Emergency: Condoms, narcotic drugs flood Boko Haram camps

Indications that Boko Haram insurgents who say they are against Western education and anything to do with the west, have been deceitful, emerged yesterday after troops found packs of condoms, used and unused, in their camps.

Also found were syringes and narcotic drugs believed to have been used by the insurgents to get high before embarking on their deadly attacks.

A statement by the Director, Defence Information, Brig-General Chris Olukolade entitled, ‘Life in Terrorists Camp: Condoms Everywhere’, reads, “More of the dirty sides of the insurgents’ life style are being revealed as troops continue to stumble on strange and bizarre objects such as several used and unused condoms as well as charms and amulets of various shapes seen in the captured terrorists’ camps.
“Other common items are syringes, test tubes and hand gloves usually found in the rubbles of most of the destroyed camps.

“Apart from chemicals and materials for producing Improvised Explosive Devices (IED) narcotics of all types are also found to be common features as troops combed through camps in Sambisa forest, New Marte, and others.

“Meanwhile, Defence Headquarters (DHQ) Assessment teams are in Yobe and Adamawa States to update the reports on the conduct of security operations in those states since deployment of troops in line with the State of Emergency.


“The outcome will also be presented for DHQ’s further strategic guidelines for the subsequent phase of the operations.

‘Video clips on civilian casualty is fake’
“The Defence Headquarters has noted the dissemination through the channels of Aljazeera Television reports alleging massive civilian casualties in the ongoing security operations.

“It wishes to point out that the video clip being shown on  the Aljazeera reports has no bearing whatsoever on the current reality in the operations areas.

“It is noted in particular that the footages being referred to as civilian casualties were actually pictures of the destruction perpetrated by the terrorists at the police stations and prisons in Bama, Borno State on 7 May 2013 when the insurgents attacked the town”.


Vanguard

The big rip-off: How petro marketers swindle motorists

Sharp practices in the downstream sector of the  Nigerian  petroleum industry have continued  to have a heavy toll on end users as many  fillings stations selling Premium Motor Spirit also known as  petrol  in the country have resorted to under-dispensing of the product.

The  nefarious activity perpetrated by petroleum marketers has gone unnoticed by many motorists  as they drive into the filling stations to  fill their tanks.

For every ten liters sold to a motorist, it is not unlikely that he drives  away with less than seven litres due to the adjusted meters by the filling stations. The implication is that the petroleum marketer gains  additional three  liters.


File photo: Long queue at a petrol filling station
According to findings, petroleum marketers make about N4 per litre on  a  truck  load of 33,000 liters as they buy around N93 per liter (depot price plus transportation cost)  to bring the cost of purchase to N3.069.000. When sold at the regulated price of N97 per liter,  actual profit will amount to N132, 000.

But to hike  their  profit margin, investigations revealed that the  marketers adjust their fuel pump meters. For instance, ten liters of fuel will cost N970 at the rate of N97 per liter. But with the adjusted meter, motorists  pay the actual price (N970) but drives  away  with  about six   liters which amounts to N582. So there is a difference of N388 which has fraudulently gone to the purse of oil marketers.

To magnify the  marketers smooth operation, multiply N388 by the average of  10 million under-dispensed litres out of the  30 million litres of petrol  consumed daily in the country and what you get is N3.8 billion loss to motorists.

Nigeria’s petroleum regulator, Department of Petroleum Resources, DPR,saddled with the responsibility of regulating, monitoring  and enforcing the  laws in the sector, used the Seraphin Can to expose  filling stations  involved in the nefarious act in Lagos recently.

The ten-liter Seraphin Can is used by the  DPR to ascertain the exact dispensing meter measurement of filling stations. When filled to the level of ten liters, dispensing meters  that have  been adjusted will show above ten liters on the display board. When this occurs, the filling station is shut  by DPR officials.

DPR said over 500 filling stations had  been shut  for under-dispensing and other related offences.

According to the regulatory body, other offences committed by filling stations include compromise of safety standards and lack of proper storage facilities.

The DPR Manager, Downstream, Lagos Zone, Mr. Kunle Soyebo, said the purpose of the recent monitoring which yielded the filling stations under-dispensing  was to ensure strict adherence to rules and regulations in the downstream sector.

“The exercise, which you have just witnessed, is carried out by our men twice every week. Any filling station operator that fails to comply with rules and regulation will have his licence revoked,” Soyebo said.

