it could face inter-national isolation if negotiations failed, a seniorIsraeli cabinet minister said yesterday.

The remarks by Strategic Affairs Minister YuvalSteinitz, who is close to Prime Minister BenjaminNetanyahu, followed recent accusations by Is-rael’s defense minister that Kerry was being“messianic” in his pursuit of a peace deal.

At a Munich security forum on Saturday, Ker-ry touched a nerve in Israel by pointing to “anincreasing de-legitimization” campaign build-ing up against it internationally and “talk of boy-cotts” if the Israeli-Palestinian conflict did notend.

Israeli minister attacks Kerryover boycott warnings

WASHINGTON denied has claims by Syria’s foreign minister that American dip-

lomats had sought to negotiate directly with theirSyrian counterparts at last week’s ‘Geneva 2’peace conference in Switzerland.

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki saidthe United States had offered to connect withSyrian officials “on a staff level” through the Unit-ed Nations and Joint Special Representative La-khdar Brahimi.

US denies Syria’s claims ofdirect talks

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Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 — 59

,

,

Of green jerseys, Ejike’sresurrection and a glorious bronze

I regret the day I met Nicodemus. This young man is simply impossible.No sooner had the Eagles walked out against Mo-

rocco in white jersey than Nicodemus rang me. Iignored him. He rang again and again and finallyresorted to sending a text. “………Oga Paul, weshould not have worn white. We should not. We willnot win this match. We should have worn green ”

I remember taking Nicodemus through the ex-ploits of the Eaglets in Abu Dhabi and how the co-lour of their jersey did not matter, yet Nicodemuswas not convinced. He ended up saying that “per-haps” at the junior level it does not matter.

Nicodemus was at it again. He has no respect forthe concept of ‘home’ and ‘away’ teams. For him nomatter what happens, Nigerian officials should al-ways insist on wearing green jerseys whether theyare home or away.

The match started and before you could say…CHAN, we were three goals down!

What annoyed Nicodemus most was not that wewere three goals down, but that I refused to pickhis calls. He resorted to sending text messages atthe speed of light, one of which read. “ Oga Basseypick my calls please. Try and reach Keshi, if there isany excuse they can muster to change to green inthe second half, they will come back……”

To cut a very long story short, the Eagles did notchange to green, they came out and won at extratime and all efforts to reach Nicodemus provedabortive…….Now he is the one that did not pick mycalls.

On Saturday, I called Nicodemus again, this timeafter we had lost to Ghana wearing green jerseys! Ijust hope that others like Nicodemus would havebeen cured of the senseless belief that anything butdetermination, attitude and ability wins matches.

Against Ghana we were not just good enough.Many have tried to justify why. Some say we weremuscled and bulldozed, others claim Morocco leftus weak and deflated…..whatever, we lost to a sidethat was hungrier.

That we could not, for over one hour neutralize ateam that was numerically inferior was not very com-plimentary. And to prove that our helplessnessagainst Ghana was no “fluke” we were presented

the same “gift” against Zimbabwe, yet we had tolabour for about an hour before we were saved theagony of facing another set of penalties with Agbimin goal…….

Let us not talk about penalties here. We were aw-ful. After watching the final match between Libyaand Ghana I drew certain conclusions. One, that ifthe Ghanaians were so good at taking penalties,how come the Libyan keeper kept them at bay? (Nab-duala it will be recalled saved two penalties andconverted one against Zimbabwe ) Perhaps I shouldalso talk about the Ghanaian goalkeeper who alsocontribute so much in giving his side hope by at-tempting and saving penalties…….

I have been asked again and again, was CHANworth it?……I do not know about other countries,but CHAN is the best thing to have happened toour domestic league. That we did not qualify in thefirst two editions did not drive the message home tous. Now that we ‘ve gone there……. to get Bronzeat first attempt, I cannot wait for our league to com-

mence, wait for the fierce competition between clubs,between players who now know that apart from theirclubs going continental, there also exists the possi-bility of getting a CHAN call up and with it an op-portunity of show casing one’s talent on a conti-nental shop window.

