Impeach President Umaru YarAdua of Nigeria Now!
Written by Paul I. Adujie
Lawcareer@gmail.com
With all sense of duty and responsibility, as a Nigerian and as a lawyer, I write to members of the Nigerian National Assembly to urge and demand the immediate and prompt impeachment of President YarAdua forthwith.
The immediate impeachment and removal from of President YarAdua is required, demand and has become mandatory necessity, in order to put an end to presidential unconstitutionalities, illegalities and sundry political rascality by President YarAdua and supporters of his lawlessness
Nigeria’s national and strategic interests demand immediate and prompt action by our National Assembly
Kneeling and begging, is not a position of strength, Nigerians have kneeled and begged Mr. YarAdua enough!
Nigeria’s national interest is paramount and should be the overarching consideration in the removal of President YarAdua. And no political parties, sectional, ethnic, religious or regional loyalties should be considered as relevant factors in the circumstances.
Clearly, President YarAdua should no longer be afforded further discretions in these matters of urgent national importance. Nigeria’s ship of state should not be allowed to head full-throttle to the precipice.
President YarAdua has engaged in gross misconduct and impeachable offense of the most egregious type and nature. President YarAdua has embarrassed and shamed the Nigerian nation long enough and enough is enough! Nigeria cannot wait anymore held hostage or ransom.
The Nigerian National Assembly should promptly and immediately feel duty bound to impeach Mr. YarAdua and do so as a matter of urgent national importance. The constitution of Nigeria provides guidance for Nigerian National Assembly to act accordingly and constitutionally sans the Rule of Law.
Section 143 subsection 11 clearly stipulates and provides as follows and I quote, 143 (11) In this section -
"gross misconduct" means a grave violation or breach of the provisions of this Constitution or a misconduct of such nature as amounts in the opinion of the National Assembly to gross misconduct.
This solemn duty is constitutionally mandated. And the Nigerian National Assembly would be acting on behalf of 150 million Nigerians at home and abroad in furtherance and in pursuit of Nigeria’s national best interests.
It is public knowledge within Nigeria and worldwide, that President YarAdua has willfully, intentionally and deliberately, in a premeditated manner, violated provision of the Constitution of Nigeria and he has continued to do so for almost 70 days hence his refusal to transmit a letter to Nigeria’s National Assembly, an instrument which is constitutionally stipulated which would trigger the assumption of office by the vice president as an acting president until the substantive president resumes duty or until a change of circumstances.
President YarAdua has failed, neglected and refused to obey the laws of Nigeria, President YarAdua has violated constitutional provisions as aforementioned and in doing so, has engaged in egregious misconduct. These violations must forthwith be considered by the Nigerian National Assembly as amounting to what is described in our constitution as gross misconduct and as a consequence, impeachable offenses under section 143 as aforementioned and excerpted above.
Nigerians, at home and abroad have been aware, and have been aghast and amazed that the president of Nigeria, the embodiment of nation in symbol and substance, have during the preceding 70 days, unseen and unheard, incommunicado, comatose, vegetative and absent from presidential duties without full disclosures and complete transparency as to his diagnosis, his prognosis and incapacitation.
Nigerians and Nigeria have been held ransom and hostage for embarrassingly, far too long. Nigerians have had enough. Nigerians are tired of inept and arrogant helmsmen who routinely engage in constitutional violations and drunken impunity and lawlessness.
Nigerians have had enough of persons such as President YarAdua and his supports, cabal and acolytes who are utterly contemptuous of the Nigerian electorate. Nigerians have had enough of persons such as Chief Michael Aondoakaa a man supposedly learned in the law. Chief Aondoakaa our nation’s Attorney General, whose reputation is that of aiding, abetting, conniving, and colluding with those who subvert and have subvert the Constitution of Nigeria and those who break all Nigerian laws with reckless impunity.
Nigerians at all levels, Nigerians from all strata of our society and Nigerians across the spectrums of regional, ethnic, linguistic and cultural groups etc have urged, implored and demand that Mr. YarAdua obeys the constitution and he has remained recalcitrant, intransigent and defiant. President YarAdua has adamantly neglected to obey and respect the Constitution and the laws of Nigeria. President YarAdua has neglected and refused entreaty by former Heads of state of Nigeria, such as General Yakubu Gowon, former President Shehu Shagari and former President Obasanjo among others.
President YarAdua continues to defy Nigerians and Nigeria. The world is watching as well. And only this week, the United States, Britain, France and the European Economic Community, issues public statements, in which they essentially echoed the well known feelings, which Nigerians at home and abroad have harbored during these preceding 70 days of Mr. YarAdua absence from presidential duties. I generally have an aversion to foreign interference in Nigerian internal or domestic affairs, but in this instance, the world is reminded of the grave implications which the current political and constitutional crises in Nigeria portends if it remains unaddressed. It could be cataclysmic in human costs.
As Nigeria is misled to nadir, and allowed to teeter in leaderless rudderless manner by President YarAdua and his enablers, persons such as the Attorney General of the Federation Chief Michael Andoakaa should put on notice as to the extreme consequences of their actions as these constitutional violations and illegalities are perpetrated against Nigerians and Nigeria, with the AGF’s implicit, explicit and tacit approvals, with his pungent winks and nods.
Chief Michael Aondoakaa have repeatedly spouted spurious, unconstitutional and completely illegal and unethical arguments, all in order to support and perpetuate fraud against Nigerians and Nigeria’s national interests which the Attorney General had sworn to defend and uphold.
Chief Aondoakaa, the current Attorney General and number one law officer of our federation, has constituted himself, Nigeria’s enemy number one who has presided over all manner of unconstitutionalities and illegal and unethical behaviors, as he has routinely advanced the most warped and most twisted arguments with pretentious coloration of legalities.
No Nigerian individual or persons and or group of persons is more important than Nigeria’s collective national interests. Neither President YarAdua nor AGF Michael Aondoakaa has more stake in what happens to Nigeria and what becomes of Nigeria, than the rest of us 150 million strong Nigerian.
Nigeria’s national interests must be emphasized over and above any parochial, sectional or myopic interests of any persons or political associations or groups within and outside Nigeria
Nigeria is a plural society. Nigeria is a multi ethnic, multi religious, multi lingual and multi cultural nation and as a result, there is a competition for limited public resources. Full citizenship for all Nigerians wherever a Nigerian lives and has indicated permanent interest. Healthy Competition instead of mutual suspicions
Carnage in Jos is connected directly to the same attitude of mutual suspicions between Nigerians our multiple ethnic, regional, religious and diverse cultural background. This attitude of mutual suspicion and emphasis on our differences, instead of emphasis of our national interests and the value, advantage and benefits imbued and encrusted in Nigerian unity in diversity, some continue to persist in treating and dealing with fellow Nigerians as other Nigerians are from the moon or mars! What else could possibly explain Mr. YarAdua’s refusal to peacefully hand over to Nigeria’s vice president who is a fellow Nigerian? Why would Mr. YarAdua think that Mr. Jonathan could by fiat, make Katsina state part of Cameroon or Ghana as soon as Mr. Jonathan assumes the position of acting president of Nigeria?
Full citizenship will eliminate the need for the dichotomy and disparity of settler or indigene. All Nigerians should be able to aspire to the presidency and vice presidency, regardless of ethnic, state and regional origins or religious belief and even absence of religious beliefs.
The National Assembly of Nigeria is constitutionally mandated to steer the Nigerian ship of state away from imminent disastrous crash, anarchy, violence and disintegration and civil war.
It must be clear to all by now, that those who will do Nigeria harm, may cash in, and take advantage of our rudderless parlous state and power void and vacuum which have been foisted upon Nigeria by the egregious constitutional violations and constitutional gross misconduct already committed by President YarAdua and his arrogant cabal of enablers.
It is now public knowledge that the Movement for the Emancipation of Niger Delta, or MEND, has called off a previously negotiated ceasefire to which President YarAdua was a direct participant and party, Mr. YarAdua as a counterparty to a contract or agreement with MEND, has failed to abide by the terms of the ceasefire agreement or contract. Therefore, MEND is arguably right to end the ceasefire entered with President YarAdua in October 2009. And MEND has a valid and legitimate argument, to wit, the absence of President YarAdua, the counterparty or other party to the agreement.
The inability and unwillingness and neglect President YarAdua to enforce the terms and tenor of the said agreement. And the complete disappearance of President YarAdua, the principal party to that agreement who has not been seen or heard from by MEND, Nigerians and the rest of the world during the preceding 70 days! MEND represent a legitimate grouse and MEND may legitimately reject the comatose agreement with the absentee president! MEND should however not engage in violent acts which may lead to loss of lives and properties.
It is clear that Nigerians are now restive. It is clear now that those with legitimate grouse and gripes may now have run out of patience, it is also clear that, foreign and domestic opportunists, may now seek to exact a pint of blood and punishment against Nigerian, as they see an open flank in our current political and constitutional crisis brought about, essentially, by the power void and vacuum by President YarAdua’s constitutional misconduct, constitutional violations, constitutional infractions and outright illegalities which have been committed by him, in his refusal to adhere to and follow, constitutional processes of power transition and peaceful devolution of power set down and laid out specifically in the Constitution of Nigeria.
Therefore, the time has now come, for the National Assembly of Nigeria, to promptly and immediately impeach President YarAdua and remove him from office as president of Nigeria, who has been absent from presidential duties consistently for about 70 days without explanations, full, complete disclosures of his prognosis in open and transparent manner.
President YarAdua should be removed from office as there is no precedent in any and in all of the nations on earth, where a president who is clearly medically and certifiably incapacitated physically and mentally, continues to cling to power, arrogantly and in complete and total subversion of the laws of the law and the Constitution of Nigeria.
Section 143 subsection 1 through subsection 2(b) of the Constitution of Nigeria provides in part, as follows, “The President or Vice-President may be removed from office in accordance with the provisions of this section. Whenever a notice of any allegation in writing signed by not less than one-third of the members of the National Assembly:-
(a) is presented to the President of the Senate;
(b) stating that the holder of the office of President or Vice-President is guilty of gross misconduct in the performance of the functions of his office, detailed particulars of which shall be specified…
Section 143 subsections 10 and 11 provides further, and states as follows…(10) No proceedings or determination of the Panel or of the National Assembly or any matter relating thereto shall be entertained or questioned in any court.
(11) In this section -
"gross misconduct" means a grave violation or breach of the provisions of this Constitution or a misconduct of such nature as amounts in the opinion of the National Assembly to gross misconduct.
It is my view, that President YarAdua has committed gross misconduct by:
1. By his continued absence from presidential duties for about 70 days without explanations in writing, to the National Assembly as constitutionally mandated.
2. President YarAdua has neglected, failed and refuse to abide, adhere and comply and effectuate section 145 of the Constitution of Nigeria, a noncompliance which Nigerian National Assembly is mandated and at minimum, entitled to interpret as a flagrant violation, so egregious in manner and span of time, and deemed President YarAdua’s violation as gross constitutional misconduct which rises to the level of an impeachable offense.
3. By the fact the Federal Executive Council or FEC, Ministers or presidential appointees, convened in obeisance to the constitution of Nigeria to consider the continued fitness of President YarAdua for office. But that the FEC failed to abide by constitutionally stipulated and mandated methods, processes and procedures requiring a medical panel, which includes the personal physician of the president to arrive a certifiable-verifiable medical opinion as continued physical and mental fitness of president to continue as such.
The FEC has therefore, through the action and omission, removed the FEC option from the table and from consideration.
4. The Nigerian National Assembly which is comprised of the Senate and the House of Representatives are the true representatives of Nigerians from all the 774 Local Government Areas of Nigeria, the 36 federating states including Nigerians in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Nigerians at home and abroad, and well wishers of Nigerians and Nigeria, hereby urge, implore and demand that Nigeria’s National Assembly act as the bulwark and savior and protector of Nigeria’s democracy, and Nigeria national interests and Nigeria’s continued existence through the courageous and heroic action which has now become necessary. Impeach President Umaru Musa YarAdua of Nigeria forthwith.
The prompt and immediate impeachment of President YarAdua is in Nigeria’s national interests and strategic interests. Otherwise, there could be an onset of violence, anarchy, coup, civil war and complete disintegration of Nigeria, all which have been speculated, feared and rumored since the continued absence form presidential duties by President YarAdua of Nigeria.
Nigeria’s National Assembly should not allow this unnecessary power vacuum and void to continue much longer, as it is a harbinger and a foreboding of immeasurable calamities, catastrophes and it could prove disastrous for Nigeria and the world. Nigerians and Nigeria deserves better. Enough is enough!
God Bless the people and government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Please also see:
A) President YarAdua Is 30 Days AWOL Or Absence Without Official Leave From Presidential Duties
B) President Yar'Adua Should Not Resign; But Obey The Constitution Instead
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Obama's America Response On Haiti A Thunderous Applause! But…
Obama's America Response On Haiti A Thunderous Applause! But…
Written by Paul I. Adujie
Lawcareer@gmail.com
President Obama’s pronouncements, promises and pledges on Haiti have been clear-eyed, vigorous and robust and it could most probably, turn out to be one of the most pivotal and defining moments of the Obama presidency, other than issues and events in the home or domestic front in America which demands presidential attention as well.
President Obama public statements of support for Haiti and Haitians, regarding the magnitude of the catastrophes, calamities and tragedies in Haiti, in the aftermath of the recent earthquake, have been, to say the least, a watershed event, an epochal mark on the sands of time, and an affective turnaround in America’s plethora of negative policies which were imposed on Haiti during the preceding two hundred years and counting.
President Obama’s comments have been such relief, this, even despite the unfair criticisms by some conservatives of President Obama, for his pronouncements and pledges on Haiti. We know that even mere pledges and promises can be subverted as exampled in the unnecessary delays in aid delivery to Haitians, during the past ten days Giving full effect to promises and pledges, through reasoned, and coordinated sustained policies will determine result oriented measurable outcomes.
The outpouring of support, the promises and pledges have been plentiful, but actual delivery on those promises and pledges will be the test at reckoning.
Monitoring will be key as well even as we move from the search and rescue phase to the relief, recovery, to reconstruction and rebuilding the shattered lives of Haitians and Haiti’s physical structures.
Since 1804 when Haiti declared her freedom, political independence and self-determination, the US has had a standing policy through which the US stifled, undermined and stymied economic and political growth in Haiti, including the invasion and occupation of Haiti for several decades by America, and the most recent American interference, manipulation through an engineered regime change in 2004 which saw the overthrow of President Betrand Aristide. It is still quite possible that the United States and others, are still in a position to undermine Haiti even now. On the other hand, the US could be a force for good in Haiti. Hopefully.
Cataclysmic seismic events in Haiti on January 12, is compelling me to publicly reveal what I have expressed privately to close associates and professional colleagues, about a litmus test which I have reserved for President Obama foreign policy, in which is my plan to measure and hinge President Obama’s new America and American policy regarding Haiti and Cuba as my single parameter, for measuring whether or not, President Obama, as president, as distinct from Obama the candidate, possesses the necessary backbone, the Chutzpa and gravitas to rework favorable policies directed at these two beleaguered Caribbean nations.
Two nations of the Caribbean beleaguered, badgered and besieged for far too long by the United States of America punitive policies. It is important to note that America, all through history, have had the support, wink and nod of France and other allies of the United States in the pursuits of these wrongheaded policies. The time is nigh for change. Haitians and Haiti have been punished enough, they have been broken enough!
Outside intermeddling and manipulations have had crippling effects as were intended by those who wanted Haitians and Haiti pulverized and pauperized, thousands of Haitians live abroad and prosper, which shames those who pretend that Haitians cannot govern themselves. Haiti have remained in a blockade, and economic and political emasculation hence negative growth in Haiti
And then came the devastation. The recent earthquake, as terrible as it was, and as high as the magnitude of suffering and hardship which the earthquake has foisted on Haiti and Haitian, it also may be a boundless opportunity … An opportunity for France and American to atone for the affronts and crimes against Haiti and Haitian during the course of the past two hundred years.
