Infrastructure

The Foolish Jonathan Presidency

/ Adeola / 3 Comments

By Adeola Aderounmu

Instead of arresting corrupt Nigerians and retrieving the stolen wealth of Nigeria, Mr. Jonathan preferred to remove the (alleged, non-existent) fuel subsidy and thereby ensuring that Nigerians are further demoted down. This means that Nigerians will now be forced to survive on even less than USD1 per day.

Already there are Nigerians who have no form of material comfort. No work, no money, no social and health security.

Some, several millions to be sure, have no form of income and no hope for the next hour.

Unemployment and hopelessness are ways of life of over 40m Nigerians.

Over 90m Nigerians are unsure of the next meal.

Words are never going to be enough to repeat that the situation in Nigeria ranks among the worst human tragedies of this era. This is largely underreported.

It is sad because as one of the richest countries in the world, it is ironic that Nigerians rank among the poorest people alive. The situation in Nigeria raises a lot of issues concerning the intelligence of the black race.

Yet rather than confront the issues, Mr. Jonathan pushed them aside and hinged the resuscitation of Nigeria on the fuel subsidy. Okonjo Iweala is a disgrace to the intelligence of the black race for championing this cause.

Can Jonathan and Iweala frankly face Nigerians and tell them that removal of fuel subsidy is the solution to the problems facing Nigeria? This collective daftness should be challenged and Nigerians will be slaves forever in their own country if they allow this fuel subsidy removal to stay. It must not, even Iweala and Jonathan should be carefully probed among the corrupt Nigerians who have destroyed the Nigerian economy.

I make bold to question Iweala on the recovered Abacha’s loot. She was the finance Minister when the Swiss Government returned parts of the monies that Abacha looted. Where is the money?

Jonathan should also be reminded that his wife is among the thieves who have looted the Nigerian treasury. She could only have done that with the consent of Jonathan himself. Jonathan and his legacy in Bayelsa leave much to be desired. He has no track record to show for any positive performance in government. Nigerians are in the hands of fraudsters!

The economy of Nigeria cannot get better by removal of fuel subsidy. It will get better when Jonathan and the PDP looters stop looting the treasury.

The economy of Nigeria will get better when true federalism is re-introduced and power taken away from the corrupt Aso Rock.

The economy of Nigeria will improve if all the people who stole monies meant for national development are prosecuted and made to return the monies they stole.

The money that have been stolen from Nigeria is several trillions of naira which make Jonathan and Iweala’s argument a foolish one.

These fools cannot fight corruption because they are part of it.

Nigerians should never, never allow them to get away with this madness.

A protester gunned down by the government of Jonathan, Jan 3 2012

A protester gunned down by the government of Jonathan, Jan 3 2012

Jonathan is showing his true colour. Nigerians are now faced with bullets and at least 2 people have been reported killed by the Jonathan government.

The people have the right to protest against the increase in the price of fuel. Transport cost has increased to over 100% more. In some place to over 300%. The price of everything has gone up and Nigerians earn N18 000 minimum wage, which is even yet to be implemented.

This government is EVIL and it must be STOPPED by all or any means possible.

The War on Fuel Subsidy: Isn’t It Time for Jonathan To Get Out of the Way?

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By Adeola Aderounmu

By removing subsidy Mr. Jonathan and Mrs. Iweala are trying to save N1 000 000 000 000 but together with others before them they have all stolen more than N60 800 000 000 000. Is it not wiser to try to recover the stolen monies by fighting corruption TOTALLY? So much for Iweala’s Havard Education and IMF employment.

If Jonathan and PDP remain in 2012, I won’t recover from the shock..!

Nigerians should resist by any/all possible means the proposed removal of the subsidy on petroleum products.

If the pump price of petrol hits N140/per liter Nigerians have a duty and the obligation to make the country ungovernable for Mr. Jonathan. Since Nigerians insisted in April 2011 that they voted for Jonathan and not the PDP, then a moral obligation here is to ensure that they remove the evil they accidentally or stupidly voted for.

