Declaration of Emergency in Nigeria! Is it too little too late?

                In December of 2011 after the Christmas Day bombing, President Goodluck Jonathan missed the opportunity to address the Boko Haram issue head-on. Instead of resolving the terrorist problem the administration decided to zero in on taxing average and/or regular Nigerians with the Fuel Subsidy scheme on January 1st, 2012. Shock and Awe policies were rolled out to conflate the oil barons and marketers with ordinary Nigerians and the Islamic fundamentalism with oil subsidies.

                Those of us that stood up as Occupy Nigerian Movement protesters have been vindicated over and over again with the exposed corruption in the Petroleum sectors reaching up to the National Assembly membership and the explosion of terror in West Africa. Hopefully, with the eventual declaration of emergency against those that have perpetrated carnage on our homeland, other fights would emerge such as those again corruption, impunity, and unemployment. These scrutiny and measures of accountability should not be reversed for opponents of the regime.

Carnage in Northern Nigeria (article written in April 2011)

                Amnesty International, one of the premier human rights organizations characterized the incidents in the northern areas of the United Nations of Nigeria as riots and demonstrations. Thus equating the carnage to the demonstrations in Bahrain, Yemen and Syria where people are currently using peaceful and civil means to petition their governments. This mischaracterization is appalling because what took place in northern Nigeria was hundreds of bloodbaths, lynching, burning of innocent human beings, arson, and gross destruction of properties by Dictator Muhammadu Buhari’s supporters. With nearly 250people dead and close to 50,000 fellow Nigerians displaced, give it up to the perpetrators of inhumanity to remain indifferent. They have mastered the skills of committing mass murders while simultaneously cloaking in victim hood. Similar butchery was the primary reasons behind the Nigerian and Biafran genocidal wars.

                Contrary to revisionist historians after the 1966 coup, counter coup d'état, and extinction of some southeastern officers from the ranks of the Nigerian Army, our union was still standing. It was days of similar mass massacres like the world have just witnessed from April 17-18th 2011, that has continued sporadically from 1960’s until now, that forced the hands of the South-easterners to head back home to peace and safety. In the process they realized that their safety could not be protected in some parts of the Disunited Nations of Nigeria and were forced to declare independence in 1966. Unfortunately these shameless killings have continued unabated since then. The Nigerian and international press always report about these barbaric incidents as though they began after 1999 when the civilians took over from the military.

                However, Enough is Enough! How can northerners continue to preach “One Nigeria” only when they are holding on to the presidency? The sad reality is that they have controlled and/or occupied the said position for about 40years within our so-called 50years independence. In their time as rulers, the Northern Military Industrial Complex (NMIC) alias Army Arrangement have legitimatized corruption and mismanaged our national resources. The northern elites have set the country backwards about twenty-five years if not more with their incessant coups and dictatorships. This retardation in developments has been felt in every nook and cranny of the United Nations of Nigeria. With the marginalization of the Niger Delta and the assassination of Dr. Ken Saro Wiwa the veils were finally lifted off the eyes of the South-south. The south west including Awoist (who would like to focus on the prediction of Chief Awolowo that a Niger Delta man would become president someday) are beginning to understand that while the Southeasterners might allegedly play you wayo, some northerners are very willing to exterminate their fellow Nigerians.

                It is one thing to contest the votes/elections and the tabulations of the result but quite another to execute regional killing orgies. These ghastly acts were done to intimidate the masses who came out in droves to cast their votes all over the country. In the north, President Goodluck Jonathan got more than 25% (http://www.inecnigeria.org/results/states.php) of the votes in nearly a dozen states. So the vitriolic Congress for Progressive Change CPC) supported murdering quads wanted to silence the segment of the northern population that have realized that the Presidency is not the panacea to their problems. The CPC supporters wanted to terrorize the Independent National Election Commission (INEC) who conducted a commendable election. These killing thugs wanted to suppress the announcement of the election results. Why did CPC supporters not wait for the pronouncement of the outcome before going out to threaten and arrest our national security?

                Where were these hooligans, their parents, and their sponsors when Dictator Sani Abacha took the whole nation hostage and ostracized Nigerians from the African and global communities of nations? We could not participate in the African Cup of Nations in South Africa and we were suspended from the Commonwealth of Nations not for resisting imperialism but due to authoritarianism. Where were these miscreants when Dictator Abdulsalami Abubakar handed the presidency to Dictator Olusegun Obasanjo in 1999? Why was there no protest when Mr. Obasanjo and his pal Professor Maurice Iwu gave the post to President Umaru Yar’Adua in 2007? But they have the audacity to slaughter law abiding Nigerians. These nonsense needs to stop right now, we have to break the cycle of massacres, we cannot compensate our way out of these man made tragedies.