“For the affected stations, we have issued them letters to report to our office and,  if they fail to show up, their licences will be revoked. So far, we have been able to shut over 500 filling stations across the country. These stations will remain shut until they comply with our rules and regulations.”

During the exercise, it was,  however, discovered that there are some good guys in the business who adhere to the rules on the dispensing of petroleum products. Major oil marketers were not found wanting as they maintained  a clean sheet in their operations while their names were engraved in the good books  of the DPR



Vanguard

20 YEARS AFTER JUNE 12 (1): What transpired inside Aso Rock just before annulment – Tonnie Iredia, NEC Spokesman

Is it not amazing and amusing that 20years after the annulment of the June 12, 1993, presidential election, leaders of Nigeria’s Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, last week, engineered the annulment of the chairmanship election of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, NGF?  In 1993, Bashorun MKO Abiola of the Social Democratic Party, SDP, defeated Bashir Tofa of the National Republican Convention, NRC, but the announcement of the results was ordered suspended by an Abuja High Court (which the law had barred from entertaining the suit). This is Nigeria where anything can and, thus, happen!

The June 12 presidential election remains the freest and fairest in the history of Nigeria. But it was annulled 20years ago this month.  In the build-up to this two-part series, a few Nigerians spoken to insisted that the country has moved on.  Indeed, that is true; but the country has merely moved on in the wrong direction on a faulty premise (Read main story).

In this first major interview with Tonnie Iredia, the Director of Public Affairs for the National Electoral Commission, NEC, since those dark days, he makes some startling revelations. And because it is vintage Iredia, you would observe the ease with which he tries to make sense in the simplest of ways, of issues that may appear at once complex and complicated. This was not the first meeting with Iredia.

Sometime in September 1987, a young-looking man, neatly dressed, walked out of the Office of the Chairman, National Electoral Commission, NEC, Professor Eme Awa.  It was the first time we (political correspondents attached to the beat made up of the late Chris Imodibe and Al-Bishak, The Guardian; Gboyega Amoboye and Kolawole Ojelabi, National Concord; Anene Ugoani, Daily Times; Dipo Onabanjo, Punch; Comrade Dangana, New Nigerian; Jide Ajani, The Republic; among others) were having a meeting with him and one of the first arguments was why NEC and not NECO should be the acronym of the National Electoral Commission.

This was at the old Senate Building, Tafawa Balewa Square, Race Course, Lagos.  His argument was about the need for credibility in the process because the ‘CO’ part of the acronym had a lot to do with FEDECO (the Federal Electoral Commission) of old which was the bye-word for manipulation and fraud. Penultimate week in Abuja, Iredia, who is a trained lawyer and  a PhD holder, explained what went down at the NEC headquarters between June 10, 1993 and the days following the election.  This is just the first part. Excerpts:

Let us start on this note. June 12, 1993 presidential election was annulled.  You were the Director of Public Affairs for the then National Electoral Commission, NEC.  Some people have said there was a hidden agenda.  This month marks 20 years after that event.  What would be your first shot?

I believe that there was a hidden agenda behind June 12.  I don’t know who had that agenda.  But I will not exonerate government because of vicarious liability and you must take both the blame and credit for whatever happened in your administration.  There were things that make me feel that there was really a hidden agenda and a lot of people had an interest in that military government continuing in office in perpetuity.


In this course of investigating this story and speaking to a lot of insiders, I gathered that NEC officials had gone to Aso Rock Presidential Villa on Thursday, June 10, 1993, to brief members of the Transitional Council on preparations for the election and that an altercation occurred that was  later to make sense.  When we went to brief the transitional administration at that time, one of the very senior members of government first made a side talk that almost turned into something else by asking what we were really in the Villa for. And we said we came to brief government on the preparations for the election of the day after tomorrow. And he said, ‘oh, is there going to be an election’? At the point this interrogation went on, we thought it was a joke.

Did this make any sense to you at that time?
No! It was as if some people in government just wanted to be sure, but with what happened later that night, it became clearer what had transpired earlier in the day.

This was in the morning of Thursday, June 10, 1993?
Yes!  It became clear that some people in government had a fore knowledge about what would later happen that night; because I no longer took that to be a joke after the events that happened later in the day. (An Abuja High Court ordered that the election should not hold and the judgment was delivered by Justice Ikpeme, a lady, at 9:35pm, less than 36hours to the election; the commission, however, went ahead to organize the election based on backing from the government of the day).

