NO fewer than 15 lecturers of Ebonyi State College of Education, Ikwo were weekend, demoted over alleged involvement in certificate forgery and for claiming to have acquired Ph.D degrees from reputable institutions outside the country.
Management of the college, on receipt of the report and recommendations of the committee set up to look into the alleged claims by the lecturers, said the exercise was not meant to witch-hunt anybody in particular but to ensure sanity and discipline within the education sector in the state.
At a press briefing in Abakaliki, Special Adviser to Governor Martin Elechi of Ebonyi State on Higher Education, Professor Mike Ituma, revealed that the discovery came as a shock, stressing that the action of the affected lecturers was a reflection of the level of decay ravaging the sector.
According to him, the action of the management of the college is a step in the right direction and government is completely in support of the action against the lecturers.
In a statement, Public Relations Officer of the college, Mr. Nkwuda Bethrand Otukobelu, noted that the 15 affected lecturers would not be allowed to run any promotion course packaged by the college till after three years.
He said: “A lot of processes were followed in verification and evaluation of the certificates of the lecturers involved. Six of the affected lecturers who had their Ph.Ds from the institutions should stop parading themselves as Ph.D holders and stop adding the title ‘Dr.’ to their names.
“That as regards to their present positions, nine of them have been demoted to Lecturer III; two to Assistant Lecturers and the remaining two to non-academic staff for not possessing relevant qualifications to be in the academic cadre.”
“That six of them who enjoyed financial benefits with the controversial certificates are to refund such benefit which accrued to them in excess of their present new position.”
“Findings by the committee and letters from the National Universities Commission, NUC, and the Federal Ministry of Education show that the institutions were neither approved nor recognized by the Federal Government of Nigeria.”
vanguard
Sunday 30 June 2013
Gov. Akpabio Fires Domestic Aides As N40 Million Cash Disappears From Own Bedroom
Three stewards working at the Akwa Ibom state governor’s lodge in Asokoro, Abuja, were on Friday summarily dismissed by the governor, Godswill Akpabio, over missing bundles of mint-fresh dollars valued at over $250,000 (N40 million) kept in the governor’s bedroom, news website Saharareporters, is reporting.
The governor, who reportedly ordered the sack of the aides (described as political appointees) personally detected on Wednesday, during his visit to Abuja, that bundles of the foreign currency he left in his bedroom had been stolen while he attended a dinner with President Goodluck Jonathan at the Aso Rock Villa.
According to the website, the missing dollars, kept in drawers in the governor’s bedroom, were leftovers from a trough of hard currency stashed away in a private security safe in the apartment. Governor Akpabio, the report says, expressed surprise that despite the near impregnable security in the lodge, coupled with the fact that the locks to that section of the lodge, including the governor’s bedroom, were routinely changed each time such heavy cash is brought in, the money still disappeared in the manner it did.
While it was yet to be ascertained that the dismissed steward actually stole the funds, they are being punished for “apparent negligence in allowing the real culprits to gain access to the otherwise restricted area of the lodge”, the report says. Saharareporters quoted a source close to the governor’s lodge as saying more heads might roll as investigations continue to find the identities of the other culprits involved in the theft of Mr. Akpabio’s cash.
The source reportedly claimed accusing fingers were being pointed at another staff member at the lodge described as one of those in charge of the overall management of the apartment.
Pilfering of huge cash in the lodge has become a recurring event, the report adds. “In one instance, it was learnt that after bundles of cash disappeared under similar circumstances, the burglary proof and window protectors around the governor’s apartment were changed sometime last year after the perpetrators broke through the ceiling to gain access to the room where cash was stacked in ‘Ghana must go’ bags,” the website writes.
It recalls that a few years ago, the governor redeployed all the civil servants at the lodge and replaced them with political appointees and other private consultants he thought could be trusted. The website says Governor Akpabio is scrambling to keep this latest incidence of theft in his bedroom under wraps.
The governor’s spokesperson could not be reached for comments Saturday night. Well known for his profligacy, Mr. Akpabio is reputed for moving around with huge cash, in violation of the Central Bank of Nigeria’s cashless economy policy. In March this year, the governor openly donated N1million “lunch money” to party chairmen from the six states in the South-South geopolitical zone who had converged on Port Harcourt for a party reconciliation session.
In March 2012, three staff of the Nigerian Aviation Handling Company (NAHCo) attached to Arik Airlines were accused of stealing N1.5million from the luggage of the governor’s protocol attachee, Ebakabasi Etuk, at Ibom International Airport. The suspects were said to have stolen the money from the bundles of cash reportedly carried by the Akwa Ibom State government team on their way back from Lagos where Governor Akpabio was awarded the ‘Sun Newspapers Man of the Year’.
Source: Premium Times*
The governor, who reportedly ordered the sack of the aides (described as political appointees) personally detected on Wednesday, during his visit to Abuja, that bundles of the foreign currency he left in his bedroom had been stolen while he attended a dinner with President Goodluck Jonathan at the Aso Rock Villa.
According to the website, the missing dollars, kept in drawers in the governor’s bedroom, were leftovers from a trough of hard currency stashed away in a private security safe in the apartment. Governor Akpabio, the report says, expressed surprise that despite the near impregnable security in the lodge, coupled with the fact that the locks to that section of the lodge, including the governor’s bedroom, were routinely changed each time such heavy cash is brought in, the money still disappeared in the manner it did.
While it was yet to be ascertained that the dismissed steward actually stole the funds, they are being punished for “apparent negligence in allowing the real culprits to gain access to the otherwise restricted area of the lodge”, the report says. Saharareporters quoted a source close to the governor’s lodge as saying more heads might roll as investigations continue to find the identities of the other culprits involved in the theft of Mr. Akpabio’s cash.
The source reportedly claimed accusing fingers were being pointed at another staff member at the lodge described as one of those in charge of the overall management of the apartment.
Pilfering of huge cash in the lodge has become a recurring event, the report adds. “In one instance, it was learnt that after bundles of cash disappeared under similar circumstances, the burglary proof and window protectors around the governor’s apartment were changed sometime last year after the perpetrators broke through the ceiling to gain access to the room where cash was stacked in ‘Ghana must go’ bags,” the website writes.
It recalls that a few years ago, the governor redeployed all the civil servants at the lodge and replaced them with political appointees and other private consultants he thought could be trusted. The website says Governor Akpabio is scrambling to keep this latest incidence of theft in his bedroom under wraps.
The governor’s spokesperson could not be reached for comments Saturday night. Well known for his profligacy, Mr. Akpabio is reputed for moving around with huge cash, in violation of the Central Bank of Nigeria’s cashless economy policy. In March this year, the governor openly donated N1million “lunch money” to party chairmen from the six states in the South-South geopolitical zone who had converged on Port Harcourt for a party reconciliation session.
In March 2012, three staff of the Nigerian Aviation Handling Company (NAHCo) attached to Arik Airlines were accused of stealing N1.5million from the luggage of the governor’s protocol attachee, Ebakabasi Etuk, at Ibom International Airport. The suspects were said to have stolen the money from the bundles of cash reportedly carried by the Akwa Ibom State government team on their way back from Lagos where Governor Akpabio was awarded the ‘Sun Newspapers Man of the Year’.
Source: Premium Times*
Adamawa Govt imposes N5,000 fine on stray animals
The Adamawa Government on Sunday expressed concerns about the continuous presence of stray animals in Yola and environs.
The Commissioner for Environment, Mrs Arziki Sawa, made this known during a sensitisation tour in Girei Local Government Area of the state.
Sawa said government had imposed N5, 000 fine on owners of any animal found straying on major streets.
She said the measure was part of government’s efforts toward enforcing sanitation laws in the state.
The commissioner said that government was sending environment officers as part of its stray animal control policy to put an end to the problem.
“The state government has directed the environmental task force to prosecute residences, who do not keep their surroundings clean,’’ she said.
She urged residents of the state to join hands with the ministry to rid the state of stray animals.
Sawa also urged the local government chairmen to constitute sanitation committees in each of the ward to monitor and supervise the weekly sanitation exercise in their respective areas.
According to her, the ministry has created dump sites within and outside the state capital for easy evacuation of the refuse by the sanitation officials. (NAN)*
The Commissioner for Environment, Mrs Arziki Sawa, made this known during a sensitisation tour in Girei Local Government Area of the state.
Sawa said government had imposed N5, 000 fine on owners of any animal found straying on major streets.
She said the measure was part of government’s efforts toward enforcing sanitation laws in the state.
The commissioner said that government was sending environment officers as part of its stray animal control policy to put an end to the problem.
“The state government has directed the environmental task force to prosecute residences, who do not keep their surroundings clean,’’ she said.
She urged residents of the state to join hands with the ministry to rid the state of stray animals.
Sawa also urged the local government chairmen to constitute sanitation committees in each of the ward to monitor and supervise the weekly sanitation exercise in their respective areas.
According to her, the ministry has created dump sites within and outside the state capital for easy evacuation of the refuse by the sanitation officials. (NAN)*
NDLEA probes drug barons for Boko Haram links
The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency has begun investigating the finances of drug barons for possible links with the Boko Haram sect and other terror groups operating in northern Nigeria.
NDLEA's Head of Public Affairs, Mr. Mitchell Ofoyeju, told SUNDAY PUNCH that the agency was aware of the possibility of terrorist activities in the North being funded through drug deals, hence the ongoing investigation.
He said, "There is usually a link between drug money and terrorism. But for now in Nigeria, we have not had any case of drug money being channelled into terrorism. That is not to say that there is no possibility. There is the possibility and we are trying to track illicit funds that can be diverted into acts of terrorism.
"We are not necessarily investigating the drug trade that the terrorists might be engaged in, we are investigating the illicit movement of finances. When we get a breakthrough, the public will be properly informed. It is definitely one of our areas of interest in the investigation."
Apart from terrorism being funded with the drug money, indications have also emerged that Boko Haram members, who have killed thousands of Nigerians, act under the influence of illicit drugs.
On Wednesday, while commemorating the International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking, Borno State Governor, Kashim Shettima, said recent discoveries had shown that members of the Boko Haram sect act under the influence of hard drugs, adding that there was the need to cut off their drug supply.
Corroborating Shettima, the NDLEA spokesman said the possibility of the terrorists acting under the influence could not be ruled out, noting that the major illicit drug in the North-East was cannabis (Indian hemp), which is produced locally.
Ofoyeju said insurgency and the consequent emergency rule in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states had made it even more difficult for the NDLEA to track down drug traffickers in the region.
He however noted that last year, 37.5kg of illicit drugs were seized and 35 people arrested in Borno; 175.7kg drugs seized and 36 people arrested in Yobe while 2529kg drugs were seized in Adamawa and 168 people were arrested.
A report published by the Director, Inter-University Centre for Terrorism Studies, USA, Yonah Alexander, in February, stated that Boko Haram and Ansaru, were being funded by drug cartels in Latin America.
The report entitled, "Terrorism in Northern Africa and the Sahel in 2012: Global Reach and Implications," said the Al-Qaida in Islamic Maghreb, had aligned with many other groups, including Boko Haram and Ansaru, in order to expand its sources of funding.
It stated that, "Primary sources of financing of their activities include kidnapping (in some cases, kidnapping is outsourced to criminals), piracy and illicit trafficking of drugs, human, vehicles and other contraband goods.
"Intelligence reports and arrests have confirmed that AQIM has established links with Latin cartels for 'drugs-for-arms' smuggling into Europe through terrorist-trafficking networks in the Sahel."
Punch
NDLEA's Head of Public Affairs, Mr. Mitchell Ofoyeju, told SUNDAY PUNCH that the agency was aware of the possibility of terrorist activities in the North being funded through drug deals, hence the ongoing investigation.
He said, "There is usually a link between drug money and terrorism. But for now in Nigeria, we have not had any case of drug money being channelled into terrorism. That is not to say that there is no possibility. There is the possibility and we are trying to track illicit funds that can be diverted into acts of terrorism.
"We are not necessarily investigating the drug trade that the terrorists might be engaged in, we are investigating the illicit movement of finances. When we get a breakthrough, the public will be properly informed. It is definitely one of our areas of interest in the investigation."
Apart from terrorism being funded with the drug money, indications have also emerged that Boko Haram members, who have killed thousands of Nigerians, act under the influence of illicit drugs.
On Wednesday, while commemorating the International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking, Borno State Governor, Kashim Shettima, said recent discoveries had shown that members of the Boko Haram sect act under the influence of hard drugs, adding that there was the need to cut off their drug supply.
Corroborating Shettima, the NDLEA spokesman said the possibility of the terrorists acting under the influence could not be ruled out, noting that the major illicit drug in the North-East was cannabis (Indian hemp), which is produced locally.
Ofoyeju said insurgency and the consequent emergency rule in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states had made it even more difficult for the NDLEA to track down drug traffickers in the region.
He however noted that last year, 37.5kg of illicit drugs were seized and 35 people arrested in Borno; 175.7kg drugs seized and 36 people arrested in Yobe while 2529kg drugs were seized in Adamawa and 168 people were arrested.
A report published by the Director, Inter-University Centre for Terrorism Studies, USA, Yonah Alexander, in February, stated that Boko Haram and Ansaru, were being funded by drug cartels in Latin America.
The report entitled, "Terrorism in Northern Africa and the Sahel in 2012: Global Reach and Implications," said the Al-Qaida in Islamic Maghreb, had aligned with many other groups, including Boko Haram and Ansaru, in order to expand its sources of funding.
It stated that, "Primary sources of financing of their activities include kidnapping (in some cases, kidnapping is outsourced to criminals), piracy and illicit trafficking of drugs, human, vehicles and other contraband goods.
"Intelligence reports and arrests have confirmed that AQIM has established links with Latin cartels for 'drugs-for-arms' smuggling into Europe through terrorist-trafficking networks in the Sahel."
Punch
Fuel Scarcity Looms As NUPENG Begins 3-Day Warning Strike Tomorrow
Nigeria’s petroleum and gas workers have issued a notice of a three-day warning strike starting Monday, over longstanding labour dispute, raising the spectre of nationwide fuel crisis as workers have been ordered to stop products at the depots.
The Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers, NUPENG, said it will end the warning strike on Wednesday after when it will embark on an “indefinite” industrial action of its demands are not met.
This is contained in a statement signed by NUPENG’s General-Secretary, Isaac Aberare, on Sunday in Lagos.
The statement said that the workers were going on strike over alleged unfair labour practices by some major oil companies in the country.
“The strike is also to protest the refusal of NARTO to implement the signed collective bargaining agreement with the petroleum tanker drivers.