The earthquake is an opportunity for a new beginning for Haiti and her peoples, and as well for those who love Haiti and peoples of Haiti. This tragedy, as painful an adversity, as it is, it does presents a chance for reconstruction, reawakening and rebirth for Haiti and Haitians, in which Haitian at home and in the Diaspora will participate actively, vigorously and prodigiously. This can assuredly be given worldwide support and impetus by those who have affronted and wronged Haiti in the past. It provides a chance for atonement and a window of opportunity to do the right thing for Haiti and Haitians and all those who wish Haiti and Haitian well.
Haiti and her people have been strangulated for far too long, with arrested development and planned obsolescence through a foreign coalitions and domestic puppets and enablers of foreign conspirators against Haiti. Haitian leaders were always expected to be in obeisance to America and France or emasculated and undermined upon failing to kowtow.
It is our hope therefore, that the outpouring of sympathy and support after the earthquake continues and leads to a groundswell of sturdy positive policies towards Haiti for the long term and for the long run. Our hope and expectations are that, lasting economic, political and infrastructural structures will be erected henceforth. And that these efforts will, in turn restore Haiti to the once great and proud people of Haiti.
Haiti as we know it, is a nation established by former West African slaves, who rose from the ashes of adversities and twin evils of slavery and colonialism. Haiti and Haitians have been exemplification of heroism, of courage and grace under fire. Haiti and Haitians have had to endure constant pressures and degradations. It is a historical fact that Haiti’s poverty was imposed on her by those who are now quick to sermonize sanctimoniously about how Haiti is the poorest nation in the western hemisphere with paucity of infrastructures. Even so, Haiti and Haitians have demonstrated extraordinary determination and resilience in the face of steady adversities.
We hope that from now forward, that the formerly undermined and emasculated Haitian economic and political leadership and Haiti Diaspora, are co-opted into the relief and reconstruction which is now unfolding in Haiti in the aftermath of the recent earthquake.
Haitians and others worldwide interested Haiti’s long term interests, through recovery and reconstruction and reconciliation of the historically disparate political and economic class which has been Haiti. Those who have prescribed economic liberalizations in the past, policies which decimated agricultural sector and local capacity, should be prevented from presiding over Haiti again now and prevented from imposing strictures which have arrested and retarded development in Haiti. Haitian government should not be undermined by foreign governments ever again. Indigenous Haitian political and economic leadership should be cultivated for the purpose of setting Haiti on the path of permanent upsurge in economic and political development.
President Obama should be applauded for offering the Temporary Protective Status or TPS to Haitians who are already here in the US and are in dire immigration limbo. Haitians in Haiti desirous of living in the US should be assisted in doing so, for after all, Haitians are ideal immigrants, Haitians are law abiding and Haitian value education and as a consequence, Haitians are the sorts of immigrants any nation needs. Haitians have been discriminated in all immigration matters, in both formulations and implementations, when compared with other nations infested with economic, political and natural disaster and instabilities which arises as a consequence.
Perhaps too, the devastation will level the class apartheid in Haiti between the establishment business class and the poor majority, classes of Haitians which have historically been pitted against one another, in the game of cat and mouse. The events of last two weeks should be used commence a true national reconciliation and healings for Haiti and Haitians, in order to reach closure of the preceding fractious, turbulent 200 years of ceaseless punishment for Haiti and Haitians.
It should be mentioned here that there were unnecessary delays in the search and rescue efforts in Haiti. There was needless delays in the distribution of water and food during the first ten days. Foods and other essential supplies, were seen behind soldiers and at the airports undistributed, and journalists were able to hand food over to survivors without incidents. There were excruciating delays, quite unnecessary delays in deploying helicopters for air dropping supplies as have been done in other locals in the past. We recognize that disasters of the magnitude in Haiti, imposes logistical nightmares.
But there surely cannot be any excuses for the apparent unconscionable delays witnessed in news reports from Haiti. Two weeks after the earthquake, no water or food, imagine that in New York City and ask yourself if there will be docile reaction. And then there were those who sought to blame hapless Haitians for so-called looting, when it was clear that desperation had set in, after ten days of dehydration and hunger. News that only very limited numbers of survivors have been served is rather depressing, to say the least. Fort Nationale is one such embarrassing example where rescue and relief have not been received 15 days after the earthquake. People literarily have lived with their bereavement and their dead, while still dehydrated and starving. All this have happened while relief planes compete for space and place with what looks like a new military invasion and occupation of Haiti all over again, by the historical usual suspects!
Search and rescue work is ebbing, and most foreign teams are heading out of Haiti. Recovery, reconstruction and reconciliation should be pursued simultaneously. Reconciliation across the board should be actively promoted, so that a lasting economic and political stability and tranquility can be found. It is time for true national reconciliations in Haiti, which evinces peaceful return of all political exiles, including former President Betrand Aristide. There is for instance, the story told of an Haitian lady in Florida, who cannot return to Haiti even after this earthquake calamitous havoc wreaked upon Haiti and Haitian, she, prevented from entering or returning to Haiti, just because she was a supporter of former President Aristide
Millions of Americans have demonstrated immeasurable generosity. I hope however that the United States government demilitarize Haiti, there are already complaints against an overbearing military presence which acted at times, as hindrances, impediments and obstacles to speedy delivery of basic human essentials, water, food, urgent medical care. Haiti will need outside assistance, engineers and technical experts in various fields, but not another foreign army of occupation. The US should withdraw troops, leave Haiti to the UN and a multilateral conglomeration of Latin/Caribbean nations to lead the efforts. To do so will be best, and the US through such dispassionate or objective gesture, will demonstrate to the world, that she is a true supporter and well wisher of Haiti and Haitians
Haiti’s glorious history and her checkered past , cause and effect, are all public knowledge. Haiti’s stunted, stymied arrested and decimated development, particularly the agricultural sector were imposed by outsiders, there is a history of rice farmers from Arkansas etc which were subsidized and enabled to subvert Haiti’s local agriculture and food productions. The new efforts in Haiti, must consciously avoid repeating these evils and affronts of the past, which were perpetrated against Haiti and Haitians.
The cataclysmic and calamitous events of January 12, presents a wonderful opportunity, to rebuild Haiti and stand Haiti in good stead, a Haiti in renaissance is born, glory restored to Haitians and Haiti.
Written by Paul I. Adujie
Lawcareer@gmail.com
President Obama’s pronouncements, promises and pledges on Haiti have been clear-eyed, vigorous and robust and it could most probably, turn out to be one of the most pivotal and defining moments of the Obama presidency, other than issues and events in the home or domestic front in America which demands presidential attention as well.
President Obama public statements of support for Haiti and Haitians, regarding the magnitude of the catastrophes, calamities and tragedies in Haiti, in the aftermath of the recent earthquake, have been, to say the least, a watershed event, an epochal mark on the sands of time, and an affective turnaround in America’s plethora of negative policies which were imposed on Haiti during the preceding two hundred years and counting.
President Obama’s comments have been such relief, this, even despite the unfair criticisms by some conservatives of President Obama, for his pronouncements and pledges on Haiti. We know that even mere pledges and promises can be subverted as exampled in the unnecessary delays in aid delivery to Haitians, during the past ten days Giving full effect to promises and pledges, through reasoned, and coordinated sustained policies will determine result oriented measurable outcomes.
The outpouring of support, the promises and pledges have been plentiful, but actual delivery on those promises and pledges will be the test at reckoning.
Monitoring will be key as well even as we move from the search and rescue phase to the relief, recovery, to reconstruction and rebuilding the shattered lives of Haitians and Haiti’s physical structures.
Since 1804 when Haiti declared her freedom, political independence and self-determination, the US has had a standing policy through which the US stifled, undermined and stymied economic and political growth in Haiti, including the invasion and occupation of Haiti for several decades by America, and the most recent American interference, manipulation through an engineered regime change in 2004 which saw the overthrow of President Betrand Aristide. It is still quite possible that the United States and others, are still in a position to undermine Haiti even now. On the other hand, the US could be a force for good in Haiti. Hopefully.
Cataclysmic seismic events in Haiti on January 12, is compelling me to publicly reveal what I have expressed privately to close associates and professional colleagues, about a litmus test which I have reserved for President Obama foreign policy, in which is my plan to measure and hinge President Obama’s new America and American policy regarding Haiti and Cuba as my single parameter, for measuring whether or not, President Obama, as president, as distinct from Obama the candidate, possesses the necessary backbone, the Chutzpa and gravitas to rework favorable policies directed at these two beleaguered Caribbean nations.
Two nations of the Caribbean beleaguered, badgered and besieged for far too long by the United States of America punitive policies. It is important to note that America, all through history, have had the support, wink and nod of France and other allies of the United States in the pursuits of these wrongheaded policies. The time is nigh for change. Haitians and Haiti have been punished enough, they have been broken enough!
Outside intermeddling and manipulations have had crippling effects as were intended by those who wanted Haitians and Haiti pulverized and pauperized, thousands of Haitians live abroad and prosper, which shames those who pretend that Haitians cannot govern themselves. Haiti have remained in a blockade, and economic and political emasculation hence negative growth in Haiti
And then came the devastation. The recent earthquake, as terrible as it was, and as high as the magnitude of suffering and hardship which the earthquake has foisted on Haiti and Haitian, it also may be a boundless opportunity … An opportunity for France and American to atone for the affronts and crimes against Haiti and Haitian during the course of the past two hundred years.
The earthquake is an opportunity for a new beginning for Haiti and her peoples, and as well for those who love Haiti and peoples of Haiti. This tragedy, as painful an adversity, as it is, it does presents a chance for reconstruction, reawakening and rebirth for Haiti and Haitians, in which Haitian at home and in the Diaspora will participate actively, vigorously and prodigiously. This can assuredly be given worldwide support and impetus by those who have affronted and wronged Haiti in the past. It provides a chance for atonement and a window of opportunity to do the right thing for Haiti and Haitians and all those who wish Haiti and Haitian well.
Haiti and her people have been strangulated for far too long, with arrested development and planned obsolescence through a foreign coalitions and domestic puppets and enablers of foreign conspirators against Haiti. Haitian leaders were always expected to be in obeisance to America and France or emasculated and undermined upon failing to kowtow.
It is our hope therefore, that the outpouring of sympathy and support after the earthquake continues and leads to a groundswell of sturdy positive policies towards Haiti for the long term and for the long run. Our hope and expectations are that, lasting economic, political and infrastructural structures will be erected henceforth. And that these efforts will, in turn restore Haiti to the once great and proud people of Haiti.
Haiti as we know it, is a nation established by former West African slaves, who rose from the ashes of adversities and twin evils of slavery and colonialism. Haiti and Haitians have been exemplification of heroism, of courage and grace under fire. Haiti and Haitians have had to endure constant pressures and degradations. It is a historical fact that Haiti’s poverty was imposed on her by those who are now quick to sermonize sanctimoniously about how Haiti is the poorest nation in the western hemisphere with paucity of infrastructures. Even so, Haiti and Haitians have demonstrated extraordinary determination and resilience in the face of steady adversities.
We hope that from now forward, that the formerly undermined and emasculated Haitian economic and political leadership and Haiti Diaspora, are co-opted into the relief and reconstruction which is now unfolding in Haiti in the aftermath of the recent earthquake.
Haitians and others worldwide interested Haiti’s long term interests, through recovery and reconstruction and reconciliation of the historically disparate political and economic class which has been Haiti. Those who have prescribed economic liberalizations in the past, policies which decimated agricultural sector and local capacity, should be prevented from presiding over Haiti again now and prevented from imposing strictures which have arrested and retarded development in Haiti. Haitian government should not be undermined by foreign governments ever again. Indigenous Haitian political and economic leadership should be cultivated for the purpose of setting Haiti on the path of permanent upsurge in economic and political development.
President Obama should be applauded for offering the Temporary Protective Status or TPS to Haitians who are already here in the US and are in dire immigration limbo. Haitians in Haiti desirous of living in the US should be assisted in doing so, for after all, Haitians are ideal immigrants, Haitians are law abiding and Haitian value education and as a consequence, Haitians are the sorts of immigrants any nation needs. Haitians have been discriminated in all immigration matters, in both formulations and implementations, when compared with other nations infested with economic, political and natural disaster and instabilities which arises as a consequence.
Perhaps too, the devastation will level the class apartheid in Haiti between the establishment business class and the poor majority, classes of Haitians which have historically been pitted against one another, in the game of cat and mouse. The events of last two weeks should be used commence a true national reconciliation and healings for Haiti and Haitians, in order to reach closure of the preceding fractious, turbulent 200 years of ceaseless punishment for Haiti and Haitians.
It should be mentioned here that there were unnecessary delays in the search and rescue efforts in Haiti. There was needless delays in the distribution of water and food during the first ten days. Foods and other essential supplies, were seen behind soldiers and at the airports undistributed, and journalists were able to hand food over to survivors without incidents. There were excruciating delays, quite unnecessary delays in deploying helicopters for air dropping supplies as have been done in other locals in the past. We recognize that disasters of the magnitude in Haiti, imposes logistical nightmares.
But there surely cannot be any excuses for the apparent unconscionable delays witnessed in news reports from Haiti. Two weeks after the earthquake, no water or food, imagine that in New York City and ask yourself if there will be docile reaction. And then there were those who sought to blame hapless Haitians for so-called looting, when it was clear that desperation had set in, after ten days of dehydration and hunger. News that only very limited numbers of survivors have been served is rather depressing, to say the least. Fort Nationale is one such embarrassing example where rescue and relief have not been received 15 days after the earthquake. People literarily have lived with their bereavement and their dead, while still dehydrated and starving. All this have happened while relief planes compete for space and place with what looks like a new military invasion and occupation of Haiti all over again, by the historical usual suspects!
Search and rescue work is ebbing, and most foreign teams are heading out of Haiti. Recovery, reconstruction and reconciliation should be pursued simultaneously. Reconciliation across the board should be actively promoted, so that a lasting economic and political stability and tranquility can be found. It is time for true national reconciliations in Haiti, which evinces peaceful return of all political exiles, including former President Betrand Aristide. There is for instance, the story told of an Haitian lady in Florida, who cannot return to Haiti even after this earthquake calamitous havoc wreaked upon Haiti and Haitian, she, prevented from entering or returning to Haiti, just because she was a supporter of former President Aristide
Millions of Americans have demonstrated immeasurable generosity. I hope however that the United States government demilitarize Haiti, there are already complaints against an overbearing military presence which acted at times, as hindrances, impediments and obstacles to speedy delivery of basic human essentials, water, food, urgent medical care. Haiti will need outside assistance, engineers and technical experts in various fields, but not another foreign army of occupation. The US should withdraw troops, leave Haiti to the UN and a multilateral conglomeration of Latin/Caribbean nations to lead the efforts. To do so will be best, and the US through such dispassionate or objective gesture, will demonstrate to the world, that she is a true supporter and well wisher of Haiti and Haitians
Haiti’s glorious history and her checkered past , cause and effect, are all public knowledge. Haiti’s stunted, stymied arrested and decimated development, particularly the agricultural sector were imposed by outsiders, there is a history of rice farmers from Arkansas etc which were subsidized and enabled to subvert Haiti’s local agriculture and food productions. The new efforts in Haiti, must consciously avoid repeating these evils and affronts of the past, which were perpetrated against Haiti and Haitians.
The cataclysmic and calamitous events of January 12, presents a wonderful opportunity, to rebuild Haiti and stand Haiti in good stead, a Haiti in renaissance is born, glory restored to Haitians and Haiti.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Obama Recast And Refocused To Recapture Direction And Legacy
Obama Recast And Refocused To Recapture Direction And Legacy
Written by Paul I. Adujie
Lawcareer@gmail.com
I do not want President Obama to fail; I have a stake in Mr. Obama’s success. Besides, Republican policies don’t interest me! However, I am increasingly worried at Mr. Obama’s prospects.
It bears restating the bare facts, President Obama inherited three major wars. Two foreign wars, and a domestic one. A war in Afghanistan and another in Iraq. And of course the civil war like domestic situation in American, which arose as a result of the financial meltdown and the economic debacle which ensued in the aftermath of the financial market meltdown.
President Obama and the Democrats committed egregious errors in the first twelve months upon receiving a landslide victory and a resounding electoral mandate in the general elections of November 2008. But so inexplicably, President Obama and the Democrats have been splendidly uninterested and unwillingly to state the facts as they are. The facts of how Republicans got America into two foreign wars and ruined the American economy by driving it too close to the precipice and disaster. Are Democrats are self-destruct?