The election was on Saturday, June 12, the next day (after the election), the government newspaper of the time, the New Nigerian, wrote an editorial and what the newspaper said  was what the other side of the argument had been saying but, more importantly, the newspaper accused the electoral commission of going ahead with the election when it knew that members of the public had been confused about the election holding or not.

In any case, it further said the commission should have enlightened Nigerians very well that the election was still going to hold. But I find that very funny because one of the things that nobody would  not take away from that commission was effective publicity. Some people were even accusing Nwosu of being too publicity conscious and, if anything, maybe there was something that the government wanted the commission to do but which it was not told.

Up until the month of June (1993), Nigerians remained long-suffering despite the shifting of the terminal date for the transition programme.  Most people have their versions of what happened.  You were in NEC.  There was this body called the Association for Better Nigeria, ABN, led by Arthur Nzeribe and one Abimbola Davies, which was conducting its affairs in a manner meant to injure NEC.  Did the commission make any move to government to say ‘please intervene in what these people are doing?’

Well, we didn’t think that the goal of ABN was to injure the electoral commission even though if they were to succeed, the injury on us would be indirect in terms of our image.  The intention was to destabilize the transition programme which was dearer to the government than even NEC. So, if the government in power was going to allow a group, by whatever name called, to destabilize its programme, then it would be foolhardy for an electoral body to say ‘we are not going to allow you injure our image’.

Because this was going to be more than an election, it was about the entire programme that the group was angling to injure.  The late Augustus Aikhomu, who was then Vice President, did issue a statement that the transition programme did not have a hidden agenda; that the government was going to keep its promise; they kept telling us not to lose faith, not to listen to rumours.  Government made several pronouncements and that gave us the impression that government was honest and sincere and that, in the event of a legal battle, these people were going to lose.

In retrospect, would you agree that NEC should have placed it on record that it approached government and warned government of the implications of the activities of the ABN, especially since the transition decree spelt out punishment for saboteurs of the programme?

All that you’ve said was for government. For us in the commission at that time, we were sure of one thing, that the efforts of the ABN could not stop us.  And you see, the laws setting us up made it very clear that ‘NOTHING’ could stop us.  You can do whatever you like – you can sue us, take us to court, obtain injunctions and what have you – but we were not going to stop what we were doing because we did not see any challenge or any obstacle in that way.  We would have preferred that there was peace and no distractions. We didn’t see the need to go and start fighting ABN since ABN had been put in a state that it could not stop us and, indeed, it could not stop us.

Now to that judgment on the night of Thursday, June 10, 1993!  The judgment was delivered at 9:35pm and, judging by the schedule of work just two days to the election, you would have still been in the office.  What was the first reaction when you heard the judgment?

The first reaction really was that we thought it was a joke. Nobody in the commission believed that there was any such judgment.

Especially at 9:35pm?
Yes, at 9:35pm.The day had ended and, if the court was going to do anything, it would have to be the following day.

So, where exactly were most officers of the commission at that time?
Some of us were still in the office, some were at home, some were in the hotels and we started calling one another and the general response was ‘please come off it’, ‘which type of joke is that?’, ‘which court’? We all thought it was a joke until the following morning when we saw the papers and the press was abuzz with the judgment. It didn’t make sense to us.

What did Professor Nwosu, your chairman, do?
He put a call across to Aso Rock and we were told that we should just continue with our work. So, the chairman called a press conference and announced that NEC was going ahead and that nothing was going to stop us.

Couldn’t the commission have gone to court that Friday to obtain an injunction?

Well, that position was canvassed by some people in the commission. But, at that point, there was a legal advice which was quite persuasive. It was a judgment delivered by Justice Oguntade, an outstanding Nigerian judge.  Some people had sought to stop us from conducting an election earlier and Oguntade said the decision of the court stopping us was illegal; that the law setting us up had made that clear; and he also said that such a judgment was in vain and that the commission was free to ignore that judgment and that the commission even had no business going on appeal.



That judgment was read to us and we were convinced that we had no business appealing the judgment and that the commission could just go about its business. So, with that, we didn’t have any business finding out about what the rule of law said more so since the government itself had given assurances that we should just go ahead. Some times when people talk about rule of law under a military, some of us laugh.  What is rule of law when military makes bad laws?  In law, a bad law is a retrospective law.  A bad law is a law that targets individuals which the military was very good at.

