You have posed a question to us, which I think deserves an answer, moreso, in light of our recent travails with a number of intrigues and sub plots, which have sought to discourage us from our cause.

But I will first turn this question around and ask another:

IF NIGERIA HAS NOT FAILED, THEN HOW HAS SHE SUCCEEDED?

In effect, can any member of this forum think of one thing that Nigeria has succeeded with? Like God proposed to Lot when He was going to destroy Sodom and Gommarah, "if you can name me even one good man, then I will spare the entire city."

We all know what happened next, God could not find even one good man in Sodom and Gomorrah, the rest is history.

On the other hand if we go point by point we will discover where she has failed, and not once, but continuously, repeatedly, and wilfully.

#1. Preservation of the dignity of mankind.

The Nigerian government has continuously and repeatedly reduced her citizens to a state less than animals. She has done this by her wilful neglect of the basic neccessities of life: lack of access to health care, lack of potable water, lack of food.

#2. The Nigerian government has failed to safe guard the safety of her citizens exposing them to armed bandits and marauders, who terrorize the citizenry at will.

#3. The Nigerian military continues to persecute certain peoples, and participates in mass murders of unarmed citizens, and extrajudicial executions of innocent traders.
In effect, under Obasanjo, it has continued its operation of terror as an instrument to silence opposition.

#4.The entire Nigerian government continues to be one of the most, or the MOST CORRUPT GOVERNMENT IN THE WORLD. The entire set up of the state is as a giant bureaucracy, composed of 36 states, and the majority of its "resources", are used to service the chosen few who are in " office", while the lot of the common man gets worse by the moment, and the national infrastructure is decaying, while the ministers languish in untold luxury.

#5.The Nigerian leaders have NO VISION, and for the most part DONT EVEN PRETEND TO HAVE ANY VISION OR PROGRAMS FOR PROGRESS.

If the leadership is corrupt, and has only one preoccupation: namely, how can I make a quick buck here and then get out, what hope is there for the commonman? He too learns this corruption and like a plague it has decimated the entire society, with every one looking for the easy way out, and every one looking for a bribe.

#6. Genocide:
The Nigerian government continues to perpetuate genocide against the igbos.

When it comes to Nigeria, there is no good news, it is a country which through greed, bad leadership, and ethnic hatreds, religious intolerance, has sealed its own fate, Nigeria doesnt need anyone to kill her, she has killed herself...

A RACKET of the highest order, with corruption so in grained in the machinery of the state.

NO ATTEMPTS TO FIND EMPLOYMENT FOR 80% of easterners!!!!! With an excess of physicians in the south, importing TURKISH DOCTORS.

Lets put it this way, if anyone thought that we would put with this state of affairs they would have to have been kidding!

An economoy which after raping the east for 30 years, still is 99% dependent on oil reources! Guys, these people make me laugh, HOW STUPID CAN A PEOPLE BE, look at them, I reallly think they are comical as they jet set all over the world, not realising that the white man must find them the laughing stock of all peoples.

Oh yes, are the robes flowing, BUT IT IS NOT FLOWING ROBES WHICH CAN MASTERMIND A BLUEPRINT FOR AN ECONOMY FOR ITS PEOPLES.

But then, they have shut the brains out, and they are elsewhere...

Tuesday, January 8, 2002.

Again, the Igbo and privatisation

By Marcel Okeke

ELEMENTARY economics teaches us that some of the reasons for siting industries in specific areas include nearness to the source of raw materials, availability of (cheap) labour, existence of a large market and other enabling infrastructure. Although these are universal criteria, their subjugation to populist, political considerations in the location of (especially strategic) industries in Nigeria have tended to obliterate their relevance. Over the years and in the un-ending search for the right path to real development, successive Nigerian governments have been guided by such nebulous concepts/principles as 'even development', quota system, advantaged or disadvantaged areas, and so on.

In practice, however, the effectuation of each of these principles at every point in time had translated in the execution of ethnic or regional agenda of sorts, with the core objective of implementing extant development plans only in a manner that benefits certain geopolitical zones or ethnic nationalities. It is therefore no mere coincidence that since the post-civil war era (1970 to date) no such heavy/strategic industry as in the steel sector, oil refining or fertilizer production among others, has been sited in the former East Central State (known as the South East geopolitical zone today.) Any key industrial establishment existing in any of the component states must, in point of fact, have its origins in the regional government era when, what is the Trans-Amadi Industrial estate in Port Harcourt (in the South-South region) was established by the Eastern Nigeria government.

And so, under the concept of even development as practised by past military and civilian regimes, certain key industries were deliberately located in various parts of the country to the exclusion of the Igbo states (the South-East). Take the steel industry: there are the steel rolling Mills in Oshogbo, Jos and Katsina as well as the steel complexes in Aladja and Ajaokuta. There are also the oil refineries in Eleme/Port Harcourt (River State), Warri (Delta State) and Kaduna (Kaduna State). Now, there is the export free zone in Calabar (Cross River State) equipped with all infrastructure; and two others are planned for other locations in the country. Where are the likes or equivalents of these key/seminal facilities in the Igbo heartland? Yet, all these establishments are properties of the Federal Government located in those places courtesy of choices made by various regimes.