First, President Obama and the Democrats seemingly called a unilateral truce with the Republicans who were repudiated at the polls by the American voting electorate. Republicans who were by now, political orphans, upon being repudiated, displaced and dislocated from power by American voters, Republicans, were quite unlike the giddy and ambivalent Democrats who had just come in from the cold after eight years without occupying the White House.
It was clear to all that defeat for the Republicans was deserved, what with three wars? Afghanistan, Iraq and the deeply troubled American economy as a consequences of the most cavalier regimen of deregulation foisted upon America and fostered by the Republicans? But, Republicans do have clear-eyed killer instincts, quite unlike Democrats.
Secondly, President Obama’s fixation on bipartisanship ignores what he himself knows to be true and self evident, which is that, everyday is an election day, at least, this is how the Republicans see politics. The Republicans are similar to hungry, and wounded lions who have already tasted blood in Scott Brown of Massachusetts. Republicans know the fight and seem always ready for the fight. Democrats fight and seem to quickly lose focus and seemingly become ambivalent and disarrayed.. Republicans understand the rules of fight or flight, the Democrats are distracted by the polemical gymnastics of fights and flights; the Democrats often gets sucker-punched as a result of these self-inflicted inattention or distractions.
During the summer of 2009, Democrats were busily emphasizing their own credentials as confused Democrats, Blue-Dog Democrats and Pink-Dog Democrats and Confused-Dog Democrats, and while the Democrats persisted in their ambivalence regarding own label, whether to be liberal or not to be, the Republicans pounced and seized the narrative and snatched the narrative from the Democrats.
President Obama was making efforts mightily on behalf of the electorate, without explaining such efforts and Republicans adept at commanding American narratives, swooped on the Democrats and won elections in Virginia, New Jersey, New York and most recently, in Massachusetts. Republicans extremists and fringe groups, Tea Party, warts and all, unleashed armies of rabble rousers, which corralled and coordinated public anger over spirally rate of unemployment rates which was over 10.2 percent nationally and actually worse in some localities, and much worse in the African American communities for instance. And in the end, what the American public knew about the Health Care Reform was what the Republicans wanted them to know and told them, such as the Death Panel nonsense etc.
Economic dislocations were exacerbated by mortgage foreclosure and high rate of unemployment, the Republicans which in fact used all manners of obfuscations and delays to derail President Obama and the Democrats engineered palliatives, managed to have emerged smelling like fresh flowers, after exploiting American public displeasure regarding foreign wars and domestic economic debacles.
All through the summer of 2009, President Obama appeared to have left his attempt at Health Care Reform on auto pilot, perhaps motivated by his unflinching belief in the fable also known as bipartisanship, to which the Republicans are not subscribers. And so, President Obama and Democrats in the US Congress who seemed confused all through the preceding twelve months, as to whether they like bearing the appellation and label of liberal poster child of American politics.
In all of this, Obama is beginning to look like David Dinkins and Jimmy Carter, a one term former mayor of New York City and president of the United States respectively, both, Democrats and fine gentlemen, were perceived by Americans as indecisive. Recently, President Obama was quoted in the press to have said that he would prefer to be an effective one term president than an ineffective two term president. President Obama may have squandered his electoral mandate during the first year, it remains to be seen whether he can recapture, recast, refocus his presidential legacy and place in history, but suffice to say, that the first year have been mismanaged and that the Republicans snatched the isolated victories in isolated off year elections, which could be a harbinger for President Obama’s legacy, mired one term or two, as president of the United States
On the foreign policy front, President Obama the candidate is not identical with Obama the chief executive and daily manager of America’s affairs. His policy regarding pullout from Iraq is uncertain, and on the matter of troop surge in Afghanistan, Mr. Obama became the war president who argued in favor of just wars. His American policy toward African nations remain inarticulate and unarticulated. And I am on record as expressing utter displeasure over his speeches to parliament in Ghana and to NAACP in New York City in July 2009. In the Ghana speech, he came across as an American president of Jewish heritage who visits Israel on his way to Auschwitz and Dachau, who says to Jews in Tel Aviv that the Holocaust was no big deal and in any case, it is time to get over it!
In my opinion, this is the moral equivalent of Mr. Obama’s off hand comments about the effects of slavery and colonialism on African development. His moving-right-along cavalier attitude regarding the historical horrors and brutalities directed at Africans and peoples of African descent, were most probably a delicately deft political calculation to please or placate conservatives at the expense at the rest of us. This is similar to Mr. Obama’s adamant insistence or belief that his attackers are not motivated by racism, even after President Jimmy Carter and others agreed with the rest of us, upon analyzing the tenor and tempo American national conversation regarding Obama. Mr. Obama seem to subscribe to the fluke which is also called post racial America, just as he similarly persists in pursuing a nonexistent bipartisanship with the Republicans who are set to dismantle his policies and presidency, one policy, and one election at a time. President Obama must avoid coming across as over-produced and too delicately balanced in his policy pursuits, as he stands the risk of being perceived as a feckless fake Republican-Democrat hybrid. I think it was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who once said, paraphrased, those who do not have the gravitas to stand for worthy causes tend to fall for worth than useless things.
Furthermore, Mr. Obama’s foreign policy appears grounded or predicated on dialogue and multilateralism, and this, of course is a breathe of fresh, when contrasted against his predecessor’s arrogance and unilateralism. President Obama as candidate, was criticized by his opponents as appearing to be a champion of appeasement, and therefore a weakling. This was because of his stated desire to dialogue with Iran, North Korea and other real and imagined enemies of the United States. I find quite out of sync with Mr. Obama pronouncement and practice, the fact that he has no policy on Nigeria beyond the current infantile snub and slap, in which he denied Nigeria the “reward” of a stop-over “visit” for a few hours in July 2009, an act widely interpreted as a snub, and his recent placement of Nigeria on a terrorism watch list, which again, is widely seen as a slap and muscling attempt directed at Nigeria. These two acts are only capable of eliciting frowns, discomforts and even antagonism, not partnership and cooperation. Nigeria has always had a very friendly and cordial diplomatic ties with the United States, despite Nigeria’s internal or domestic wrangling and challenges. And on the matter of terrorism, Mutallab’s father is my best defense, he reported his son the Americans and he exemplifies the excellent character and integrity in the majority of Nigerians, 150 million strong. Regarding Nigeria therefore, Mr. Obama will need a shift of the paradigm, from snub-slap, to dialogue and engagement. .
There is no doubt that President Obama’s presidential legacy, will for the most part, be shaped by domestic policies, and I have very strong feelings that the outcomes will be determined by his fruitless efforts at bipartisanship. President Obama seem ensconced and entrenched in his starry-eyed bipartisan utopian dreams, while Republicans and other political opponents of President Obama readies for the next election and fight for supremacy in American politics. President Obama and the Democrats will be better served to hold the feet to the fire of Republicans Party, the party of NO, and let the public see the Republicans for what they are. Similarly, President Obama also need to remind himself and his own party members, the Democrats, that they were elected to pursue policies for which the Democrats are known and loved. Bipartisanship is desirable, but in the current American political environment, it is rather a utopian wish and it amounts to a unilateral truce and self-limitation on the part of the Democrats, who are still shrill-shouting themselves hoarse about the necessity of bipartisanship with Republicans who are only interested in the next, and the next, and the next electoral victories
Bipartisanship as an idea remains an aspiration to what ought to be quite distinct from what is. Republicans have all through the first year of the Obama presidency, mounted solid opposition, locked step and very disciplined, even in their minority capacity. This fact seem to manage to escape the Democrats.
President Obama and the Democrats were elected in repudiation of Republican conservative policies, but, the Democrats are acting as though, they are confused as to what political and economic policies they represent.
President Obama and his Democrats must stand up and fight, and this means pursuing liberal economic, social and political policies for which they were preferred over the Republicans. President Obama’s Health Care Reform was not vigorously explained to the American electorate by the president and the Democrats, even so, it had 56 percent public approval, but subsequent to President Obama’s State of the Union Speech, the Health Care Reform Bill received a 66 percent public approval rating, according to a CBS News poll, only barely a few hours after President Obama gave the speech or address to the US Congress.
This increase in public approval through understanding, is clearly illustrative and demonstrates how the president and his party dropped the ball in the public explaining department. President Obama and the Democrats inherent the worst economy since the Great Depression, and then the galloping trillion dollar public expenditure in deficit spending on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and then the stimulus package, necessitated by the damage wrought upon America by wrongheaded policies unfurled by the Republicans during their preceding eight years reign at American economic and political policy helms.
I am unable to understand why President Obama and the Democrats seem to think that they will be demeaning themselves, if they reminded the American electorate how we got where we are, while explaining as well, steps which the Democrats are taking to remedy these situations, and further, the derailing impediments, obstacles which Republicans are stacking against the Democrats, who are doing the heavy lifting and clearing the Augean Stable and undertaking the Herculean tasks cleaning up after the Republicans.
It should be, it ought to be very clear that the Democrats are engaged in doing the difficult job of cleaning up after the Republican induced public policy hurricanes, and who is better to do this explaining than President Obama and his Democratic Party, the inheritors of the gargantuan losses and mismanagement of the Republican years? Perhaps it is not too late for President Obama to explain, recast, recapture and refocus Democratic Party policy thrusts which takes cognizance of the electorate.
President Obama still has time to recast, recapture and gain momentum and refocus on what will be his presidential legacy, as a one term president, but preferably, my president for next seven years. There is so much stake in his outcome for the rest of the world, and me.
Written by Paul I. Adujie
Lawcareer@gmail.com
I do not want President Obama to fail; I have a stake in Mr. Obama’s success. Besides, Republican policies don’t interest me! However, I am increasingly worried at Mr. Obama’s prospects.
It bears restating the bare facts, President Obama inherited three major wars. Two foreign wars, and a domestic one. A war in Afghanistan and another in Iraq. And of course the civil war like domestic situation in American, which arose as a result of the financial meltdown and the economic debacle which ensued in the aftermath of the financial market meltdown.
President Obama and the Democrats committed egregious errors in the first twelve months upon receiving a landslide victory and a resounding electoral mandate in the general elections of November 2008. But so inexplicably, President Obama and the Democrats have been splendidly uninterested and unwillingly to state the facts as they are. The facts of how Republicans got America into two foreign wars and ruined the American economy by driving it too close to the precipice and disaster. Are Democrats are self-destruct?
First, President Obama and the Democrats seemingly called a unilateral truce with the Republicans who were repudiated at the polls by the American voting electorate. Republicans who were by now, political orphans, upon being repudiated, displaced and dislocated from power by American voters, Republicans, were quite unlike the giddy and ambivalent Democrats who had just come in from the cold after eight years without occupying the White House.
It was clear to all that defeat for the Republicans was deserved, what with three wars? Afghanistan, Iraq and the deeply troubled American economy as a consequences of the most cavalier regimen of deregulation foisted upon America and fostered by the Republicans? But, Republicans do have clear-eyed killer instincts, quite unlike Democrats.
Secondly, President Obama’s fixation on bipartisanship ignores what he himself knows to be true and self evident, which is that, everyday is an election day, at least, this is how the Republicans see politics. The Republicans are similar to hungry, and wounded lions who have already tasted blood in Scott Brown of Massachusetts. Republicans know the fight and seem always ready for the fight. Democrats fight and seem to quickly lose focus and seemingly become ambivalent and disarrayed.. Republicans understand the rules of fight or flight, the Democrats are distracted by the polemical gymnastics of fights and flights; the Democrats often gets sucker-punched as a result of these self-inflicted inattention or distractions.
During the summer of 2009, Democrats were busily emphasizing their own credentials as confused Democrats, Blue-Dog Democrats and Pink-Dog Democrats and Confused-Dog Democrats, and while the Democrats persisted in their ambivalence regarding own label, whether to be liberal or not to be, the Republicans pounced and seized the narrative and snatched the narrative from the Democrats.
President Obama was making efforts mightily on behalf of the electorate, without explaining such efforts and Republicans adept at commanding American narratives, swooped on the Democrats and won elections in Virginia, New Jersey, New York and most recently, in Massachusetts. Republicans extremists and fringe groups, Tea Party, warts and all, unleashed armies of rabble rousers, which corralled and coordinated public anger over spirally rate of unemployment rates which was over 10.2 percent nationally and actually worse in some localities, and much worse in the African American communities for instance. And in the end, what the American public knew about the Health Care Reform was what the Republicans wanted them to know and told them, such as the Death Panel nonsense etc.
Economic dislocations were exacerbated by mortgage foreclosure and high rate of unemployment, the Republicans which in fact used all manners of obfuscations and delays to derail President Obama and the Democrats engineered palliatives, managed to have emerged smelling like fresh flowers, after exploiting American public displeasure regarding foreign wars and domestic economic debacles.
All through the summer of 2009, President Obama appeared to have left his attempt at Health Care Reform on auto pilot, perhaps motivated by his unflinching belief in the fable also known as bipartisanship, to which the Republicans are not subscribers. And so, President Obama and Democrats in the US Congress who seemed confused all through the preceding twelve months, as to whether they like bearing the appellation and label of liberal poster child of American politics.
In all of this, Obama is beginning to look like David Dinkins and Jimmy Carter, a one term former mayor of New York City and president of the United States respectively, both, Democrats and fine gentlemen, were perceived by Americans as indecisive. Recently, President Obama was quoted in the press to have said that he would prefer to be an effective one term president than an ineffective two term president. President Obama may have squandered his electoral mandate during the first year, it remains to be seen whether he can recapture, recast, refocus his presidential legacy and place in history, but suffice to say, that the first year have been mismanaged and that the Republicans snatched the isolated victories in isolated off year elections, which could be a harbinger for President Obama’s legacy, mired one term or two, as president of the United States
On the foreign policy front, President Obama the candidate is not identical with Obama the chief executive and daily manager of America’s affairs. His policy regarding pullout from Iraq is uncertain, and on the matter of troop surge in Afghanistan, Mr. Obama became the war president who argued in favor of just wars. His American policy toward African nations remain inarticulate and unarticulated. And I am on record as expressing utter displeasure over his speeches to parliament in Ghana and to NAACP in New York City in July 2009. In the Ghana speech, he came across as an American president of Jewish heritage who visits Israel on his way to Auschwitz and Dachau, who says to Jews in Tel Aviv that the Holocaust was no big deal and in any case, it is time to get over it!
In my opinion, this is the moral equivalent of Mr. Obama’s off hand comments about the effects of slavery and colonialism on African development. His moving-right-along cavalier attitude regarding the historical horrors and brutalities directed at Africans and peoples of African descent, were most probably a delicately deft political calculation to please or placate conservatives at the expense at the rest of us. This is similar to Mr. Obama’s adamant insistence or belief that his attackers are not motivated by racism, even after President Jimmy Carter and others agreed with the rest of us, upon analyzing the tenor and tempo American national conversation regarding Obama. Mr. Obama seem to subscribe to the fluke which is also called post racial America, just as he similarly persists in pursuing a nonexistent bipartisanship with the Republicans who are set to dismantle his policies and presidency, one policy, and one election at a time. President Obama must avoid coming across as over-produced and too delicately balanced in his policy pursuits, as he stands the risk of being perceived as a feckless fake Republican-Democrat hybrid. I think it was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who once said, paraphrased, those who do not have the gravitas to stand for worthy causes tend to fall for worth than useless things.
Furthermore, Mr. Obama’s foreign policy appears grounded or predicated on dialogue and multilateralism, and this, of course is a breathe of fresh, when contrasted against his predecessor’s arrogance and unilateralism. President Obama as candidate, was criticized by his opponents as appearing to be a champion of appeasement, and therefore a weakling. This was because of his stated desire to dialogue with Iran, North Korea and other real and imagined enemies of the United States. I find quite out of sync with Mr. Obama pronouncement and practice, the fact that he has no policy on Nigeria beyond the current infantile snub and slap, in which he denied Nigeria the “reward” of a stop-over “visit” for a few hours in July 2009, an act widely interpreted as a snub, and his recent placement of Nigeria on a terrorism watch list, which again, is widely seen as a slap and muscling attempt directed at Nigeria. These two acts are only capable of eliciting frowns, discomforts and even antagonism, not partnership and cooperation. Nigeria has always had a very friendly and cordial diplomatic ties with the United States, despite Nigeria’s internal or domestic wrangling and challenges. And on the matter of terrorism, Mutallab’s father is my best defense, he reported his son the Americans and he exemplifies the excellent character and integrity in the majority of Nigerians, 150 million strong. Regarding Nigeria therefore, Mr. Obama will need a shift of the paradigm, from snub-slap, to dialogue and engagement. .