                Notwithstanding the concerns of Amnesty International the Nigerian government has a responsibility to use adequate force to defend law abiding citizens. While the observance of peaceful protest should remain sacrosanct the carnage that we have just witnessed in Nigeria should be prevented and suppressed with commensurable force to safeguard the lives of innocent law abiding citizens. The union of the United Nations of Nigeria cannot remain sacrosanct for long when it is a death sentence in northern Nigeria to be suspected of southern ethnicities, an Ancestor worshipper, a Christian, and a Muslim who votes for a Christian. My own sister (a Christian, an Igbo and Ijaw) supported and campaigned for Dictator Muhammadu Buhari, so what would the murderers do in her case?

                Moreover the fact is that people like Mr. Buhari and former Vice President Atiku Abubakar had sown the seeds of violence before the elections. They purposely used languages like “lynching” and the “inevitability of violence” to ginger up their supporters in preparation of the Saturday April 16, 2011 elections. Hence, Buhari did not see the need to call off his supporters from the streets while the killings went on for more than twenty four hours. Alhaji Abubakar wants to pay lip service to the so-called revered indivisibility of our nation when the lives and property of southerners and fellow northerners who voted their conscience is not guaranteed in the United Nations of Nigeria. Our people are nonchalantly orphaned, our parents are rendered childless through brutality, and others are maimed. The sanctity, safety, and respect of lives should be our primary sacrosanct obligation and not nationhood/religion.   

                Moreover, the Nigerian federal and northern state governments need to bow their heads in shame because of their negligence. They knew that some in northern Nigeria would turn to their tried and true part time of using tyrannical savagery. The stakeholders should have prepared for the worst while hoping for the best which many of us knew was not likely given the antecedents of some northerners. Heads of the Nigerian security apparatus need to immediately tender their resignations. Hopefully, contrary to press reports, Captain Emmanuel Ihenacho the Minister of Interior was relieved of his position for the ineptitude in providing security for our young national service coopers and the general public in the north. The expectation is that he was not suspended due to internal political considerations from Imo State. It would be a betrayal of the highest order to the victims if no one takes accountability for this perennial mayhem.

            Never Again should people be victimized in such callous ways with impunity. President Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan and the authorities need to establish the Emergency Response Tactical Teams (ERT) in all northern states that have a past history of perpetrating this carnage. The ERTs should train and practice the needed skills to protect the general public and should never be deployed to disrupt non-violent protest. These teams should be able to be organized within 15minutes of any disturbances when the lives and properties of individuals from the United Nations of Nigeria are under attack. Our governments should mandate the ERT to protect our visitors too. We must protect the sanctity of the African lives.           

                                          Nnamdi F. Akwada MSW, BA is a Social Justice Activist     


 

 

 

 

Southern Nigerian Guidelines (SNG)

                The premise of this opinion article is predicated on the notion that Southern Nigeria needs to insist on the Sovereign National Conference (SNG) in order to rectify the divisions, poverties, and insecurities within the constituent nationalities of the United Nations of Nigeria. Like South Sudan, Southern Nigeria must be willing to peacefully shut down the entire oil pipelines in the Niger Delta. These actions are necessary in light of the high levels of mass decadence and elites’ sponsored terrorism that we have witnessed for the last 40years and past 4year respectively. There ought to be some reactions from the masses to send some shockwaves to the strata so that we can break away from the status quo. Hence this is by no means a call to arms but a calculated strategy of bringing representatives of all our various nationalities together to craft a republic that is beneficial for the regular Nigerians. Haphazard and half measures like the much heralded constitutional amendment in Nigeria would not suffice. We need to form a union that is not based on 19th/20th century European protectorate contraptions or those of our military and civilian dictators and scoundrels a.k.a. internal colonial masters. Instead ours should be a union grounded in self-determination, our combined destinies, and inter-regional survival.      

            Consequently, the nationalities within Southern Nigeria need to convey a 3-5days conference on national security, transparency, and economic development. This august summit would seek to build on the just concluded South-South Economic Summit that took place in Asaba Delta State on April 27, 2012 at which Professor Wole Soyinka spoke. Civil society groups, states and local government representatives from the South West, South East, and South-South should attend the aforementioned conference with a mission of laying the groundwork for security, good governance, and development in Southern Nigeria in lieu of the systematic corruption in Nigeria and terrorist attacks by Boko Haram and other insurgencies in the country. This gathering should be the precursor for the Sovereign National Conference and emissaries from the Middlebelt of Nigeria should be encouraged to attend. The key issues that should be discussed include the actualization of the Sovereign National Conference, the demand for a confederation system of government in Nigeria, transparency in states and municipal governments, and job creation through investments in infrastructures to benefit our burgeoning youth populations. 