At that time, Nigerians should demand for the sack of Ngozi Iweala. This is the same woman who in connivance with Obasanjo ensured that Abacha’s loots disappeared into thin air. Now she is the champion for the removal of subsidy.

No Nigerian politician or Minister will be affected by this policy because they steal and loot as they like. Instead it the people who are already poor that will become poorer. More than 90m Nigerians live from hand-to-mouth, mostly on less than 2 dollars / day.

Already since many years now, many civil servants don’t go to work daily because of insecurity and the cost of transportation. With the removal of subsidy the cost of transportation will be one of the highest in the world on some of the world’s worst roads!

When the cost of transportation increases, the cost of food will increase and hunger will become more rampant. A spiral effect will ensure and the cost of housing increases. In a country where unemployment is a way of life, crime will increase and insecurity will reach an unprecedented height.

And the thieves in Aso rock and other government houses will continue to merry and loot. This is probably the last chance for the Nigerian revolution!

It is time for the people to seize their regions and stop this homage to Abuja. For the government that has always denied the people an open referendum for how to lead their lives, there will probably be no better opportunity for self-determination than now.

Jonathan as a typical corrupt Nigerian politician has refused to confront the hydra-headed problem which itself is corruption. If you are corrupt or you have skeletons in you cupboards, then it is clear you cannot fight corruption.

The same goes for Mrs. Iweala and the zeal with which she is pursuing this evil agenda.

Otherwise all the corrupt people in NNPC should have been prosecuted by now. All the corruption around the Nigerian oil should have been tackled by now. Jonathan came to power in April 2011 and it is business as usual.

Instead of rolling out a blue print for Agriculture and how our mineral sources (including Uranium) will be used in 2012, Mr. Jonathan and Mrs Iweala are reading out riots acts. Jonathan stated that he is ready to confront the demonstrations that will follow.

It appears that N921.9 billion for “war” in the 2012 budget was not only for BOKO HARAM war. Part of it will be used to fight the people and kill the voters if possible. The evil in PDP will be manifested more than ever before in 2012.

Iweala and Jonathan want to save N1 Trillion. I challenged both to them to prosecute all the corrupt politicians in Nigeria, they will emerge with more than N60 Trillion.

They can start with the USD12 billion that Babangida cannot account for. They can then proceed to the N16 billion that melted away under Obasanjo while pretending to be fixing the power problem.

Even Abacha’s loot should be retraced and Iweala can tell us what exactly happened to the recovered loot. What she must not say this time is the lie she told a few years ago: that the money was used to execute projects that pre-dated the recovered loot.

In several ways and through several avenues, Nigeria can recover billions of dollars of stolen funds that will make the proposed removal of fuel subsidy a useless adventure.

In that sense Nigeria needs strong men who can take actions and prosecute thieves and loots. We are tired of weak men and weak women like Mr. Jonathan and Mrs. Iweala.

Nigerians have only one major obligation in 2012, to end the PDP Regime in any way they can as a way forward..!

Governor Fashola Finally Makes His Presence Known at Festac Grammar School

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by ADEOLA ADEROUNMU

The Lagos State Government has finally sent one of its building contractors Access-1 Energy and Trading Company to start re-construction work at Festac Grammar School.

LASG awards contract for Reconstruction work at Festac Grammar School

LASG awards contract for Reconstruction work at Festac Grammar School

For those who have not been following the story. Here are links to the story so far:

Governor Fashola, Festac Grammar School Ti Baje o..!

Festac Grammar School Vs Lagos State Government

Photo Essay: Festac Grammar School Alumni Projects’ Management Group Is Working

In April when this struggle started I had written that one of the greatest mysteries of Lagos State Ministry of Education is how a school that got the first prototype one storey-structure in the old Ojo Local Government was left to rot away totally as a predominantly poultry school. It seems that the government of Governor Fashola, in a reaction to the series of stories about the embarrassing situations at FGS, is set to repair, renovate and re-construct FGS.

I also made a promise that was hard to keep. But I did my best. The ultimate goal was to write about Festac Grammar School once a month because as I stated then: the problems with Festac Grammar School became for me a personal struggle. It is still a cause.