“We are also unhappy over the bad state of roads across the nation,” the statement said.
The statement said that all efforts by the Federal Ministry of Labour to intervene in the issue three weeks ago had failed.
It said that the oil multinationals had failed to implement the agreement reached for a truce brokered by the Minister of Labour, Emeka Wogu.
The statement alleged that the union’s call for a stakeholders meeting in the oil and gas sector to address the situation had also been ignored.
It directed all members of NUPENG at the various depots to stop loading petroleum products for the next three days.
“Members in all the branches in the country must also follow suit,” the statement said.
It said that if after the three-day strike, nothing was done to address the situation NUPENG would be forced to embark on an indefinite nationwide strike.
(NAN)*
Vigilante arrests 2 women with assault weapons, IED in Maiduguri
A youth vigilance group, popularly called “the Civilian JTF’’, said it apprehended two women attempting to smuggle assault weapons into the Monday market in Maiduguri on Sunday.
Eyewitnesses told newsmen that the women, who concealed the weapons in their dresses, were nabbed at the Bulabulin entrance gate of the market.
One of the witnesses, Malam Modu Bulama, a trader, said that they were in the market when they heard noise from the gate.
“We rushed to scene, but on getting there, we saw two women in veil with assault weapons,’’ he said.
Bulama said that each of the women concealed an AK 47 rifle, a pistol and some items believed to be Improvise Explosive Devise (IED) in their veil.
A member of the vigilante, Malam Usman Ibrahim, corroborated Bulama’s claim, adding: “we were on a routine checking at the gate when these women came with heavy veil.
“At first we did not bother to look at them, but we realised that one of them was shivering, we said something must be wrong,’’ Ibrahim said.
He said that when they were searched, “we found that each of them concealed an AK 47 rifle, a pistol and IED in their veil.
“We were surprised at the discovery, so we took them to officials of the Joint Task Force (JTF) on Operation Restore Order (ORO) for investigations,” Ibrahim said.
The JTF spokesman, Lt.-Col. Sagir Musa, could not be contacted for comment, but a senior military officer, who spoke on condition anonymity, confirmed the story.
The official said the JTF was already investigating the case. (NAN)*
Eyewitnesses told newsmen that the women, who concealed the weapons in their dresses, were nabbed at the Bulabulin entrance gate of the market.
One of the witnesses, Malam Modu Bulama, a trader, said that they were in the market when they heard noise from the gate.
“We rushed to scene, but on getting there, we saw two women in veil with assault weapons,’’ he said.
Bulama said that each of the women concealed an AK 47 rifle, a pistol and some items believed to be Improvise Explosive Devise (IED) in their veil.
A member of the vigilante, Malam Usman Ibrahim, corroborated Bulama’s claim, adding: “we were on a routine checking at the gate when these women came with heavy veil.
“At first we did not bother to look at them, but we realised that one of them was shivering, we said something must be wrong,’’ Ibrahim said.
He said that when they were searched, “we found that each of them concealed an AK 47 rifle, a pistol and IED in their veil.
“We were surprised at the discovery, so we took them to officials of the Joint Task Force (JTF) on Operation Restore Order (ORO) for investigations,” Ibrahim said.
The JTF spokesman, Lt.-Col. Sagir Musa, could not be contacted for comment, but a senior military officer, who spoke on condition anonymity, confirmed the story.
The official said the JTF was already investigating the case. (NAN)*
ACN Denies APC Interim Leadership’s An All-Muslim Affair
The Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) has condemned in strong terms the relentless campaign of calumny against the All Progressives Congress (APC), describing the latest attempt to use ethno-religious sentiments to destroy the fledgling party as a cheap shot that has fallen flat on the faces of the purveyors of falsehood.
ACN National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed in a statement issued in Lagos on Sunday, however thanked Nigerians for rejecting refusing to be swayed by the arguments of those who it said are hell bent on perpetuating mediocre leadership in Nigeria.
“These purveyors of falsehood do not want good governance. That’s why they are peddling the lies that the interim leadership of the APC is controlled by Muslims, and that it did not reflect the country’s plural values.
“The truth is that while ethno-religious sentiments did not form the criteria used in selecting the interim leadership, we were conscious that Nigeria is a country of plural values. That is why we have 17 Christians and 18 Muslims (the best balance possible in the odd number of 35 posts that were shared). That is why the 35 occupiers of the opositions are from 29 different states, four more than the 25 stipulated by INEC. It was equal opportunity across all zones!” it said.
ACN challenged anyone who doubts the authenticity of the facts and figures it provided to verify them at INEC, instead of taking to the Social Media to spread rumours.
The party described the latest attempt to abort the APC baby as the last-ditch futile effort by those who have mounted similar campaigns against the party in the past.
“First, they ambushed us by duplicating our acronym, sponsored of course by those who are well known to Nigerians and, when that failed to slow down our momentum, they said the sharing of posts will divide us and ultimately sound our death knell. With these moves having failed woefully, they have now played what they considered their most potent joker: the ethno-religious card.
“Thankfully, this too has failed. Nigerians are so desirous of good governance that they will not allow any play on sentiments to shake their resolve,” it said.
ACN said the promoters of the APC are so determined to give Nigeria the good leadership that has eluded the country for so long that they have decided to shelve their differences and make whatever sacrifices that are necessary to achieve their objective.
Consequently, the party implored all Nigerians who want an end to the rapacious and incompetent leadership currently plaguing their country to continue to disregard the attempts by enemies of progress to sabotage the birth of the APC just as it advised all to be vigilant in the days ahead, saying “After all, it is said that eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”*
Gunmen free 175 inmates in Ondo jaibreak
AT least 30 unknown gunmen at the early hours of Sunday, stormed the Olokuta Medium Security Prison in Akure, Ondo State capital and set free about 175 inmates.
Officials of the prison reportedly fled to the bush following the bombardment.
The gunmen reportedly barricaded the Akure-Ore Expressway where the prison was located for hours while the operation lasted.
Ironically, reports had it that some of the escapees were later re-arrested by the security agents at some of the brothels within the capital city and other neighbouring villages.
vanguard
Officials of the prison reportedly fled to the bush following the bombardment.
The gunmen reportedly barricaded the Akure-Ore Expressway where the prison was located for hours while the operation lasted.
Ironically, reports had it that some of the escapees were later re-arrested by the security agents at some of the brothels within the capital city and other neighbouring villages.
vanguard
Death Of Delta APC Would-Be Governorship Candidate, Senator Ewerhido Attributed To “Spiritual Attacks” Over 2015 Elections
The death of Senator Pius Ewherido of the Democratic Peoples Party (DPP) representing Delta Central Senatorial district in the National Assembly today has sent tongues wagging in Delta State forcing the state government to urge calm.
Since the announcement of Ewerhido’s death today, the Delta Central Senatorial district and Delta state in general have been thrown into mourning.
Several of the late senator's constituents and family members wept uncontrollably when the sad news was broken to them around 5:50 PM Nigerian time.
Some political associates of Senator Ewherido told Saharareporters that the death of the senator was due to “spiritual attacks” that took place few days ago which boils down to 2015 elections.
According to our sources, Senator Ewherido slumped three days ago while answering a phone call and had blood gushing out of his mouth and nose before he was rushed to the National Hospital in Abuja . Since his hospitalization, the Delta State government had reportedly begun preparations to fly him to Germany for treatment before he gave up the ghost this evening.
Another source close to the senator told Saharareporters that Ewherido has already been designated as the Delta state governorship candidate of the yet to be registered All Progressives Congress (APC) in the forthcoming 2015 elections and all plans to that effect were already sealed awaiting the registration and full fledge take off of the party.
However, a medical source at the National Hospital told Saharareporters that the senator died of heart attack after he had a stroke some 48 hours ago.
Senator Ewerhido was recently expelled from the Democratic People's Party (DPP), accused of attending the meetings of the APC without authorization.
Insisting that the senator was “killed’ by his enemies, our source who was speaking in a solemn tune further disclosed the spiritual attacks have several angles to it, saying that they suspect an unnamed politician serving in governor Emmanuel Uduaghan’s government who had a running battle with Ewherido during the PDP primaries for the senatorial district before the senator cross carpeted to the DPP and defeated him in the 2011 elections. He allegedly boasted severally that he is still a senator in waiting.
Our source also disclosed that a onetime governorship aspirant and oil magnate from Sapele who is based in Port Harcourt, was also "spiritually attacked" by the same politician but the he survived through divine intervention.
“My brother the death of Senator Pius Ewherido is not ordinary. Delta state has lost a gem, our only hope for 2015 election. The most painful aspect of it all is that he has already gotten the ticket to fly the APC governorship flag in the state and now look at what has befallen us. Delta state politics has turned into something else. Those behind the death of Chief (Barr) Pius Akpor Ewherido, our distinguished Senator, alias "Gogorogo" shall never go unpunished”, he said before hanging up the phone.
Several political associates of the senator who did not want to be quoted lamented the sudden demise of Ewherido describing him as their best hope for a shot at the governorship of Delta state in 2015. They said he was a fine gentleman and astute politician who has brought succor to his people.
In the past two months social media platforms as well as political groups have been buzzing with the of plans by Ewherido to contest the governorship seat come 2015.
Meanwhile, the Government of Delta State has commiserated with the family of senator Ewherido.
In a statement released and signed by the Secretary to the State Government, Comrade Ovuozourie Macaulay and made available to media, expressed its deep condolences to the family at this trying moment and advised Deltans, particularly members of his constituency to remain calm.
“We pray that God grants his family, constituents and all of us, the fortitude to bear the irreparable loss.” The statement said.
As at the time of writing this report the social media have been flooded with a series of condolence messages and the life and time of Ewherido.
It would be recalled that the Delta state chapter of the Democratic People’s Party (DPP) on May Ist, 2013 suspended Senator Pius Ewherido, the acting national deputy chairman, Olisemeka Akamukale, the vice chairman of Delta central senatorial district, Henry Olori as well as a leader in Sapele Local Government Area of Delta State, Cyril Ogodor from the party.
Briefing the press in his office, Asaba, Chairman of the DPP in the State, Chief Tony Ezeagwu had explained that the decision to suspend the members was reached at the state executive council as a result of what he called gross misconduct and anti-party activities.
“We inaugurated a 12-man committee to midwife our joining the APC, and we officially applied, but the application was not approved. But Ewherido and Akamukale went ahead and been attending APC meetings when we have not been admitted into that fold. Akamukale went to INEC to say that he is the acting national chairman of the party in his bid to force us into the merger.”
sahara reporters
Since the announcement of Ewerhido’s death today, the Delta Central Senatorial district and Delta state in general have been thrown into mourning.
Several of the late senator's constituents and family members wept uncontrollably when the sad news was broken to them around 5:50 PM Nigerian time.
Some political associates of Senator Ewherido told Saharareporters that the death of the senator was due to “spiritual attacks” that took place few days ago which boils down to 2015 elections.
According to our sources, Senator Ewherido slumped three days ago while answering a phone call and had blood gushing out of his mouth and nose before he was rushed to the National Hospital in Abuja . Since his hospitalization, the Delta State government had reportedly begun preparations to fly him to Germany for treatment before he gave up the ghost this evening.
Another source close to the senator told Saharareporters that Ewherido has already been designated as the Delta state governorship candidate of the yet to be registered All Progressives Congress (APC) in the forthcoming 2015 elections and all plans to that effect were already sealed awaiting the registration and full fledge take off of the party.
However, a medical source at the National Hospital told Saharareporters that the senator died of heart attack after he had a stroke some 48 hours ago.
Senator Ewerhido was recently expelled from the Democratic People's Party (DPP), accused of attending the meetings of the APC without authorization.
Insisting that the senator was “killed’ by his enemies, our source who was speaking in a solemn tune further disclosed the spiritual attacks have several angles to it, saying that they suspect an unnamed politician serving in governor Emmanuel Uduaghan’s government who had a running battle with Ewherido during the PDP primaries for the senatorial district before the senator cross carpeted to the DPP and defeated him in the 2011 elections. He allegedly boasted severally that he is still a senator in waiting.
Our source also disclosed that a onetime governorship aspirant and oil magnate from Sapele who is based in Port Harcourt, was also "spiritually attacked" by the same politician but the he survived through divine intervention.
“My brother the death of Senator Pius Ewherido is not ordinary. Delta state has lost a gem, our only hope for 2015 election. The most painful aspect of it all is that he has already gotten the ticket to fly the APC governorship flag in the state and now look at what has befallen us. Delta state politics has turned into something else. Those behind the death of Chief (Barr) Pius Akpor Ewherido, our distinguished Senator, alias "Gogorogo" shall never go unpunished”, he said before hanging up the phone.
Several political associates of the senator who did not want to be quoted lamented the sudden demise of Ewherido describing him as their best hope for a shot at the governorship of Delta state in 2015. They said he was a fine gentleman and astute politician who has brought succor to his people.
In the past two months social media platforms as well as political groups have been buzzing with the of plans by Ewherido to contest the governorship seat come 2015.
Meanwhile, the Government of Delta State has commiserated with the family of senator Ewherido.
In a statement released and signed by the Secretary to the State Government, Comrade Ovuozourie Macaulay and made available to media, expressed its deep condolences to the family at this trying moment and advised Deltans, particularly members of his constituency to remain calm.
“We pray that God grants his family, constituents and all of us, the fortitude to bear the irreparable loss.” The statement said.
As at the time of writing this report the social media have been flooded with a series of condolence messages and the life and time of Ewherido.
It would be recalled that the Delta state chapter of the Democratic People’s Party (DPP) on May Ist, 2013 suspended Senator Pius Ewherido, the acting national deputy chairman, Olisemeka Akamukale, the vice chairman of Delta central senatorial district, Henry Olori as well as a leader in Sapele Local Government Area of Delta State, Cyril Ogodor from the party.
Briefing the press in his office, Asaba, Chairman of the DPP in the State, Chief Tony Ezeagwu had explained that the decision to suspend the members was reached at the state executive council as a result of what he called gross misconduct and anti-party activities.
“We inaugurated a 12-man committee to midwife our joining the APC, and we officially applied, but the application was not approved. But Ewherido and Akamukale went ahead and been attending APC meetings when we have not been admitted into that fold. Akamukale went to INEC to say that he is the acting national chairman of the party in his bid to force us into the merger.”
sahara reporters
Saturday 29 June 2013
EXCLUSIVE: Jonathan violates Nigerian laws, corners N3billion general hospital for own town, Otuoke
The Federal Government does not build general hospitals. But PREMIUM TIMES can report today that President Goodluck Jonathan has waived two vital rules to establish a princely N2.8 billion new general hospital for his hometown, Otuoke, effectively placing the coastal community as an exclusive beneficiary of a strange largesse not known to federal laws.
