posted                         

quote:

---

IT was a classic case of identity mix-up when the Federal Capital Territory Minister, Malam Nasir el-Rufai, at the weekend in New York, accused a United States (U.S.)- based Nigerian lawyer, Mr. Emeka Ugwuonye, of fuelling anti-government feelings abroad using a false name. As the minister was speaking, Ugwuonye who later told The Guardian he was shocked, could not resist it, stood up briefly to say: "That is not correct sir." But the minister did not respond.

The U.S.-based lawyer, in a statement after the ceremony, denied the minister's claim. He said: "The claim by Minister El-Rufai that I wrote an opposition letter to the Finance Minister on the dollar salary controversy was a false charge. Also, the claim that I could have written any such opposition under a name different from mine was also false and potentially damaging to my reputation as a lawyer, given that he made these allegations in a public gathering."

Ugwuonye added: "Ordinarily, this type of allegation would have been a matter for some recourse and protracted refutation. However, I have had to view the conduct and statement of Mr. El-Rufai in the context of the relationship that has subsisted between him and me in the past, as well as in the context of all that I have known about his dispositions as a person. He has been a friend and a brother…"

---

posted                      

quote:

---

Ugwuonye said that he would not like to " think he (El-Rufai) made his statement with malice, even though it did appear that he used the opportunity of a great speech to aim a well-calculated blow at me."

---

posted                         

quote:

---

“Mbadiwe Backs Anenih Over Obasanjo's Successor" … Mbadiwe, in a statement made available in Lagos said that many people misunderstood Anenih's position to imply that anything undemocratic would be done to ensure that the President's choice emerged. He stressed that the President's far-reaching political structure, intimidating stature, history of accomplishments and goodwill, deployed behind any candidate would guarantee the person's emergence through a democratic process. Besides, Mbadiwe, a former governorship aspirant in Imo State, said that President Obasanjo could not afford to be uninterested in who succeeds him, given the need to perpetuate the legacies that he would be leaving behind... On speculations that the Constitution could be amended to provide for a five year single term and the allegation that President Obasanjo may run under such an arrangement for a third term, Mbadiwe said he saw nothing wrong with that, insisting that at the appropriate time, Nigerians would decide whether the President had done well enough to warrant his staying on in power... ThisdayOnline 7/15/04.

---

Another big time Igbo speaketh. A perpetual political JOBBER who squandered his father’s assets and tarnished the legacy and image the man K.O. Mbadiwe secured on his own strength and still lost the Imo gubernatorial election. What say ya?

[ July 15, 2004, 05:00 PM: Message edited by: MeBiafran ]

___________________
BIAFRA: The land of my ancestors now, yesterday and always. So it will be!

posted                         

quote:

---

I have to give my props to Kenn here. -Ednut

---

Who's Kenn guy? If he's the same as emeka ugwuonye then he remains a fool for prostrating and cowering before an awusa idiot. Doesn't he have the constitutional right to float a petition? Isn't it what democracy is all about? What's the crime here for him to beg "sir, sir that's not true?" What fucking for? Rufai's disappointment and anger towards this two-faced monster could be traced to him being part of the system in the sense he hangs, plays, dines and wines with them when it is convenient. During this wining and dining you can't tell us he never poured unnecessary encomiums on the same system he ran back to the U.S. to masticate. My brother we must remain consistent in our identification of these s in order not to diminish how we view the yoroba and awusa efulefus too, period!

You cannot pick and choose based on the buddy system Ed. Last time I added Jim Nwobodo to the list you asked he be removed and I obliged even though no reason was given and this time with the info on this emeka fella so glaring you have to give "props" to who? Based on emeka's performance he's no doubt a political JOBBER whose SYCOPHANTIC trade was exposed in the presence of all and sundry a big time OTINPKU. C'mon fella the s*h*i*t happened in the USA not in their nigeria. Disprove the article.

[ July 16, 2004, 03:34 PM: Message edited by: MeBiafran ]

___________________
BIAFRA: The land of my ancestors now, yesterday and always. So it will be!

posted                      

quote:

---

Who's Kenn guy? --- Mebiafran

---

posted                      

quote:

---

Thanks for answering my question in this case I'm still lost why our man Ednut skipped my post to open up on emetule....MeBiafra

---

MeBiafra,
Emetulu and Efulufu Emeka are separate guys and after reading the link you provided, I noticed that Kenn was not going to take it on one cheek with a smile like Emeka did. That was what I was responding to, sorry if I got things missed up for ya. I forgot some are new here and may be oblivious of some history on these naija related message boards.