Now that hope has come, I feel obliged to write this story about the presence of Governor Fashola in Festac Grammar School through Acces-1 Energy Trading Company.

I have not received the details of the contract; therefore I am not in a position to describe the extent of the work that will be done.

However I do know the old storey building that was built in 1985 has now been given some re-touching in terms of structural maintenance.

One of the dilapidated poultry block of classrooms has been pulled down completely to pave way for a new storey building of 12 classrooms.

Foundation of Storey Building of 12 Classrooms

Foundation of Storey Building of 12 Classrooms

These developments are in the positive directions. They are in line with one of the long-term objectives of the Alumni Association to ensure that the school poultry structures built by Lateef Jakande are overhauled and replaced by modern storey buildings.

This objective should never be different from the functions of the Lagos State Ministry of Education. How schools are allowed to rotten remain inexplicable and if we tie it to the systemic corruption in the Nigeria system then it is an indication of what I feared most: that the future of the unborn generations remain stolen.

Whichever way, it gladdens the heart and it brings a sense of fulfillment to witness the re-construction work at FGS. Without any doubt I am convinced that it was a rapid response to our calls that have been made on the NVS and some of our blogs.

The Lagos State Government has shown that we do not need to know anyone in the corridors at Alausa in Ikeja before our agitations can be attended to. What the LASG must also ensure is that it carries out its functions without allowing us to carry the burdens to the web space all the time.

Our agitations and concerns are genuine and noble. It is clear that we want education to be promoted. A sane environment is necessary to produce sane minds. A sane environment is necessary to nurture the future generations.

On our part as members of the Alumni Group we have made progresses. We have donated some equipment to the school and we have helped them to settle electricity bills. We have more plans.

In terms of our organization we are now duly registered and our activities are governed by a written constitution. We are in the process of electing our executive members to take over from the caretaker committee and more than ever before the future of the Alumni Group look secured.

This year, less than 5 months after we re-converged as Alumni Group from our different niches we have organized career day/ workshop at Festac Grammar School and we have awarded prizes to outstanding students.

We have made ourselves more visible in Festac Town and we have provided ourselves with the platform that will motivate the students attending Festac Grammar School. They are now in contact with us. We have a wonderful opportunity to be their role models and mentors.

For us this year is a success story in the history of our Alumni Group.

It is not yet Eureka! It must be pointed out that governments in Nigeria are fond of abandoning projects and looting the funds earmarked for such projects, even after the shameful 10% kickbacks. We hope that the re-construction work at Festac Grammar School will be neither a half-baked project nor an abandoned one.

Our hope is that this rejuvenation that will inspire and motivate the students and staffs of FGS.

The Alumni Group, as promised in a previous essay, will work closely with the leadership of the school to emphasize the importance of maintenance culture. On the long run too, we will have to find the appropriate communication channel to ease information flow between the Lagos State Ministry of Education and our Alumni Group. That will help us to know first-hand about the plans that are made for schools in Lagos and how often the structures will be checked for comfort and safety.

The academic aspect can also not be over emphasized. Quality control measures should be re-introduced while all hands must be on deck to rescue the “dying culture” of attending public schools.

No matter what happens, FGS will remain in our hearts and we will never relent until the image of the school both in terms of structure and academic excellence are revitalized fully. We are committed.

Acknowledgement : All photos were courtesy of
Oluwafisayo Oyeromade Ogunjimi Orilambo

Email: pheesayor@hotmail.com

aderounmu@gmail.com

A Move that Should Send the Jonathan Government Packing!

/ Adeola / 2 Comments

By Adeola Aderounmu

The tasks facing Nigerians continue to pile up. More than ever before Nigerians need to rise up and stop the evil once and for all time.

What is subsidy on petroleum products?

Since time immemorial Nigeria’s oil wealth has been looted, mismanaged and plundered.

The government of Jonathan is making no serious efforts to get Nigeria’s money from the likes of Babangida and thousands of politicians who have looted and mismanaged the economy.

How much is the government going to re-coup from the subsidy? How much is being looted daily in Nigeria and how much money do we have draining away from the national treasury every minute?