There is no doubt that President Obama’s presidential legacy, will for the most part, be shaped by domestic policies, and I have very strong feelings that the outcomes will be determined by his fruitless efforts at bipartisanship. President Obama seem ensconced and entrenched in his starry-eyed bipartisan utopian dreams, while Republicans and other political opponents of President Obama readies for the next election and fight for supremacy in American politics. President Obama and the Democrats will be better served to hold the feet to the fire of Republicans Party, the party of NO, and let the public see the Republicans for what they are. Similarly, President Obama also need to remind himself and his own party members, the Democrats, that they were elected to pursue policies for which the Democrats are known and loved. Bipartisanship is desirable, but in the current American political environment, it is rather a utopian wish and it amounts to a unilateral truce and self-limitation on the part of the Democrats, who are still shrill-shouting themselves hoarse about the necessity of bipartisanship with Republicans who are only interested in the next, and the next, and the next electoral victories
Bipartisanship as an idea remains an aspiration to what ought to be quite distinct from what is. Republicans have all through the first year of the Obama presidency, mounted solid opposition, locked step and very disciplined, even in their minority capacity. This fact seem to manage to escape the Democrats.
President Obama and the Democrats were elected in repudiation of Republican conservative policies, but, the Democrats are acting as though, they are confused as to what political and economic policies they represent.
President Obama and his Democrats must stand up and fight, and this means pursuing liberal economic, social and political policies for which they were preferred over the Republicans. President Obama’s Health Care Reform was not vigorously explained to the American electorate by the president and the Democrats, even so, it had 56 percent public approval, but subsequent to President Obama’s State of the Union Speech, the Health Care Reform Bill received a 66 percent public approval rating, according to a CBS News poll, only barely a few hours after President Obama gave the speech or address to the US Congress.
This increase in public approval through understanding, is clearly illustrative and demonstrates how the president and his party dropped the ball in the public explaining department. President Obama and the Democrats inherent the worst economy since the Great Depression, and then the galloping trillion dollar public expenditure in deficit spending on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and then the stimulus package, necessitated by the damage wrought upon America by wrongheaded policies unfurled by the Republicans during their preceding eight years reign at American economic and political policy helms.
I am unable to understand why President Obama and the Democrats seem to think that they will be demeaning themselves, if they reminded the American electorate how we got where we are, while explaining as well, steps which the Democrats are taking to remedy these situations, and further, the derailing impediments, obstacles which Republicans are stacking against the Democrats, who are doing the heavy lifting and clearing the Augean Stable and undertaking the Herculean tasks cleaning up after the Republicans.
It should be, it ought to be very clear that the Democrats are engaged in doing the difficult job of cleaning up after the Republican induced public policy hurricanes, and who is better to do this explaining than President Obama and his Democratic Party, the inheritors of the gargantuan losses and mismanagement of the Republican years? Perhaps it is not too late for President Obama to explain, recast, recapture and refocus Democratic Party policy thrusts which takes cognizance of the electorate.
President Obama still has time to recast, recapture and gain momentum and refocus on what will be his presidential legacy, as a one term president, but preferably, my president for next seven years. There is so much stake in his outcome for the rest of the world, and me.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Haiti My Love; We Are All Haitians Now; Haiti Cheri, Mon Amour, Je t'aime
Haiti My Love; We Are All Haitians Now; Haiti Cheri, Mon Amour, Je t'aime
Written Paul I. Adujie
I am overwhelmed with emotions. I am mournful and tearful. I am so saddened and feel broken and helpless.
I am compelled to ask why Haiti tragedies are seemingly ceaseless and endless. And why is it that Haiti never gets any respite? Why is it that Haiti has all through history suffered calamities, catastrophes and disasters? Why is a once great people in a nation which was full of promise, now perpetually embroiled in palpable devastation and abject poverty?
Haiti’s beginning was auspicious and most audacious, and that, in itself, inspired ceaseless and endless reprisals from two hemispheres. And then, there are also reprisals from outer space and now, reprisals from underground.
An article in The New York Times by one Tracy Kidder captures the core and essence of Haiti’s plights and predicaments, Mr. Kidder a few days ago, wrote what encapsulates the happenstances of history regarding Haiti “Haiti is a country created by former slaves, kidnapped West Africans, who, in 1804, when slavery still flourished in the United States and the Caribbean, threw off their cruel French masters and created their own republic.”
Mr. Kidder further stated that “Haitians have been punished ever since for claiming their freedom: by the French who, in the 1820s, demanded and received payment from the Haitians for the slave colony, impoverishing the country for years to come; by an often brutal American occupation from 1915 to 1934; by indigenous misrule that the American government aided and abetted. (In more recent years American administrations fell into a pattern of promoting and then undermining Haitian constitutional democracy.)”
In the aftermath of this calamitous earthquake, there have been outpouring of promises and pledges of disaster relief and it is hoped that these promises and pledges are delivered. And again, in the words of Mr. Kidder, “The ultimate goal of all aid to Haiti ought to be the strengthening of Haitian institutions, infrastructure and expertise.”
It must be clear to all by now, that the decision to disband Haitian military was wrongheaded. It is similar in consequence and outcome to the disbandment of Iraqi military at the onset of the invasion and occupation of Iraq by the United States in 2003.
In Haiti as in Iraq, some members of the military were anti people and operated with impunity and above the law. But the thing to have done, was to reform both militaries, instead of abolishing or disbanding them, and leaving a void or vacuum. While the foreign search and rescue team will be in Haiti for a short time, and then leave, it must be stated that Haitians must be assisted to endow own local infrastructure, managed by the locals in the locales. The world must get out of the business of decimating local capacities and local enterprise, whether it relates to the raising of pigs or the production of milk or the management of local military or paramilitary. There is so much value in local content, even imperfect ones, they usually know the terrains, and conditions and with stake in the outcome for the long term or long haul.
Haiti was pressured into a situation, in which she had no army or military, while in Iraq, the US disbanded Iraqi military by fiat or pronouncement, as the US described uniformed Iraqis as tools in the hands of Saddam Hussein. I take the view that no nation should be in the business of deciding what other nations should have a standing army or military. In the case of Iraq, the disbandment of Iraqi military, which was ostensibly loyal to Saddam, produced unintended consequences, including, becoming the source of insurgency and disgruntlement which undermined America’s occupation of Iraq. Regarding Haiti, abolishing the military, produced yet another unintended consequence. It deprived Haiti of trained, organized and cohesive first responders or military efficiency which could have been directed at rescue efforts in partnership with arriving foreign rescuers and first responders.
Reform should have been encouraged instead of disbandment of military and paramilitary. After all, on the matter of lawlessness and impunity, local police forces and law enforcement agencies in America were in cahoots, connivance and collusion to oppress African Americans, segregate and discriminate against African Americans. Local police and law enforcement agencies in America were tools of the Klu Klux Klan, they were intertwined, interconnected and doubled and piggy backed in their nefarious activities. There were multiplicities of impunity and lawlessness, racism and criminality all at the expense of African Americans... even as recent as 40 years ago. Jim Crow was official policy until the Civil Rights movement and until segregation requiring the US National Guard to enforce human rights and civil rights which were routinely violated by local officials and other local police and local law enforcements agencies... until there were reforms. Reform should have been policies in Haiti and not the disbandment of law enforcement agencies in Haiti. Disbandment was as a consequence and was precipitated by pressures from the outside
In the days and weeks ahead, a Haitian military or paramilitary force, would have been useful in maintaining law and order. Directing traffic and preventing anti social behavior and chaos, which are quite likely to ensue, as victims who are still stunned, recover from shocks and soon become desperate for limited resources and services.
The grief is palpable and thankfully, through all of this, Haitians are generously supportive of each other; Haitians are digging fellow citizens out of earthquake rubbles and sharing water, gauzes and the very minimal of resources which they have left
There will be desperations borne of long suffering and hardship. The paucity of resources, such as water and food, could very likely lead to stampede and disorderliness, and yet again, the world will wonder why? There could be stampede and local military, paramilitary and or civil defense forces would have been useful in this regard. But there have been deliberate decimation and depletion of local capacities.
There are concerns that there could be outbreaks of cholera, diarrhea and other diseases which might result from the now festering poor sanitary conditions and the scarcity of clean water, electricity, as well as exposed broken sewers. All these present logistical nightmares for search and rescue personnel, local and foreign, requiring dynamic modalities. And again, building local capacities is crucial, in view of long term considerations.
Haiti, just like Jamaica, Guyana have had their local capacities whittled by outsiders deliberately. Those who resisted such outsider usurpers, have been labeled castigated and cast off, Linden Forbes Samson Burnham of Guyana was called socialist communist, and so was Michael Manley of Jamaica, just because they sought to protect and preserve local initiative, local enterprise and local capacities. Haiti used to produce a great deal of what she consumed, and even exported. There was abundance of rice and animal husbandry. Jamaica used to produce milk and dairy and banana in abundance, until Jamaica was targeted by the multinationals, and resisters labeled communists. Farmers, food and agro industrial conglomerates in America continue to receive subsidies from governments, while same western governments pressure Caribbean and African nations not to grant any such subsidies. This practice creates unfair trade practices for the advantage of western conglomerates, farmers and food producers, and this in turn decimates local initiatives and local enterprise and capacity building in Caribbean and African nations… for the advantage of western entities. Sadly, there are no social safety nets in these nations, quite unlike it is found in western societies. So many odds are piled upon Caribbean and African nations and these odds are all connected by the strands of race which in turn festoon social political instability. There are these cause and effect which are all connected and our fates are linked and in the Haiti earthquake, I see the plights and predicaments of all Caribbean nations and continental Africans and peoples of African descent worldwide. Never a dull pleasant moment, never a respite!
It is so easy for some in the world today, to ignore or be willingly ignorant of the evil seeds which were sown in these nations, seeds sown and nurtured, which have led to these structural defects and persisting instabilities. There are continued manipulations, interventions and interferences by outsiders, which undermines growth and development and sturdy structures. It is quite easy for those willing to be superficial, intellectually lazy and or, unwilling to confront the inconvenient truth, to blame the victims and say, why can’t these nations ever help themselves?
The truth is, there is nothing ordained or preordained about people Caribbean and continental African nations. There is nothing in our genes which guarantees failed nation economic, political and socials instabilities and failed nation statuses. Tracy Kidder and Bill Quigley addressed some of these in Mr. Kidder’s article in The New York Times and Mr. Quigley’s in the Huffington Post of January 14, 2010 titled, “What the Mainstream Media Will Not Tell You About Haiti: Part of the Suffering of Haiti is "Made in the USA"
Some are right now installing puppets in Afghanistan and Iraq, puppets who are too willing and only amenable to the wishes of foreign powers and the political and business interests of outsiders, in denigration, dimunition and complete disregard of the interests and roles of the local peoples. Local political and business power structures which are inconsistent and in contradiction to the peoples of Afghanistan and Iraq are being planted, but in a few years, may 50 or 100 years hence, people will wonder why the offspring of today’s Afghan war lords are undemocratic or corrupt or both, ditto for Iraq.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-quigley/what-the-mainstream-media_b_424126.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/14/opinion/14kidder.html?pagewanted=print
http://video.nytimes.com/video/2006/01/27/world/1194817109852/haiti-democracy-undone.html
In this immediate aftermaths of the earthquake and in the long term, Haiti need us all.
The people of Haiti would need money, and sundry material assistance from all of us. There is need for more. President Obama should extend Temporary Protective Status or TPS to Haitians. The Congressional Black Caucus have for many years argued that the US bring equity and justice to Haitians regarding immigration opportunities. This is the immigration status which have in the past been extended to citizens of nations with political turmoil and or natural disasters. Haiti unfortunately, have faced political instability, hurricanes and now, this earthquake devastation. Haitians therefore doubly qualify for the TPS status, because Haiti has been afflicted by political crises and natural disasters and so, both criterion have been met. Haiti’s doubly whammies qualifies her for TPS, if any nation was ever so qualified. Haiti and Haitians have always been treated differently compared with other nations.
Haiti in all of these, it must be remembered, has had a very checkered history and Mr. Kidder’s article referenced above alluded directly to this point. And it must be restated here, because it bears repeating the major role and the enormous negative impact in Haitian affairs, by the direct interventions, manipulations and interferences in Haiti’s economic, political and constitutional development.
Haitian history is full and replete with abundant evidence of the havoc wrought upon Haiti by France, the United States and Britain through direct actions, collusion and connivance to punish Haiti for, having the audacity to auspicious resist French usurpation and domination, and thereafter, having the temerity to declare political independence in 1804.
The defeated France, demanded and received punitive reparations from Haiti, which subsequently left Haiti impoverished. Haiti is country of rich culture, forerunners in the fight for freedom and independence for Black peoples worldwide. Haiti’s freedom and political independence predated American Emancipation Proclamation for African Americans. Haitian independence and freedom was precursor to political independence for African nations post colonialism.
Haitians by laying claim to the fundamental human right to be a free people, earned the wrath of the French and the United States. Haitians declaration of independence and freedom, was seen as a direct affront and challenge to the superiority complexes in France and the United States. Haiti’s declaration of independence and freedom, was inconsistent to American and European worldview of racial hierarchy and superiority complex, and in this singular act by Haitians more than 200 years ago, there having been relentless efforts to undermine Haiti by the Americans and the French.
This deliberate policy to undermine Haiti, culminated in the labeling and overthrow of former President Betrand Aristide, albeit, an imperfect man, an imperfect politician.
The government of the United States under former President George W. Bush, funded the National Republican Institute which directly undermined Haitian democracy. The American government directly and indirectly supported criminal and murderous elements, including drug dealers, known to the US, all in efforts to remove the constitutionally elected government of Betrand Aristide
Haiti paid for her independence and paid dearly, deforestation set in, result of sale of mahogany trees… foreign intervention have been negative for Haiti, the US have intervened thrice, the US also prevented $500 million IMF/World Bank facility… which in turn, led to deprivation, social discontent, violence and chaos. The former President Betrand Aristide was deceived and lured away by the Americans into exile on February 29, 2004 and he remains in South Africa. The quandary is unmitigated and unabated, all these are now multiplied by this devastating earthquake.
Haiti need the support of everyone on earth and the Gods need to come down from the heavens! Haiti has done nothing wrong and Haiti deserves respite. Haiti earned her political independence and freedom more than 200 years ago and these have been mostly rubbished by reprisals against Haiti for her audacity.
Lovers of political independence, freedom, liberty and justice should support Haiti into a new dawn of recovery, reconstruction and rebirth. We must all join hands to foster a new dawn and a renaissance in Haiti. We all have a stake in what becomes of Haiti, Haiti matters, particularly, as the forerunner of freedom from slavery and political independence for peoples of African descent and continental Africans. We are all Haitians. We are all more Haitians now! We all feel Haiti’s ageless, ceaseless and endless agonies and pains
Haiti Cheri, Mon Amour, Je t'aime
Haiti Darling, I Love You!
Written Paul I. Adujie
I am overwhelmed with emotions. I am mournful and tearful. I am so saddened and feel broken and helpless.
I am compelled to ask why Haiti tragedies are seemingly ceaseless and endless. And why is it that Haiti never gets any respite? Why is it that Haiti has all through history suffered calamities, catastrophes and disasters? Why is a once great people in a nation which was full of promise, now perpetually embroiled in palpable devastation and abject poverty?
Haiti’s beginning was auspicious and most audacious, and that, in itself, inspired ceaseless and endless reprisals from two hemispheres. And then, there are also reprisals from outer space and now, reprisals from underground.
An article in The New York Times by one Tracy Kidder captures the core and essence of Haiti’s plights and predicaments, Mr. Kidder a few days ago, wrote what encapsulates the happenstances of history regarding Haiti “Haiti is a country created by former slaves, kidnapped West Africans, who, in 1804, when slavery still flourished in the United States and the Caribbean, threw off their cruel French masters and created their own republic.”