TGIF AUDI A6. GET YOURS.

www.osondu.com

[ July 16, 2004, 10:29 PM: Message edited by: Ednut ]

___________________
Feel me? Ofu onye ana asi unu abia go. - Ednut Igbo-American .
www.airamericaradio.com visit her.

posted                         

quote:

---

To be educated does not end with writing long but MEANINGLESS grammer.

---

posted                         

quote:

---

Special Adviser to the President on Constitutional Matters, Chief Ojo Maduekwe had flayed the calls for a national confab, insisting there is no need for any conference, let alone according it a sovereign status. - Thisdayonline July 20, 2004

---

posted                         

quote:

---

If consigning errant Igbo leaders into Mazi Diogu and WIC Hall of Shame assists in arresting the political waywardness of some of our Igbo leaders, so be it. Let it be done without fear, favor nor discrimination. Rascality must indeed, have a limit." Mz K. C . Asagwara, on the WIC Hall of Shame initiative. - Amadi O.

---

posted                         

quote:

---

Nasir el-Rufai: Saint with soiled robes

by UGOCHUKWU EJINKEONYE


Now that the din and blind rage of the Highly Distinguished Senators of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (HDSFRN) have been successfully disposed of with at least four carefully crafted, but obviously insincere, apologies, I think that time is now ripe for the FCT Minister, Mr. Nasir el-Rufai, to get himself a low stool at some quiet corner, pause awhile, and try to ask himself, as Prof Chinua Achebe would counsel, where the rain really began to beat him. With the air thoroughly rid of rowdy, incoherent threats from senators by, perhaps, crispy “bulldozers” from Aso Rock, certainly, El-Rufai’s meditation would suffer no distractions.

I am pretty sure that if Mr. El-Rufai would heed my advice, and go about the suggested retreat with utmost sincerity, he would certainly emerge from the soul-searching session more than persuaded that he has become too morally impaired to remain in public office. The greatest asset of a public office holder is credibility. I know that this is a very strange insistence in an administration like Obasanjo’s that clearly makes a big show of its moral disability, but then, Mr. El-Rufai, in a bid to ensure he stood out from the pack, had bored everyone sore with drab sing-songs about his very outstanding moral properties, and it would be interesting to see how he would go on functioning in office after his recent very damaging encounter with his astounding misdeeds in office, though, from the outset, I had had this nagging suspicion that the whole thing about El-Rufai’s righteousness was a mere media-deodorized dubious moral image. But even that meretricious reputation too, now clearly unmasked and unuseful, seems not to have survived the very injurious effect of his latest head-on collusion with the Upper Legislative House.

Nor would the Senate itself come out of it unscathed, because, at the end of the day, whatever impressions the Nigerian people would form about their senators may not be inspired by El-Rufai’s drunken categorization of them as highly distinguished fools, but will to a larger extent be moulded by their capacity and willingness to let patriotism and rule of law moderate their handling of the post-apology chapter of this sordid affair. Indeed, the matter is far beyond an apology from Baba and his insufferably arrogant “son,” and the senate has a responsibility to allay the fears created by El-Rufai’s insidious insinuations, and demonstrate to the Nigerian people that what they are after in this matter is not vengeance but justice and probity. Indeed, we have before us weighty matters, bordering on ethics and rule of law, things that should be of utmost concern to any responsible senate, and no time would be most appropriate for Adolphus Wabara and his colleagues in the Upper House to demonstrate convincingly that they are by no means what Mr. El-Rufai had recently called them. It would be most damaging, both to their image and the health of the polity, for the senators to vindicate the suspicion that they are more interested in getting a pound of the haughty Mallam’s unduly summarized flesh to repair their bruised ego than dealing with the festering case of corruption and gross abuse of office so prominently advertised in this case.

Indeed, El-Rufai has elevated himself to a very insidious phenomenon in our polity, and the senators would be appointing themselves eager accomplices in this sickening monstrosity if they yield to any influences and condone his insufferable excesses.