It is not clear how and when the federal government first conceived the hospital project, as it was not listed in federal budgets between 2009 and 2011, and even after.
But the Federal Executive Council meeting of August 17, 2011, presided over by Mr. Jonathan, gave approval for the project, and a N2.8billion contract was hurriedly awarded to Messrs Avandale Limited. The job was projected to last only 12 months; and indeed, unlike the usual delay government projects face, it was delivered on time.
As the administration became aware that PREMIUM TIMES was making extensive enquiry about the hospital, President Jonathan hurried to Otuoke on Saturday to purportedly inaugurate the 40-bed hospital, which has now been named Otuoke Comprehensive Cottage Hospital.
At the ceremony, Mr. Jonathan claimed the project began as an initiative of the Bayelsa state government in 2006 before it was taken over by the presidency.
He did not say why he mandated the MDG office, which he personally supervises, to spearhead the project. Mr. Jonathan also did not tell his audience that an estimated N2.8billion federal money was pumped into the project, although a report say the project was eventually completed at a cost of N3.5billion.
Apart from the fact that it was never budgeted for (a violation of the appropriation law), the project breached a longstanding government policy requiring that the federal government provides only tertiary (teaching hospital, federal medical centers, and specialist hospitals); while the states build secondary facilities (general hospitals). Local governments provide primary facilities (health centers).
An exception to that rule, lately, has been the federal government’s direct intervention in local health care, in a spirited campaign against maternal and infant mortality, ahead of the 2015 target date for the actualisation of the Millennium Development Goals.
Otuoke hospital is a general hospital, strictly a secondary health facility, which should have come under the responsibility of the Bayelsa state government. But in 2011, few months after securing his official first term, President Jonathan sidelined that requirement, authorized through the Federal Executive Council, the construction of the N2.8billion hospital in his hometown, and personally supervised its speedy completion within 12 months.
The hospital stands clearly as the only known general hospital nationwide deliberately constructed with federal money by the president since taking office in 2010, a review of government projects, budgets and implementation records show.
Federal health officials also confirmed, in interviews with PREMIUM TIMES, the anomaly of the Otuoke project.
“The federal government is only concerned about tertiary health institutions, anything more than that, we don’t know,” a top official of the ministry of health headquarters said. Many of the officials who spoke insisted on anonymity, for fear they might be victimized.
“We don’t have any responsibility with general hospitals,” the official said.
Mr. Jonathan approved the erection of the hospital in Otuoke even when a Federal Medical Centre, FMC, had already been established in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital. Federal Medical Centres were established nationwide in states that do not have Federal University Teaching Hospitals present, for the purpose of providing tertiary level health care, which is within the purview of the Federal Government in the concurrent nature of health care delivery system in Nigeria, explains a government policy document seen by this paper.
Covering up illegality through the MDG
Mr. Jonathan himself knows he has broken the law by taking over the responsibility of the Bayelsa State government to establish a general hospital for his community. Perhaps to address that concern, the Otuoke hospital project was approved and executed not as a ministry of health project, but as part of intervention projects by the Millennium Development Goals office.
Even at that, the project breached the MDG plan. Where it appears minimally in line, its scale far outweighs similar allocations in other states, showing the imbalance that often characterize federal projects; and how the beneficiaries of such indiscretions are always the constituencies of powerful public officials. President Jonathan’s action also underlines the nepotism that usually characterise the siting of federal projects across the country.
The MDG office, headed by Precious Gbeneol, a known loyalist of the president, helps with water projects, renovates schools, builds small health centers and assists in health projects that specifically apply to maternal and infant health.
Two staff of the MDG office said they were not aware of projects such as the building of general hospitals anywhere. “It’s not what we do, we build only health centres, water projects, education and things like that,” one official said.
While affirming that position, a spokesperson for the office, Desmond Utomwen, however said the MDG department occasionally provides specific assistance to existing general hospitals in special circumstances. He cited how the office assisted the Obstetric unit of Kubwa general hospital in Abuja.
A detailed review of budgets and government project records show the nature of assistance the office provides. Besides supplies of drugs, contraceptives, antiretroviral drugs, insecticide-treated nets and the construction of primary health centers, a number of hospitals received minimal interventions in the form of renovation and completion between 2009 and 2013. All did so at far minimal rate, compared to the hospital in Otuoke.
The presidency refused to comment for this story. Telephone calls to presidential spokesperson were neither answered nor returned while an emailed message to the same official is yet to be responded to.
Otuoke: From a quiet hamlet to a controversial city
A low lying coastal settlement with a population of a few thousands, Otuoke, in Ogbia local government area of Bayelsa state, has undergone rapid transformation and unprecedented development just for being the birth place of a president, putting behind its poverty, and rapidly emerging into a modern city.
After Mr. Jonathan became president, the town’s poor past dramatically faded with its roads expanded, drained and lit by street lamps.
When the president approved six new universities shortly after taking office, one went to Otuoke, to fill Bayelsa state’s slot.
The transformation of the community has however also brought loads of controversies within the three years of the president’s tenure.
In early 2012, President Jonathan shocked Nigerians when he led his local Anglican Church to receive a curious donation of a 1200-seater auditorium from Italian construction firm, Gitto, a federal contractor that has continued to bid for construction jobs from the administration.
Many Nigerians consider the donation an attempt by the company to curry favour from the president.
When critics raised concerns that by receiving the church gift, the president had violation his office’s code of conduct which bars him from accepting gifts from government contractors while in office, Mr. Jonathan and his supporters hit back, questioning the rationality of turning down a worship centre donated by a private entity to a community.
The Otuoke community managed to stay out of media glare until 2013 when politicians and government allies again gathered for a fund raiser for the same small church.
At the event, controversial businessman, Arthur Eze, donated N1.2 billion while the Akwa Ibom state governor, Godswill Akpabio donated N230 million purportedly on behalf of 23 governors of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, drawing outrage from Nigerians.
While the community steadied through the controversies, it remained a top destination for high ranking federal government projects, as it effortlessly scooped key road, water, education and health projects, a review of the budgets since 2009 show.
A similar blend of projects is hard to come by in several other poverty-stricken villages across the Niger-Delta.
Between 2010 and date, while other communities struggle to receive road and water projects, from the intervention agency, the Niger Delta Development Commission, Otuoke constantly got allocations. By 2012, its focus went beyond roads, and it was given a N2.08 billion “ultra modern market.” The job was handed to Kari Investment Company Limited on November 4.
This year, the community is listed in the budget for a new School of Midwifery, even though it already hosts a federal university
Premium times
It is not clear how and when the federal government first conceived the hospital project, as it was not listed in federal budgets between 2009 and 2011, and even after.
But the Federal Executive Council meeting of August 17, 2011, presided over by Mr. Jonathan, gave approval for the project, and a N2.8billion contract was hurriedly awarded to Messrs Avandale Limited. The job was projected to last only 12 months; and indeed, unlike the usual delay government projects face, it was delivered on time.
As the administration became aware that PREMIUM TIMES was making extensive enquiry about the hospital, President Jonathan hurried to Otuoke on Saturday to purportedly inaugurate the 40-bed hospital, which has now been named Otuoke Comprehensive Cottage Hospital.
At the ceremony, Mr. Jonathan claimed the project began as an initiative of the Bayelsa state government in 2006 before it was taken over by the presidency.
He did not say why he mandated the MDG office, which he personally supervises, to spearhead the project. Mr. Jonathan also did not tell his audience that an estimated N2.8billion federal money was pumped into the project, although a report say the project was eventually completed at a cost of N3.5billion.
Apart from the fact that it was never budgeted for (a violation of the appropriation law), the project breached a longstanding government policy requiring that the federal government provides only tertiary (teaching hospital, federal medical centers, and specialist hospitals); while the states build secondary facilities (general hospitals). Local governments provide primary facilities (health centers).
An exception to that rule, lately, has been the federal government’s direct intervention in local health care, in a spirited campaign against maternal and infant mortality, ahead of the 2015 target date for the actualisation of the Millennium Development Goals.
Otuoke hospital is a general hospital, strictly a secondary health facility, which should have come under the responsibility of the Bayelsa state government. But in 2011, few months after securing his official first term, President Jonathan sidelined that requirement, authorized through the Federal Executive Council, the construction of the N2.8billion hospital in his hometown, and personally supervised its speedy completion within 12 months.
The hospital stands clearly as the only known general hospital nationwide deliberately constructed with federal money by the president since taking office in 2010, a review of government projects, budgets and implementation records show.
Federal health officials also confirmed, in interviews with PREMIUM TIMES, the anomaly of the Otuoke project.
“The federal government is only concerned about tertiary health institutions, anything more than that, we don’t know,” a top official of the ministry of health headquarters said. Many of the officials who spoke insisted on anonymity, for fear they might be victimized.
“We don’t have any responsibility with general hospitals,” the official said.
Mr. Jonathan approved the erection of the hospital in Otuoke even when a Federal Medical Centre, FMC, had already been established in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital. Federal Medical Centres were established nationwide in states that do not have Federal University Teaching Hospitals present, for the purpose of providing tertiary level health care, which is within the purview of the Federal Government in the concurrent nature of health care delivery system in Nigeria, explains a government policy document seen by this paper.
Covering up illegality through the MDG
Mr. Jonathan himself knows he has broken the law by taking over the responsibility of the Bayelsa State government to establish a general hospital for his community. Perhaps to address that concern, the Otuoke hospital project was approved and executed not as a ministry of health project, but as part of intervention projects by the Millennium Development Goals office.
Even at that, the project breached the MDG plan. Where it appears minimally in line, its scale far outweighs similar allocations in other states, showing the imbalance that often characterize federal projects; and how the beneficiaries of such indiscretions are always the constituencies of powerful public officials. President Jonathan’s action also underlines the nepotism that usually characterise the siting of federal projects across the country.
The MDG office, headed by Precious Gbeneol, a known loyalist of the president, helps with water projects, renovates schools, builds small health centers and assists in health projects that specifically apply to maternal and infant health.
Two staff of the MDG office said they were not aware of projects such as the building of general hospitals anywhere. “It’s not what we do, we build only health centres, water projects, education and things like that,” one official said.
While affirming that position, a spokesperson for the office, Desmond Utomwen, however said the MDG department occasionally provides specific assistance to existing general hospitals in special circumstances. He cited how the office assisted the Obstetric unit of Kubwa general hospital in Abuja.
A detailed review of budgets and government project records show the nature of assistance the office provides. Besides supplies of drugs, contraceptives, antiretroviral drugs, insecticide-treated nets and the construction of primary health centers, a number of hospitals received minimal interventions in the form of renovation and completion between 2009 and 2013. All did so at far minimal rate, compared to the hospital in Otuoke.
The presidency refused to comment for this story. Telephone calls to presidential spokesperson were neither answered nor returned while an emailed message to the same official is yet to be responded to.
Otuoke: From a quiet hamlet to a controversial city
A low lying coastal settlement with a population of a few thousands, Otuoke, in Ogbia local government area of Bayelsa state, has undergone rapid transformation and unprecedented development just for being the birth place of a president, putting behind its poverty, and rapidly emerging into a modern city.
After Mr. Jonathan became president, the town’s poor past dramatically faded with its roads expanded, drained and lit by street lamps.
When the president approved six new universities shortly after taking office, one went to Otuoke, to fill Bayelsa state’s slot.
The transformation of the community has however also brought loads of controversies within the three years of the president’s tenure.
In early 2012, President Jonathan shocked Nigerians when he led his local Anglican Church to receive a curious donation of a 1200-seater auditorium from Italian construction firm, Gitto, a federal contractor that has continued to bid for construction jobs from the administration.
Many Nigerians consider the donation an attempt by the company to curry favour from the president.
When critics raised concerns that by receiving the church gift, the president had violation his office’s code of conduct which bars him from accepting gifts from government contractors while in office, Mr. Jonathan and his supporters hit back, questioning the rationality of turning down a worship centre donated by a private entity to a community.
The Otuoke community managed to stay out of media glare until 2013 when politicians and government allies again gathered for a fund raiser for the same small church.
At the event, controversial businessman, Arthur Eze, donated N1.2 billion while the Akwa Ibom state governor, Godswill Akpabio donated N230 million purportedly on behalf of 23 governors of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, drawing outrage from Nigerians.
While the community steadied through the controversies, it remained a top destination for high ranking federal government projects, as it effortlessly scooped key road, water, education and health projects, a review of the budgets since 2009 show.
A similar blend of projects is hard to come by in several other poverty-stricken villages across the Niger-Delta.
Between 2010 and date, while other communities struggle to receive road and water projects, from the intervention agency, the Niger Delta Development Commission, Otuoke constantly got allocations. By 2012, its focus went beyond roads, and it was given a N2.08 billion “ultra modern market.” The job was handed to Kari Investment Company Limited on November 4.
This year, the community is listed in the budget for a new School of Midwifery, even though it already hosts a federal university
Premium times
2015: Northern governors may form new party
Northern governors, and other senior politicians in the region, may form a new political party, SUNDAY PUNCH has learnt.
A source who is part of the move to ensure that the region recaptures power in the 2015 general elections disclosed this to one of our correspondents in Abuja, on Friday.
The source said the formation of a new political party was one of the three options being considered by northern political leaders as politicking for the next general election gathers steam.
The source added that the region would not allow itself to be used and dumped in the manner “Nuhu Ribadu was dumped by the Action Congress of Nigeria during the 2011 elections.”
Ribadu, the former Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, was the presidential candidate of the ACN in the 2011 election.
However, he lost the states controlled by the party, except Osun State, and is believed to have been a victim of a deal between his party’s power brokers and those of the Peoples Democratic Party.
The source, who pleaded anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the press, said, “The reality of our current political isolation is not lost on us here in the North.
Punch
Amaechi threatens to dump PDP
•Says: If they suffocate us in PDP and we need to move, we move.
Hours after embracing President Goodluck Jonathan at Port Harcourt Airport, Rivers State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi yesterday evening raised the stakes in the crisis rocking the state branch of the party by threatening to dump the ruling People’s Democratic Party(PDP).
He vowed to leave for any other party if PDP insists on the reversal of the suspension of Obio/Akpor local council executives as pre-condition for him to remain in the party.
Amaechi said this while reacting to questions by the Bishop of the Anglican Communion, Niger Delta Diocese, Rev. Ignatius C. Kattey, at the 60th birthday thanksgiving service of the former president of the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA), O.C.J. Okocha (SAN) in Port Harcourt.