That election held and held well.  But we’ve never had that type of peaceful elections again.  What conditions made it possible to have that type of ambience?

We must give that credit to the military.  But the other side of it is that military-organised elections are no elections because people are virtually cowed into doing what they do.  The militarization is such that you begin to wonder whether you were actually holding an election. Professor Nwabueze, the learned legal luminary, drew attention to the fact that in 1993 alone, over 103 decrees were promulgated to regulate elections. You can imagine that with such number of decrees, nobody really knew whether we were doing elections or not.

That election was free and fair to the extent that the kind of things that people were able to stomach was just so that the military should go such that Nigerians conditioned themselves to tolerate the plethora of decrees regulating elections – like disqualifying people in the morning and bringing them back with another decree in the evening.  People accepted the things that they would not accept today because they wanted the military to go.

But we must also be fair that the Nwosu team was quite knowledgeable, was quite articulate, and the plans were very, very detailed.  And then there was this inter-governmental agency set up just for the election in which everybody put all hands on deck. I want to believe that it would take a long while to have that type of election again if ever we do.

The election held but the Chief Judge of Abuja ordered NEC to stop announcing the results. Now, why did NEC, which claimed that the laws setting it up forbade it from obeying the court, turn round to obey the fresh order? What happened?


Wonderful!  This question had been asked before but let me tell you that people did not understand what transpired. The first judgment issued by Justice Ikpeme was disobeyed by the electoral commission with the active support of the government.  The government itself came up with a statement that it was going ahead with the election and, therefore, the commission had the government of the day behind it.

But there was this argument put forward by our legal department that, as of that day, the statute, case law, had been put down by Oguntade and we did not have any business obeying a court that had been disallowed from stopping us; that we didn’t have any business going on appeal because the previous judgment had shown that we had no business obeying it; and the mood of the nation was such that the election had to hold.Therefore when the chairman came out to say the election would be held, there was jubilation and the mood of the nation was one of relief. Then the second judgment came.

Sorry, before that second judgment given by the Chief Judge of Abuja, Dahiru Saleh, did you not see any signs to show that something untoward could happen?

Good.  I, as Director of Public Affairs of the commission, brought some innovations, one of which was that the results were to be mounted on a scoreboard outside the commission’s building but within its compound so that people who were just passing by on the street would be updated with the latest and we were supposed to be displaying these results as and when they were certified to be correct, counted; and collated and the agents agreeing and affirming the authenticity of the results, we would go ahead and put on the scoreboard. After about eight of the results from the states had been put on the scoreboard, I was called into the office of the chairman and was told to go and remove the scoreboard.  I became shocked when I heard this.

This was before the second judgment ordering NEC to stop?
Yes! The second judgment had not come.  I was told to go and remove it, that there was no need to display inchoate results because it was not good to start telling people who was leading when the whole results had not been received.  I didn’t know if this was a new thinking by members of the commission or whether it was the political parties themselves who wanted this.

Today, many people blame the military but it was the political parties that instigated most of the things the military did.  It was the politicians themselves who went to the military to complain that the primaries they conducted, to determine who their candidates would be, was fraught with irregularities and dangers and that the process should be canceled.  By the time the then military president came out to disqualify the candidates, people said the military didn’t want to go. Meanwhile, it was these same candidates who went and complained that their own primaries were  useless and that  they should be canceled.

I suspect that it was these same politicians who came up with the idea that we should stop announcing the results on the scoreboard. For the first time, the directive instructing me not to display the results was not rational; it wasn’t like the directives I usually got.  The persons telling me to stop didn’t even look persuaded and persuasive enough about the instruction.  It was as if something negative was in the air because we had announced the governorship election results in the same way, so what was the big deal?

Was this instruction from Professor Nwosu, your chairman?
I think it was from the election committee, which had  the chairman, the chief returning officer, the resident electoral commissioners,  national commissioners and the representatives of the two political parties.  They were all there.  They said we should stop displaying the results.  At that point, I lost hope in the process; so when just later, a court ruled that we should stop announcing results, it looked as if it was a script.  I didn’t know how others felt but I became disillusioned because we had done our best and one of the innovations was this result announcement on the spot.

So, if it had been announced on the spot where the result, was counted and collated and I received it in the headquarters, why shouldn’t I display it for Nigerians? That put me off. Back to the question of the court judgment that we obeyed!  There was no meeting at which the decision to obey was made and, if there was any such meeting, I wasn’t there.  Most decisions at that time were unanimous.  Though I wasn’t a member of the commission, I was a staff, a director, but I was always privy to decisions and events that influenced such decisions so that, in making public statements, I would be seen to be credible and on top of the matter; so when the decision was made, I wasn’t in the picture whether it was a one-man decision or the committee agreed.