Mr. Kidder further stated that “Haitians have been punished ever since for claiming their freedom: by the French who, in the 1820s, demanded and received payment from the Haitians for the slave colony, impoverishing the country for years to come; by an often brutal American occupation from 1915 to 1934; by indigenous misrule that the American government aided and abetted. (In more recent years American administrations fell into a pattern of promoting and then undermining Haitian constitutional democracy.)”
In the aftermath of this calamitous earthquake, there have been outpouring of promises and pledges of disaster relief and it is hoped that these promises and pledges are delivered. And again, in the words of Mr. Kidder, “The ultimate goal of all aid to Haiti ought to be the strengthening of Haitian institutions, infrastructure and expertise.”
It must be clear to all by now, that the decision to disband Haitian military was wrongheaded. It is similar in consequence and outcome to the disbandment of Iraqi military at the onset of the invasion and occupation of Iraq by the United States in 2003.
In Haiti as in Iraq, some members of the military were anti people and operated with impunity and above the law. But the thing to have done, was to reform both militaries, instead of abolishing or disbanding them, and leaving a void or vacuum. While the foreign search and rescue team will be in Haiti for a short time, and then leave, it must be stated that Haitians must be assisted to endow own local infrastructure, managed by the locals in the locales. The world must get out of the business of decimating local capacities and local enterprise, whether it relates to the raising of pigs or the production of milk or the management of local military or paramilitary. There is so much value in local content, even imperfect ones, they usually know the terrains, and conditions and with stake in the outcome for the long term or long haul.
Haiti was pressured into a situation, in which she had no army or military, while in Iraq, the US disbanded Iraqi military by fiat or pronouncement, as the US described uniformed Iraqis as tools in the hands of Saddam Hussein. I take the view that no nation should be in the business of deciding what other nations should have a standing army or military. In the case of Iraq, the disbandment of Iraqi military, which was ostensibly loyal to Saddam, produced unintended consequences, including, becoming the source of insurgency and disgruntlement which undermined America’s occupation of Iraq. Regarding Haiti, abolishing the military, produced yet another unintended consequence. It deprived Haiti of trained, organized and cohesive first responders or military efficiency which could have been directed at rescue efforts in partnership with arriving foreign rescuers and first responders.
Reform should have been encouraged instead of disbandment of military and paramilitary. After all, on the matter of lawlessness and impunity, local police forces and law enforcement agencies in America were in cahoots, connivance and collusion to oppress African Americans, segregate and discriminate against African Americans. Local police and law enforcement agencies in America were tools of the Klu Klux Klan, they were intertwined, interconnected and doubled and piggy backed in their nefarious activities. There were multiplicities of impunity and lawlessness, racism and criminality all at the expense of African Americans... even as recent as 40 years ago. Jim Crow was official policy until the Civil Rights movement and until segregation requiring the US National Guard to enforce human rights and civil rights which were routinely violated by local officials and other local police and local law enforcements agencies... until there were reforms. Reform should have been policies in Haiti and not the disbandment of law enforcement agencies in Haiti. Disbandment was as a consequence and was precipitated by pressures from the outside
In the days and weeks ahead, a Haitian military or paramilitary force, would have been useful in maintaining law and order. Directing traffic and preventing anti social behavior and chaos, which are quite likely to ensue, as victims who are still stunned, recover from shocks and soon become desperate for limited resources and services.
The grief is palpable and thankfully, through all of this, Haitians are generously supportive of each other; Haitians are digging fellow citizens out of earthquake rubbles and sharing water, gauzes and the very minimal of resources which they have left
There will be desperations borne of long suffering and hardship. The paucity of resources, such as water and food, could very likely lead to stampede and disorderliness, and yet again, the world will wonder why? There could be stampede and local military, paramilitary and or civil defense forces would have been useful in this regard. But there have been deliberate decimation and depletion of local capacities.
There are concerns that there could be outbreaks of cholera, diarrhea and other diseases which might result from the now festering poor sanitary conditions and the scarcity of clean water, electricity, as well as exposed broken sewers. All these present logistical nightmares for search and rescue personnel, local and foreign, requiring dynamic modalities. And again, building local capacities is crucial, in view of long term considerations.
Haiti, just like Jamaica, Guyana have had their local capacities whittled by outsiders deliberately. Those who resisted such outsider usurpers, have been labeled castigated and cast off, Linden Forbes Samson Burnham of Guyana was called socialist communist, and so was Michael Manley of Jamaica, just because they sought to protect and preserve local initiative, local enterprise and local capacities. Haiti used to produce a great deal of what she consumed, and even exported. There was abundance of rice and animal husbandry. Jamaica used to produce milk and dairy and banana in abundance, until Jamaica was targeted by the multinationals, and resisters labeled communists. Farmers, food and agro industrial conglomerates in America continue to receive subsidies from governments, while same western governments pressure Caribbean and African nations not to grant any such subsidies. This practice creates unfair trade practices for the advantage of western conglomerates, farmers and food producers, and this in turn decimates local initiatives and local enterprise and capacity building in Caribbean and African nations… for the advantage of western entities. Sadly, there are no social safety nets in these nations, quite unlike it is found in western societies. So many odds are piled upon Caribbean and African nations and these odds are all connected by the strands of race which in turn festoon social political instability. There are these cause and effect which are all connected and our fates are linked and in the Haiti earthquake, I see the plights and predicaments of all Caribbean nations and continental Africans and peoples of African descent worldwide. Never a dull pleasant moment, never a respite!
It is so easy for some in the world today, to ignore or be willingly ignorant of the evil seeds which were sown in these nations, seeds sown and nurtured, which have led to these structural defects and persisting instabilities. There are continued manipulations, interventions and interferences by outsiders, which undermines growth and development and sturdy structures. It is quite easy for those willing to be superficial, intellectually lazy and or, unwilling to confront the inconvenient truth, to blame the victims and say, why can’t these nations ever help themselves?
The truth is, there is nothing ordained or preordained about people Caribbean and continental African nations. There is nothing in our genes which guarantees failed nation economic, political and socials instabilities and failed nation statuses. Tracy Kidder and Bill Quigley addressed some of these in Mr. Kidder’s article in The New York Times and Mr. Quigley’s in the Huffington Post of January 14, 2010 titled, “What the Mainstream Media Will Not Tell You About Haiti: Part of the Suffering of Haiti is "Made in the USA"
Some are right now installing puppets in Afghanistan and Iraq, puppets who are too willing and only amenable to the wishes of foreign powers and the political and business interests of outsiders, in denigration, dimunition and complete disregard of the interests and roles of the local peoples. Local political and business power structures which are inconsistent and in contradiction to the peoples of Afghanistan and Iraq are being planted, but in a few years, may 50 or 100 years hence, people will wonder why the offspring of today’s Afghan war lords are undemocratic or corrupt or both, ditto for Iraq.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-quigley/what-the-mainstream-media_b_424126.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/14/opinion/14kidder.html?pagewanted=print
http://video.nytimes.com/video/2006/01/27/world/1194817109852/haiti-democracy-undone.html
In this immediate aftermaths of the earthquake and in the long term, Haiti need us all.
The people of Haiti would need money, and sundry material assistance from all of us. There is need for more. President Obama should extend Temporary Protective Status or TPS to Haitians. The Congressional Black Caucus have for many years argued that the US bring equity and justice to Haitians regarding immigration opportunities. This is the immigration status which have in the past been extended to citizens of nations with political turmoil and or natural disasters. Haiti unfortunately, have faced political instability, hurricanes and now, this earthquake devastation. Haitians therefore doubly qualify for the TPS status, because Haiti has been afflicted by political crises and natural disasters and so, both criterion have been met. Haiti’s doubly whammies qualifies her for TPS, if any nation was ever so qualified. Haiti and Haitians have always been treated differently compared with other nations.
Haiti in all of these, it must be remembered, has had a very checkered history and Mr. Kidder’s article referenced above alluded directly to this point. And it must be restated here, because it bears repeating the major role and the enormous negative impact in Haitian affairs, by the direct interventions, manipulations and interferences in Haiti’s economic, political and constitutional development.
Haitian history is full and replete with abundant evidence of the havoc wrought upon Haiti by France, the United States and Britain through direct actions, collusion and connivance to punish Haiti for, having the audacity to auspicious resist French usurpation and domination, and thereafter, having the temerity to declare political independence in 1804.
The defeated France, demanded and received punitive reparations from Haiti, which subsequently left Haiti impoverished. Haiti is country of rich culture, forerunners in the fight for freedom and independence for Black peoples worldwide. Haiti’s freedom and political independence predated American Emancipation Proclamation for African Americans. Haitian independence and freedom was precursor to political independence for African nations post colonialism.
Haitians by laying claim to the fundamental human right to be a free people, earned the wrath of the French and the United States. Haitians declaration of independence and freedom, was seen as a direct affront and challenge to the superiority complexes in France and the United States. Haiti’s declaration of independence and freedom, was inconsistent to American and European worldview of racial hierarchy and superiority complex, and in this singular act by Haitians more than 200 years ago, there having been relentless efforts to undermine Haiti by the Americans and the French.
This deliberate policy to undermine Haiti, culminated in the labeling and overthrow of former President Betrand Aristide, albeit, an imperfect man, an imperfect politician.
The government of the United States under former President George W. Bush, funded the National Republican Institute which directly undermined Haitian democracy. The American government directly and indirectly supported criminal and murderous elements, including drug dealers, known to the US, all in efforts to remove the constitutionally elected government of Betrand Aristide
Haiti paid for her independence and paid dearly, deforestation set in, result of sale of mahogany trees… foreign intervention have been negative for Haiti, the US have intervened thrice, the US also prevented $500 million IMF/World Bank facility… which in turn, led to deprivation, social discontent, violence and chaos. The former President Betrand Aristide was deceived and lured away by the Americans into exile on February 29, 2004 and he remains in South Africa. The quandary is unmitigated and unabated, all these are now multiplied by this devastating earthquake.
Haiti need the support of everyone on earth and the Gods need to come down from the heavens! Haiti has done nothing wrong and Haiti deserves respite. Haiti earned her political independence and freedom more than 200 years ago and these have been mostly rubbished by reprisals against Haiti for her audacity.
Lovers of political independence, freedom, liberty and justice should support Haiti into a new dawn of recovery, reconstruction and rebirth. We must all join hands to foster a new dawn and a renaissance in Haiti. We all have a stake in what becomes of Haiti, Haiti matters, particularly, as the forerunner of freedom from slavery and political independence for peoples of African descent and continental Africans. We are all Haitians. We are all more Haitians now! We all feel Haiti’s ageless, ceaseless and endless agonies and pains
Haiti Cheri, Mon Amour, Je t'aime
Haiti Darling, I Love You!
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Mutallab Terrorist Incident As A Teachable Moment Or Lesson To All Nigerians
Mutallab Terrorist Incident As A Teachable Moment Or Lesson To All Nigerians
Written Paul I. Adujie
Some Nigerians, oftentimes, make pronouncements, as though they are temporary citizens of Nigeria
The failed attempt by Umaru Farouk Abdul Mutallab to bomb United Airlines flight 253 out of the air and the aftermaths, have managed to act as a reminder to those who pretend to be temporary citizens of Nigeria, that they are in fact still Nigerians, just like other 150 million of us, with shared destiny, warts and all!
Those Nigerians abroad or in the Diaspora, who are too often badmouthing Nigeria and are too quick to engage in ethnic, religious and regional jousting, claiming superiority, engaging in chauvinism, bigotries and flame-throwing, are now lumped with the rest of us. The rest of us, who have often pointed out that it is infinitely more beneficial to focus on tackling Nigeria’s national challenges and national issues, and refrain from the debilitating negative matters of ethnic, religious and regional difference or claimed superiority.
We have frequently argued that paucity and or complete absence of public infrastructure is not peculiar to a particular ethnic group, or region and religious group. National issues such as the downward spiral of our educational institutions, the absence equipment and medicines in hospitals are not unique to particular ethnic group.
The high rate of unemployment in Nigeria is a national phenomenon. The absence of clean drinking piper borne water is not an Hausa, Igbo or Yoruba issue, it is and remains a national issue. Neither is the absence of adequate power generation and transmission by NEPA or, PHCN
And now, the United States has just increased our burden, as the US lumped Nigeria together with nations which the US accuses of antagonizing it and having animus toward it and suddenly, 150 million Nigerians are once again, for better and for worse, inextricably bound and linked together, by reason of our national origin. Nigerians at home and abroad now have a choice in the matter resist the generalization against Nigerians and Nigeria, demand that the US remove us from the unsavory list or some Nigerians can continue to say that they are from Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa republics, or pretend to be from the moon or mars!
I take the position that Nigerians in unison, should protest and demand that our nation not be so labeled, castigated with current unfair generalizations; Or, Nigerians who so wish, can approach security agents at airports worldwide, and insist on introducing selves as citizens of Arewa,or Biafra or Oduduwa Republics and therefore, separate, apart and distinct from those of us Nigerians! There is a clear choice.
It is the case that when unwarranted attacks were directed at Nigeria, soon after the Mutallab incident in Detroit, Michigan in the United States, some Nigerians quickly engaged in their usual practice of finger pointing. These finger pointing were predicated and rooted in, the useless perfunctory distinctions in Mutallab’s religious faith, his ethnicity and the region of Nigeria from which his father hails. For these finger pointing Nigerians, it was not enough to just denounce the attempted criminal acts of Mutallab, it instead became quite important to some, to specify Mutallab’s religion, ethnicity and regional origins.
The truth is that Mutallab has lived more than half his life, until the incident, outside the shores of Nigeria, but he nevertheless remains a Nigerian for good and for evil, and in success and in failure. But some Nigerians sought to portray him as merely from that religion, that ethnic group and that region! The bitter truth is that, non-Nigerians are splendidly uninterested in our internal workings or arrangements and the schisms and family squabbles between the various political, ethnic and religious divisions in Nigeria. Those Nigerians bigots can engage in all the splitting hairs they want, to their heart content.
All Nigerians should see generalizations against Nigerians and Nigeria for what they generalizations are. All Nigerians should see discrimination against Nigerians and Nigeria for what discrimination is
We must see double standards and disparities in treatments reserved for Nigerians and Nigerian in comparison to all others for what such double standards and disparities really are.
Nigerians should stop accepting, explaining and justifying maltreatment of Nigerians and Nigeria by airlines or credit card companies and all other entities, be they nations or corporate entities. Nigerians must get away and get out from the mindsets which allow some Nigerians accept discrimination as something Nigerians and Nigeria have earned and deserves! Nigeria is as imperfect as other nations of the world. Nigerians must therefore using Nigeria’s internal imperfections as acceptable excuses as why nations and corporate entities must accept our money and our efforts and yet give us less that we deserve, because we have Nigerian origins and heritage!
There are internal frictions in Nigeria which are a result of plural and diverse nature of Nigeria. The benefits derivable from our diversity and being a plural society are quite tremendous.
Nigeria is a plural society. In plural societies, it is not uncommon to have competition for space and resources. Resources are not infinite and as a consequence, resource allocation is liable to have tinges of competition between the multiple variables of imbued in a multi ethnic, multi religious, multi cultural and multi lingual and multi regional interests. This “competition” for resources, can often mean, competing and sometimes conflicting interests, but, such competing-conflicting interests, need not be violent or unfriendly. There is no necessity for violence or war and bitterness in the “competition” which ensues as a result resource sharing or resource allocation processes.
Unfortunately, there are too many Nigerians who have instead, become entrenched in bigotries, biases and prejudices against other Nigerians, too many Nigerians make negative pronouncements as if in auto response and almost reflexively about other Nigerians, other than members of their ethnic, religious, linguistic and regional group. There are too many Nigerians who are quick to describe fellow Nigerians of other ethnic, religious, regional and or linguistic groups in the most abrasive, base and most corrosive terms.