The implication of this tacit policy of development by exclusion is the reality we face today ñ namely the so-called Igbo apathy to the ongoing privatisation exercise. By hook or crook, virtually all the concerns being privatised under the programme are located outside the geopolitical zone (Igbo). Also, the lessons of the Nigerian civil war and its aftermath are yet to convince any rational Igbo to invest reasonably in the acquisition of industries located in far-flung parts of the country. If 32 years after the war, there is still what is called abandoned property, and the Igbo is still hunted and killed under all manner of pretexts (especially in various parts of Northern Nigeria), what is the incentive to prompt him to heartily acquire or co-own companies deliberately located in the enclave of his confessed adversaries? Imagine an Ekenedili Chukwu (from Nnewi) or his company wanting to acquire or be the core investor in the Cement Company of Northern Nigeria or the Benue Cement Company in Gboko. If such a move by a Dangote could be forced down the throat of the people and government of Benue, it is an impossibility for an Igbo person or company to be accepted or tolerated.

And, aside from all these, if the villager, in Ewekoro or Shagamu (Ogun State) understands privatisation to mean buying the shares of the West African Portland Cement Company (with factories in these locations), what is the equivalent meaning to the villager in Nsukka (Enugu State), Nnewi (Anambra State), Afikpo (Ebonyi State), Isuochi (Abia State) or Okigwe (Imo State)? Add this to the fear and survival instinct inflicted on the Igbo by the civil war and the unrelenting victimisation of the Easterner in several parts of the country, then you estimate the risk aversion tendency of the otherwise astute Igbo businessman regarding the ongoing privatisation exercise. Perhaps, had successive governments done all that is necessary to fully re-absorb the Igbo into the mainstream of all facets of national affairs (since 1970), the campaign (though largely political) to convince the people and governments of the South-Eastern states to fully participate in the ongoing privatisation programme would have been unnecessary.

In point of fact, the average Igbo man is a citizen of the world who feels at home and mixes freely in any corner of the globe. Check out the profile of successful Nigerians in all fields of decent human endeavours and you will be amazed to notice the preponderance of the Igbo stock. Whether in Europe, America, India, sub-regions of Africa (including countries of the ECOWAS), people from the South-Eastern states of Nigeria are found to be key investors, traders and industrialists. Is it not therefore ironical that at home (here in Nigeria) in this day and age, the Government of the day is finding it difficult to convince the Igbo to be part of the owners of Nigerian concerns through the privatisation programme?

Preliminary results of the first phase of the programme indicate a marginal participation of the people and governments of the South-Eastern states. Rather, the itinerant herdsmen in the Northern fringes of the country and their astute' governments are shown to be the major actors and participants of the exercise, which from all indications is a key plank of this administration. But rather than worry about, and address the root causes of the Igbo apprehension, government officials and paid agents of the administration are going all over the place preaching the benefits of privatisation to the Igbo ñ a people whose only sense of belonging lies in the announcement of awarded road contracts in the area (but which are hardly ever executed). Only Prof. Jerry Gana, the Minister of Informational and National Orientation can tell correctly, the number of times he has announced such contract awards in the past two and a half years.

Education: The false entity called Nigeria cannot offer her citizens good education without break in the accademic calenda.

Electricity: A lying Government, who promised constant power supply by the end of last year.

Communication: Nigeria is have the most expensive GSM services in the world. The question is how come and where is the money going to?

Petroleum: This year the fuel price was increased by the lying government with reference to the labour union or othe market forces. It affected the cost of transportation automaticially, every other food item has added money.

Security: When you talk about this, we sees it as if one is searching for diamond in inside a tree trunk. This has eluded the false federation.

Good leadership: Far cry. Just don't think about it to avoid heart attack.

Unemployment: There is not plan and future for the youths. They need an urgent rescure or else what we are having now will be just a child's play when most of them will grow up without meanful employment and future. No youth program any longer.

Nigeria has failed in every area you can look at it.

Biafra must succeed.

Check this out!

Nigeria is a country, IF you are lucky to have a job, and IF you are lucky to get paid at all - your chances is a Killing Wage. IF you don’t have a job, well Life is TOUGH.

The above is at the backdrop of Living Wage as the NORM, in normal societies.

Summa summarum (a.k.a. In short), Nigeria has not only failed – she is a putrid case – very pathetic indeed.

Just a thought.

At last the politicians are they getting it? You gotta eat first and then become an investor, when you don chop belly full---seemingly the self obvious, duh, but in Abuja this is high fallutin stuff.

Why the northern alliance dafinone, did they but you too Judas, with the 20 pieces of silver?Senator David Dafinone has disclosed that the Niger Delta which doesn't produce enough food is prepared to go into an alliance with the north which has fertile land but cannot develop because of lack of resources.