And there was nothing to suggest that this was coming while the commission prepared for the election? And then the second judgment came stopping the announcement of the results and the commission obeyed?

I was able to understand why the commission obeyed because something that was present when the commission disobeyed in the first instance was no longer present by the time the second judgment came.  It was the government of the day. In fact, the judgment by Dahiru Saleh was that he was going to issue a court warrant to arrest Nwosu and his principal officers for disobeying the Ikpeme judgment.

The first order was an order that was inanimate; the second one was personal on Nwosu and his principal officers, to show cause why they should not be jailed for contempt. Personal liberty was now involved; it was no longer just an order for the organization.  Now it was clear that there was personal danger.  We could not revert to government again.

Why?
You won’t believe that the warrant and judgment by Saleh was served on us by the then Attorney General, Clement Akpamgbo; so, there was actually nobody to run to because the Attorney General would have been the one we could have approached but here we were, he was the one who served it on us and I remember what he told the chairman. He told the chairman that if you disobey, then you are on your own; and so we knew that any disobedience was at our own peril.


Vanguard

Cheque printing: Accredited firms may not meet local demand

There are indications that the recent decision by the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, to accredit only two local firms to print 300 million cheques and other security paper instruments for the  22 banks in the country may  not be  the  best  economically due to lack of capacity by the firms to meet the demand of banks.

The CBN,  in collaboration with the MICR Technical Implementation Committee,  conducted the accreditation and re-accreditation exercise of cheque printers in Nigeria in line with the Nigeria Cheque Printers’ Accreditation scheme qualification criteria. At the end of the exercise,  only two local printers were selected.

Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Plc was curiously  delisted at the end of  the accreditation and re-accreditation exercise.

Prior to the circular (BPS/DIR/CIR/04/2013) to “Deposit Money Banks, Cheque Printers and other Stakeholders on the the Accreditation of Cheque Printers for 2013/14”, signed by Dipo Fatokun, Director, Banking and Payments System Department of CBN, dated May 9, 2013, findings  revealed that the accredited firms  printed only a fraction of cheques used by banks in the country.

Security printing firms print cheques, certificates, and other valuable documents. Until the new regime, a significant percentage of such printers were foreign-based. Businesses in the country were executed via their intermediaries, known as brokers.

Stakeholders in the sector believed that the implication of the apex bank’s decision will be chaos  economically, citing the  capacity  of the accredited firms to  meet the demands of the  banks.

Delisting 13 firms with the exclusion of foreign printing firms by the CBN, according to findings, has increased the production burden of the accredited firms to print cheques and other security paper instruments.

The  CBN, in the circular, stated that the reason behind the non- re-accreditation of foreign based printers  was in line with the bank’s policy to domesticate cheque printing in Nigeria, adding that all banks are,  by the circular, reminded to patronise only the CBN accredited cheque printers.

Some stakeholders, who spoke on the condition of anonymity,  said the CBN’s policy to domesticate cheque printing in the country is a welcome development.

“It is a welcome development to domesticate cheque printing in the country because it will lead to healthy competition and a reduction of prices as seen in other sectors of the economy.  However, foreign printers should be allowed to build a strong customer base because they are willing to invest in Nigeria, but insecurity, lack of stable power supply may hinder them to come in and invest,” a stakeholder said.

“I am sure that these investors (delisted printers)will require extension of time-line that will enable  them initiate their projects for  local production.

“Putting the printing of cheques and other security document in the hands of two printing firms to meet the demands of all the banks in the country will only take us back to the early days of banking when customers will have to wait for as long of six months or more before they can receive their cheque order. ”

The delisted foreign printers include: Kalamzoo Secure Solutions Ltd, Birmingham, England; Security Print Solution, UK; CFH Total Document Mgt Ltd, England: Smith and Ouzman Ltd, England; Tall Security Print Ltd, England; A1 Trade  Print Services, England; Papi Pinting Coy Ltd, UK; Corrinum Continous Ltd, UK; Euphoria Comm. Ltd, UK; and DLRS Group, Ireland. Others are Camelot Ghana Ltd, Accra, Ghana; and Shave and Gibson Group based in South Africa.