There are these Nigerians with romantic notions of distinct fictional entities to which these Nigerians owe superior loyalty, passion, commitment and dedication. There are too many Nigerians who expend, no, squander, is more appropriate a term, they squander wastefully, valuable time in dwelling in their infantile make-belief Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa republics. And as such, all debates of Nigerian national issues are too often mired and subsumed in ethnic, religious and regional lopsided perspectives based on parochial, myopic and ridiculously illogical prisms of being from the variously superior and holier than thou Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa republics. The Mutallab incident has be no exceptions.
Nigerians will do well from now on, to engage in the debate of issues affecting Nigerians and Nigeria, from the point of view of common national and strategic interests. Time is nigh for Nigerians of all ethnic, religious and regional background to rally around Nigeria. Nigerians need to engage in vigorous and vibrant debates regarding sundry national issues, proffer solutions, in efforts to amicably resolve Nigeria’s challenges. Nigerians must cease and desist from the not so beguiling self-defeating and energy sapping and energy dissipating fixations on ethnic, regional and religious distinctions and dichotomies
All Nigerians should concentrate on demonstrating our intellectual prowess and resilience, through problem solving which benefits every Nigerian and Nigeria. Nigeria is currently bedeviled with myriad challenges and Nigerians are known worldwide, for astuteness and for intellectual acumen. It is time to deploy our prodigious and superb intellect on behalf of all Nigerians and Nigeria. Post independence Nigerians have been wedded together for fifty years, and time is nigh to make it stick! All Nigerians should quit pretending that there is a suitable alternative to the nationhood of Nigeria and our citizenship.
All Nigerians should stop pretending that our Nigerian-ness is some sorts of temporary arrangements. Nigerians are in this together and for good, it is time to settle down and make it work best for us. There are examples of multicultural, multi-ethnic and multilingual nations on earth with similar complexities such as we have in Nigeria.
There are more than a billion people each in China and India. Coincidentally, the economies of both China and India, are in the upsurge and in double digit growth, most of these advances are powered by Diaspora Chinese and Indians. Both China and India are similar to Nigeria in their multi ethnic, multi cultural and multi lingual compositions. Both China and India, have huge Diaspora populations, similar again, to the way Nigeria is today. And recently, a Chinese America chose returning to China to contribute to Chinese national development, over a ten million dollar opportunity offered to him in America where he currently conducts important research.
The European Economic Community/European Union now have a common continental currency, which competes, frequently out competes the US Dollar. The EEC/EU arrangements ensures a large market, mobility of labor, which have engendered higher standard of living for Europeans east and west… There is an identical strength, okay, potential political, economic and strategic strength in Nigeria’s numbers as currently composed, this is good for Nigeria, for West Africa, for the African continent and indeed, it is good for the whole world! Why would any Nigerian seek to change that?
Besides, it is quite foolhardy for any Nigerian who tries to convince any airport security agent around the world, that he is not Nigerian or that he is uniquely from Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa imaginary republics. Our Nigerian swagger will shine through and the security agents do not care about these unknown imaginary republics! Claiming to be from Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa makes you a fraudster and it would increase the heightened security odds against you!
In October 2010, Nigeria will celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of her national political independence from Britain, a former colonizer and usurper of Nigeria’s political, economic and cultural powers. Nigerians should therefore focus on the business of making Nigeria a nation which is developed, advanced and great. We all must learn to focus on the big picture. Every nation is playing to win, it a is hostile race to the top, it is grueling and only the organized, efficient and focused survives.
Nigerians must focus on how to put Nigeria on international platforms and pedestals in the comity of nations of the world in the scheme of things, as the wheels of history continues to turn.
All Nigerians should focus on whatever it takes to attain Nigeria’s rightful place at the global table.
Written Paul I. Adujie
Some Nigerians, oftentimes, make pronouncements, as though they are temporary citizens of Nigeria
The failed attempt by Umaru Farouk Abdul Mutallab to bomb United Airlines flight 253 out of the air and the aftermaths, have managed to act as a reminder to those who pretend to be temporary citizens of Nigeria, that they are in fact still Nigerians, just like other 150 million of us, with shared destiny, warts and all!
Those Nigerians abroad or in the Diaspora, who are too often badmouthing Nigeria and are too quick to engage in ethnic, religious and regional jousting, claiming superiority, engaging in chauvinism, bigotries and flame-throwing, are now lumped with the rest of us. The rest of us, who have often pointed out that it is infinitely more beneficial to focus on tackling Nigeria’s national challenges and national issues, and refrain from the debilitating negative matters of ethnic, religious and regional difference or claimed superiority.
We have frequently argued that paucity and or complete absence of public infrastructure is not peculiar to a particular ethnic group, or region and religious group. National issues such as the downward spiral of our educational institutions, the absence equipment and medicines in hospitals are not unique to particular ethnic group.
The high rate of unemployment in Nigeria is a national phenomenon. The absence of clean drinking piper borne water is not an Hausa, Igbo or Yoruba issue, it is and remains a national issue. Neither is the absence of adequate power generation and transmission by NEPA or, PHCN
And now, the United States has just increased our burden, as the US lumped Nigeria together with nations which the US accuses of antagonizing it and having animus toward it and suddenly, 150 million Nigerians are once again, for better and for worse, inextricably bound and linked together, by reason of our national origin. Nigerians at home and abroad now have a choice in the matter resist the generalization against Nigerians and Nigeria, demand that the US remove us from the unsavory list or some Nigerians can continue to say that they are from Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa republics, or pretend to be from the moon or mars!
I take the position that Nigerians in unison, should protest and demand that our nation not be so labeled, castigated with current unfair generalizations; Or, Nigerians who so wish, can approach security agents at airports worldwide, and insist on introducing selves as citizens of Arewa,or Biafra or Oduduwa Republics and therefore, separate, apart and distinct from those of us Nigerians! There is a clear choice.
It is the case that when unwarranted attacks were directed at Nigeria, soon after the Mutallab incident in Detroit, Michigan in the United States, some Nigerians quickly engaged in their usual practice of finger pointing. These finger pointing were predicated and rooted in, the useless perfunctory distinctions in Mutallab’s religious faith, his ethnicity and the region of Nigeria from which his father hails. For these finger pointing Nigerians, it was not enough to just denounce the attempted criminal acts of Mutallab, it instead became quite important to some, to specify Mutallab’s religion, ethnicity and regional origins.
The truth is that Mutallab has lived more than half his life, until the incident, outside the shores of Nigeria, but he nevertheless remains a Nigerian for good and for evil, and in success and in failure. But some Nigerians sought to portray him as merely from that religion, that ethnic group and that region! The bitter truth is that, non-Nigerians are splendidly uninterested in our internal workings or arrangements and the schisms and family squabbles between the various political, ethnic and religious divisions in Nigeria. Those Nigerians bigots can engage in all the splitting hairs they want, to their heart content.
All Nigerians should see generalizations against Nigerians and Nigeria for what they generalizations are. All Nigerians should see discrimination against Nigerians and Nigeria for what discrimination is
We must see double standards and disparities in treatments reserved for Nigerians and Nigerian in comparison to all others for what such double standards and disparities really are.
Nigerians should stop accepting, explaining and justifying maltreatment of Nigerians and Nigeria by airlines or credit card companies and all other entities, be they nations or corporate entities. Nigerians must get away and get out from the mindsets which allow some Nigerians accept discrimination as something Nigerians and Nigeria have earned and deserves! Nigeria is as imperfect as other nations of the world. Nigerians must therefore using Nigeria’s internal imperfections as acceptable excuses as why nations and corporate entities must accept our money and our efforts and yet give us less that we deserve, because we have Nigerian origins and heritage!
There are internal frictions in Nigeria which are a result of plural and diverse nature of Nigeria. The benefits derivable from our diversity and being a plural society are quite tremendous.
Nigeria is a plural society. In plural societies, it is not uncommon to have competition for space and resources. Resources are not infinite and as a consequence, resource allocation is liable to have tinges of competition between the multiple variables of imbued in a multi ethnic, multi religious, multi cultural and multi lingual and multi regional interests. This “competition” for resources, can often mean, competing and sometimes conflicting interests, but, such competing-conflicting interests, need not be violent or unfriendly. There is no necessity for violence or war and bitterness in the “competition” which ensues as a result resource sharing or resource allocation processes.
Unfortunately, there are too many Nigerians who have instead, become entrenched in bigotries, biases and prejudices against other Nigerians, too many Nigerians make negative pronouncements as if in auto response and almost reflexively about other Nigerians, other than members of their ethnic, religious, linguistic and regional group. There are too many Nigerians who are quick to describe fellow Nigerians of other ethnic, religious, regional and or linguistic groups in the most abrasive, base and most corrosive terms.
There are these Nigerians with romantic notions of distinct fictional entities to which these Nigerians owe superior loyalty, passion, commitment and dedication. There are too many Nigerians who expend, no, squander, is more appropriate a term, they squander wastefully, valuable time in dwelling in their infantile make-belief Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa republics. And as such, all debates of Nigerian national issues are too often mired and subsumed in ethnic, religious and regional lopsided perspectives based on parochial, myopic and ridiculously illogical prisms of being from the variously superior and holier than thou Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa republics. The Mutallab incident has be no exceptions.
Nigerians will do well from now on, to engage in the debate of issues affecting Nigerians and Nigeria, from the point of view of common national and strategic interests. Time is nigh for Nigerians of all ethnic, religious and regional background to rally around Nigeria. Nigerians need to engage in vigorous and vibrant debates regarding sundry national issues, proffer solutions, in efforts to amicably resolve Nigeria’s challenges. Nigerians must cease and desist from the not so beguiling self-defeating and energy sapping and energy dissipating fixations on ethnic, regional and religious distinctions and dichotomies
All Nigerians should concentrate on demonstrating our intellectual prowess and resilience, through problem solving which benefits every Nigerian and Nigeria. Nigeria is currently bedeviled with myriad challenges and Nigerians are known worldwide, for astuteness and for intellectual acumen. It is time to deploy our prodigious and superb intellect on behalf of all Nigerians and Nigeria. Post independence Nigerians have been wedded together for fifty years, and time is nigh to make it stick! All Nigerians should quit pretending that there is a suitable alternative to the nationhood of Nigeria and our citizenship.
All Nigerians should stop pretending that our Nigerian-ness is some sorts of temporary arrangements. Nigerians are in this together and for good, it is time to settle down and make it work best for us. There are examples of multicultural, multi-ethnic and multilingual nations on earth with similar complexities such as we have in Nigeria.
There are more than a billion people each in China and India. Coincidentally, the economies of both China and India, are in the upsurge and in double digit growth, most of these advances are powered by Diaspora Chinese and Indians. Both China and India are similar to Nigeria in their multi ethnic, multi cultural and multi lingual compositions. Both China and India, have huge Diaspora populations, similar again, to the way Nigeria is today. And recently, a Chinese America chose returning to China to contribute to Chinese national development, over a ten million dollar opportunity offered to him in America where he currently conducts important research.
The European Economic Community/European Union now have a common continental currency, which competes, frequently out competes the US Dollar. The EEC/EU arrangements ensures a large market, mobility of labor, which have engendered higher standard of living for Europeans east and west… There is an identical strength, okay, potential political, economic and strategic strength in Nigeria’s numbers as currently composed, this is good for Nigeria, for West Africa, for the African continent and indeed, it is good for the whole world! Why would any Nigerian seek to change that?
Besides, it is quite foolhardy for any Nigerian who tries to convince any airport security agent around the world, that he is not Nigerian or that he is uniquely from Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa imaginary republics. Our Nigerian swagger will shine through and the security agents do not care about these unknown imaginary republics! Claiming to be from Arewa, or Biafra or Oduduwa makes you a fraudster and it would increase the heightened security odds against you!
In October 2010, Nigeria will celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of her national political independence from Britain, a former colonizer and usurper of Nigeria’s political, economic and cultural powers. Nigerians should therefore focus on the business of making Nigeria a nation which is developed, advanced and great. We all must learn to focus on the big picture. Every nation is playing to win, it a is hostile race to the top, it is grueling and only the organized, efficient and focused survives.
Nigerians must focus on how to put Nigeria on international platforms and pedestals in the comity of nations of the world in the scheme of things, as the wheels of history continues to turn.
All Nigerians should focus on whatever it takes to attain Nigeria’s rightful place at the global table.
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Generalizations Against Nigerian Muslims, Nigerians And Nigeria
Generalizations Against Nigerian Muslims, Nigerians And Nigeria
Written by Paul I. Adujie
Amateurish criminal action by a Nigerian citizen, against Northwest or Delta flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit, has unleashed unwarranted and unbridled criticism against Nigerian Muslims, Nigerian Security Agencies and Nigeria the country.
This, even though Nigerian Muslims, Nigerian Security Agencies and Nigeria have all denounced the suspect and his botched criminal enterprise.
These unwarranted attacks, maligning and denigrations of Nigeria, have occurred despite the facts. The facts are that the father of the Nigerian citizen in question, acted forthrightly, as he took actions, he clearly and specifically notified the United States of America of his worry, regarding his son’s radicalization or extremism. A father acted against his son, that is profound and heroic! How is it possible for some, to still generalize about Nigerian Muslims and Nigeria, in the face such division between good and evil even at a nuclear family level?
Some in the western media are hastily and lazily describing Nigeria as a sort of fertile breeding ground or recruitment forum for Al Qaeda or Taliban. And this is quite untrue, just as it is a quantum leap in silly speculations. After all, there are homegrown terrorists here, in the United States and this should not lead anyone to label all Americans, just as, there should be no generalizations against Nigerian Muslims, Nigerians and Nigeria, just because of the acts of one lone wolf Nigerian without known cohorts or co-conspirators, co-actors, accomplices and collaborators anywhere in Nigeria or with any other Nigerian anywhere in the world.
It should be clear to the world that a mistake was made. A father reported a son, and American law enforcement and security agencies thereafter accomplished nothing much after the complaint by the suspect’s father.
The fact is that, someone dropped the ball in neglecting to put on a no-fly list or at minimum, put him under some extra scrutiny if he indicated interests in flying, and particularly so, when is destination is the United States.
To be forewarned is to be forearmed. The United States was put on notice for a long time, as to the possibility of Umar Farouk Abdul Muttallab’s criminal act which occurred on Christmas Day 2009. The suspect’s visa to the United States, could and should have been revoked. The US Embassy in Nigeria is well known and is on record for denying visas or revoking and or canceling visas because it received an anonymous telephone call against a visa recipient, visa applicant. The US Embassy in Nigeria regularly denies visas to Nigerians over flimsy reasons or no reason at all, and in this instance, there was abundance of reasons to have revoked or cancelled the suspect’s visa or put his travel plans under heightened scrutiny and red alert.
The suspect’s father is prominent and high profile Nigerian citizen. He was a leader of a major bank in Nigeria. He volunteered information against his own son. And despite this advance warning by a Nigerian father, a hero and a patriot, in all of these, those whose duties it was to act, failed to act and instead of accepting their lapses, they are conveniently blaming everyone and everything else, but themselves. It is in comparison to a situation in which the president of a major bank in America, Citibank or Chase Bank, reports his son to law enforcements, after careful observation and consideration and the law enforcement agencies neglected to take action and thereafter, seeking scapegoats.
There are three critical issues to examine in this incident which could have been catastrophic in outcome, had he been successful. The attempt by Umar Farouk Abdul Muttallab to engage in criminal acts against an aircraft and its passengers could have been nipped in the bud, it was clearly preventable.
First, it was preventable in view of the fact that there were advance notice to the appropriate American law enforcement agencies, as to the possibility of its occurrence. The suspect’s father took prescient and profound steps to address the risks, even where, taking such action, clearly meant a diminution of life and liberty for his son. It must be stressed that this is not by any means an easy thing for any parent to do. The elder Mutallab, must have agonized and gone through most excruciating pains and nevertheless resolved to do the right thing and he did, he reported his own flesh and blood as someone with criminal tendency or inclination, while the suspect was still preparatory or the crime in an inchoate phase.
Secondly, the Mutallab, the suspect, began his trip in Nigeria, and more specifically, from Lagos Airport where there is a huge presence of American security personnel stationed there in almost overbearing numbers and yet this slipped through their fingers and every expert, pseudo analyst and commentator has been blaming Nigerian security operative since the Christmas Day incident. It is common knowledge worldwide, that American Customs, Immigrations and Drugs or Narcotics Enforcement Agents now play pervasive permeating roles in airports around the world these days, particularly, since September 11, 2001. Agents of US law enforcements dominate airport screenings in many countries, including Nigeria. How then, did this suspect beat all of them in Lagos and Amsterdam? My personal experience in Canada and Bahamas is that flights bound for America from these countries are literarily taken over by the American Enforcement Agents.