            The expediency of this gathering cannot be over emphasized when we are witnessing an elitist bankrolled terrorist onslaught on the Nigerian people in northern Nigeria. Our police stations, military barracks/installations, churches, prisons/jails, and the international community buildings have become primary targets for the bloodthirsty Boko Haram criminals in the north. As a sad testament to our current realities the so-called northern elders have been unambiguous in their predilections to offer rhetorical shield for the relentless carnages in the north.

Unlike the perennial meetings of the North Elders Forum/Arewa Elders Forum that have yielded sycophantic comments and no substances, the Southern Nigerian Guidelines workshop would be results oriented. For example, when retired General Theophilus Danjuma said that the north is on fire during recent gatherings, others should have immediately asked him to bring out some of his ill-gotten wealth to quench the fire. We need to ask Mr. Danjuma if his pronounced “Somalialisation of Nigeria” has a correlation with the massive national fortunes the members of the 1% Northern Military Industrial Complex like him have amassed to the detriment of the public good.  Similar questions could be asked of Senate President Mr. David Mark and his foundations. Do they still generate revenues from oil wells in the Niger Delta? How much of their rogue funds have they used in making some differences in the lives of everyday northerners and other folks?

            During the Southern Nigerian Guidelines conference we have to tell ourselves the truth which should be distinct from the presentations in recent assemblies of General Yakubu Gowon former Nigerian Head of State and Mr. Ibrahim Shekarau former governor of Kano State. Both men are comparable to other so-called elites who continue to wallow in their own self-imposed denials and realities. Gowon keeps on blaming General Ojukwu for succession rather than the ethnic and religious inspired pogrom in the north that he oversaw before the war and during the Biafra genocide. Similar killings are continuing today because so-called elder statesmen like Dictator Gowon continue their embellishments.

Relatively, no one ventures to ask the ex-chief executive in Kano State about his stewardship to the people. Why did Mr. Shekarau stop polio vaccinations under his watch and as a result institutionalize increased poverty? Governor Shekarau contested for the presidency in 2011 and was bestowed with the title Sardauna of Kano by the Emir of Kano because he stood for the interest of the northern Nigerian 1%. However to his credit and under his watch Nigeria remained part of the three nations who were unsuccessful in eradicating polio. In this disgracefully World Health Organization WHO rankings, we stand hand in hand with Pakistan and Afghanistan. Stewardship and accountability should be the hallmark of the Southern confab. Instead of worshipping positions, status, and power, our goals should include identifying the root causes of our problems in a land where it is not enough to be a chief, but one has to be a high chief without any community service, morals, and mores.   

Generally, clinicians recognize “acceptance” as the first step in dealing with denial. Meanwhile the elites in Nigeria continue to be in denial concerning our dire straits we have to go ahead with the southern workshop to address our pandemic addiction to corruption, massive underdevelopment, and swelling insecurities. Civil society activists, state legislators and local government representatives of the various southern nations should be the primary conduit of actualizing this conference. Afterwards some of our governors are entrenched in the status quo as members of the 1% in Nigeria and maybe the world; we cannot allow them to undermine the south confab.

Therefore one of the first resolutions that should be addressed in the assembly is the stripping of immunity from governors and all other serving officials. There is a need to realize that the official immunity tradition is as antiqued as the British inspired and informed hair wigs that our barristers still place on their heads under the Nigerian scorching sun. Prosecutorial or Qualified Immunity is at the heart of the systematic corruption in the south and the whole nation. Our legislators need to look into a framework of recalling all elected officials in southern Nigeria through referendums which should be organized by obtaining signatories of certain percentages of the electorate.

            Former and present governors and judges in south Nigeria would have to be sent the message that the business of governance and accountability will demand drastic changes. In the Southern Nigerian Guidelines conference our state legislators and human rights and environmental rights activists need to come up with best practices to hold prior, present, future politicians, and public trust office holders responsible for their actions and inactions. Gone should be the days when criminal and corruption charges are only brought by the federal government as in the case of Governor Bode George of Ondo State and another nation such as United Kingdom have to sentence and incarcerate our known thieves like Governor James Ibori of Delta State for wanton fraud.

State laws and prosecutors should be strengthened and encouraged to go after crooked politicians, businesses, and judges. State legislators should pass laws that increase the amount of incarceration periods for intimidating, comprising, and bribing government officials especially judges. The acceptance of quid pro quo arrangements in terms of offering and receiving favors should also be brainstormed and criminalized when legislators return to their various southern states. If these measured are successfully codified into laws after the south conference, then we might very well bid farewell to the era of fugitive ex-governors.        