He said "once we can carry out our agricultural revolution with the north and the Middle Belt, you will find out that factories will be set up to produce canned food, ground nut oil etc, so that Nigeria will embark on an industrial revolution."

Speaking in Kaduna yesterday, Senator Dafinone who said resource control is a national phenomenon which will benefit all Nigerians, emphasised that if there is an agricultural revolution in the North with the sinking of boreholes from Chad to Sokoto, more food will be grown and "we will within three years grow enough food for the whole of the West African zone." Adding that it would also fight desert encroachment.

According to him, once the alliance materialises "we will know that over the spell of the exploration of our oil, we will not be in want. We will have somewhere to get regular food."

He said resource control is all about "giving us part of the profit accruing from exploiting our land so that we can benefit from it." Adding that agitators of resource control are not saying that the money should be paid neither to the governors, not the Federal Government as they were bound to end somewhere else.

Dafinone who is a leader of the Union of Niger Delta while emphasising that the whole basis of resource control is that governments of the states of the federation are not making judicious use of the proceeds from oil, noted that South Korea which Nigeria was much better off in 1960 today has a per capita income of 6,000 while Nigeria which had a per capita income in 1960 of 600 today has 300.

While calling for a roundtable to discuss the proportion of what goes to who, he asked where the justification was in a state in a resource control area paying N9 billion to buy Econet shares and yet the people have no water to drink and there are no good roads.

He said since the international community is prepared to make good the losses we have suffered in the past from oil exploration and exploitation, it will be only fair for government to establish a trust fund or a Niger Delta Bank for Reconstruction and Development with members of the board drawn from the international community, trusted people from the community and the Federal Government.

Senator Dafinone who said resource control is an implementation of economic and political theory lamented that the situation in Nigeria today is that both the agent (Federal Government) and the trustee (state governments) take everything that comes from the profit from oil exploration and exploitation without giving anything to the natives who own the land and the labour who are the entrepreneured.

Senator David Dafinone has disclosed that the Niger Delta which doesn't produce enough food is prepared to go into an alliance with the north which has fertile land but cannot develop because of lack of resources.

He said "once we can carry out our agricultural revolution with the north and the Middle Belt, you will find out that factories will be set up to produce canned food, ground nut oil etc, so that Nigeria will embark on an industrial revolution."

Speaking in Kaduna yesterday, Senator Dafinone who said resource control is a national phenomenon which will benefit all Nigerians, emphasised that if there is an agricultural revolution in the North with the sinking of boreholes from Chad to Sokoto, more food will be grown and "we will within three years grow enough food for the whole of the West African zone." Adding that it would also fight desert encroachment.

According to him, once the alliance materialises "we will know that over the spell of the exploration of our oil, we will not be in want. We will have somewhere to get regular food."

He said resource control is all about "giving us part of the profit accruing from exploiting our land so that we can benefit from it." Adding that agitators of resource control are not saying that the money should be paid neither to the governors, not the Federal Government as they were bound to end somewhere else.

Dafinone who is a leader of the Union of Niger Delta while emphasising that the whole basis of resource control is that governments of the states of the federation are not making judicious use of the proceeds from oil, noted that South Korea which Nigeria was much better off in 1960 today has a per capita income of 6,000 while Nigeria which had a per capita income in 1960 of 600 today has 300.

While calling for a roundtable to discuss the proportion of what goes to who, he asked where the justification was in a state in a resource control area paying N9 billion to buy Econet shares and yet the people have no water to drink and there are no good roads.

He said since the international community is prepared to make good the losses we have suffered in the past from oil exploration and exploitation, it will be only fair for government to establish a trust fund or a Niger Delta Bank for Reconstruction and Development with members of the board drawn from the international community, trusted people from the community and the Federal Government.

Economic growth 3%
Inflation 15%
External debt $27bn
66% of population below poverty line
45% of GDP is oil exports

Looks like failure to me, and I am not even an economist!

Revenue unable to cater for programmes, says Udenwa

Thursday, 24th January, 2002
By Chidi Nkwopara

OWERRI, IMO—THE state government says its activities and programmes may be scuttled, following the inability of its monthly revenue to take care of its expenditure profile.

Governor Achike Udenwa dropped the bombshell in his address to the second meeting of Imo leaders of thought at the multi purpose hall, Owerri.

"You recall that during our last meeting, I made it clear that our revenue was increasingly becoming unable to match our expenditure profiles. I regret to inform you today that the situation has further deteriorated. Our true financial situation is indeed frightening", Udenwa lamented.

Continuing, the governor said that as at last December, the state’s total "revenue earnings came to N902 million, including our share of GSM proceeds and excess crude reserve."

While disclosing that these additions are not to be shared in subsequent months, the governor also expressed alarm that "the personnel cost alone for that month was N717 million."

According to Governor Udenwa, other expenditure for the month came to N317 million, bringing the total to over N1 billion.