In this incident therefore, it is one of two things, it is either that the suspect bomber was so clever in his subterfuges, so much so, that no precautions by the Nigerians and their American counterparts at the Lagos Airport could detect his murderous shenanigans or that, he was hiding in plain sight and the Americans, the Dutch and the Nigerian security system failed the world in not detecting him. It cannot be that the Americans and the Dutch performed excellently, but the Nigerians failed in some sorts of selective way hence the failure to detect the bomber in Lagos or at some other point during his flight.
The suspect embarked on his flight initially in Lagos with the Dutch airline, KLM flight 588 on a Boeing 777, 11:00 PM, Nigerian time, on Christmas eve, a first screening in Lagos ostensibly undertaken by a combined team of American and Nigerian security operatives. Thereafter, more screening were undertaken at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam for transit passengers including the suspect Mutallab, in their second and final leg of flights Northwest-Delta flight 253 on Airbus A330 departure at 8:54AM from Amsterdam to Detroit, Michigan. I have been a transit passenger through Amsterdam and other airports in Europe and around the world, and transit passengers received secondary or additional checks before merging with continuing or final leg of journeys. And as a matter of fact, checks in Amsterdam have revealed that Mutallab the suspect changed planes from KLM to Northwest-Delta with other passengers in Amsterdam. And that he and others, were required to be checked or screened before boarding the Detroit portion of their flight through Northwest-Delta.
It will be recalled that a similar murderous attempt by Richard C. Reid also known as the shoe-bomber, he too had embarked upon a similar transatlantic flight in 2001 with plans to bomber a jetliner bound for the US out of the skies. Reid like Mutallab the suspect, was thwarted as well and I do not recall anyone blaming Britain and or labeling all Muslims in Britain and for that matter, blaming all Britons, because of the dastardly attempt by Reid. This makes me want to ask, what exactly is different now? Reid fooled security operatives in Europe and got into the flight board for the United States. Tackling crimes, international crimes, must become collaborative and more multilateral in planning and implementation.
Instead of blaming Nigerians, Nigerian Muslims and Nigeria, the suspect’s father should be held up as a hero. He did his part, he supplied his son’s name to law enforcement and intelligence community, but for their reason, chose to treat the report as trivial or treat the complaint with levity and disregard, because according to their judgment, the son of whom the biological father complained, did not have derogatory information against him on file. What is more derogatory than a father calling his son a religious extremist?
This incident happily resulted in no loss of lives. However, it does exemplifies the need for shared intelligence and more elaborate communication between American National Security Agencies and their Nigerian counterparts as equal partners in the global fight against crimes and those who perpetuate crimes. Poor communication and inadequacy in information sharing between agencies of the American security apparatuses led to the lapses culminating in this near tragic incident in Detroit airspace.
It is now public knowledge that the suspect has been traveling. The suspect should have been monitored in all his travels to London, Dubai, Yemen before he ever embarked on the fateful journey to Detroit from Lagos via Schiphol. After Mutallab the elder reported his son, Mutallab the suspect should have been flagged as a person of interest and it would not have been too much to subject all his travels to extra scrutiny. There was no room for error or the sort of lapses which enabled him to travel widely, evade detection, despite his father’s generous information against him.
There should have been a universal precaution after the report by his father. This is more so, especially in view of the plots of violence and spates of violence which has not ebbed since September 11, 2001. Even by the admission of Mr. Edmund S. Hawley, formerly of Transportation Security Administration and others in Homeland Security claim to know that Al Qaeda and other extremist or militants group have since September 11, 2001 and they are going to keep trying, and so, vigilance is the operative word or key word here, and yet, this is precisely the opposite of what was done when the elder Mutallab reported his son’s bent for extremism and militancy. There was a neglect of vigilance.
Worldwide vigilance is demanded by all, in the security services everywhere. I could have been on that plane. We should all be concerned as to where penetration might be next and this is not a Nigerian problem or challenge. Mistakes were made everywhere in this particular case of Mutallab and the mistakes were made on both sides of the Atlantic. Blaming Nigeria is quite unreasonable in view of all the circumstances and the known facts.
The world must reject the notion that it is okay to blame Nigeria in a matter like this, where there was a name and an identified individual who, despite advance notice and warning, slipped through multiple layers of security, defying the Americans, the Dutch and the Nigerians, all.
Unfortunately however, since the incident, all manner experts, analyst and commentators have had most disparaging things to say about Nigerian Muslims, Nigerians and Nigeria. We have heard how porous and ill-equipped Nigerian Airports are. We have heard and seen the so-called Osama Bin Ladin perception index which has determined that Osama is considered as if some sort of hero in my Nigeria according to PEW “Research” which has claimed that Osama is more popular in Nigeria than in Pakistan and Afghanistan together, with 54% popularity among Nigerian Muslims.
Whereas, the truth of the matter is that there are approximately 50 million Muslims in Nigeria, they are not admirers of Osama bin Ladin and they are not all like the suspect , whose father, it must be restated, is a Muslim himself, who would report his son to the Nigerian and American authorities, clearly because his did not share his son’s worldview. This criminal act is purely an isolated incident without Al Qaeda or Taliban connections as some have strenuously sought to fathom from ashes and dusts. Nigeria is not a hub for any extremism. Nigeria is not a recruitment ground for any mass murderers. Nigerians and Nigeria reject this untoward and unsavory label and any attempts to smear us and generalize about Nigerians and Nigeria. Nigerians reject generalizations and these rush to judgment about Nigeria, because of a crime committed by one Nigerian citizen alone.
However, this has not stopped those intellectually lazy journalists, experts, analyst, so-called political leaders and sundry careless commentators from generalizing about Nigerians, Nigerian Muslims in particular and Nigeria as a nation. Too many of these person clearly do not know where Nigeria is on the world map. Nor do they care to know Nigerians and Nigeria.
I have rolled my eyes each time they pronounced Lagos which is properly pronounced LayGUS as LA-GUS or LAH GOSH! Just the same way these persons have lazily and ignorantly pronounced Iraq as EYE-RACK, instead of Iraq which is properly pronounced as EERAK. The ignorance and intellectual laziness is so palpable. It makes me want to ask, how much effort could it really take to say Lagos correctly? There are several Nigeria diplomatic missions in the United States, notably in Washington D.C. New York, Atlanta and Houston etc and one phone call could have done it, and besides, there are thousands of Nigerians in America, ignored and sidelined in all of these commentaries and opinions about an incident arising from the behavior of a Nigerian citizen. Western journalists should at least learn to say LayGus and not LAH-GOSH !
When all is said and done, the truth is that millions of Nigerians, Christians, Muslims and Atheists have since Christmas Day incident, condemned and denounced the attempt by Umar Farouk Abdul Muttallab, at mass murders of passengers in an American airline. Countless Nigerian individuals and groups, in Nigeria, in America and elsewhere in the Diaspora have roundly condemned the suspect for engaging in what could have been a major tragedy with catastrophic proportions.
It is such terrible shame that some would seek to demean Nigerian Muslims, other Nigerians and Nigeria as a nation, when in fact criminals and their crimes are not peculiar to any nation, especially in the face of homegrown religious extremists right here in America itself! Richard Reid is not a Nigerian.
The murderer who assassinated former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin is not a Nigerian. Rabbi Kahane is not a Nigerian, Major Hassan is not a Nigerian. Timothy Micveigh was not a Nigerian. John Walker Lindh the Taliban is not a Nigerian. Ted Kaczynski the Unabomber is not a Nigerian. The woman who attacked the Pope on Christmas eve is not a Nigerian. Christian extremists militants who the name of God and in the name of being anti abortion shoot, to kill, shoot to maim and shoot to murder medical doctors in America, are extremist and dangerous across the world and across all religions. Religious extremism is global and it is an affliction endured by all. Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab is accused of a crime and he should be judged accordingly to the fullest extent of the laws and based on the evidence.
Crimes and criminals demean us all, with their negative impacts and in their equally negative consequences or outcomes. Crimes and criminals are like religious extremism-militancy, they are like virtues and vices which are part of human frailties and foibles, warts and all and are universal.
Not peculiarly Nigerian.
It is therefore a shame and disgrace on the part of those who are exploiting the Northwest/Delta flight 253 incident to disparage Nigerian Muslims, Nigerian Security Services and Nigeria as a country!
Written by Paul I. Adujie
Amateurish criminal action by a Nigerian citizen, against Northwest or Delta flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit, has unleashed unwarranted and unbridled criticism against Nigerian Muslims, Nigerian Security Agencies and Nigeria the country.
This, even though Nigerian Muslims, Nigerian Security Agencies and Nigeria have all denounced the suspect and his botched criminal enterprise.
These unwarranted attacks, maligning and denigrations of Nigeria, have occurred despite the facts. The facts are that the father of the Nigerian citizen in question, acted forthrightly, as he took actions, he clearly and specifically notified the United States of America of his worry, regarding his son’s radicalization or extremism. A father acted against his son, that is profound and heroic! How is it possible for some, to still generalize about Nigerian Muslims and Nigeria, in the face such division between good and evil even at a nuclear family level?
Some in the western media are hastily and lazily describing Nigeria as a sort of fertile breeding ground or recruitment forum for Al Qaeda or Taliban. And this is quite untrue, just as it is a quantum leap in silly speculations. After all, there are homegrown terrorists here, in the United States and this should not lead anyone to label all Americans, just as, there should be no generalizations against Nigerian Muslims, Nigerians and Nigeria, just because of the acts of one lone wolf Nigerian without known cohorts or co-conspirators, co-actors, accomplices and collaborators anywhere in Nigeria or with any other Nigerian anywhere in the world.
It should be clear to the world that a mistake was made. A father reported a son, and American law enforcement and security agencies thereafter accomplished nothing much after the complaint by the suspect’s father.
The fact is that, someone dropped the ball in neglecting to put on a no-fly list or at minimum, put him under some extra scrutiny if he indicated interests in flying, and particularly so, when is destination is the United States.
To be forewarned is to be forearmed. The United States was put on notice for a long time, as to the possibility of Umar Farouk Abdul Muttallab’s criminal act which occurred on Christmas Day 2009. The suspect’s visa to the United States, could and should have been revoked. The US Embassy in Nigeria is well known and is on record for denying visas or revoking and or canceling visas because it received an anonymous telephone call against a visa recipient, visa applicant. The US Embassy in Nigeria regularly denies visas to Nigerians over flimsy reasons or no reason at all, and in this instance, there was abundance of reasons to have revoked or cancelled the suspect’s visa or put his travel plans under heightened scrutiny and red alert.
The suspect’s father is prominent and high profile Nigerian citizen. He was a leader of a major bank in Nigeria. He volunteered information against his own son. And despite this advance warning by a Nigerian father, a hero and a patriot, in all of these, those whose duties it was to act, failed to act and instead of accepting their lapses, they are conveniently blaming everyone and everything else, but themselves. It is in comparison to a situation in which the president of a major bank in America, Citibank or Chase Bank, reports his son to law enforcements, after careful observation and consideration and the law enforcement agencies neglected to take action and thereafter, seeking scapegoats.
There are three critical issues to examine in this incident which could have been catastrophic in outcome, had he been successful. The attempt by Umar Farouk Abdul Muttallab to engage in criminal acts against an aircraft and its passengers could have been nipped in the bud, it was clearly preventable.
First, it was preventable in view of the fact that there were advance notice to the appropriate American law enforcement agencies, as to the possibility of its occurrence. The suspect’s father took prescient and profound steps to address the risks, even where, taking such action, clearly meant a diminution of life and liberty for his son. It must be stressed that this is not by any means an easy thing for any parent to do. The elder Mutallab, must have agonized and gone through most excruciating pains and nevertheless resolved to do the right thing and he did, he reported his own flesh and blood as someone with criminal tendency or inclination, while the suspect was still preparatory or the crime in an inchoate phase.
Secondly, the Mutallab, the suspect, began his trip in Nigeria, and more specifically, from Lagos Airport where there is a huge presence of American security personnel stationed there in almost overbearing numbers and yet this slipped through their fingers and every expert, pseudo analyst and commentator has been blaming Nigerian security operative since the Christmas Day incident. It is common knowledge worldwide, that American Customs, Immigrations and Drugs or Narcotics Enforcement Agents now play pervasive permeating roles in airports around the world these days, particularly, since September 11, 2001. Agents of US law enforcements dominate airport screenings in many countries, including Nigeria. How then, did this suspect beat all of them in Lagos and Amsterdam? My personal experience in Canada and Bahamas is that flights bound for America from these countries are literarily taken over by the American Enforcement Agents.
In this incident therefore, it is one of two things, it is either that the suspect bomber was so clever in his subterfuges, so much so, that no precautions by the Nigerians and their American counterparts at the Lagos Airport could detect his murderous shenanigans or that, he was hiding in plain sight and the Americans, the Dutch and the Nigerian security system failed the world in not detecting him. It cannot be that the Americans and the Dutch performed excellently, but the Nigerians failed in some sorts of selective way hence the failure to detect the bomber in Lagos or at some other point during his flight.
The suspect embarked on his flight initially in Lagos with the Dutch airline, KLM flight 588 on a Boeing 777, 11:00 PM, Nigerian time, on Christmas eve, a first screening in Lagos ostensibly undertaken by a combined team of American and Nigerian security operatives. Thereafter, more screening were undertaken at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam for transit passengers including the suspect Mutallab, in their second and final leg of flights Northwest-Delta flight 253 on Airbus A330 departure at 8:54AM from Amsterdam to Detroit, Michigan. I have been a transit passenger through Amsterdam and other airports in Europe and around the world, and transit passengers received secondary or additional checks before merging with continuing or final leg of journeys. And as a matter of fact, checks in Amsterdam have revealed that Mutallab the suspect changed planes from KLM to Northwest-Delta with other passengers in Amsterdam. And that he and others, were required to be checked or screened before boarding the Detroit portion of their flight through Northwest-Delta.
It will be recalled that a similar murderous attempt by Richard C. Reid also known as the shoe-bomber, he too had embarked upon a similar transatlantic flight in 2001 with plans to bomber a jetliner bound for the US out of the skies. Reid like Mutallab the suspect, was thwarted as well and I do not recall anyone blaming Britain and or labeling all Muslims in Britain and for that matter, blaming all Britons, because of the dastardly attempt by Reid. This makes me want to ask, what exactly is different now? Reid fooled security operatives in Europe and got into the flight board for the United States. Tackling crimes, international crimes, must become collaborative and more multilateral in planning and implementation.
Instead of blaming Nigerians, Nigerian Muslims and Nigeria, the suspect’s father should be held up as a hero. He did his part, he supplied his son’s name to law enforcement and intelligence community, but for their reason, chose to treat the report as trivial or treat the complaint with levity and disregard, because according to their judgment, the son of whom the biological father complained, did not have derogatory information against him on file. What is more derogatory than a father calling his son a religious extremist?
This incident happily resulted in no loss of lives. However, it does exemplifies the need for shared intelligence and more elaborate communication between American National Security Agencies and their Nigerian counterparts as equal partners in the global fight against crimes and those who perpetuate crimes. Poor communication and inadequacy in information sharing between agencies of the American security apparatuses led to the lapses culminating in this near tragic incident in Detroit airspace.
It is now public knowledge that the suspect has been traveling. The suspect should have been monitored in all his travels to London, Dubai, Yemen before he ever embarked on the fateful journey to Detroit from Lagos via Schiphol. After Mutallab the elder reported his son, Mutallab the suspect should have been flagged as a person of interest and it would not have been too much to subject all his travels to extra scrutiny. There was no room for error or the sort of lapses which enabled him to travel widely, evade detection, despite his father’s generous information against him.
There should have been a universal precaution after the report by his father. This is more so, especially in view of the plots of violence and spates of violence which has not ebbed since September 11, 2001. Even by the admission of Mr. Edmund S. Hawley, formerly of Transportation Security Administration and others in Homeland Security claim to know that Al Qaeda and other extremist or militants group have since September 11, 2001 and they are going to keep trying, and so, vigilance is the operative word or key word here, and yet, this is precisely the opposite of what was done when the elder Mutallab reported his son’s bent for extremism and militancy. There was a neglect of vigilance.