He said the PDP should not give him conditions over Obio/Akpor, saying that it was only the lawmakers who suspended them, or the court that could lift the suspension.
The governor explained to the crowd at the service that the law that empowered the lawmakers to suspend council officials also empowered him to dissolve the executive, but said he has not done that.
“If they reverse it tomorrow, there is one more option left to me, I can dissolve the entire executive. The police can remain there as much as they want, it is Obio/Akpor people’s problem; the money is going nowhere.
The Nation
Amaechi vs Police Chief: The politics and intrigues of a battle
The inside story of the feud in Rivers State between the governor and the state police commissioner, who is believed in some quarters to be fighting the cause of the authorities in Abuja.
Rivers State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Mbu Joseph Mbu, has been having a running battle with the state government since he assumed office.
Many top officials of the state government are of the opinion that the police boss is acting a script of the authorities in Abuja.
They are quick to point at the way he ordered his men to seal Obio Akpor local government secretariat barely a week after the Rivers State House of Assembly suspended the Chairman of the council, his vice and 17 councilors over allegations of abuse of public funds and breach of security.
The action of the police has made it impossible for the seven-man Caretaker Committee that was put in place by the state government to function. The staff of the local government have also not been able to access their offices. This has been the state of things at Obio Akpor local government in the last two months.
The Caretaker Committee, led by Mr Chikordi Dike, got a High Court order asking the police to vacate the secretariat with a caveat that it should provide minimal security while activities resume at the place. Barely three hours after the police moved out of the place, the plant room in the secretariat was set ablaze allegedly by hoodlums.
There were also protests by youths allegedly from Obio Akpor local government who threatened to wreak havoc on the place if the Caretaker Committee was allowed access to the secretariat.
The two developments forced the police to move in again to seal the place.
The police, the Caretaker Committee and the suspended elected officials of the council, at press time, were in court on issues surrounding the secretariat. There are those who think the action of the police is laced with bias while some others believe the security agency acted to save lives and guard against chaos in the local government area.
Meantime, the Speaker of Rivers State House of Assembly, Hon Otelemaba Amachree, was the first to accuse the police commissioner of partiality in the political crisis rocking the state. Reports quoted Amachree as calling for immediate redeployment of the commissioner on account of his alleged interest in the state political crisis. Some local government Chairmen in the state also levelled same accusation against Mbu.
But to the Felix Obuah-led Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the state and loyalists of the Minister of State for Education in Obio Akpor and other parts of the state, the police commissioner deserved to be commended for his actions on the political crisis in Obio Akpor local government council.
Obuah, the factional Chairman of the Rivers PDP, in a press statement, lauded Mbu, saying he had not acted outside his lines of duty.
The face-off between the state government and the police commissioner took a dramatic twist recently when the latter labelled Governor Chibuike Amaechi a tyrant and dictator. According to Mbu, his problem with those in government was because of his alleged refusal to act at the whims and caprices of the governor.
Amaechi: Berates Police boss. Mbu: Amaechi is a dictator
“Our governor is very tyrannical, he is a dictator. He wants everybody to say ‘yes sir’ to him and I said I will not say so. I am a professional”, the police boss said. He further said he was in the state purely on police duty, pleading that Amaechi should not drag his name into the murky waters of politics. He further reiterated his ban on protest without police permission in the state.
The dust generated by his comment on the governor had hardly settled when Amaechi fired his own shot daring Mbu to shoot him over public protest. The governor said he had concluded plans to storm the street of Port Harcourt with hundreds of Rivers people to march against the ban against public protests by the police commissioner. He said the police boss should be ready to open fire on him and hundreds of protesters.
Amaechi boasted that there was no way several Mbus would be able to stop the protest march which he would lead. The governor said while he would be at the head of the protesters, the Secretary to Rivers State Government, SSG, would be on ground to receive a formal letter from him and the protesters, stressing that he would soon pick a date for the exercise.
The governor also alleged that the state police commissioner recently ordered his men to stop people of Orashi who were coming to pay him a solidarity visit. Chairmen of the four local governments in the area corroborated Amaechi’s statement.
According to the foursome, Chairman of Ahoada East, Mr Cassidy Ikegbedi; Ahoada West, Awori Miller; Abua Odua, Udi Odum; and Ogba Egbema Ndoni, Mr Austin Ahiamadum, they got a call from the police Area Commander in charge of their zone asking them not to embark on the visit. But they insisted on their right. The council chairmen said their people were harassed at Rumuji, Emohua local government area by the police as they were going to Port Harcourt to pay the solidarity visit to the governor.
On Thursday, Mbu explained why his men had to stop those coming for the visit. According to him, the initial information available to the police was that they were coming to Port Harcourt for a public protest.
The police boss said he had to ask his men to allow them into the state capital after the governor called to tell him that they were coming on a solidarity visit.
“We got report by 1 am on Tuesday that some elements were being mobilised to come to Port Harcourt for a public protest. We had to stop them. His Excellency called me to say they were on solidarity visit to Government House. And I called my officers to allow them to come”. Mbu, who described Amaechi as his friend, brother and boss, said there was no problem between them. According to him, whatever problem existed was a media creation.
“His Excellency is the Chief Security Officer (of Rivers State), he is my friend. I am his 2ic.”
When told that the governor had threatened to embark on a street protest with hundreds of Rivers people to challenge the police ban on peaceful protest in the state, the police boss said he was not sure Amaechi would do so. “I know that His Excellency is not thinking in the direction”.
Mbu said the ban on protest without approval from the police was still in force in the state. “We won’t discuss the planned protest by the governor now.”
On his relationship with Amaechi, the police commissioner said the media had been busy creating false impression that they were fighting. “Forget what journalists are busy writing about the governor and myself. He is my friend, brother and boss. Yesterday we spoke for about thirty minutes”.
When asked if he would open fire on the governor if he leads his protesters, the police chief smiled and said,” how can I shoot my governor?”
Vanguard
Rivers State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Mbu Joseph Mbu, has been having a running battle with the state government since he assumed office.
Many top officials of the state government are of the opinion that the police boss is acting a script of the authorities in Abuja.
They are quick to point at the way he ordered his men to seal Obio Akpor local government secretariat barely a week after the Rivers State House of Assembly suspended the Chairman of the council, his vice and 17 councilors over allegations of abuse of public funds and breach of security.
The action of the police has made it impossible for the seven-man Caretaker Committee that was put in place by the state government to function. The staff of the local government have also not been able to access their offices. This has been the state of things at Obio Akpor local government in the last two months.
The Caretaker Committee, led by Mr Chikordi Dike, got a High Court order asking the police to vacate the secretariat with a caveat that it should provide minimal security while activities resume at the place. Barely three hours after the police moved out of the place, the plant room in the secretariat was set ablaze allegedly by hoodlums.
There were also protests by youths allegedly from Obio Akpor local government who threatened to wreak havoc on the place if the Caretaker Committee was allowed access to the secretariat.
The two developments forced the police to move in again to seal the place.
The police, the Caretaker Committee and the suspended elected officials of the council, at press time, were in court on issues surrounding the secretariat. There are those who think the action of the police is laced with bias while some others believe the security agency acted to save lives and guard against chaos in the local government area.
Meantime, the Speaker of Rivers State House of Assembly, Hon Otelemaba Amachree, was the first to accuse the police commissioner of partiality in the political crisis rocking the state. Reports quoted Amachree as calling for immediate redeployment of the commissioner on account of his alleged interest in the state political crisis. Some local government Chairmen in the state also levelled same accusation against Mbu.
But to the Felix Obuah-led Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the state and loyalists of the Minister of State for Education in Obio Akpor and other parts of the state, the police commissioner deserved to be commended for his actions on the political crisis in Obio Akpor local government council.
Obuah, the factional Chairman of the Rivers PDP, in a press statement, lauded Mbu, saying he had not acted outside his lines of duty.
The face-off between the state government and the police commissioner took a dramatic twist recently when the latter labelled Governor Chibuike Amaechi a tyrant and dictator. According to Mbu, his problem with those in government was because of his alleged refusal to act at the whims and caprices of the governor.
Amaechi: Berates Police boss. Mbu: Amaechi is a dictator
“Our governor is very tyrannical, he is a dictator. He wants everybody to say ‘yes sir’ to him and I said I will not say so. I am a professional”, the police boss said. He further said he was in the state purely on police duty, pleading that Amaechi should not drag his name into the murky waters of politics. He further reiterated his ban on protest without police permission in the state.
The dust generated by his comment on the governor had hardly settled when Amaechi fired his own shot daring Mbu to shoot him over public protest. The governor said he had concluded plans to storm the street of Port Harcourt with hundreds of Rivers people to march against the ban against public protests by the police commissioner. He said the police boss should be ready to open fire on him and hundreds of protesters.
Amaechi boasted that there was no way several Mbus would be able to stop the protest march which he would lead. The governor said while he would be at the head of the protesters, the Secretary to Rivers State Government, SSG, would be on ground to receive a formal letter from him and the protesters, stressing that he would soon pick a date for the exercise.
The governor also alleged that the state police commissioner recently ordered his men to stop people of Orashi who were coming to pay him a solidarity visit. Chairmen of the four local governments in the area corroborated Amaechi’s statement.
According to the foursome, Chairman of Ahoada East, Mr Cassidy Ikegbedi; Ahoada West, Awori Miller; Abua Odua, Udi Odum; and Ogba Egbema Ndoni, Mr Austin Ahiamadum, they got a call from the police Area Commander in charge of their zone asking them not to embark on the visit. But they insisted on their right. The council chairmen said their people were harassed at Rumuji, Emohua local government area by the police as they were going to Port Harcourt to pay the solidarity visit to the governor.
On Thursday, Mbu explained why his men had to stop those coming for the visit. According to him, the initial information available to the police was that they were coming to Port Harcourt for a public protest.
The police boss said he had to ask his men to allow them into the state capital after the governor called to tell him that they were coming on a solidarity visit.
“We got report by 1 am on Tuesday that some elements were being mobilised to come to Port Harcourt for a public protest. We had to stop them. His Excellency called me to say they were on solidarity visit to Government House. And I called my officers to allow them to come”. Mbu, who described Amaechi as his friend, brother and boss, said there was no problem between them. According to him, whatever problem existed was a media creation.
“His Excellency is the Chief Security Officer (of Rivers State), he is my friend. I am his 2ic.”
When told that the governor had threatened to embark on a street protest with hundreds of Rivers people to challenge the police ban on peaceful protest in the state, the police boss said he was not sure Amaechi would do so. “I know that His Excellency is not thinking in the direction”.
Mbu said the ban on protest without approval from the police was still in force in the state. “We won’t discuss the planned protest by the governor now.”
On his relationship with Amaechi, the police commissioner said the media had been busy creating false impression that they were fighting. “Forget what journalists are busy writing about the governor and myself. He is my friend, brother and boss. Yesterday we spoke for about thirty minutes”.
When asked if he would open fire on the governor if he leads his protesters, the police chief smiled and said,” how can I shoot my governor?”
Vanguard
Moments of Drama Inside Aso Rock: Amaechi wins some, loses some
- on June 30, 2013 at 2:33 am in Special Report
Last week, the crisis in the NGF moved into Aso Rock Presidential Villa with dramatic effects. This is the story of how Governor Amaechi was humbled one night, while he drew level the following day, with the active collaboration of his majority governors – both drama inside the Villa.
By Ben Agande, Abuja
Never before has the country witnessed so much drama as it did last week since the imbroglio over the election of the chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum. Since the controversy that erupted following the rejection by some governors of the election of Rotimi Amaechi as the chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum, every action or inaction of Amaechi who is seen to be in the bad books of the presidency has been subject to microscopic scrutiny. So when the meeting of the Nigerian Governors Forum was convened last Wednesday night, some loyalists to the president interpreted the action as a further affront on the president who had scheduled dinner to honour women in his cabinet for that same night. For many, Amaechi and his group of nineteen governors who had all been invited for the meeting may not attend the dinner to further drive home their spite for the president. They were utterly mistaken.
About thirty minutes into the dinner which had in attendance President Goodluck Jonathan as well as the president of Malawi, Joyce Banda, the former Ghanaian President, John Kufour, the president of the senate and other high ranking government officials, governor Rotimi Amaechi and his supporter-governors were ushered into the Banquet hall of the presidential Villa when the programme of event had already started. His admission into the hall was an aberration that had never taken place for a long time. Once the president is seated for a function, no other person is allowed to come into the venue especially as noisily as Governor Amaechi and his colleagues were allowed to do.
According to a security source in the presidential Villa, ‘the decision to allow the governors come in even against protocol was to avoid the situation whereby unnecessary politics would be read into our action if we stopped them from entering. We decided to allow them through the back door so that they would not distract the programme and we would not be accused of playing politics. It was a delicate decision that we had to take with a view to balancing our security obligations while not providing reasons for unnecessary politicking”.
Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State; Sokoto State Deputy Governor, Alhaji Mukhtar Shagari; factional Chairman, Nigeria Governors’ Forum, Mr. Jonah Jang of Plateau State; Niger State Governor, Dr. Babangida Aliyu; Nasarawa State Governor, Alhaji Tanko Al-Makura, Inspector General of Police, M.D Abubakar and factional Chairman of Nigeria Governors’ Forum, Rotimi Amaechi.
It was a decision that they later came to regret, Sunday Vanguard learnt. As soon as the governors were allowed in, while a few of them like Governor Rotimi Amaechi went to the front seats which had had been reserved for them, other governors like Murtala Nyako of Adamawa and Magatarkada of Sokoto chose to seat at the back of the hall where seats had been reserved for the media.
But while the Secretary to the government of the Federation, Anyim Pius Anyim was reading his welcome address, another drama was to play out between the governor of Rivers state, Rotimi Amaechi and the president’s security details. Few minutes after he sat on his seat, Amaechi moved from his seat and made to towards where the president and his guests were seated. It was a decision that he apparently did not think through. His journey was truncated as a security detail of the president politely but firmly told him that he could not access the president at that point in time.
Giving reason for the action of the security operatives, a senior security source at the Villa confided in Sunday Vanguard that it was a decision that was solely informed by security considerations and not politics. “The president and his guests were listening to the Secretary to the Government of the Federation who was delivering his speech. Allowing governor Amaechi to approach him at that time would have caused a huge distraction. We could not have afforded to allow that” he said.