            Some have asked about how we plan to convene a Sovereign Nation Conference and how do we assign the representatives for the said conference. We go by pass our federal legislators, make dem go hug transformers because dem too mago mago (Pidgin English). Our federal senators and house of assembly members are some of the highest paid legislators in the world, they are insensitive, corrupt, and out of touch with the people. Our local legislators, who are more representative of the 99% of Nigerians, have to occupy the quest for true representative democracy. In the interest of more transparency we also need to push for public funded elections so that we do not have a plutocracy influenced by cabals. We have to create systems that empower our people and rekindles our ethical can do spirits. Our societies and communities should be receptive to the contributions of our youthful expatriates that are scattered all around the world. More importantly we need to invest in inter-state public works projects that would elevate the standard of living for our ever expanding home-based youth and elderly populations.

            Part of the mission of the Southern Nigerian Guidelines gathering must be to offer pragmatic solutions to our ongoing problems. With all the aforementioned plugged holes of corruption we would have the opportunity to capitalize on infrastructures that are going to benefit the masses for the next 50-100years. Primary bilateral areas to concentrate on includes, improving the healthcare delivery systems and research facilities in the south. With the number of southern medical manpower and specialists in Nigeria and around the globe there are no reasons why the health-wealth gradient continues to deteriorate. At the very least we need to have comprehensive plans to cure and feed ourselves with our human capital. The agriculture sectors would demand enormous investments and subsidies so that we can reduce our importation of basic food stuffs. Our universities and tertiary institutions from Obafemi Awolowo University IIe Ife to Rivers States University of Science and Technology, from University of Nigeria Nsukka to University of Lagos, from University of Uyo to University of Benin, and from Federal University of Technology Owerri to University of Calabar need to have each other’s faculties on speed dial.

Consequently, the four walls of these educational centers need to establish a fifth wall for research industries and technological zones to nourish and heal the rest of West Africa. There is also the need for southern Nigerian nation states to cooperate with other countries along the West African coastlines including the Bright of Biafra, to enable us build thriving fishing and tourism industries. This is not the 15th century and we should not allow our mangrove swamps and maritime estuaries to be pillaged by other countries and corporations through unannounced and unaccounted fishing raids. Plans should be made to monetize these sectors by establishing secure tourist coastal cities with boardwalks activities and thriving seafood processing businesses to serve the African and international markets. It makes no sense for South Koreans, Europeans, or any other countries to steal our seafood commodities in broad daylight and then sell them back to Africans for triple the prices or more in the form of processed fisheries. These are valuable sources of community development projects that we need to take into consideration.     

Another priority area that we have to finance and cooperate on in southern Nigeria is the transportation system. After more than 50years of independence we seem to exist on the colonial setups because most of our so-called leaders have been more concerned with enriching themselves and their cronies rather than establishing safe and modern inter-state highway and subway systems. Despite our strides in aviation within the past 10years we have not efficiently developed our roads and the consequence and cost in preventable lost lives remains one of the saddest testimonies of our ineptitude. In reality, if we are to calculate all the monies that have been derived from petroleum production since Dictator Yakubu Gowon infamously announced to the world in the 1970’s that Nigeria had so much money that we did not know what to do with it, we should have constructed multiple beltways throughout the nation. As part of the southern Nigerian conference we have to come up with plans to build these rail and road systems to the outskirts of Benin Republic via Ogun and Oyo States on the West as a gateway to the rest of West Africa and to the outskirts of Cameroun through Cross River and Benue States as a gateway to Central Africa. This would ensure viability to transport regular people, agriculture, and other goods that would increase business enterprises.  

            Southern Nigerian Guidelines confab has to deal with the problems of security within and outside south Nigeria. With the amount of resources in south Nigeria there is no justifiable reason why anyone in that region should want for anything. We have to espouse the dignity of the African/Black life through our deeds and be willing to take drastic measures to buttress this point. In the absence of the Sovereign National Conference, presence of rampant corruption, and the provocation of terrorism, we have to create Human Rights shields to occupy and takeover all the petroleum pipelines and trucks that are supplying the north with crude and refined oil when necessary. There is no need to blow up these infrastructures to prove our points.

As a final point, our domestic agenda in the south should include the eventual divestment in petroleum productions, so that we can clean our environment after years (1956-Present) of relentless pollutions/oil spills, corruption, underdevelopment and exposures to carcinogens. These actions should be taken as self-determination survival measures notwithstanding the bottom lines of our federal government, petroleum cabals, and the global petroleum industry cartels. Since we have one of the largest per capital graduates within the engineering and technology fields in the whole of Africa, we have to reintroduce the clean energy and renewable energy paradigm to our schools and ways of life. Southern Nigeria is surrounding by the Atlantic Ocean which is a possible source of hydroelectric plants and wind turbine energies and we have enough sunlight to manufacture and export solar energies.         