It would be recalled that the apex bank initiated NICAPS as part of the Federal Government’s local content enhancement policy, to  stimulate indigenous entrepreneurship.



Vanguard

How Amaechi ignited crisis in NGF, by Jang, Mimiko, Obi, Imoke

Factional chairman of the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF), Governor Jonah Jang of Plateau State, and three other members of his group – Governors Olusegun Mimiko (Ondo), Peter Obi (Anambra) and Liyel Imoke (Cross River) – are blaming the Chairman of the rival group, Governor Rotimi Amaechi, of igniting the crisis in the Forum.

They alleged that Amaechi insisted on going for second term as the NGF chairman in the name of an “unknown constitution”, and contrary to the Forum’s convention stipulating one term only for the incumbent chairman.

The four governors spoke at a press conference in Abuja, yesterday.

Jang, who alleged  that Amaechi as Chairman of the NGF, turned himself into a dictator, stressed that there was never anywhere in the Forum’s constitution that a Chairman could be re-elected.

The Plateau governor explained that there was no time governors met to ratify the constitution, adding that the only time they parleyed on the issue was when Vice President Namadi Sambo was still the governor of Kaduna State, insisting the constitution was never ratified to accommodate a sitting Chairman re-contesting, “contrary to what Amaechi was propagating”.


The governor said, “Amaechi virtually became a dictator, dictating everything. He brought in a constitution that many of us had never seen or aware of. The only time we looked into the constitution was when Namadi Sambo was still there and there was nowhere that says a sitting Chairman could be re-elected. The constitution was never ratified.”

Describing the video coverage of the election as improper, the factional NGF chairman said, “We have never called journalists to video our proceedings; if it is Amaechi that planted the camera, it is morally corrupt”.

When asked why the Forum had not intervened in the suspension of the Rivers  governor from the PDP, Jang, who noted that the matter was not the business of NGF, but, that of  the PDP Governors Forum, said that Amaechi had not formally reported the matter to the NGF.

Speaking on how elections had been conducted by the NGF since 1999, the Cross River governor,  Imoke, who explained that the elections had always been by consensus, said the reason was to avoid acrimony that would otherwise emanate after election.

Imoke said, “It is a consensus between the North and South that it will be one term. For the 14 years of the existence of the NGF, there has never been an election. The reason  we agreed on consensus is because it will be divisive.

Mimiko,. who expressed worry over the unfolding scenario, said that not one governor would say he was very proud of what happened at the Forum.

The Ondo governor blamed  the Rivers governor for the development, saying he (mimiko) did not vote during the election, but  that 18 governors endorsed Jang for the chairmanship position.  He added that the day after the election, 18 members reported when Jang called for a meeting.

According to him, Amaechi, notwith-standing that he was a contender in the poll,  took over everything, including the printing of the ballot papers and procurement of ballot boxes which, according to him, was against the principle of democratic practice.  He stated that had the governors in opposition to Amaechi walked out during the election, which was one of the options, Nigerians would have misconstrued it to mean another thing, adding that the other option was for them to smash the ballot box.

He challenged whoever carried out the video coverage during the election to show the total clips.  Mimiko described the NGF as a voluntary association any governor could decide to leave anytime.

According to him, the best thing to do before the election was for Amaechi to step down  for  somebody else to preside over the election, but Amaechi “insisted that he will not vacate the seat before the election”.

S/East govs endorsed me – Obi
Obi said South-east governors had endorsed him for the governors forum chair before Amaechi was picked for the position in 2011, adding that he lost the position  because he was not from PDP.

A letter, signed by his colleagues from the four other South-Easter states: Theodore Orji, Martins Elechi, Sullivan Chime and Ohakim, with reference number SEGF/S/GOVS/INT/1/022 and addressed to Saraki, who was then Chairman of NGF, with the heading “nomination of Mr. Peter Obi”, said, “We, the governors of the South-east of Nigeria wish to respectfully nominate Mr. Peter Obi, Governor of Anambra state of Nigeria as a candidate for the position of Chairman, Nigerian Governors Forum.

”Our action in this regard is unanimous as a zone and is borne of our firm conviction that he will discharge the functions of this office with credibility, dedication and due diligence”.

The Anambra governor said he was surprised that the meeting, which was supposed to be a valedictory session for the former Kwara governor and NGF Chairman, was turned to an election event, where Amaechi emerged as Saraki’s successor, adding that he was then begged to accept the position of Vice Chairman.