But the drama involving governor Rotimi Amaechi reached its crescendo on Thursday last week at the meeting of the National Economic Council. The council is a meeting of the governors under the chairmanship of the Vice president to forge a common economic front for the state and the federal government. Before the controversy over the chairmanship of the Nigerian Governors Forum, the chairman of the Forum usually occupies a prominent place and his seat is clearly marked to indicate that he is the leader of the governors present. But obviously following directives from above, the sitting arrangement was changed from the usual. Previously the Chairman of the Governors Forum would usually sit directly opposite Vice President Namadi Sambo who chairs the council but last week Thursday, no seat was allocated for the NGF chairman ostensibly to avoid a situation whereby the presidency would be accused of taking sides in the controversy surrounding the NGF elections.
Instead, the seats were rearranged in alphabetical order and since there is no State with Q, this brought both Ameachi and Jang to sit beside each other, probably the first time they were sitting so close to each other since the NGF face off.
so when governor Rotimi Amaechi came into the council Chambers and headed for where he thought his seat would be, he was politely informed by the protocol officers that his seat was the one marked with R, representing Rivers state. It was at that moment that it dawned on him and other governors present who his neighbour was going to be.
Governor Muazu Babangida Aliyu who is also the chairman of Northern Nigeria Governors’ Forum, voiced out the anxiety that had dominated the hall when he told Amaechi: “So you are going to sit with Jang. This is very nice oh. Somebody is trying to be diplomatic here.”
To this Amaechi replied : “We are still together. So, I am going to sit with him. The real chairman and the… (laughter).
The arrival of governor Jang created a frenzy amongst supporters of governor Amaechi who apparently wanted to take advantage of the presence of the media to send a message from the seat of power which is widely perceived to be the real power behind Jang.
The Edo State Governor, Adams Oshimole whose theatrical abilities may have been honed by several years of his experience in the labour movement led other governors to where Jonah Jang was seated and pointed to Amaechi, saying “that is my chairman!”. He added for dramatic effect still looking at Jang “you are the leader of the other PDP extended faction”, drawing laughter from those present in the Chambers hall. By this, Amaechi drew blood too, to even the scores against Jang and the presidency after the incident of the previous night
For governor Oshiomhole and his colleagues, though the comment was supposed to be a joke to lighten the mood at the council chambers, the moment may have presented a sobering moment for governor Jang who wore a bland face for most of the encounter. This drama is bound to be repeated again and again for as long as the crisis in the Nigerian Governors’ Forum remains unresolved.
Vanguard
Moments of Drama Inside Aso Rock: Amaechi wins some, loses some
- on June 30, 2013 at 2:33 am in Special Report
Last week, the crisis in the NGF moved into Aso Rock Presidential Villa with dramatic effects. This is the story of how Governor Amaechi was humbled one night, while he drew level the following day, with the active collaboration of his majority governors – both drama inside the Villa.
By Ben Agande, Abuja
Never before has the country witnessed so much drama as it did last week since the imbroglio over the election of the chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum. Since the controversy that erupted following the rejection by some governors of the election of Rotimi Amaechi as the chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum, every action or inaction of Amaechi who is seen to be in the bad books of the presidency has been subject to microscopic scrutiny. So when the meeting of the Nigerian Governors Forum was convened last Wednesday night, some loyalists to the president interpreted the action as a further affront on the president who had scheduled dinner to honour women in his cabinet for that same night. For many, Amaechi and his group of nineteen governors who had all been invited for the meeting may not attend the dinner to further drive home their spite for the president. They were utterly mistaken.
About thirty minutes into the dinner which had in attendance President Goodluck Jonathan as well as the president of Malawi, Joyce Banda, the former Ghanaian President, John Kufour, the president of the senate and other high ranking government officials, governor Rotimi Amaechi and his supporter-governors were ushered into the Banquet hall of the presidential Villa when the programme of event had already started. His admission into the hall was an aberration that had never taken place for a long time. Once the president is seated for a function, no other person is allowed to come into the venue especially as noisily as Governor Amaechi and his colleagues were allowed to do.
According to a security source in the presidential Villa, ‘the decision to allow the governors come in even against protocol was to avoid the situation whereby unnecessary politics would be read into our action if we stopped them from entering. We decided to allow them through the back door so that they would not distract the programme and we would not be accused of playing politics. It was a delicate decision that we had to take with a view to balancing our security obligations while not providing reasons for unnecessary politicking”.
Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State; Sokoto State Deputy Governor, Alhaji Mukhtar Shagari; factional Chairman, Nigeria Governors’ Forum, Mr. Jonah Jang of Plateau State; Niger State Governor, Dr. Babangida Aliyu; Nasarawa State Governor, Alhaji Tanko Al-Makura, Inspector General of Police, M.D Abubakar and factional Chairman of Nigeria Governors’ Forum, Rotimi Amaechi.
It was a decision that they later came to regret, Sunday Vanguard learnt. As soon as the governors were allowed in, while a few of them like Governor Rotimi Amaechi went to the front seats which had had been reserved for them, other governors like Murtala Nyako of Adamawa and Magatarkada of Sokoto chose to seat at the back of the hall where seats had been reserved for the media.
But while the Secretary to the government of the Federation, Anyim Pius Anyim was reading his welcome address, another drama was to play out between the governor of Rivers state, Rotimi Amaechi and the president’s security details. Few minutes after he sat on his seat, Amaechi moved from his seat and made to towards where the president and his guests were seated. It was a decision that he apparently did not think through. His journey was truncated as a security detail of the president politely but firmly told him that he could not access the president at that point in time.
Giving reason for the action of the security operatives, a senior security source at the Villa confided in Sunday Vanguard that it was a decision that was solely informed by security considerations and not politics. “The president and his guests were listening to the Secretary to the Government of the Federation who was delivering his speech. Allowing governor Amaechi to approach him at that time would have caused a huge distraction. We could not have afforded to allow that” he said.
But the drama involving governor Rotimi Amaechi reached its crescendo on Thursday last week at the meeting of the National Economic Council. The council is a meeting of the governors under the chairmanship of the Vice president to forge a common economic front for the state and the federal government. Before the controversy over the chairmanship of the Nigerian Governors Forum, the chairman of the Forum usually occupies a prominent place and his seat is clearly marked to indicate that he is the leader of the governors present. But obviously following directives from above, the sitting arrangement was changed from the usual. Previously the Chairman of the Governors Forum would usually sit directly opposite Vice President Namadi Sambo who chairs the council but last week Thursday, no seat was allocated for the NGF chairman ostensibly to avoid a situation whereby the presidency would be accused of taking sides in the controversy surrounding the NGF elections.
Instead, the seats were rearranged in alphabetical order and since there is no State with Q, this brought both Ameachi and Jang to sit beside each other, probably the first time they were sitting so close to each other since the NGF face off.
so when governor Rotimi Amaechi came into the council Chambers and headed for where he thought his seat would be, he was politely informed by the protocol officers that his seat was the one marked with R, representing Rivers state. It was at that moment that it dawned on him and other governors present who his neighbour was going to be.
Governor Muazu Babangida Aliyu who is also the chairman of Northern Nigeria Governors’ Forum, voiced out the anxiety that had dominated the hall when he told Amaechi: “So you are going to sit with Jang. This is very nice oh. Somebody is trying to be diplomatic here.”
To this Amaechi replied : “We are still together. So, I am going to sit with him. The real chairman and the… (laughter).
The arrival of governor Jang created a frenzy amongst supporters of governor Amaechi who apparently wanted to take advantage of the presence of the media to send a message from the seat of power which is widely perceived to be the real power behind Jang.
The Edo State Governor, Adams Oshimole whose theatrical abilities may have been honed by several years of his experience in the labour movement led other governors to where Jonah Jang was seated and pointed to Amaechi, saying “that is my chairman!”. He added for dramatic effect still looking at Jang “you are the leader of the other PDP extended faction”, drawing laughter from those present in the Chambers hall. By this, Amaechi drew blood too, to even the scores against Jang and the presidency after the incident of the previous night
For governor Oshiomhole and his colleagues, though the comment was supposed to be a joke to lighten the mood at the council chambers, the moment may have presented a sobering moment for governor Jang who wore a bland face for most of the encounter. This drama is bound to be repeated again and again for as long as the crisis in the Nigerian Governors’ Forum remains unresolved.
Vanguard
Moments of Drama Inside Aso Rock: Amaechi wins some, loses some
- on June 30, 2013 at 2:33 am in Special Report
Last week, the crisis in the NGF moved into Aso Rock Presidential Villa with dramatic effects. This is the story of how Governor Amaechi was humbled one night, while he drew level the following day, with the active collaboration of his majority governors – both drama inside the Villa.
By Ben Agande, Abuja
Never before has the country witnessed so much drama as it did last week since the imbroglio over the election of the chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum. Since the controversy that erupted following the rejection by some governors of the election of Rotimi Amaechi as the chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum, every action or inaction of Amaechi who is seen to be in the bad books of the presidency has been subject to microscopic scrutiny. So when the meeting of the Nigerian Governors Forum was convened last Wednesday night, some loyalists to the president interpreted the action as a further affront on the president who had scheduled dinner to honour women in his cabinet for that same night. For many, Amaechi and his group of nineteen governors who had all been invited for the meeting may not attend the dinner to further drive home their spite for the president. They were utterly mistaken.
About thirty minutes into the dinner which had in attendance President Goodluck Jonathan as well as the president of Malawi, Joyce Banda, the former Ghanaian President, John Kufour, the president of the senate and other high ranking government officials, governor Rotimi Amaechi and his supporter-governors were ushered into the Banquet hall of the presidential Villa when the programme of event had already started. His admission into the hall was an aberration that had never taken place for a long time. Once the president is seated for a function, no other person is allowed to come into the venue especially as noisily as Governor Amaechi and his colleagues were allowed to do.
According to a security source in the presidential Villa, ‘the decision to allow the governors come in even against protocol was to avoid the situation whereby unnecessary politics would be read into our action if we stopped them from entering. We decided to allow them through the back door so that they would not distract the programme and we would not be accused of playing politics. It was a delicate decision that we had to take with a view to balancing our security obligations while not providing reasons for unnecessary politicking”.
Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State; Sokoto State Deputy Governor, Alhaji Mukhtar Shagari; factional Chairman, Nigeria Governors’ Forum, Mr. Jonah Jang of Plateau State; Niger State Governor, Dr. Babangida Aliyu; Nasarawa State Governor, Alhaji Tanko Al-Makura, Inspector General of Police, M.D Abubakar and factional Chairman of Nigeria Governors’ Forum, Rotimi Amaechi.
It was a decision that they later came to regret, Sunday Vanguard learnt. As soon as the governors were allowed in, while a few of them like Governor Rotimi Amaechi went to the front seats which had had been reserved for them, other governors like Murtala Nyako of Adamawa and Magatarkada of Sokoto chose to seat at the back of the hall where seats had been reserved for the media.
But while the Secretary to the government of the Federation, Anyim Pius Anyim was reading his welcome address, another drama was to play out between the governor of Rivers state, Rotimi Amaechi and the president’s security details. Few minutes after he sat on his seat, Amaechi moved from his seat and made to towards where the president and his guests were seated. It was a decision that he apparently did not think through. His journey was truncated as a security detail of the president politely but firmly told him that he could not access the president at that point in time.
Giving reason for the action of the security operatives, a senior security source at the Villa confided in Sunday Vanguard that it was a decision that was solely informed by security considerations and not politics. “The president and his guests were listening to the Secretary to the Government of the Federation who was delivering his speech. Allowing governor Amaechi to approach him at that time would have caused a huge distraction. We could not have afforded to allow that” he said.
But the drama involving governor Rotimi Amaechi reached its crescendo on Thursday last week at the meeting of the National Economic Council. The council is a meeting of the governors under the chairmanship of the Vice president to forge a common economic front for the state and the federal government. Before the controversy over the chairmanship of the Nigerian Governors Forum, the chairman of the Forum usually occupies a prominent place and his seat is clearly marked to indicate that he is the leader of the governors present. But obviously following directives from above, the sitting arrangement was changed from the usual. Previously the Chairman of the Governors Forum would usually sit directly opposite Vice President Namadi Sambo who chairs the council but last week Thursday, no seat was allocated for the NGF chairman ostensibly to avoid a situation whereby the presidency would be accused of taking sides in the controversy surrounding the NGF elections.
Instead, the seats were rearranged in alphabetical order and since there is no State with Q, this brought both Ameachi and Jang to sit beside each other, probably the first time they were sitting so close to each other since the NGF face off.
so when governor Rotimi Amaechi came into the council Chambers and headed for where he thought his seat would be, he was politely informed by the protocol officers that his seat was the one marked with R, representing Rivers state. It was at that moment that it dawned on him and other governors present who his neighbour was going to be.
Governor Muazu Babangida Aliyu who is also the chairman of Northern Nigeria Governors’ Forum, voiced out the anxiety that had dominated the hall when he told Amaechi: “So you are going to sit with Jang. This is very nice oh. Somebody is trying to be diplomatic here.”
To this Amaechi replied : “We are still together. So, I am going to sit with him. The real chairman and the… (laughter).
The arrival of governor Jang created a frenzy amongst supporters of governor Amaechi who apparently wanted to take advantage of the presence of the media to send a message from the seat of power which is widely perceived to be the real power behind Jang.
The Edo State Governor, Adams Oshimole whose theatrical abilities may have been honed by several years of his experience in the labour movement led other governors to where Jonah Jang was seated and pointed to Amaechi, saying “that is my chairman!”. He added for dramatic effect still looking at Jang “you are the leader of the other PDP extended faction”, drawing laughter from those present in the Chambers hall. By this, Amaechi drew blood too, to even the scores against Jang and the presidency after the incident of the previous night
For governor Oshiomhole and his colleagues, though the comment was supposed to be a joke to lighten the mood at the council chambers, the moment may have presented a sobering moment for governor Jang who wore a bland face for most of the encounter. This drama is bound to be repeated again and again for as long as the crisis in the Nigerian Governors’ Forum remains unresolved.
Vanguard
72 Hours After Aso Rock Drama: Jonathan, Amaechi embrace in public
Barely 72 hours after security personnel stopped Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State from approaching President Goodluck Jonathan at the Aso Rock Presidential Villa, Abuja, both men embraced publicly yesterday in Port-Harcourt, Rivers State capital.
The embrace took place at the Port-Harcourt International Airport when Jonathan was returning from his home state of Bayelsa where he commissioned a hospital facility.
Presidential Villa operatives had, on Wednesday, blocked Amaechi from getting to Jonathan at the seat of power during a dinner, an action that was interpreted in many quarters as stemming from the crisis in the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF).