Dedicated to the Memory of Dr. Ken Saro-Wiwa

                              Nnamdi F. Akwada MSW, BA is a Social Justice Activist

In Response to Professor Ango Abdullahi and Mallam Adamu Ciroma

                This article is in response to the mischievous rants of Professor Ango Abdullahi http://www.punchng.com/news/we-are-ready-for-break-up-northern-leaders/ and Mallam Adamu Ciroma http://saharareporters.com/news-page/god-will-bring-new-usman-danfodiyo-clean-nigeria-says-adamu-ciroma regarding the state of affairs in the Disunited Nations of Nigeria. As a teenager in Port-Harcourt there eventually came a time that my mother could not spank me as a means of actualizing discipline, however since she was not the primary enforcer in our household she had always combined the use of talk therapy and ass whooping. Mother was quick to use such English adages as “A stitch in time saves nine” to get me to examine my actions and change my ways. But by far her numero uno admonition to me was Shakespeare’s “To Thine Own Self Be True.” These words were normally said after letting me know that I could tell her all the lies in the world but it was more important to remain frank with myself upon vacating her presence. In my capacity as a social justice activist I would be remiss if I fail to point out the similarities between my situation as a Nigerian youngster and the so-called Northern Nigerian leaders like Professor Abdullahi and Mallam Ciroma.     

                Consequently, when old men and jobbers like Alhaji Adamu Ciroma of the Northern Elders Forum and Professor Abdullahi of the Arewa Elders Forum are busy with the Mis-Education of northerners and causing rancor in the nation, we the members of the Nigerian progressive community must stand up and chastise them. This is all the more imperative because of the void in young progressive voices from northern Nigeria. Religion, Corruption, and Elitism has been used to manipulate the influences of youthful future leaders in the north who could have risen up to join the discourse with moral clarity by demanding justice for all, instead of those select few. In its place we continue to have these vacuums were people like Abdullahi and Ciroma, staunch members of Nigeria’s 1% wealthy crooks are allowed to display their follies and buffoonery. What do we expect when a highly educated chap like Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab alias the underwear bomber, was only confined to either joining the corruption and elitism of his father’s generation or to use the Islamic religion as a tool to hate others? How come young Farouk was not allowed and/or afforded the intellectual decency of challenging the decadent status quo in the north and in Nigeria?

                In Southern Nigeria, religious leaders like Benson Idahosa, Kumuyi, Father Edeh, Adebayo, Arinze, Oritsejafor, Stephen Akinola, Amaga, Okogie, Peter Akinola, Ukpai, Olukoya, Oyakhilome, Oyedepo (slapper/assaulter) cannot tell some of us that the sky is red and we believe when we can observe with our own eyes that the sky is actually blue. Advocates for the Sovereign National Conference do not want the country to breakup. Instead we are demanding for true confederation in the spirit of the Aburi Accord which General Ojukwu and General Gowon signed in Ghana, 1967. We demand a Nigeria that is free from the contraptions of the Northern Military Industry Complex, NMIC. Our federation’s resources should benefit the larger majority and not the select few who have self-imposed themselves as Lords over us. For instance President Jonathan should not be championing the institutionalization of Islamic schools otherwise known as Almajiris through the building of more such schools. For God sakes these were the steppingstones of the current Boko Haram insurgencies that have consumed the north. The desires of the progressive communities are for a nation that trumpets economic justice, development, equality, selflessness more than nepotism, religion, ethnicity, and mediocrity.

                As such we cannot seat by and allow men like Professor Ango Abdullahi and Mallam Adamu Ciroma to use their distorted cognitive dissonance to assemble their perverted realities without pushing back. These men are analogous to the Republicans in the United States who are adept at manufacturing their own realities. Nigerian progressives and our people are not asking for too much when we demand to seat down and discuss the future of the country. Our goal is to have a functional democracy as opposed to the plutocracy that we are witnessing that only works for 1% of our population rather than the other 99%. We want a country where mundane things function for the regular Nigerians. We demand a nation in which corrupt criminals like former governors and present governors such as Governors Peter Odili, Ikedi Ohakim, T.A. Orji, Senator Abubakar Saraki and former Speaker of the House Dimeji Bankole to mention a few, are not provided with carte blanche to ruin the nation with their immoral gluttony. Progressives insist on seating to ascertain why we have petroleum cabals who are looting the treasury with government accomplices while the Niger Delta swamps are more polluted than the Gulf of Mexico.

                When I remember the admonition “To Thine Own Self Be true” I realize why my mother the daughter of a secondary school Principal, Mr. Alaibe Ogan would always remind me of the truth. Since I was called Alaibe after my grandfather I remain fearless in advocating for the longings of my countrymen. Fellow Compatriots of the United Nations of Nigeria require a land where President Goodluck Jonathan’s ideas of transformation is not just the selective sacking of one state governor in the person of Timipre Sylva but all and sundry corrupt officials. For example, our Petroleum Resources Minister Diezani Allison-Madueke and Central Bank Governor Sanusi Lamido Sanusi should have gotten their pink slips months ago if our president was true to himself and the citizenry. Professor Abdullahi and Mallam Ciroma should continue to thank their lucky stars that despite reaching our frustration threshold some of us are still maintaining our humanity. In the face of frequent provocations they should pray that that day never comes when we go off the deep end. This is essential because as social justice activists some of us are not pacifist and might well be driven to our machinations to counter the northern sponsored Boko Haram and the present scourges of corruption. These so-called leaders should be glad that at this juncture we only demand for dialogue cross the table.    