Babangida is keeping over 12 billion dollars. Bankole, David Mark, all former governors and all former and current government officials are keeping/looting several billions in different banks scattered around the country and around the world.

More than a million times we have said that individuals like Babangida should return our looted funds. Nothing happened. We are still shouting that looting should stop and looted funds should be returned even if it is from the Jonathans. This has not happened.

Abacha’s loot that was returned disappeared under the watch of Okonjo-Iweala and Obasanjo. No trace of the funds and these people are still in government or active from the sideline.

More than a million times we have said that it is not sustainable for the Nigerian lawmakers to continue to earn billions of naira annually while the rest of the country is on a freefall.

Nigerian politicians are the richest in the world while the ordinary people of Nigeria are among the poorest in the world.

How many times are we going to write and cry out loud that these things cannot continue the way they are.

The only way now to keep the mouths of Nigerian politicians wide and big to fit their extravagant life styles and unbelievably enormous wages is to tax the poor and needy and make them poorer and needier by making them pay more for petrol and kerosene.

Obasanjo and his co-travelers stole billions of naira meant for the power sector. Today Nigerians live in absolute darkness. Nigerians use all kinds of deadly generator sets to power their homes and offices. Noise pollution and severe environmental degradation means that life threatening factors have increased astronomically.

Over a long period of several years, more than half of a century Nigerian politicians and military gangsters collectively ruined the country economically, politically and morally.

Human dignity in Nigeria is on the negative axis.

The crooks in government continue to award all kinds of contracts to themselves. They never did what they promised. Instead they stole the monies for the contracts without doing anything. Nigeria was grounded on all fronts!

We know that the fight against corruption will continue to be superficial and pretentious because Jonathan and his wife have been accused of corruption.

Now Nigerians are been prepared for more days of evil and unknown years of grief.

Jonathan and his economic team want to increase the price per liter of petrol. The subsidy part of it is the malicious expression of their collective malformed mentalities. The successive evil governments in Nigeria have used the same phrase over the years and it has always worked.

It has always worked to put Nigerians in both chains and bondages.

If l could l will make this the last evil government in Nigeria.

What has changed since the prices of petroleum products started its artificial way upward in 1978? Our lives have only gone worse. The standards and quality still getting lower as the cost kept its rising profile.

The constant part of it is that the people looting and stealing have remained at large. They and now the Jonathan crew are living in opulence. They have no clue what it means for the rest of us to be jobless or to live on poverty wage of N18 000 per month.

Can Jonathan live on N18 000 per month? Even a maid or a houseboy cannot live on that!

Nigeria must NEVER, l repeat NEVER allow the price of petrol to go above what it is today. Nigerians should defend what is left of their already debased dignity.

Nigerians should fight Jonathan and anyone who tries to increase the cost of petroleum products. They should do so with the last drop of blood in their veins.

At all or any cost, Nigerians make sure that this man from the delta creeks does not add to the avalanche of burdens facing them.

The only reason any deceptive ruler will increase the cost of petroleum products again in Nigeria will be to increase the looting monies available to looters and useless Nigerian politicians.

Life is already too expensive. Why make it worse?

What has been done with the money that accrued from the increase in petroleum products since 1999, that is under the most useless party in Africa?

Why is the Nigerian government constantly in the need to remove the subsidy? As far as Nigerians are concerned there is no subsidy on petroleum products.

What have been missing since 1960 are good leadership and future-planning sane people in Nigerian government.

Is it the fault of the masses that Nigerian refineries are not working?

Is it the fault of the Nigerian people that the useless Nigerian government keeps importing petrol? Isn’t that a scandal that should be tackled?

So in four years Jonathan will not turn the Nigerian petroleum industry around? Of course not! How can he fight the power that controls him?

So, since 1999 PDP cannot make Nigeria work? Maybe there are no functional brains in the PDP!

No one in the Jonathan economic team can reason out that the best way is to find permanent solutions to Nigeria’s problems.

What blueprints is this fake transformation based upon?

What does the bad government mean by promising to provide infrastructure only after it has removed the subsidies?