The Aso Rock incident was the climax of the crisis in the NGF which saw the President disposed to Governor Jonah Jang of Plateau State as chairman of the body as against Amaechi, who secured a second term as the NGF chairman with 19 votes to 16.
Jonathan, en route Abuja after the Bayelsa visit, yesterday, embraced Amaechi at the Port-Harcourt Airport.
He arrived the airport in a presidential chopper.
As the president emerged from the helicopter, he made for the tarmac where the Rivers governor stood with members of his state executive council.
President Goodluck Jonathan being received by Governor Rotimi Amaechi at the Port Harcourt International Airport . The President was on his way to Abuja from Bayelsa Saturday morning.
Astonishment
Both men were locked in an embrace after a handshake while those around watched in astonishment.
Those at the airport included the Minister of State for Education, Chief Nyesom Wike, the arrowhead of opposition to Amaechi in Rivers State, and the managing director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Dr Chris Oboh.
Jonathan later boarded the presidential jet for Abuja.
Maternal Mortality
Earlier, while in Bayelsa, the President commissioned a 40-bed Comprehensive Cottage Hospital in Otuoke, Ogbia local government area, saying the nation’s maternal mortality rate had dropped by 30 per cent in the last four years.
The multi million Naira health facility, built by the Bayelsa State Government, is located at the president’s home town.
Speaking at the occasion, Jonathan put the nation’s current maternal mortality rate at 350 as against 500 deaths per one hundred thousand women recorded in 2008.
His administration, he assured, would not relent in its efforts to attain the Millennium Development Goals, MDGs, target of 250 per one hundred thousand women by 2015.
The President, who reiterated his commitment to the MDGs, especially in the health sector, said all hands would be on deck at ensuring that the nation achieves its MDGs objectives in all the sectors by 2015.
vanguard
AMCON will recoup investments in Enterprise, Mainstreet, Keystone banks – Lemo
on June 30, 2013 at 3:15 am in Business
*Says CBN is driving down bank interest rates, charges
Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Mr Tunde Lemo, in this interview, speaks on the performance of the economy, the exchange rate in the last two years and Asset Management Company of Nigeria, AMCON. Excerpts:
Some critics allege that the Asset Management Company of Nigeria, AMCON, is lumping performing loans together with the non- performing ones. What is your perspective?
I don’t know where the allegation is coming from; and I think people need to understand the role of AMCON. AMCON is a child of necessity. AMCON came because of the need to address the issue of non-performing loans. I won’t call them toxic assets because they are impeding the growth of commercial banks. This is at the aftermath of the global financial crisis. And so what AMCON did was to simply buy off these non-performing loans from banks so they can have a fresh breathe. AMCON also assisted in restructuring and recapitalizing the banks that were affected by the global financial crisis and currently they have significant investments in three of those institutions. AMCON has been very successful, and, between now and the next 10 years, we expect it to have recovered all its investments from three main sources: One, the assets they are sitting on which they bought from the banks and which they are going to sell, but the sale will be done in such a systematic way as not to cause a major stir in the property or capital market.
So, a significant amount of income would come from that area. The second area is through the sale of the banks where they have significant investments. Now that they have sold Union Bank, and talking about Enterprise Bank, Mainstream Bank and Keystone Bank, it is expected that they will also earn a lot, because they have repaired those banks. The banks have bounced back and they are doing well now.
The third will be the sinking fund which the Central Bank and the Bankers Committee have created. CBN, year in year out, is putting N50 billion into the fund, while the banks are committing five percent of their total assets into the fund. So when you look at the funding from these three sources over a period of 10 years, AMCON should be able to service its bond obligations.
The Central Bank of Nigeria head office in Abuja.
What is the drive for the reinforcement of the policy to publicise the lending rate by the CBN ?
The CBN has counselled banks that they need to be transparent in the publication of their interest rates the margin and deposit rate. The reason is because the banks are different in shapes and sizes, and some of them are big players while some have branches all over the country. So cost structure will differ from bank to bank, and, depending on what their strengths are, it is important to have transparency on the part of the customers. In fact, the transparency that they are advocating in industries means that banks should be transparent in all to let the public know what the deposit rates are and what the lending rates are for different kinds of credits; that is basically what the (CBN) governor re-echoed at a recent Bankers Committee meeting. This will also enable everyone know how competitive he is and then there is a valid explanation around the kind of interest rate that you charge.
What is the possibility of lowering credit rates which many people say are too high?
It is very rational for you to think interest rate could be as low as possible, but what are the major components of interest rate of financial institutions? Of course interest rate would depend on the prevailing money market rate, which is currently 12 percent. It may seem high, but you have to look at where the inflation number is, inflation currently is around 9.6 percent, almost 10 percent. So two and a half or three percent spread over inflation is not too high because if you don’t allow depositors to have positive real interest rate, it would affect savings mobilization; it would affect deposits mobilization. What do I mean by that? When you buy Pounds, for instance, or Treasury Bill, if you do not have a rate that is above inflation rate, then you are poorer by so doing. And so it’s important for you to be competitive and also have rate size, which will assist in mobilizing deposits. The resources are optimally utilized between savers and users of funds. If the savers are a little above some points above inflation rate, which is why we cannot just drop our policy rate, if inflation is where it is. On top of that is what we call the risk premium on credit risk and some other operational risks. In Nigeria, you find out that the cost of doing business is high, because of structural factors like the roads are not good, security and electricity challenges, and so on and so forth.
When we fix those infrastructure, and then doing business in Nigeria becomes less voluminous, of course we are going to have a much slimmer margin for banks. So when you look at the risk we reach, which is currently around 10 to 11 percent, and then you add the risk premium and then the administration cost for banks, you land where we are.
Back to your question, whether or not, interest rate could be lower? Interest rate could be lower if we deal with those structural factors.When all of that happens , then inflation comes down and the Central Bank policy rate comes down. The lending rate will also come down. This will make banks to be very efficient. In the last three years, we have learnt how to embark on share service; of course you know I drove that personally, and, because of that, the banks are building skills now and they are lot more efficient than before.
So the share service is reducing the interest rate in banks?
That is what is transmitting now into some reduction in interest rate. Banks themselves have come together and they are making commitments that they would also be willing to reduce interest rate in the interest of the economy and the real sector.
The logic of share service is for banks to reduce their cost structure, they need to have a rethink on the way they do business at areas of assets they are acquiring now; in other words, it may be more cost effective for them to jointly own some assets and share service and that we have seen in the area of infrastructure. We have seen that also in the area of currency distribution and haulage. Today, we have CIT companies which is cash in transit companies that run bullion activities for the industry as a whole instead of individual banks doing it all by themselves. We have also seen that in cashless; the essence of cashless is to ensure that our payment system is structured such that transactions are done using the electronic payment channel.
It also means that cost of doing business, cost of payment will also drop; our plan really is to save as much as possible 30 percent of the operating cost. We are not there yet, but there have been significant reduction in the bank operating expenditure and because of that bank charges are already coming down. In the review of the guide to bank charges, we have started to see even banks themselves coming to commit to reduction in charges. One of them is the commission of turnover; commission of turnover before was maximum of five percent; now they charge only three percent, and then, with the commitment that over time, in the next two to three years, it will further drop. Today we talk about high cost of borrowing but, if you look at the big boys, the big companies, the companies that have good rating, they are not borrowing at high rates. The big banks have large exposure to these big companies and the real sector has started to attract credits at very reasonable rates. You will also remember that the Central Bank is also intervening directly in some sectors of the economy which is agriculture and real sector through SME lending, and aviation. So the way it works is that some funds were deposited with Bank of Industry for lending to commercial banks, and these are also lent out at commercial rates.
With reasonable stability credit rates, has the country been able to stay afloat of the global credit crunch?
Today, the customers in the sectors that are mentioned have been able to access costs at single digit interest rate. The macro economy is a lot more stable today than before and, when you look at the key industries , it starts from inflation. Inflation number has been consistently in single digit since January, that is commendable and the exchange rate volatility has almost disappeared. Today we have very stable exchange rate in the last two years. Plus or minus one percent, 156 to 157 to a dollar, which is very commendable in this kind of clime and the external reserve level is well over 48 billion US dollars, which is almost like the highest point since the outset of the global financial crisis.
So when you look at these achievements, you know that they are an index of a very strong economy. The economy is very strong. About 25 percent of the xternal reserve that we were talking about is inflow of foreign capital, portfolio funds and FDI which, of course, is a confirmation and endorsement of the economy because, when you begin to see the inflow of portfolio funds and FDI, it will naturally not come unless you are voting for the economy.
Vanguard
Something worse than Boko Haram is coming, says Prophet Olabayo
…Says Jonathan should drop his 2015 ambition
PRIMATE Theophilus Olabayo, 67, founder of Evangelical Church of Yahweh with headquarters in Mende, Maryland, Lagos, had remained one of Nigeria’s respected prophets whose prophesies had shaken the high and mighty in the country. In this interview, the cleric says there would be a spiritual revolution that will rock the nation to its foundation and at the end of it, a new nation will emerge. Excerpts:
What really happened that you went off the radar for several years?
I have been talking. A prophet doesn’t just say things. It’s when God asks me to speak that I speak. Many atimes, I warn our leaders but they don’t have listening ears. I was the only one who said President Umaru Yar’Adua had a terminal disease and when the condition got worse, the wife called some of us to Abuja to ask of the chances of her husband. I said the husband would die and Jonathan would become president. I warned President Goodluck Jonathan that people would make the country ungovernable for him, but people said I was a prophet of doom. Is it not happening now? Let me quickly say this here that worse than Boko Haram is about to happen.
It’s no secret that you had some health challenges which may have been responsible for your absence for some time. What is the nature of your ailment?
I did not lay off. Elijah was sick and he was still doing God’s work. I had an attack. A spiritual attack but I am still hale and hearty. Spirit cannot die. The spirit of God cannot die in you. The body may be weak, it doesn’t matter. But the spirit cannot die. God will continue to speak through you.
Is it true that you had stroke, Sir?
It’s not a big deal that someone has stroke but I am okay. While on a trip to Kaduna, God had revealed to me that I would have stroke and would be away for some time. So I looked for someone who knew about stroke; one of my pastors.
Primate Olabayo
How did it happen and what was your first reaction?
I was going for a revival in Kaduna and God told me to go with somebody who knows about stroke. The man had to follow me to Kaduna. When I got to Kaduna, they told me one of my townsmen was sick and when I got to his place, God said I should not do anything though he was suffering. I got a room for him, paid his bills and left after praying for him. As I was returning to the church in Kaduna, I had the attack.
And did you have any medical treatment?
Definitely!
Why do you think it’s a spiritual attack?
I know because God told me about it. I know it could be exhaustion because I pray and fast a lot.
There was this rumour among the people that one of the reasons your church went down was because you were caught in adultery with somebody else’s wife. Is it true sir?
God will forgive you. Where? That is why Nigeria cannot move forward. How do you expect me; I preach the Word of God, I preach against adultery, then I’ll be caught in such an act! Impossible! Anybody can lie against you.
At your age sir, are you thinking of passing over the baton to someone else soon?
I am a prophet and it is not hereditary. God can choose anybody. When it’s time for me, God will tell me to lay hands on the person. God has not told me yet, I’m still a young man. There are so many people that are coming up, not only one person. Among them, God will raise up leaders. We have young pastors coming up in the church who have the gift of the Word of God, the Bible. Not only vision, people believe that it’s when you just speak in tongues alone or see vision. No! There are different types of gifts.
There are churches as soon as the founders pass away you don’t hear much from those churches…
It can’t happen here because it’s God that called me. When it is time, God will raise up another leader among us.
What do you foresee for Nigeria?
We are sitting at the keg of gunpowder. We are looking at total darkness in the nation. We need to pray very well because these political people are not doing the right things. Nothing is working; the worst corruption is in Nigeria. There has never been corruption as worse as this. The name of Nigeria is now corruption and some of the journalists are not helping matters. People are being bribed. But there’s going to be a revolution. The poor will overtake the rich. You’ve not seen anything. You’ve not seen Boko Haram. Worse Boko Haram is about to happen and we have to pray against religious war that may last seven years.
Let Jonathan drop his ambition for 2015. Let him work and allow his work speak for itself. Most of his political alleys especially from his Niger Delta are deceiving him and are talking carelessly. They will be consumed one after another. They are already beating war drums if he fails to return in 2015; let them keep quiet. They are not helping matters. Very soon they’ll start bombing.
The chairman of PDP is going to face another problem because there’s going to be crisis and if care is not taken, he is going to be removed. They are going to scatter them and cause confusion between him and the president. Most of these governors that are being sacked are going to join hands together to form another party. A new party will emerge which will be more powerful than PDP. Not APC! Gov. Rotimi Amaechi’s current challenges will create more problems in this country.
What’s the way out of all of these? How can we prevent this doom from coming to pass in Nigeria?
The problem with Nigeria is leadership. We are so corrupt and wicked. We manipulate things and we don’t allow God to work. They don’t believe in God. They go about looking for protection; some of them think they are untouchable. They don’t believe there’s God. One day they are going to give account. God is going to intervene in the affairs of Nigeria very soon and a brand new nation will emerge from the ashes of a revolution. The president is being caged by some few people. When you are saying the truth, they arrest you. Some of his close people are enemies and he doesn’t know. If he’s not careful, they are going to run him down.
There are things to be done spiritually. I don’t need to discuss all these with the Press because our leaders don’t have listening ears. We need to come together and work for this nation because we have children. We don’t want our children to suffer. Because if there’s war in Nigeria today, Ghana cannot accommodate the number of refugees. They are holding notional meetings. If they want to do something, somebody will talk today; they will give him millions of naira to keep quiet.
They are not saying anything, they are only exchanging money and that is what is destroying this country. Our refineries are not working; the roads are bad, armed robbers have taken over; there’s no work, now they want to sack people. The man is making more mistakes everyday. Every step he takes, he’s making wrong decisions. Many of his advisers are selfish and wicked people. They are just accumulating wealth. And they are old. They don’t give up. They are acquiring properties.
Some say Nigeria might not survive beyond 2015. Do you agree?
I went to America of recent and I prophesied and it happened. Let me tell you, it’s not America that will dictate for us. God is saying that we should avoid war; religious war.
Sir, is there anything the Church or anybody can do to avert a violent revolution?
As I am prophesying now, some church leaders and prayer contractors will take it to them to get money, to get oil blocks and buy aeroplanes for themselves. That will not solve the problem.
Despite the health cha-llenges, you still talk like this. When are you ever going to get tired?