                                          Nnamdi F. Akwada MSW, BA is a Social Justice Activist

Reference

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBxUJd_cI40

President Jonathan the Lap Dog of Corruption- In the Era of Boko Haram

In the 1980’s Port-Harcourt (The Garden City) was a dynamic place with a characteristic tranquil and restive edge. I remember going to the Saint Mary’s Catholic Church with my siblings by a taxi on those weekends when my parents would drive to the Imo State country side en-route to my father’s village. After church we would cross Aggrey road near the Lagos bus stop, Town area and visit with our older cousins Amoni, Bright, and Ibinabo. My cousins, Amoni and Bright were gainfully employed secondary school graduates at the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation NNPC. On most occasions when we trooped in to request for snacks and ice cream, one of my cousins whom we called uncle due to the age difference, would be on the oil rigs preoccupied in an honest day’s work. While my cousin Ibinabo was at the Rivers State University of Science and Technology, his brothers were working at the Eleme refinery and the oil rigs with their high school certificates. These days, university graduates are unemployed and constitute an ever increasing proportion of the underemployed in our so-called giant of Africa.

            Interestingly, those days when my younger ones and I took the cab (a drop) once or twice a month to the Catholic Church soon came to an end, after I discovered the corruption and hypocrisy within organized religion. Thankfully, I did not have to wait for contemporary times to discern the multilayered ongoing worldwide scandals in the church. As a teenager, I opted for the Pentecostal and evangelical churches that unbeknownst to me came out of the so-called Bible belt in the United States otherwise known as the Deep South. Most present day Nigerians and Africans are still ignorant of the fact that some of the same folks from the West that want them to be born-again have placed policies and structures to impede African American development through mass incarceration, structural inequality, and disenfranchisement in the United States. Indeed the hypocrisy in the church is not unlike what we experience in other religions and politics. Nigerian superstar Majek Fashek informed us back in the day that Religion is Politics.

            Subsequently we have an emission of religion, ethnic intolerance, nepotism, and corruption in today’s’ political dispensation that threatens to untangle the United Nations of Nigeria. On the right corner we have President Goodluck Jonathan and his corrupt lieutenants who sold Nigerians the mannequin bill of transformation. The President and the likes of Okonjo-Iweala, Sanusi, Madueke, Aganga, and Onwuliri do not remember or just do not care that close to 1000 fellow Nigerians gave their lives for the introduction and realization of a new political democratic era. In Jonathan, we thought we saw an individual from the academy that could rise above the dictates of the Northern Military Industrial Complex NMIC. We were under the impression that he could resist the trappings of authoritarianism and corruption of former government officials. But our aspirations (luck) is been tarnished as this administration goes about desecrating the memories and labours of our contemporary heroes of democracy. The young men and women of the National Youth Service Corp NYSC who were murdered during and after the elections are treated as though they died in vain.

Meanwhile President Jonathan has becomes a lap dog of corruption for international and national syndicates. President Christine Largade of the International Monetary Fund IMF, who wants to use discredited neo-liberalism economic theories to increase the number of poor individuals on the African continent, is an example of such corrupt international principles. She visited Nigeria to reinforce the inside lobbying efforts of Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala the Nigerian Finance minister and former vice president of the World Bank. After meeting Ms. Largade on December 19th, 2011 and notwithstanding the horrendous Christmas day church bombing that killed nearly 50 people; the call for religious and ethnic repatriations; the call to arms by the various tribes; massive displacement and hysteria, we received the New Year’s gift from President Jonathan that increased petroleum prices by more than 100%. These were the rude awakening that became a catalyst for the Occupy Nigeria Movement in our country and in the Diaspora.   

 Rather than focusing on the cabal of Nigerian petroleum importers and bunkery organizers the government decided to punish the same regular and poor people who elected them. Under the guise of deregulation and privatization the previous military and civilian administrations had conveniently lined up their cronies as venture capitalist in the petroleum sectors to the disadvantage of the less privileged people. In a classical example of double speak these fat cats increase the cost of petroleum production in the nation through various direct federal government sanctioned subsidies/fleecing of the treasury.