There also exists a lot of arguments as to whetherwe took the best there is in the domestic league toSouth Africa. Maybe not Agbim. I also know that ata time Kwambe was a regular on Keshi’s list he wasnowhere on the starting eleven of Sunshine Stars!Benjamin Francis of Heartland is even worse......notfor his club duties, as long as he is a national teamregular......

However, What ever the arguments are, I remem-ber that in the previous two editions when perhapswe had taken the “best”, we ended up not qualify-ing, so we can only thank Coach Keshi for this sin-gular effort and achievement. It can only get better.

Finally, did the competition offer Keshi World Cupalternatives? People rush to mention Ejike Ozue-nyi. God bless him. How can I forget that terriblefall and the look on the face of his colleagues whorushed in to see whether he was still breathing?More worrisome for me was to see him rushing backto the field minutes later…….thanking God that heis still alive to reap from a very productive champi-onship for self and country.

But Ejike has always been around…..Benjamin…..Kwambe….Agbim….they are as old as Keshi’s ex-ploits in the Nations Cup and World Cup. Perhapsthis competition has only helped to prove that a lotstill needs be done at the domestic level to chal-lenge the rising profile of our foreign armada whogratefully have stepped up their activity level inEurope in the last three weeks.

We thank God for CHAN ( We nearly came backafter the first round) we salute the team and wel-come them back home with the credible bronze. Asone of my friends will say “at all at all na him bad”

For Keshi, too bad that he cannot go on break. AsBlatter perhaps told him in South Africa, “….seeyou in Brazil” …..where the Real Thing waits. Bra-zil will not be ‘moi-moi’ I swear.

See you next week.

I just hope that others likeNicodemus would have beencured of the senseless beliefthat anything but determina-tion, attitude and ability winsmatches

THE Director Gener-al of the National

Sports Commission, Ho-nourable Gbenga Eleg-beleye has told the Su-per Eagles team thatwon the bronze medal ofthe just concluded Afri-ca Nations Champion-ship (CHAN) to put thecompetition behind themand focus more on theBrazil 2014 World Cupthat would kick off inJune.

He harped on goodpreparations as well asselection of best legs forthe Eagles to achievesuccess in the WorldCup.

Elegbeleye has taskedthe team to use the WorldCup as a better avenueto prove their worth andto make Nigerians hap-py. He also commendedthem for not coming backhome empty handed as

Elegbeleye wants Eagles tofocus on World Cup

60 — Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

they did well to beatZimbabwe 1-0 to clinchthe bronze medal of theCHAN 2014 competi-tion. He also expressedhappiness over a mem-ber of the team, EjikeUzoenyi who emerged

Most Valuable Player ofthe competition just likeKelechi Iheanacho whowon same award in thelast U- 17 World Cupheld in United ArabEmirates last year Octo-ber.

TUSSTLE . . . Super Eagles Abubakar Ibrahim viesfor the ball with Peter Moyo of Zimbabwe duringtheir 2014 CAF African Nations Championships3rd/4th playoff at Cape Town Stadium.

IG boosts National BadmintonTeam •Ahead of Uganda Cham-

pionship

THE Inspector General of Police Alhaji

Mohammed Abubakarvisited and trained withNigeria Badminton play-ers who were preparingfor the 9th edition of theUganda InternationalBadminton tournamentscheduled to take placeon 20th-23rd of Februaryin Lugogo Indoor stadi-um, Uganda.

The IG who is a formernational badminton play-er as well as an ex-boardmember of Nigeria Foot-ball Association, NFA,promised to continue tosupport the players sothat they can gain enoughpoints that will qualifythem for the 2016 Olym-pics in Brazil.

”If we engage theyouths especiallythrough sports, we havedone one great thing,which is taking themaway from the streets andis a very good factor increating better leaders oftomorrow”

Also on Sunday, Abujabadminton club donated

a set of jersey and bad-minton equipment to thenational team ahead ofthe Ugandan tourna-ment. The chairman Abu-ja badminton club,Abubakar Isa said it istheir way of supportingthe Nigeria BadmintonFederation, NBF.