I have viewed El-Rufai’s hasty projection in media circles as the holiest man in Nigeria with immense suspicion. It was clear that when El-Rufai without any iota of evidence accused two principal officers of the senate of demanding N54 million from him to facilitate the senate’s endorsement of his nomination as minister, his confidence had rested on a formidable media image which he was sure would dwarf out the feeble protestations of the accused persons, especially, as the duo belonged to a senate that practically stinks. No doubt, he had ensured he got the pipers dully paid. Little wonder then that the report of the Senate’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) contains the chilling submission that the “righteous” Mallam had squandered the sum of N192, 156,171.00 on publicity and public relations alone!

And because El-Rufai (or is it El-Ruffian) considers himself above the laws of the land, perhaps, because those laws were probably put in place by “fools”, he had in utter disdain for Due Process and Civil Service regulations hired two 1997 graduates as Special Assistants and single-handedly fixed outrageously jumbo salaries for them; and before the lucky duo could properly settle down to work, their salaries have already amounted to nearly N20 million! Now, El-Rufai had lied to the nation that these were special tokunbo species whose “sacrificial” return to help deliver a country of “fools” like Nigeria was facilitated by the World Bank which also was paying their salaries. But we have since been shown a World Bank’s letter stating unequivocally that El-Rufai’s two “experts” could not “meet the minimum relevant experience requirement as provided in the TORs” to be classified as such, and so, the World Bank had nothing to do with their employment and salaries. Does any thing here point you to some ulterior motive in the FCT Minister’s vigorous defense of the dollar-denominated salaries of two “super ministers”? And one of El-Rufai’s two special assistants who had unceasingly insisted she was a US citizen (despite the Mallam’s consistent contrary claims) did not also participate in the mandatory NYSC programme. And El-Rufai, the Emperor of Abuja, had personally signed the appointment letters of these tokunbo assistants in contravention of civil service rules. And all these were happening right under the nose of “Madam Due Process”, our friend, Oby Ezekwesili.

In December 2003, El-Rufai also made the following questionable payments to a certain M.S. Hamidu for “special services”: N5,488,500.00 (Dec.17), N 8,119,355.00 (Dec.22), N10,850,000.00 (the same day), and N4,788,160.00 (Dec.22).

Indeed, E-Rufai’s arrogant wallowing in the putrid pit of corruption induces nausea. As Director-General of Bureau for Public Enterprise (BPE), El-Rufai could not account for N141 billion that had accrued to the nation through the controversial privatization programme. Quoting the belly-aching discovery of the senate committee, Daily Independent on Sunday, September 5, 2004, reported that under El-Rufai, the BPE “only remitted N45 billion to the CBN but withdrew N35 billion a week later, leaving a balance of N2.4 billion in the account.” Indeed, El-Rufai, characteristically, refused to sign the BPE 2002 audited accounts as required by law.

President Obasanjo has a responsibility to rid his cabinet of arrogant, clever hypocrites like El-Rufai. A number of commentators have already moved in to save him with colourless verbiage about his passion, intellect and dedication, the same way a section of the media have continually intimidated Obasanjo into believing that El-Rufai was indispensable. This is one reason why Nigeria has refused to make any advance: We always find reasons to shield our favourites from the just consequences of their misdeeds, and in the process embolden others to commit worse atrocities. Highly visible and garrulous fakes like El-Rufai, with sickening penchant for indiscriminately dropping the president’s name, should be used as public example, to demonstrate that corruption is not officially condoned in Nigeria. The senate would merely be endorsing El-Rufai’s description of them if they prove incapable of ensuring he keeps a date with the laws he has so flagrantly flouted.

I am not denying El-Rufai’s soulless zeal to clean up Abuja and beautify it with the blood of the poor and less-privileged for the comfort of the rich. Indeed, his likes have better talent for destruction than for building up. I had thought there should be a social, human, angle to these heartless demolitions and sacking of hawkers and traders, without providing them with alternatives, and not caring whether they died or lived? No decent government, except ones represented by ungodly, haughty, blackmailing whistle-blowers like El-Rufai, would implement its big dreams without due consideration to its citizenry, no matter how lowly placed. With a character like our class-conscious El-Rufai thumbing his nose at the not-so-lucky Nigerians, and wishing they were flung far away from his empire to some refuse dump site or any similar place, this administration has no better advertiser for its unparalleled heartlessness. - Kwenu.com, Thursday, September 23, 2004.

---