Instead of competition, efficiency, and price decrease we became saddled with monopolies and wastes in the highest levels. As a result there emerged millionaires and billionaires who could careless about the wellbeing of other Nigerians. According to Dictator Babangida some of those folks took record time to criminally amass the wealth that he painstakingly took 8years to steal. They became more interested in maintaining the status quo and placed some of their ill gotten loots as hedges towards the realization of the peoples backed Jonathan’s presidency. The names of these culprits were miraculously released by representatives of our National Assembly of disrepute and pimps. Our so-called representatives wanted to shift the criticism from the public on account of the earth shaking salaries, allowances, bonuses they steal for doing next to nothing.    

Additionally, these developments have not slowly down our race to the bottom and the corruption in Abuja. Nigerians have become tennis balls in the hands of the 1% uber rich on the left corner, who insist on draining us until the last blood and/or oil. At the national level corruption is manifested in the economic and security purviews, while President Jonathan continues in the lap dog status. Boko Haram suspects are disappearing from law enforcement custody as fast as dollars and naira are milked from our coffers. In the likes of Inspector General of Police Hafiz Ringim we see a level of malfeasances and coalition with the elements that are killing innocent law enforcement officers, Christians, and Muslims, whereas the Northern elites who promised us these mayhem are protected in their posh mansions with a combination of their private security details and the national security apparatus.

Coincidentally Mrs. Diezani Allison-Madueke wants Nigerians that cannot afford three balanced meals, lack stable electricity, and basic healthcare to sacrifice for the nation when her children are frolicking worldwide. She appeared in front of the Nigerian National Assembly and did not know how much oil is produced and/or consumed in the country. The Minister of Petroleum Mrs. Madueke does not know the whereabouts of nearly $2billion petroleum funds. In the National Assembly hearing Mrs. Madueke pointed the finger at the Minister of Finance Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala who reciprocated the gesture. Despite these systematic fraudulent anomalies, both ministers are not in danger of loosing their jobs. We have the emergence of a Southern Delta Industrial Complex SDIC, with all the surviving ex-governors of Rivers State and Bayelsa State residing in Abuja.

Despondently, the similarities between the SDIC and the NMIC Northern Military have not gone unnoticed by the masses. The SDIC political authority and economic realignment is devoid of pursuing policies for the betterment of the Nigerian people. This is reflected in the combined difficulties of increasing fuel prices on people and the ineptitude in combating the constant Boko Haram massacres. Our so-called officials in positions of trust do not exude confidence in the general public. This was exemplified by the reports of Ms. Vera Ezimora about the outing of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Professor Viola Onwuliri in the Washington DC and Maryland area. Her callous remarks were “We have one hundred and sixty million people. If 2million are on the streets, then that means one hundred and fifty-eight million are in their homes.” Professor Onwuliri could not reckon the significance of 2million people on the streets of Nigeria who were demanding for a new discourse and the rescinding of the fuel taxation on the poor. These were the same people that President Goodluck Jonathan shamefully intimidated with the deployment of the Nigerian Army, ironically when northern Nigeria is awash with Boko Haram operatives.   

Consequently, this incompetence has quickening an unexpected awakening in the Nigerian people who have yearned for a transparent and just government since the evolution of the fourth democratic republic. Nigerians are now asking about the much acclaimed transformational governance which is nowhere in site. Some of us in the Diaspora have made a resolution to standup from the sidelines, and others have recommitted their energies to the actualization of peoples’ influenced changes in Nigeria. We plan to convene a civil society; social and economic justice led Sovereign National Conference in the United States. We are eventually going to bring this conference back to the African shores for forward consultations to seek a way forward, that is absent of tribalism, religious intolerance, injustice, and corruption. Our objectives include the implementation of paradigms to ensure accountability and job creation. The goals will also involve the use of national resources to provide livable employment and healthcare opportunities for Nigerians. We are going to strive for a society where 99% of the population can survive with an honest wage.

             Nnamdi Frank Akwada MSW, BA is a Social Justice Activist

Executive Director African Diaspora Institute and US African Cultural Festival

http://www.usafricanculturalfestival.com/

Member- Occupy Nigeria Movement Washington DC

http://nnamdiakwada.blogspot.com/

Washington DC Coordinator: Let There Be Light In Nigeria- Nigeria Million March

www.nigerianmillionmarch.com     

Reference:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjeUJt_tunU

http://saharareporters.com/article/my-meeting-professor-viola-onwuliri-minister-foreign-affairs

Occupy Nigeria Movement Washington DC- Call to Action

On January 1st 2012, the Nigerian people at home and in the Diaspora awoke to the unitary imposition of Petroleum Taxes on the citizens of the United Nations of Nigeria. This precipitous decision by President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration occurred on the same week that Nigerians were slaughtered in Niger State during a Christmas Day service by the regional northern Nigerian organization Boko Haram. In evoking the memories of the Nigerian and Biafra genocidal war the erstwhile organization also called on all Christians in the north to head back to the south irrespective of their years of residency and ethnic affiliations. Boko Haram statements also encouraged northerners in the south to come back to the north. However President Jonathan and his officials decided to apply shock doctrine tactics on regular and poor Nigerians with the so-called removal of fuel subsidy in the height of these unresolved national chaos. These nonchalant actions have precipitated a people’s popular movement against the actions of the government which the labour unions came around to join and against the continued pogrom of Boko Haram.