I can’t be tired. They have tried me. I was the only one condemning Sani Abacha. One day they sent one brig-adier to me, I was in my house. As he came, I said something is in your stomach, he said yes, Sir. They said you should come and arrest me, he said yes Sir. I said but you have a daughter, he said yes sir. That day, my phone just stopped working I know it was their handiwork. When he came, God revealed to me and I told him you are going to land into problem, your oga will die.
Before Abacha died, one Austin came to me. He said he has a friend of Abubakar, I said he’s going to be next president and Abacha would die, and it happened. There’s nobody that God cannot catch. If 100 pastors and mallams are praying for them, they can’t survive. God is about to move if they don’t change and repent because they have put us under bondage for long. These pastors, let them change. They will say we are Pentecostals, that doesn’t mean you cannot speak truth. There was a time it was only me and Idahosa that were speaking during Babangida’s era. Most of these pastors that were condemning prophec-ies, are now prophesing. Where did they see it? Jealousy and envy are the things killing them.
What is your own assessment of late Pa Obadare?
He’s a man of God. He’s one of the chosen men of God, a soul winner, has the fear of God. That’s one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. He was a blind man and was quoting the Bible. A good preacher of God. He’s one of the best in the Body of Christ that we miss
Vanguard
PRIMATE Theophilus Olabayo, 67, founder of Evangelical Church of Yahweh with headquarters in Mende, Maryland, Lagos, had remained one of Nigeria’s respected prophets whose prophesies had shaken the high and mighty in the country. In this interview, the cleric says there would be a spiritual revolution that will rock the nation to its foundation and at the end of it, a new nation will emerge. Excerpts:
What really happened that you went off the radar for several years?
I have been talking. A prophet doesn’t just say things. It’s when God asks me to speak that I speak. Many atimes, I warn our leaders but they don’t have listening ears. I was the only one who said President Umaru Yar’Adua had a terminal disease and when the condition got worse, the wife called some of us to Abuja to ask of the chances of her husband. I said the husband would die and Jonathan would become president. I warned President Goodluck Jonathan that people would make the country ungovernable for him, but people said I was a prophet of doom. Is it not happening now? Let me quickly say this here that worse than Boko Haram is about to happen.
It’s no secret that you had some health challenges which may have been responsible for your absence for some time. What is the nature of your ailment?
I did not lay off. Elijah was sick and he was still doing God’s work. I had an attack. A spiritual attack but I am still hale and hearty. Spirit cannot die. The spirit of God cannot die in you. The body may be weak, it doesn’t matter. But the spirit cannot die. God will continue to speak through you.
Is it true that you had stroke, Sir?
It’s not a big deal that someone has stroke but I am okay. While on a trip to Kaduna, God had revealed to me that I would have stroke and would be away for some time. So I looked for someone who knew about stroke; one of my pastors.
Primate Olabayo
How did it happen and what was your first reaction?
I was going for a revival in Kaduna and God told me to go with somebody who knows about stroke. The man had to follow me to Kaduna. When I got to Kaduna, they told me one of my townsmen was sick and when I got to his place, God said I should not do anything though he was suffering. I got a room for him, paid his bills and left after praying for him. As I was returning to the church in Kaduna, I had the attack.
And did you have any medical treatment?
Definitely!
Why do you think it’s a spiritual attack?
I know because God told me about it. I know it could be exhaustion because I pray and fast a lot.
There was this rumour among the people that one of the reasons your church went down was because you were caught in adultery with somebody else’s wife. Is it true sir?
God will forgive you. Where? That is why Nigeria cannot move forward. How do you expect me; I preach the Word of God, I preach against adultery, then I’ll be caught in such an act! Impossible! Anybody can lie against you.
At your age sir, are you thinking of passing over the baton to someone else soon?
I am a prophet and it is not hereditary. God can choose anybody. When it’s time for me, God will tell me to lay hands on the person. God has not told me yet, I’m still a young man. There are so many people that are coming up, not only one person. Among them, God will raise up leaders. We have young pastors coming up in the church who have the gift of the Word of God, the Bible. Not only vision, people believe that it’s when you just speak in tongues alone or see vision. No! There are different types of gifts.
There are churches as soon as the founders pass away you don’t hear much from those churches…
It can’t happen here because it’s God that called me. When it is time, God will raise up another leader among us.
What do you foresee for Nigeria?
We are sitting at the keg of gunpowder. We are looking at total darkness in the nation. We need to pray very well because these political people are not doing the right things. Nothing is working; the worst corruption is in Nigeria. There has never been corruption as worse as this. The name of Nigeria is now corruption and some of the journalists are not helping matters. People are being bribed. But there’s going to be a revolution. The poor will overtake the rich. You’ve not seen anything. You’ve not seen Boko Haram. Worse Boko Haram is about to happen and we have to pray against religious war that may last seven years.
Let Jonathan drop his ambition for 2015. Let him work and allow his work speak for itself. Most of his political alleys especially from his Niger Delta are deceiving him and are talking carelessly. They will be consumed one after another. They are already beating war drums if he fails to return in 2015; let them keep quiet. They are not helping matters. Very soon they’ll start bombing.
The chairman of PDP is going to face another problem because there’s going to be crisis and if care is not taken, he is going to be removed. They are going to scatter them and cause confusion between him and the president. Most of these governors that are being sacked are going to join hands together to form another party. A new party will emerge which will be more powerful than PDP. Not APC! Gov. Rotimi Amaechi’s current challenges will create more problems in this country.
What’s the way out of all of these? How can we prevent this doom from coming to pass in Nigeria?
The problem with Nigeria is leadership. We are so corrupt and wicked. We manipulate things and we don’t allow God to work. They don’t believe in God. They go about looking for protection; some of them think they are untouchable. They don’t believe there’s God. One day they are going to give account. God is going to intervene in the affairs of Nigeria very soon and a brand new nation will emerge from the ashes of a revolution. The president is being caged by some few people. When you are saying the truth, they arrest you. Some of his close people are enemies and he doesn’t know. If he’s not careful, they are going to run him down.
There are things to be done spiritually. I don’t need to discuss all these with the Press because our leaders don’t have listening ears. We need to come together and work for this nation because we have children. We don’t want our children to suffer. Because if there’s war in Nigeria today, Ghana cannot accommodate the number of refugees. They are holding notional meetings. If they want to do something, somebody will talk today; they will give him millions of naira to keep quiet.
They are not saying anything, they are only exchanging money and that is what is destroying this country. Our refineries are not working; the roads are bad, armed robbers have taken over; there’s no work, now they want to sack people. The man is making more mistakes everyday. Every step he takes, he’s making wrong decisions. Many of his advisers are selfish and wicked people. They are just accumulating wealth. And they are old. They don’t give up. They are acquiring properties.
Some say Nigeria might not survive beyond 2015. Do you agree?
I went to America of recent and I prophesied and it happened. Let me tell you, it’s not America that will dictate for us. God is saying that we should avoid war; religious war.
Sir, is there anything the Church or anybody can do to avert a violent revolution?
As I am prophesying now, some church leaders and prayer contractors will take it to them to get money, to get oil blocks and buy aeroplanes for themselves. That will not solve the problem.
Despite the health cha-llenges, you still talk like this. When are you ever going to get tired?
I can’t be tired. They have tried me. I was the only one condemning Sani Abacha. One day they sent one brig-adier to me, I was in my house. As he came, I said something is in your stomach, he said yes, Sir. They said you should come and arrest me, he said yes Sir. I said but you have a daughter, he said yes sir. That day, my phone just stopped working I know it was their handiwork. When he came, God revealed to me and I told him you are going to land into problem, your oga will die.
Before Abacha died, one Austin came to me. He said he has a friend of Abubakar, I said he’s going to be next president and Abacha would die, and it happened. There’s nobody that God cannot catch. If 100 pastors and mallams are praying for them, they can’t survive. God is about to move if they don’t change and repent because they have put us under bondage for long. These pastors, let them change. They will say we are Pentecostals, that doesn’t mean you cannot speak truth. There was a time it was only me and Idahosa that were speaking during Babangida’s era. Most of these pastors that were condemning prophec-ies, are now prophesing. Where did they see it? Jealousy and envy are the things killing them.
What is your own assessment of late Pa Obadare?
He’s a man of God. He’s one of the chosen men of God, a soul winner, has the fear of God. That’s one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. He was a blind man and was quoting the Bible. A good preacher of God. He’s one of the best in the Body of Christ that we miss
Vanguard
Clark didn’t nominate me as minister — Orubebe
The Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Elder Godsday Orubebe, is in the eye of the storm following allegations of corruption and non-performance against him. In this interview, Orubebe dismisses the allegations and speaks on the frosty relationship between him and Chief Edwin Clark. Excerpts:How do you react to the allegation by some stakeholders in the Niger Delta that you just pocket the money being made available to the ministry for the development of the region?
I want to reason that, that is another level of madness exhibited by people who think the way they are, that is the way others are. Today, in this country, there is a process of doing things. There is a procurement law in place. So how do you pocket money? People talk out of ignorance. They don’t know what it takes to award a contract. As a minister, I don’t have the power to sit down in my office and call in Mr. A and say ‘I give you this contract’. It is advertised; so it sounds stupid, it exposes the ignorance of people who sit in their houses, offices and in the market places to say ministers are pocketing money. It is absolute nonsense.Is Elder Orubebe actually corrupt in view of the recent outcry by some Delta leaders and a group led by a former member of the House of Representatives, Mr. Dino Melaye, asking the EFCC to prosecute you over alleged corrupt practices? How do you feel about the allegations of corruption against you?
Elder Orubebe is not corrupt and cannot be corrupt. Dino Melaye came out that time and said I awarded contracts that were not in the budget, that I awarded contracts worth N27 billion and that I had paid the money and that I have pocketed the money. He said I awarded particularly one contract for N1.2 billion and then increased it to N12 billion and paid for it. I think Nigerians are cleverer now, they now understand what governance is, they understand the process of awarding contracts. Of course I came out and addressed a press conference. The man said N27billion but the contracts that were awarded were just N6 million; he said I had paid all the money, but the contractors were mobilized with only N990 million. At the time they were talking, we were owing the contractors and we were even talking to their bankers to let them know that we gave contracts to these people and the money was not available yet and that they should give them time to work.Are you bothered by the call on Mr. President to sack you from the cabinet?
I am not bothered because Nigerians, including Mr. President, know that these people are acting foolishly and they are ignorant of the measures Mr. President has put in place to ensure transparency in governance. I am not bothered about them and that is why I don’t talk about it because everybody knows that the allegations are malicious and, unfortunately, they don’t have the facts. I think the critics are day-dreaming and have personal interests. Some of them expected certain things from me and, when they were not available, then Orubebe is a bad man; it is very sad. But, as far as I am concerned, that concept of blackmailing people for personal gains is an old thing. That is an old concept. The new concept is doing things transparently and getting things done so that Nigeria can move forward.
Godsday Orubebe
The smear campaign is a cheap blackmail and I will not succumb. We are doing things transparently and we continue to do it despite the claims by this category of people. We cannot be intimidated, we are on course and we will get to where we are going. I think it is better that they begin to act as reasonable people and get their facts right before they come out to misinform the public.
If you say Elder Godsday Orubebe is that upright, why do you think they are after him?
I want to believe that some of them see me as a threat; some of them feel that with Elder Godsday Orubebe around, they would not be able to realize what they want to gain in life. Some of them have confronted me that I want to take leadership from them and I begin to wonder if leadership is just for some people. Leadership emerges through the will of God and I have never contested leadership with anybody.
The rumours are everywhere in Delta State that you are nursing governorship ambition in 2015.
I have told people who care to listen that, today, as far as I am concerned, my immediate concern is to work for Mr. President, support Mr. President to enable him deliver his Transformation Agenda. I stand as one of the key supporters of Mr. President, one of the key loyalists of Mr. President to do what he wants us to do to move Nigeria forward. As far as I am concerned, 2015 is still very far and it is in God’s hands. When we get to 2015, that is when other things will come up. When we get to 2015, I have the right to contest like any other Deltan but that is not in the agenda for now.
But you are being accused of declaring for governorship during your recent condolence visit to the family of a prominent Urhobo politician, Chief Lords Alams Barovbe, in Ovu, Ethiope East LGA.
Can any reasonable person ever believe that someone who wants to be a governor would go to a burial ceremony to declare his intention? It is absolute nonsense. I was there on condolence visit and we were talking about the activities of the man and that was how we ended. And so it was nonsense, it was cheap blackmail for anybody to say that. If I want to contest for governorship of Delta State, even if I want to contest in 2015 and I want to declare, number one, I would have made proper consultations and number two, when I am declaring, the entire state will gather at one place for me to declare and tell them.
But your leader, Chief Edwin Clark is one of the people who accused you and he even said you are not fit for the governorship of the state.
Chief Clark is entitled to his opinion but, fortunately, in the statement, he said he was told, he was not there. And so he must have acted from an uninformed position. I am sure some mischievous people that are always around looking for their daily bread must have carried that information to him. But, thank God, he said he was not there, he was informed. Number two, if I want to contest the governorship of Delta State in 2015, Chief Clark also knows that I have the capability to run for the governorship of Delta State, I am not barred by the constitution and I have support of people and nobody will stop me from running. He is free to support anybody but there are thousands and thousands of people who will also support me if I want to run in 2015.Are you of the opinion that the petition by some Delta leaders to the EFCC was rooted in the governorship issue in 2015?
I don’t want to talk about where they are coming from but, as far as I am concerned, it is absolute nonsense, baseless, it is unfounded and self-serving and they cannot smear my name. People of Delta State and people of this country that I have related with know that I am a man of integrity.
A section of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Burutu LGA of the state, where you and Clark hail from, recently announced your suspension from the party. What is your reaction?I am glad you said a section of the PDP. I think we have, today, a group that was put in place by Chief Clark and it is these people that went on air to say Orubebe is suspended but I don’t lose sleep over it because it is of no consequence.What is your relationship with Chief Edwin Clark now?
I don’t have any problem with Chief Edwin Clark. He is one of the leaders we have in Ijawland. Our relationship is very cordial.
But supporters of Chief Clark have openly said that you are an ingrate in view of the widespread belief that he recommended you for appointment as minister. Why are you ungrateful?
Chief Clark did not recommend me for appointment as minister, but he supported me when the battle over my appointment started. He was not the one who nominated me but he supported me when there was crisis over the appointment. I know the person who recommended me; at the appropriate time I will mention that name. I was recommended to the government by a young man, whose identity I will reveal at a later date. However, I have done everything humanly possible to carry Chief Clark along.What is your relationship with the leadership of the PDP in the state?