Nigerians have endured more than 50 years of senselessness in government. We can endure till that time when a sensible government will plan for our children. Our lives are already wasted. My future was stolen before I was born. What else can I lose?

Our children and the generation coming after should be the focus. Therefore this talk about subsidy is evil machinery that should be met with the greatest possible resistance that will if necessary bring an abrupt end to the order of things and send all these wicked men and women into permanent exile or prisons.

Nigerians don’t need any cosmetic solution to the problems that have been created by 51 years of looting and continuous corruption.

Build the refineries. Stop importing petrol. Take away all forms of corruption in government.

Recover all stolen funds at all cost and by all means! Make them visible and accountable!

It doesn’t matter how long it takes to build the refineries. It is a task that must be done.

It doesn’t matter what it takes to fight corruption, it must be done. It doesn’t matter what it takes to get rid of the cabal in the administration, or in the economic sector or in the executive or judiciary. These things must be done.

it doesn’t matter how long it takes to recover all looted funds and whoever is keeping them, these funds must show face!

Jonathan must never be allowed to increase the cost of petroleum products. What he and the blood-suckers in the economic group including the corrupt people in the ministry of finance must be told is that only permanent solutions are acceptable.

If Jonathan’s government take out the imaginary subsidy on petroleum products to satisfy the greedy needs of his gang Nigeria should make sure that his government is thrown out in the days that follow. Nigerians cannot afford one more evil government.

The other day a man died in Oyo state while waiting on the queue for a verification exercise that will fetch him N1000 in pension. This is in the same country where already corrupt lawmakers and politicians effortlessly cart away billions of naira in allowances daily.

Nigerians wasted their time, votes and probably their lives voting for the PDP government in 2011. Nigerians lied to themselves; they said they voted for Jonathan and not PDP. Nigerians brought this new evil upon themselves but it is never too late to counter-act unless you are dead.

Now that Nigerians know that Jonathan is PDP and PDP is Jonathan I wondered what they are going to do about it. Nigerian should ponder deeply about that.

The proposed removal of the subsidy on petroleum products should be the last test of resilience for Nigerians. If it happens Nigerian should sack this government immediately. Arise O’ compatriots..!

Nigerians and their foolish rulers

/ Adeola / 2 Comments

By Adeola Aderounmu

On May 22 2007 I wrote a famous article titled Nigerian leaders are fools. It made headlines and appeared on a BBC review.

The title of that article should have been Nigerian rulers are fools. We have shortage of leaders and the country is in a big mess.

Nigerians are living in denial because they carry false hopes.

I continue to have arguments with a few groups of people who think that my views are extreme and think that we should be optimistic about a better tomorrow. These people and I near our graves and we have not known what it means to live under normal circumstances in Nigeria.

Millions of Nigerians have lived and died without knowing the true meaning of life. They were denied the essence of it by thieves and looters who have occupied the Nigerian political scene in uniform and agbada. Those unfortunate Nigerians had no access to the basic things of life and simple infrastructure like constant electricity was never a part of their short miserable lives.

Yet millions of Nigerians living nurse (false) hopes and aspirations under a system that calls for nothing other than a bloody revolution.

It doesn’t matter now into how many pieces Nigeria should be divided. It doesn’t make sense to worry about the outcome when the alternative that I’d known for over 3 decades is not different from living in the biblical hell.

What should make sense is how to stop the stupidity and senselessness of both politicians and military rulers in mufti.

Politics is Nigeria is an insult to the intelligence of man. It questions the superiority of man over lower beings.

No Nigerian government has made the total elimination of corruption an open and targeted agenda. This is because all the people in government are corrupt. All these people include past and present rulers of Nigeria, and in various capacities. Almost invariably they are all birds of the same feather.

It doesn’t matter how lazy or hardworking Nigerian politicians and public servants are: they are all thieves and looters to varying degrees. Even Lagos that we thought was a pace setter has been opened up a nest of foolish looters.

I have argued all these years that N1 stolen from public funds or N1 taken without accountability has a snowball effect. It adds to the poverty and impoverishment in the land. In Nigeria funds are looted in billions of dollars and the looters walk free. Ask Mrs. Waziri the figure head at EFCC. Even ask Ribadu the talkative before her. It’s all mess.