Consequently Nigerians at home and abroad have been on the streets since January 9th in protest against said tax hikes. At the Washington DC Occupy Nigeria Movement the current developments in Nigeria on January 16, 2012 have not weakening our convictions to keep fighting for less privileged Nigerians. President Jonathan has pegged the taxes at 97 naira per liter and simultaneously ordered the Nigerian Army into the streets of Lagos to intimidate peaceful protesters. On the other hand the NLC and TUC have betrayed the Nigerian people that started the peaceful protest. The labour unions have conducted Nicodemus style negotiations with government officials who seem devoid of conscience and should have reduced their own bonuses, allowances, and salaries by 50% before inflicting more hardships on ordinary people. These so-called negotiations were missing members of the social and economic justice activism communities in Nigeria.

After throughout consultations and deliberations the Occupy Nigerian Movement in Washington DC calls on President Jonathan to immediately redeploy our troops from the streets of Lagos and into those enclaves of Boko Haram. The Lagos State governor Mr. Babatunde Fashola should immediately assign the police in Lagos to protect peaceful protesters and properties instead of offering non-denials. Nigerians have the right to assembly and petition their government and those inalienable rights should not be infringed upon. We call on fellow compatriots to go back to the streets in demonstrations against the fuel taxes and the Boko Haram menace.

Nigerians need to get back on the streets to force our government to actually rescind the price of fuel back to 65 naira per liter, stop the carnage of Boko Haram, and address officially sanctioned corruption. Nigerians in the Diaspora understand that the quandary for President Goodluck Jonathan is if he should support the people who voted for him or the people that sponsored his elections. We realize that the clever by a dime so-called elites and fund hedgers have also activated their trump card of Boko Haram to place our president on a tight leash just in case he has any cute ideas. These strategies can be juxtaposed against those of the Republicans and Wall Street executives in the United States. After the so-called change elections and knowing that President Barack Obama might comply with the people’s desire for change, the conservatives came up with their game plan. Wall Street had funded our Community Organizer's election but also knew that their financial crimes (mortgage fraud, credit swaps, hedging, derivatives etc.) were enormous. So that decided to cooperate with the Conservatives, the free market guys that provide subsidies to themselves and their business partners. They joined forces to use Astroturf groups to attack Mr. Obama. President Jonathan occupies a similar dilemma and needs to decide what constituencies to serve.

Thus, the Occupy Nigeria Movement Washington DC will be protesting at the Nigerian Embassy in Washington DC, from 12pm -2pm on Wednesday January 18, 2012. We pray on fellow Nigerians at home and in the Diaspora to continue their peaceful protest until we eventually get a transformational and representative government that listens to the aspirations of the people with regards to fuel taxation on the poor, corruption, and effectively deals with the Boko Haram situation. We also call on protesters to remain peaceful and orderly during these demonstrations.

Date: Wednesday January 16th, 2012

Location: 3519 International Court NW Washington DC

Arrival Time: 11:30am

Rally Time: 12:00pm

Dispersal Time: 2:00pm

For More Information Contact:

Estella Ogbonna DC Activist

ms.estella@estellacouture.com,  www.estellacouture.com,  www.fashionforthenations.org

Harrison “Harry Baba” Nwozo, Executive Director, TribeX International

Tribex2000@yahoo.com

Emilia Jones Esq. Activist

Akpabot92@gmail.com

Ifeanyi Nwoko, DMV Activist

okeanyi@gmail.com

Nkeiru Ogbuokiri-Ojo, Washington DC Activist

nkiru@live.com

Seun Akinsanya, Activist

seun@theseunakinsanyaproject.com, www.theseunakinsanyaproject.com

Vera Ezimora, Writer, Blogger, Host

vera@verastic.com, www.verastic.com,

William Bikia Idoniboye

djbixx@hotmail.com,  www.djbixx.com

Oby Nwaogbe, Director, Producer

Oby234@gmail.com, www.oboneproductions.com

Chika Uwazie, Youth Activist

Chikaodinaka@gmail.com

Nnamdi F. Akwada, Social Justice Activist

Executive Director, US African Cultural Festival/ African Diaspora Institute

Washington DC Coordinator: Let There Be Light In Nigeria- Nigerian Million March

nakwa001@gmail.com,  www.nigerianmillionmarch,  www.usafricanculturalfestival.com