”We are trying to pro-mote badminton in Nige-ria and we feel we shouldstart with the nationalteam.” Isa added.President of NBF, JusticeDanlami Senchi who wason hand to receive thedonations, thanked thedonors especially the IGfor helping to promotebadminton in Nigeriaand assured that Nigeriawill qualify for 2016Olympics.

”We want to thank theIG as well as the Abujabadminton club for theirsupport, we hope we’llalso get the support of the

sports ministry. Our aimis to gain enough pointsthat will help our playersqualify for the Olympics.”Senchi concluded.

National badmintoncaptain Olaoluwa Fagbe-mi said the team hopes towin at least four goldmedals in Uganda.Organisers say 16 teamshave confirmed participa-tion in the championship,that will see 64 playerstaking part in differentcategories.

•Abubakar

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 — 61

CHAN to the World Cupin Brazil and Uzoenyibelieves that they meritto be in the squad to Bra-zil.

The Enugu Rangers

UzoenyiContinues from BP International player also

promised that the MVPgong would not distracthim as he plans to rideon his success in SouthAfrica to global recogni-tion in Brazil if selectedby Stephen Keshi.

Egwuekwe, KwambeContinues from BP

because nothing hasbeen concluded. “No, Ican’t disclose the namesof the clubs becausetalks are still inprogress,” he retorted.

Likewise, his teammate and a co-defenderSolomon Kwambe didnot travel with the rest ofthe bronze-winning teamto Nigeria for samereasons.

Although he would nottalk to reporters,Kwambe was said tohave several offers fromclubs in South Africa,Europe and Canada. Hetold Sports Vanguard inBloemfontein after thedefeat to Ghana that hewas considering an offerfrom a Canadian clubbut pointed out thatnothing had beenconcluded for now.

Anichebe: I didEverton a favourWEST Bromwich

Albion strikerVictor Anichebe has re-vealed that he was in-structed to score in the1-1 draw with Liverpoolyesterday by a formerEverton teammate.The 25-year-old cameoff the bench to rescuea point for the Baggiesthis afternoon, cancel-ling out Daniel Stur-ridge’s first-half effort.Consequently, the Redshold just a two-pointlead over the Toffees inthe race for ChampionsLeague qualification,and Anichebe - whospent seven years atGoodison Park - admitsthat he is happy to denttheir European ambi-tions for his old club.He told reporters: “It’salways nice to score andI was itching to get on.I had a text from one ofthe Everton players tosay do us a favouragainst Liverpool.”

The strike was Ani-chebe’s second of theseason.

NSC warns federations overcompetitionsTHE Director of

Sports Federationand Elite Athletes Depart-ment (FEAD) of the Na-tional Sports Commission(NSC), Dr. Bolaji Ojo-Obahas warned sports federa-tions to desist from enter-ing for international com-petitions without the ap-proval of the NSC.

He stated that the NSC’sendorsement was re-quired for Sports Federa-tions to enroll for interna-tional competitions, de-scribing the action of somefederations that enter forsuch competitions withoutthe knowledge and en-dorsements of the Com-mission as ‘’wrong and abreach of establishedsporting procedure.”

Dr. Ojo-Oba said theCommission frowns at thisattitude and would hence-forth consider sanctions forerring federations.

Dr. Ojo-Oba spoke in thelight of the controversy thathas trailed the camping ofNigeria’s volleyball team,which is preparing for aninternational competition.“The Commission is una-ware that that they were

going for any competition.As at today, we do nothave any written requestfor funds from them.

“These include availa-ble funding, sports devel-opment goals, rating of theteam and others,” he said.

“Federations should not

just wake up and say theyare participating in inter-national competitions.When they enter for suchcompetitions, it is underthe banner of Nigeria andso the Commission, whichis the premier sports agen-cy in the country, shouldbe fully aware to give ap-proval. This is essential forproper planning.”

JOSE Mourinho hasreignited a simmer-

ing rivalry with ManuelPellegrini by mocking theManchester City manag-er ’s faux pas in theChampions League ear-lier in the season, whenthe Chilean failed to re-alise that his side couldhave topped their groupwith a single goal.