Nigeria is one of the most blessed countries in the world but it is home to some of the world’s poorest people who ironically live in the Niger Delta Oil Region. Northern Nigeria has one of the highest illiteracy levels and their women can hardly write their names. Some can’t!

Nigeria has been run like a gangster business. At the federal and state, at the local and municipality levels, it’s all the same. The country has been on a free-fall since 1960. How the country remains one is an aberration.

There is no other country on any planet where people have looted and stolen so much that there has not been a revolution or a war or series of it. Nigerians are living in captivity. It’s a sad situation. Yet they are not fighting on a scale that will topple the system of things.

Boko Haram and the Niger Delta militants are chasing selfish interests. In a way they should actually be allowed to carve their own niches away from Nigeria. Who says they must be within Nigeria?

There is a big difference between terrorism and a revolution anyway.

MASSOB wanted BIAFRA. Why not now? Why the silence? Why the timidity?

The Oduduwa Group is emerging stronger. It was about time.

It doesn’t matter how many groups or nations emerge from Nigeria. What will be relevant is that people should belong to a nation where their rights are respected and where they have absolute freedom to pursue happiness, peace of mind and unlimited or limited resources to achieve their life goals.

These are not going to be the end in themselves because the stupid people who have ruined Nigeria are from all the possible regions you can imagine.

But when we have gone our different ways, I am sure there will be greater control within the regions to check the sort of absurdity now being perpetrated by the aimless Jonathan dynasty.

The president of Nigeria and several of his Ministers should actually be cooling off in a forgotten prison by now. They have all stolen! They are still stealing!

We didn’t need the revelations from the wikileak cables. It helps though. We already know that these things exist.
The crimes that Nigerians have continued to commit against themselves include doing nothing about all these nonsense. Their decision to tolerate and live with these aberrations negates the essence of life. It deters the pursuance of happiness and it deprives one of the fulfilled life.

Every year funds are looted as infrastructure are neglected. Roads, schools, hospitals and other basic things like electricity and water have been sent to the archive as far as common people are concern.

There is no one checking the system.

Several Nigerian journalists are interested in government jobs. Good people are rare in Nigeria. The men and women with the pens know it is their own way to the treasury. Many Nigerian journalists are crooks and serving a corrupt government makes them accomplices in this great crime against humanity.

When journalists have become beggars in the presence of the politicians, then information reaching the people will continue to be that of fake hope in a hopeless country.

In other professions people are interested in short cut to wealth and fraud is prevalent. What is more definite in expressing a banana republic or jungle existence?

The problems in Nigeria have reached a scale such that there is no going back. As far or as long as Nigeria exist as one country poverty will remain above 70% and unemployment among youths may exceed 50% in the nearest future.
No one man sitting in Abuja and overseeing corruption daily can tackle the national problems facing over 140m people.

The system is so bad now that it is a permanently hopeless situation.

When you have a country where corruption is legalized and madness is allowed in public offices, where then are you heading?

In Nigeria all the corrupt rulers and murderers are living as free men. It is pure insanity when the laws of the land are inadequate. It is more than insanity when the judges up to the Supreme Court accept millions of dollars in bribes to give false verdicts.

In that sense Nigeria is not a country. It is an aggregation of confused people enslaved by the junta and tropical gangsters.

That order designed by the colonialists and mastered by the tropical gangsters posing as rulers must be dismantled in order to set people free in their various regions.

It is from that point that groups and tribes can start to figure their ways forward. No one should care how long it will take to find the way forward. It may take 100 years but not starting at all is the greater evil fostered by fear.

No one should even care how things will work out or not.

The present order of things in Nigeria cannot continue. It is just not thinkable to imagine that Nigerians now more than 140m people have been zombied for the past 50 years by a clique that has managed to self-perpetuate itself in several forms and under several disguise.

From the bottom of my heart, I believe no more in one Nigeria and I refuse to accept the oneness of it. I believe that my roots lie in the Oduduwa Kingdom or Empire.

It is time for change. No matter how long we delay, it is inevitable and it is our key to freedom.