He described the Forum as an association that is not recognised by the Nigeria constitution, adding that the NGF was a trouble for him when he was Vice Chairman.

Meanwhile, Saraki, yesterday, faulted Obi over the claim that the South-east governors endorsed him for the NGF chair before Amaechi was suddenly picked for the position in 2011, saying  the Anambra governor was rejected.

The former Kwara State governor, who explained that Obi was rejected because he was not a member of majority party, stressed  that there was no trade off, as it was the convention that the party with the majority governors should produce the chairman of the NGF and he was not in the party.



Vanguard

2015: North shuns Jonathan’s peace moves

*Tells emissary: ‘He should look for re-election help elsewhere’
*Atiku faults automatic ticket bid


The moves launched by President Goodluck Jonathan to get northern leaders to support him ahead of the 2015 presidential election appear to have failed, Sunday Vanguard has learnt. One of the moves was the emissary sent to the Northern Elders Forum (NEF) at a meeting in Abuja.

The northern leaders were said to have told the emissary, a senior presidential aide, point-blank, they would rather prod one of their own to stand against the president in the next elections.

Jonathan, it was gathered, on Thursday, sent the senior aide to persuade the influential northern group to back down on attacking him and to, once again, support him to return in 2015.

The presidential aide, according to Sunday Vanguard sources, met with an NEF delegation of three at a guest house in Jabi, Abuja and tried for about two hours to extract assurance of support from the group.

Two former ministers from the North and a former adviser to erstwhile President Olusegun Obasanjo allegedly represented NEF at the meeting.



The emissary reportedly assured the NEF delegation that the Presidency would take urgent steps to correct perceived imbalances in the polity, which the northerners were complaining about, and the threat by ex-militant, Asari Dokubo, who recently vowed to attack anyone who stood in the way of Jonathan’s re-election.

The northern leaders were said to have pointedly rejected any appeasement from the Presidency, asking the aide to tell Jonathan that they were not interested in working with him anymore.

“We met with a man sent to us by the president and we told him our mind because we feel that there is no need to continue to deny the fact that we are opposed to Jonathan running again in 2015,”one of the sources, present at the meeting, said.

“We have seen enough of Jonathan in the last four years or so. We do not believe that there is any more magic he will bring to salvage Nigeria.

“We made it clear to the emissary that if we continued to support him beyond 2015, Nigeria would be thrown into more corruption, insecurity, poverty and misery in the midst of rising oil revenue.

“We also told the man sent by the president that his actions and utterances are pro-Ijaw and that he could seek new allies from other parts of the  country to actualise his political ambition in the next polls.”

In the meantime, NEF Secretary, Prof Ango Abdullahi, has faulted the recommendation by Chief Tony Anenih, the Chairman of the Board of Trustees (BoT) of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which seeks to give automatic ticket to Jonathan and first term governors of the party.

Abdullahi said the move was not only undemocratic but was also in violation of the party’s constitution, which provides for primary election.

Describing the postulation as a desperate move to edge out other presidential aspirants of the PDP in the run-up to 2015, the former ABU Vice Chancellor asked the party faithful to reject such dictatorial proposal.


Vanguard

Hunger Hits Boko Haram Members: 56 Insurgents Caught While Searching For Food

Military authorities in Borno State they had arrested a group of 56 terrorists that were moving from village to village in search of food, following a tip off from civilians.



Some member of the group, according to the Director of Defence Information, Brigadier-General Chris Olukolade, who were moving around in a Toyota Land Cruiser Jeep with registration number Borno XA 428 ADM, suspected to have been stolen, were arrested at Daban Masara village while looking for food.

Weapons found in their possession included AK-47 rifles, single-barrel shotgun, double-hand shotgun and various calibres of arms.

Other items recovered from the group included seven packs of Improvised Explosive Devices (IED), two rocket-propelled gun chargers, two machetes, bomb detonators, camouflage and other military uniforms. They were also with charms, seven vehicles and eight tricycles.

Olukolade said that it was believed that some stranded terrorists were keen on establishing new camps. According to him, most of them are currently in search of food, and are being trailed by military operatives.

The defence spokesman also disclosed that there were a few encounters with some insurgents in forest locations, apart from the identified and destroyed camps.

He said that the intensive cordon and search operation being conducted by the troops of the Special Forces received a major boost from civilian cooperation in communities close to locations being focused in the operation.


Tribune