My relationship with the leadership of the PDP is very cordial. Peter Nwaoboshi is my state chairman; he is a very strong, great man, he is doing very well and I am supporting him and his entire executive so that we deliver PDP for all the elections in 2015. PDP is the only party we have in Delta State. I am very happy with our executives and the way they run the affairs of the party.How can you say that when Chief Clark accused you of instigating some members to drag the party to court?
How can I instigate people to take the party to court? That is the beauty of democracy, everybody has the opportunity to say whatever he wants to say. That is the beauty of democracy. If I have cause to go to court, it is me that would go. If people are aggrieved and they go to court, are they saying people don’t have any right to go to court to seek redress? If somebody is walking and stumbles on a wood, it is Orubebe; I think they should stop this nonsense. And I have told you that I am working with the state chairman of PDP to ensure that we deliver in all future elections.
Vanguard
I want to reason that, that is another level of madness exhibited by people who think the way they are, that is the way others are. Today, in this country, there is a process of doing things. There is a procurement law in place. So how do you pocket money? People talk out of ignorance. They don’t know what it takes to award a contract. As a minister, I don’t have the power to sit down in my office and call in Mr. A and say ‘I give you this contract’. It is advertised; so it sounds stupid, it exposes the ignorance of people who sit in their houses, offices and in the market places to say ministers are pocketing money. It is absolute nonsense.Is Elder Orubebe actually corrupt in view of the recent outcry by some Delta leaders and a group led by a former member of the House of Representatives, Mr. Dino Melaye, asking the EFCC to prosecute you over alleged corrupt practices? How do you feel about the allegations of corruption against you?
Elder Orubebe is not corrupt and cannot be corrupt. Dino Melaye came out that time and said I awarded contracts that were not in the budget, that I awarded contracts worth N27 billion and that I had paid the money and that I have pocketed the money. He said I awarded particularly one contract for N1.2 billion and then increased it to N12 billion and paid for it. I think Nigerians are cleverer now, they now understand what governance is, they understand the process of awarding contracts. Of course I came out and addressed a press conference. The man said N27billion but the contracts that were awarded were just N6 million; he said I had paid all the money, but the contractors were mobilized with only N990 million. At the time they were talking, we were owing the contractors and we were even talking to their bankers to let them know that we gave contracts to these people and the money was not available yet and that they should give them time to work.Are you bothered by the call on Mr. President to sack you from the cabinet?
I am not bothered because Nigerians, including Mr. President, know that these people are acting foolishly and they are ignorant of the measures Mr. President has put in place to ensure transparency in governance. I am not bothered about them and that is why I don’t talk about it because everybody knows that the allegations are malicious and, unfortunately, they don’t have the facts. I think the critics are day-dreaming and have personal interests. Some of them expected certain things from me and, when they were not available, then Orubebe is a bad man; it is very sad. But, as far as I am concerned, that concept of blackmailing people for personal gains is an old thing. That is an old concept. The new concept is doing things transparently and getting things done so that Nigeria can move forward.
Godsday Orubebe
The smear campaign is a cheap blackmail and I will not succumb. We are doing things transparently and we continue to do it despite the claims by this category of people. We cannot be intimidated, we are on course and we will get to where we are going. I think it is better that they begin to act as reasonable people and get their facts right before they come out to misinform the public.
If you say Elder Godsday Orubebe is that upright, why do you think they are after him?
I want to believe that some of them see me as a threat; some of them feel that with Elder Godsday Orubebe around, they would not be able to realize what they want to gain in life. Some of them have confronted me that I want to take leadership from them and I begin to wonder if leadership is just for some people. Leadership emerges through the will of God and I have never contested leadership with anybody.
The rumours are everywhere in Delta State that you are nursing governorship ambition in 2015.
I have told people who care to listen that, today, as far as I am concerned, my immediate concern is to work for Mr. President, support Mr. President to enable him deliver his Transformation Agenda. I stand as one of the key supporters of Mr. President, one of the key loyalists of Mr. President to do what he wants us to do to move Nigeria forward. As far as I am concerned, 2015 is still very far and it is in God’s hands. When we get to 2015, that is when other things will come up. When we get to 2015, I have the right to contest like any other Deltan but that is not in the agenda for now.
But you are being accused of declaring for governorship during your recent condolence visit to the family of a prominent Urhobo politician, Chief Lords Alams Barovbe, in Ovu, Ethiope East LGA.
Can any reasonable person ever believe that someone who wants to be a governor would go to a burial ceremony to declare his intention? It is absolute nonsense. I was there on condolence visit and we were talking about the activities of the man and that was how we ended. And so it was nonsense, it was cheap blackmail for anybody to say that. If I want to contest for governorship of Delta State, even if I want to contest in 2015 and I want to declare, number one, I would have made proper consultations and number two, when I am declaring, the entire state will gather at one place for me to declare and tell them.
But your leader, Chief Edwin Clark is one of the people who accused you and he even said you are not fit for the governorship of the state.
Chief Clark is entitled to his opinion but, fortunately, in the statement, he said he was told, he was not there. And so he must have acted from an uninformed position. I am sure some mischievous people that are always around looking for their daily bread must have carried that information to him. But, thank God, he said he was not there, he was informed. Number two, if I want to contest the governorship of Delta State in 2015, Chief Clark also knows that I have the capability to run for the governorship of Delta State, I am not barred by the constitution and I have support of people and nobody will stop me from running. He is free to support anybody but there are thousands and thousands of people who will also support me if I want to run in 2015.Are you of the opinion that the petition by some Delta leaders to the EFCC was rooted in the governorship issue in 2015?
I don’t want to talk about where they are coming from but, as far as I am concerned, it is absolute nonsense, baseless, it is unfounded and self-serving and they cannot smear my name. People of Delta State and people of this country that I have related with know that I am a man of integrity.
A section of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Burutu LGA of the state, where you and Clark hail from, recently announced your suspension from the party. What is your reaction?I am glad you said a section of the PDP. I think we have, today, a group that was put in place by Chief Clark and it is these people that went on air to say Orubebe is suspended but I don’t lose sleep over it because it is of no consequence.What is your relationship with Chief Edwin Clark now?
I don’t have any problem with Chief Edwin Clark. He is one of the leaders we have in Ijawland. Our relationship is very cordial.
But supporters of Chief Clark have openly said that you are an ingrate in view of the widespread belief that he recommended you for appointment as minister. Why are you ungrateful?
Chief Clark did not recommend me for appointment as minister, but he supported me when the battle over my appointment started. He was not the one who nominated me but he supported me when there was crisis over the appointment. I know the person who recommended me; at the appropriate time I will mention that name. I was recommended to the government by a young man, whose identity I will reveal at a later date. However, I have done everything humanly possible to carry Chief Clark along.What is your relationship with the leadership of the PDP in the state?
My relationship with the leadership of the PDP is very cordial. Peter Nwaoboshi is my state chairman; he is a very strong, great man, he is doing very well and I am supporting him and his entire executive so that we deliver PDP for all the elections in 2015. PDP is the only party we have in Delta State. I am very happy with our executives and the way they run the affairs of the party.How can you say that when Chief Clark accused you of instigating some members to drag the party to court?
How can I instigate people to take the party to court? That is the beauty of democracy, everybody has the opportunity to say whatever he wants to say. That is the beauty of democracy. If I have cause to go to court, it is me that would go. If people are aggrieved and they go to court, are they saying people don’t have any right to go to court to seek redress? If somebody is walking and stumbles on a wood, it is Orubebe; I think they should stop this nonsense. And I have told you that I am working with the state chairman of PDP to ensure that we deliver in all future elections.
Vanguard
R-E-V-E-A-L-E-D: ‘How Oyedepo, Onaiyekan, others tried to save Yar’Adua’
…Family warned to evacuate ex-president 3 weeks before death – PFN scribe
The late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua may not have died had the family heeded the advice to evacuate him from Aso Rock Presidential Villa, Abuja three weeks before he died.
National Secretary of Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN), Pastor Emmanuel Nuhu Kure, one of the four pastors who visited the Villa to pray for Yar’Adua at the height of his sickness in 2010, disclosed this at the weekend.
The three other pastors were Bishop David Oyedepo of the Living Faith World Outreach, aka Winners Chapel; Cardinal John Onaiyekan, the Catholic Bishop of Abuja; and erstwhile Aso Rock Chaplain, Prof. Yusuf Obaje. The pastors visited the seat of power for the prayer session after Yar’Adua was flown back from Saudi Arabia where he had been taken for treatment for an undisclosed illness.
Late President Yar’Adua
The PFN National Secretary said he told the Yar’Adua family at the meeting that there was the need to take the president out of Aso Rock within three weeks to keep him alive.
According to him, however, they shunned the advice as they were afraid that President Goodluck Jonathan, then vice president, would take over (power) if they took him out of the Villa immediately.
“Of course, I was not obeyed and exactly three weeks after that visit, he died”, Kure, based in Kafanchan, Kaduna State, but spoke to Sunday Vanguard in Lagos, last week, said.
Narrating what transpired at the prayer session for Yar’Adua, which he claimed lasted about 10 minutes, “sharp and straight to the point”, the PFN leader said: “When we went in there, they pulled me aside and said the reason you are here sir, go beyond that, can God show mercy? Can God change these things? It’s like deep inside of them, they felt he (Yar’Adua) might not survive. And they had the right to ask God for mercy. That was why they called in the Muslims and the Christians”.
He continued: “So I knew my own mission but I sensed things do not happen like that and I told them what would make him escape death. I told them privately. That is, me and them, it had nothing to do with the four (he and the other pastors). My reason for being called was slightly different from the other three. I think Oyedepo was called because of the miracles (he was performing) in the Living Faith Church. We were called in because they believed we have access to God and that we could pray some effective prayers that would help the matter.
‘Not politically convenient’
“I told them the Lord said that within three weeks they should take him out of the Villa to somewhere he’d be without pressure. That was the time the polity was heating up. I told them to take him away from there (Aso Rock) because while there within those three weeks, even if as much as one mosquito bite him, he would die. I told them I saw only three weeks. So if they had taken him out within those three weeks, maybe God would have shown mercy and given him some rest and added some time to his life.
“I don’t know how much, I’m not God. I’m just an oracle who spoke for that season. And the understanding I got later, I was told they couldn’t take him out because it was not politically convenient. They were afraid that Jonathan would take over if they took him out immediately. He kept him there to ensure that Jonathan did not take over even when it was to the detriment of his health. Maybe it was a tactical move; the wife had no say in the matter”.
Captivity
Exonerating the former president’s wife, Turai, from blame over the failure to move Yar’Adua from Aso Rock as advised, Kure said, “Nigerian politicians are very complicated and sophisticated people when they know their interests are at stake; they will use you to remain relevant. They will keep you there until they get what they want. I think she was also in captivity.
“Of course she would have wanted her husband to live; she would have wanted to remain the first lady naturally. Let’s not pretend about these things. Constitutionally it was not her call; it was the politicians’ call which was what the people in the National Assembly and Nigerians were making that, `let the constitution have its way’. It was a constitutional call, it was not her call”… FULL INTERVIEW NEXT WEEK!
Vanguard
The late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua may not have died had the family heeded the advice to evacuate him from Aso Rock Presidential Villa, Abuja three weeks before he died.
National Secretary of Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN), Pastor Emmanuel Nuhu Kure, one of the four pastors who visited the Villa to pray for Yar’Adua at the height of his sickness in 2010, disclosed this at the weekend.
The three other pastors were Bishop David Oyedepo of the Living Faith World Outreach, aka Winners Chapel; Cardinal John Onaiyekan, the Catholic Bishop of Abuja; and erstwhile Aso Rock Chaplain, Prof. Yusuf Obaje. The pastors visited the seat of power for the prayer session after Yar’Adua was flown back from Saudi Arabia where he had been taken for treatment for an undisclosed illness.
Late President Yar’Adua
The PFN National Secretary said he told the Yar’Adua family at the meeting that there was the need to take the president out of Aso Rock within three weeks to keep him alive.
According to him, however, they shunned the advice as they were afraid that President Goodluck Jonathan, then vice president, would take over (power) if they took him out of the Villa immediately.
“Of course, I was not obeyed and exactly three weeks after that visit, he died”, Kure, based in Kafanchan, Kaduna State, but spoke to Sunday Vanguard in Lagos, last week, said.
Narrating what transpired at the prayer session for Yar’Adua, which he claimed lasted about 10 minutes, “sharp and straight to the point”, the PFN leader said: “When we went in there, they pulled me aside and said the reason you are here sir, go beyond that, can God show mercy? Can God change these things? It’s like deep inside of them, they felt he (Yar’Adua) might not survive. And they had the right to ask God for mercy. That was why they called in the Muslims and the Christians”.
He continued: “So I knew my own mission but I sensed things do not happen like that and I told them what would make him escape death. I told them privately. That is, me and them, it had nothing to do with the four (he and the other pastors). My reason for being called was slightly different from the other three. I think Oyedepo was called because of the miracles (he was performing) in the Living Faith Church. We were called in because they believed we have access to God and that we could pray some effective prayers that would help the matter.
‘Not politically convenient’
“I told them the Lord said that within three weeks they should take him out of the Villa to somewhere he’d be without pressure. That was the time the polity was heating up. I told them to take him away from there (Aso Rock) because while there within those three weeks, even if as much as one mosquito bite him, he would die. I told them I saw only three weeks. So if they had taken him out within those three weeks, maybe God would have shown mercy and given him some rest and added some time to his life.
“I don’t know how much, I’m not God. I’m just an oracle who spoke for that season. And the understanding I got later, I was told they couldn’t take him out because it was not politically convenient. They were afraid that Jonathan would take over if they took him out immediately. He kept him there to ensure that Jonathan did not take over even when it was to the detriment of his health. Maybe it was a tactical move; the wife had no say in the matter”.
Captivity
Exonerating the former president’s wife, Turai, from blame over the failure to move Yar’Adua from Aso Rock as advised, Kure said, “Nigerian politicians are very complicated and sophisticated people when they know their interests are at stake; they will use you to remain relevant. They will keep you there until they get what they want. I think she was also in captivity.
“Of course she would have wanted her husband to live; she would have wanted to remain the first lady naturally. Let’s not pretend about these things. Constitutionally it was not her call; it was the politicians’ call which was what the people in the National Assembly and Nigerians were making that, `let the constitution have its way’. It was a constitutional call, it was not her call”… FULL INTERVIEW NEXT WEEK!
Vanguard
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)