Man City vs Chelsea

Mourinho taunts Pellegrini

City, who play Chelseain a crunch encounter atthe top of the PremierLeague tonight, wereleading Bayern Munich3-2 in Germany in De-cember and would havequalified as group win-ners on goal differencehad they added a fourth.However, Pellegrini hassince apologised for be-ing unaware of the math-ematical permutations,bringing on Jack Rodwellin the closing stages ofthe match.

City lead Chelsea bythree points and have afar superior goal differ-ence but have been drawnagainst Barcelona in thelast 16 of the ChampionsLeague. Mourinho, whosucceeded Pellegrini asmanager of Real Madridin 2010 and irked theSouth American with hiszealous celebrations afterChelsea’s 2-1 victory overCity earlier in the cam-paign, claimed the Man-chester club would not beregarded as a great sideuntil they had triumphedin Europe.

“They won one title,they won a couple ofcups. Only in Europethey didn’t do well.Speaking objectively theydid very bad in the Cham-pions League in previousseasons, also in the Eu-ropa League they didbad,” said Mourinho.“The first thing to be suc-cessful in Europe is toknow the rules of the com-petition, that’s the firstthing.”

Pellegrubu (l) with Mourinho

EXCEPT theu n e x p e c t e d

happens, Super Eaglesand Enugu Rangerswinger Ejike Uzoenyi isone of the players whowill form part ofNigeria’s 2014 WorldCup squad.

The performance of thestriker in the justconcluded AfricanNations Championshipin South Africa, wherehe was declared theMost Valuable Player ofthe tournament hasplaced the striker in poleposition to make theStephen Keshi WorldCup squad.

In a chat with reporters

Uzoenyi in line for World Cup — Keshiafter the bronze winningeffort of the SuperEagles in Cape Town,Keshi said, “I can safelysay this is Ejike’stournament and I thankGod for him.”

Keshi was asked at themixed zone after thematch against Zimbabweto review theperformance of theRangers striker in thetournament.

The coach admittedEjuke towered above

others despite theunfortunate semi finalloss to Ghana, and hesaid, “Ejike didwonderfully well. Hemade the tournamentlook like his project andhis efforts have beenacknowledged by all.”

Although the coachsaid he would notdisclose the names ofthe players who willmake the World Cupsquad, he assured thathe would be happy if the

petite forward w makesthe World Cup squad, allthings being equal.

“He has done well, butthere is room forimprovement. I hope hemakes the squad,” Keshiprayed.

THREE Local Eagles stars, Ejike

Uzoneyi, Rabiu Ali andOdunlami Kunle madethe CAF’s best XI of thejust concluded AfricanNations Championship.

Also, Black Stars trio,-Joshua Tijani, JordanOpoku and Siedu Ban-sey also made the list.

Another set of threeGhana players- StephenAdams, Yahaya Moham-med and Abeiku Ainoo-son-were named in thesubstitutes.

Tijani who played inall six matches as left-back and captain Opokuwas influential in mid-field.

Uzoenyi, Ali, Kunlemake CAF’s best XI

CONTEST: Dumte Pyagbara of Nigeria gets to the ball ahead of Partson Jaureof Zimbabwe during their match on February 1.

CMYK

62 — Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

CMYK

Vanguard, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 — 63

CMYK

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YESTERYESTERYESTERYESTERYESTERDAY'S ANSWERSDAY'S ANSWERSDAY'S ANSWERSDAY'S ANSWERSDAY'S ANSWERSTODAY'S PUZZLETODAY'S PUZZLETODAY'S PUZZLETODAY'S PUZZLETODAY'S PUZZLE

Sudoku

YESTERDAY'S SOLUTIONS

VANGUARD,VANGUARD,VANGUARD,VANGUARD,VANGUARD, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014 MONDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2014

QUICK CROSSWORDQUICK CROSSWORDQUICK CROSSWORDQUICK CROSSWORDQUICK CROSSWORDACROSS3 Whiskers (5)9 Appeared (6)10 Excursion (6)11 Name (5)12 Egg-shaped (4)15 Duct (4)17 Erased (7)20 Sorrowful (3)21 Trench (5)23 Sketched (4)25 Acid (4)26 Subsequently (5)28 Finish (3)30 Wished (7)33 Elderly (4)35 Season (4)36 Courteous (5)38 Plaid (6)39 Strict (6)40 Brute (5)

DOWN1 Spate (5)2 Regional (5)3 Wager (3)4 Revised (6)5 Part (4)6 Owing (3)7 Less (5)8 Leered (5)13 Selling (7)14 Flat (5)16 Fought (7)18 Plunged (5)19 Deed (3)22 Custom (5)24 Lump (3)27 Careless (6)28 Ground (5)29 Disparage (5)31 Jockey (5)32 Dissuade (5)34 Pit (4)36 Taxi (3)37 Chartered (3)

ACROSS: 1, Abduct 5, Bowser 9, Rover 10,Pillow 11, Garret 12, Pedal 14, Code 17,Ran 18, Pile 20, Treat 22, Clear 23, Seizure24, Seven 26, Yacht 29, Prod 30, Wed 32,Deer 33, Hades 35, Inched 36, Bolted 37,Regal 38, Endued 39, Recede.

DOWN: 1, Aspect 2, Delude 3, Crop 4, Tower5, Began 6, Oral 7, Sortie 8, Rotter 13,Dazzled 15, Order 16, Eased 18, Plead 19,Lathe 21, Ten 22, Cry 24, Sprite 25, Voiced27, Centre 28, Trudge 30, Waded 31, Debar33, Here 34, Sole.

Brazil: Home Eagles deservemore shirts — UzoenyiMOST Valuable

Player, MVP, ofthe just concluded Afri-can Nations Champion-ship, CHAN, EjikeUzoenyi has charged hislocal based Eagles to re-double their efforts andfight for places in Niger-ia’s final list to the WorldCup in Brazil.

Uzoenyi, the most out-standing player of thetournament and the en-gine room of StephenKeshi’s team

said that they(home-based) are equal if notbetter than foreign-based Eagles and de-serve shirts to the WorldCup.

Coach Stephen Keshihas promised to takefour outstanding home-based players from the

••• in line for World Cup — Keshi — Pg 61Continues on Page 61

Man City V Chelsea 9pmVillarreal V Osasuna 10pmGenoa V Sampdoria 8.45pm

ResultsEPL

Arsenal 2 Palace 0West Brom 1 Liverpool 1

Serie AAtalanta 3 Napoli 0Catania 3 Livorno 3Chievo 0 Lazio 2Sassuolo 0 Verona 2

La LigaElche 1 Almeria 0Betis 2 Espanyol 0

Today’s Fixtures

Egwuekwe, Kwamberemain in South Africa

SUPER Eagles TeamB defenders,

Azubuike Egwuekweand Solomon Kwwambedid not return to Nigeriayesterday with the rest ofthe team after the AfricanNations Championshipwhich the Eagles won abronze.

The dependabledefenders did not boardthe bus that took theirteammates to the CapeTown airport as theywere billed to travel to

Johannesburg same dayto finalise possibletransfer talks with someunnamed clubs.

Egwuekwe confirmedto Sports Vanguard thathe will be holding talkswith clubs in thecommercial town ofJohannesburg butwould not name theclubs in question.

“ I am not travelling toNigeria with the teambecause of contract talkswith some clubs,” hestated, but added thathe won’t mention thenames of the clubsContinues on Page 61

MAN OF THE MOMENT — Ejike Uzoenyi

CMYK

How to Play Sudoku

Place a number (1-9) in each blank cell. (No line canhave two of the same number).

Each row (nine lines from left to right), column, (alsonine lines from top to bottom) and 3 X 3 block within abold block (nine blocks) contains number from 1through 9. This means that no number can appear twicein any block, column or row.

No mathematics is involved – no adding, subtraction, divisionor multiplication, just plain logic and your imagination.