Worldwide vigilance is demanded by all, in the security services everywhere. I could have been on that plane. We should all be concerned as to where penetration might be next and this is not a Nigerian problem or challenge. Mistakes were made everywhere in this particular case of Mutallab and the mistakes were made on both sides of the Atlantic. Blaming Nigeria is quite unreasonable in view of all the circumstances and the known facts.
The world must reject the notion that it is okay to blame Nigeria in a matter like this, where there was a name and an identified individual who, despite advance notice and warning, slipped through multiple layers of security, defying the Americans, the Dutch and the Nigerians, all.
Unfortunately however, since the incident, all manner experts, analyst and commentators have had most disparaging things to say about Nigerian Muslims, Nigerians and Nigeria. We have heard how porous and ill-equipped Nigerian Airports are. We have heard and seen the so-called Osama Bin Ladin perception index which has determined that Osama is considered as if some sort of hero in my Nigeria according to PEW “Research” which has claimed that Osama is more popular in Nigeria than in Pakistan and Afghanistan together, with 54% popularity among Nigerian Muslims.
Whereas, the truth of the matter is that there are approximately 50 million Muslims in Nigeria, they are not admirers of Osama bin Ladin and they are not all like the suspect , whose father, it must be restated, is a Muslim himself, who would report his son to the Nigerian and American authorities, clearly because his did not share his son’s worldview. This criminal act is purely an isolated incident without Al Qaeda or Taliban connections as some have strenuously sought to fathom from ashes and dusts. Nigeria is not a hub for any extremism. Nigeria is not a recruitment ground for any mass murderers. Nigerians and Nigeria reject this untoward and unsavory label and any attempts to smear us and generalize about Nigerians and Nigeria. Nigerians reject generalizations and these rush to judgment about Nigeria, because of a crime committed by one Nigerian citizen alone.
However, this has not stopped those intellectually lazy journalists, experts, analyst, so-called political leaders and sundry careless commentators from generalizing about Nigerians, Nigerian Muslims in particular and Nigeria as a nation. Too many of these person clearly do not know where Nigeria is on the world map. Nor do they care to know Nigerians and Nigeria.
I have rolled my eyes each time they pronounced Lagos which is properly pronounced LayGUS as LA-GUS or LAH GOSH! Just the same way these persons have lazily and ignorantly pronounced Iraq as EYE-RACK, instead of Iraq which is properly pronounced as EERAK. The ignorance and intellectual laziness is so palpable. It makes me want to ask, how much effort could it really take to say Lagos correctly? There are several Nigeria diplomatic missions in the United States, notably in Washington D.C. New York, Atlanta and Houston etc and one phone call could have done it, and besides, there are thousands of Nigerians in America, ignored and sidelined in all of these commentaries and opinions about an incident arising from the behavior of a Nigerian citizen. Western journalists should at least learn to say LayGus and not LAH-GOSH !
When all is said and done, the truth is that millions of Nigerians, Christians, Muslims and Atheists have since Christmas Day incident, condemned and denounced the attempt by Umar Farouk Abdul Muttallab, at mass murders of passengers in an American airline. Countless Nigerian individuals and groups, in Nigeria, in America and elsewhere in the Diaspora have roundly condemned the suspect for engaging in what could have been a major tragedy with catastrophic proportions.
It is such terrible shame that some would seek to demean Nigerian Muslims, other Nigerians and Nigeria as a nation, when in fact criminals and their crimes are not peculiar to any nation, especially in the face of homegrown religious extremists right here in America itself! Richard Reid is not a Nigerian.
The murderer who assassinated former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin is not a Nigerian. Rabbi Kahane is not a Nigerian, Major Hassan is not a Nigerian. Timothy Micveigh was not a Nigerian. John Walker Lindh the Taliban is not a Nigerian. Ted Kaczynski the Unabomber is not a Nigerian. The woman who attacked the Pope on Christmas eve is not a Nigerian. Christian extremists militants who the name of God and in the name of being anti abortion shoot, to kill, shoot to maim and shoot to murder medical doctors in America, are extremist and dangerous across the world and across all religions. Religious extremism is global and it is an affliction endured by all. Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab is accused of a crime and he should be judged accordingly to the fullest extent of the laws and based on the evidence.
Crimes and criminals demean us all, with their negative impacts and in their equally negative consequences or outcomes. Crimes and criminals are like religious extremism-militancy, they are like virtues and vices which are part of human frailties and foibles, warts and all and are universal.
Not peculiarly Nigerian.
It is therefore a shame and disgrace on the part of those who are exploiting the Northwest/Delta flight 253 incident to disparage Nigerian Muslims, Nigerian Security Services and Nigeria as a country!
Monday, December 21, 2009
President YarAdua Is 30 Days AWOL Or Absence Without Official Leave From Presidential Duties
President YarAdua Is 30 Days AWOL Or Absence Without Official Leave From Presidential Duties
Written by Paul I. Adujie
Absence Without Official Leave or AWOL, from duty by our president has put us in needless quandary. This is unacceptable and it should not continue.
Exactly 30 days ago, President Umaru Musa YarAdua left Nigeria for Saudi Arabia, ostensibly, for medical treatments, due to his known imperfect health condition, no one of course, begrudges our president for his unfortunate health status.
Even as Nigerians in the millions pray ceaselessly in churches and mosques and other houses of worship, at home and abroad, President YarAdua remains incapacitated, indisposed and perhaps in a precarious physical health condition in far away Saudi Arabia.
President YarAdua’s absence from work, and particularly, his departure without following laid down constitutional procedure, has thrown up questions. What is the best way to resolve President YarAdua’s refusal and or neglect to have been in compliance with constitutional stipulations? The drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, intended to seamlessly address circumstances similar to the ones in which President YarAdua have found himself as a consequence of his recurring ill health and indispositions.
The irony and oxymoron in President YarAdua’s AWOL, should not be lost on anyone in Nigeria or thiis world. This is so, as President YarAdua, upon becoming president of Nigeria, claimed to be a believer of the Rule of Law and constitutionalism, to the applause and embrace by Nigerians, who believed him on these claims, claims, which have eventually, turned out to be a mere ruse in the first place.
It will be recalled that President YarAdua at the inception of his administration, loudly claimed that he was a man of the people and that he would be a listening president and the servant leader with obeisance to the constitution of Nigeria. Since his inauguration in May 2007 and up till his moment of departure to King Faisal Hospital in Saudi Arabia, our president’s actions and pronouncements were not illustrative nor demonstrative of his self-avowed claims to being an apostle and an adherent of the rule of law, constitutionality, nor his false pretense of being a listening president who is as well a servant leader.
Exigent circumstances now dictates that President YarAdua be wheeled off Nigeria’s presidency.
This is important, in order to avoid a void, and an unnecessary political vacuum. Nigerians, and all those who wish Nigeria well, have been worried sick over a now highly likely probability of political and constitutional crises. This festering crises atmosphere is already very ominous and looming larger by the day and portends evil.
These unnecessary constitutional and political toxic mix of conditions have been foisted upon Nigeria by, and through the unwillingness of President YarAdua to follow the clearly laid out constitutional process. President YarAdua have neglected and refused to abide by set constitutional provisions, every time he has been away from presidential duties. President YarAdua and his acolytes are clearly disdainful of section 145 of the constitution of Nigeria, which require a president to formally inform Nigeria’s National Assembly of absence from presidential duties.
Clearly, it should be emphasized that, the drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, anticipated a sitting president may embark on a vacation away from the seat of government in our nation’s capital, in Abuja; A Nigerian president may, therefore, for instance choose to relax in any part of Nigeria, such as a vacation in Yankari Game Reserve, Obudu Ranch, etc or in the rare event, embark on overseas vacation, perhaps to a gambling trip in Las Vegas, Nevada in the United States. It is also quite likely, that the drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, also anticipated a happenstance such as the physical impairment of a president, which is identical to the current situation in which President YarAdua is clearly categorized.
Clearly, it was the intent, of the drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, in inserting section 145 of our constitution, that in both it’s letter and spirit, there should always be an orderly devolution and succession of power, even in the short term.
It should be clear therefore, that the primary reading and the only interpretation possible, of section 145 of the constitution of Nigeria, is a desire, a strenuous and fastidious desire to avoid a constitutional power void and constitutional power vacuum
Naturally then, the creation of the post or office of the vice president to complement the office and position of substantive president is also a derivation of this natural constitutional aversion for power void and vacuum. The position of vice president in our constitution was not intended as a mere decoration or as a superfluous political ornament for Nigeria’s constitutional democracy.
These very same political and constitutional crises, which now looms larger and larger, as everyday comes to an end, were the very reasons why, the drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, created the position of the vice president
The position of the vice president is constitutionally analogous to the usefulness and importance of a spare tire in car. Car manufacturers create space for the storage of spare tire in vehicles, in order that motorists would not be stranded without recourse, in the event of a rupture, puncture, burst and flat tire.
A spare tire saves the day, as a temporary respite or permanent replacement, depending on the circumstances. But in all cases, being in the possession of a spare tire, ensure an orderly devolution or transition and the journey embarked upon by the motorist and passengers continues with minor adjustment or discomfort or dislocations.
In President YarAdua, Nigeria has had a motorist, who loudly proclaims himself as an excellent motorist. President YarAdua however drives a car which is not brand new, and in fact, a car known to have tires with advertised precarious condition and yet, this motorist who is quick to proclaim himself an excellent driver, frequently traveled with this car, bad tires and all, and yet, neglects to bring along the spare tire, every time he embarkson trips with the car, imperfect tires, bad road and all!
President YarAdua has analogously brought Nigeria to where we are today, because of his ego, his malice or because he is stubborn hard head, he traveled without a spare tire, prescribed , tried and proven efficacy, which is supported by scientific research, as an imperative by car designers and manufacturers and highly recommended for safety of driver and passengers. All passengers are now facing imminent dangers, all due to being without a spare or replacement tire and hence we are stranded
It is time therefore, for Nigeria to leave or jettison this stubborn, ego maniac, arrogant and self absorbed driver. It was he, who refused and neglected to travel with a road trip prerequisite, a spare tire. It must be realized that it his arrogance, neglect and or refusal, has the potential of subjecting the car to damage or theft. It must, additionally be realized, that the stubborn driver through his arrogance, neglect and refusal to imbibe the good driver conduct of taking the spare tire with him, and activating the spare tire as prescribed and as needed, subjects everyone in the car to unnecessary harm as well.
Nigerians are the passengers in the car being driven by President YarAdua. He is an arrogant, ego maniac, stubborn and self absorbed driver who have, despite advise and available data, disregarded the imperative a spare tire. Nigerians are now stranded with the president on a deserted road in a desert and in the middle of nowhere, all puns intended. Our presidency is stranded in the desert in the Middle East region and far away from home. While government policies and programs, including the current budget stalls in abeyance.
How long can Nigeria afford to leave presidential duties in the limbo? Another 30 days? Another year?
Nigerians, it must be said, have in the circumstances, been very patient for these long 30 days, waiting for solution. But we are still stranded in the middle of nowhere, we are running out of water, food, and all other necessities and it is time to live the arrogant, and stubborn driver to his own devices in the desert. And his will not judge us as harsh. After all, it is the fault of this arrogant and stubborn driver who neglected to equip the car with manufacturer scientifically predetermined prerequisite for road trips by car, spare tire!
It is now time to consider our self-preservation. We must now bid the arrogant and stubborn driver farewell and a goodbye, leave him with the car, bereft of spare tire, food and supplies. We cannot afford to remain in flux or cast adrift as a consequence of our driver’s arrogance and stubbornness.
It is time to leave our driver. He will be stranded, but we must leave and wish him the best of luck.
After these long thirty days of hunger and thirst. After these long thirty days of uncertainties. After these thirty days of feeling like a nation about to implode. And After these long thirty days of being held hostage due to the arrogance neglect and or refusal to comply clear constitutional provisions.
Presidential duties are not part time within the constitution of Nigeria. Nigerians must therefore completely and totally disregard the inanities of Mr. Michael Aondoakaa, Attorney General and Minister for Justice as when he recently lectured Nigerians to the effect President YarAdua can govern Nigeria from Saudi Arabia. As if Nigeria is still a colony and being governed in absentia, by a monarch President YarAdua, and he Mr. Aondoakaa is the potentate governor-general or divisional officer on the ground handing out “the law” to the locals in locales.
If President YarAdua is not totally incapacitated or comatose, he should immediately, from his hospital bed in Saudi Arabia, write a letter to the National Assembly to formally inform them that he has proceeded on medical vacation. After all, Nigerians have been lectured by the AGF Aondoakaa that our president is well enough to manage Nigeria from his hospital bed? This means he can write a letter to Nigeria’s National Assembly at the very least. When the president so writes, the current anomalies with be corrected and resolved.
This would clear the current lacuna and pave the way for Vice-president Goodluck Jonathan to take over presidential duties, until the return of the president when and if, he is able to do so. In writing to the National Assembly, President YarAdua would have retroactively or in retrospect, complied with section 145 of the constitution of Nigeria, as he should have, from the onset of his trip to Saudi Arabia and eventual hospitalization since.
It is now obvious to all, that the daily business of governing Nigeria at the presidential levels have grinded to a halt. Our nation is left in limbo and left to totter and wobble, due to the vacuum and void, created by the absence, and then, neglect of President YarAdua to abide by and with section 145 of our constitution.
The seal of the president is needed to formalize the 2009 Supplementary Appropriation Bill. Similarly, the so-called amnesty program for members of MEND or the phenomenon of militants in the Niger Delta agitation for improved conditions still awaits full implementation and presidential oversight
Others have pointed to numerous other pending or shelved events such as the 2009 National Honors Award which cannot be conferred because the substantive president is AWOL and the vice president have no constitutional instrument conferring substantive powers on him, again, due to the egregious omission by President YarAdua prior to his departure from Nigeria.
Furthermore, there are the matters of appointments of the new President of the Court of Appeal and the Chief Justice of Nigeria have been duly confirmed, but still await the proper administration of their oath of office, and these are constitutionally stipulated to be administered by the President.
Currently, the vice president have been presiding over the Federal Executive Council , but it must be stated that as a matter constitutional law, and by virtue of Section 148 of the 1999 Constitution, it is the case that, only the president can preside over the Federal Executive Council (FEC) he is chairman of the board so to speak. Other than these, there sundry policy matters of national importance, including, domestic and foreign policy matters which demands presidential assent or approval. And no one Nigerian should hold the lives, the health, wealth and happiness of 150 million Nigerians hostage or to ransom.
It is not in Nigerians’ and Nigeria’s best interests to wait indefinitely for what happens or becomes, the outcomes of the President YarAdua circumstances. If he loved Nigeria, he would have followed the provisions of the constitution of Nigeria, whether he was in perfect physical health condition or impaired.
The National Assembly of Nigeria should now intervene to avert looming political and constitutional crises and probable catastrophes, which may ensue, due to the acts and omission of President YarAdua.
President YarAdua should be removed from office as a result of his haven been indisposed for so long, and, due to his precarious and steadily ebbing state of physical health. Nigeria is a nation, and not a personal estate or fiefdom. And Nigerians have been kept in the dark for too long. And for all we know, he may now in fact, be comatose or in vegetative state. And his handlers have refused to communicate and update Nigerians with his condition.
The Nigerian National Assembly should remove President YarAdua from office as a consequence on his refusal and neglect to comply with section 145 of the constitution of Nigeria.
President YarAdua should be removed from office due to his physical and mental incapacity to perform as president of Nigeria for more than 30 consecutive days.
President YarAdua should be removed from office because pertinently described exigent circumstances, and further, President YarAdua should be removed from office as president of Nigeria, for the protection and preservation of Nigeria and Nigeria’s national security and strategic interests.
Written by Paul I. Adujie
Absence Without Official Leave or AWOL, from duty by our president has put us in needless quandary. This is unacceptable and it should not continue.
Exactly 30 days ago, President Umaru Musa YarAdua left Nigeria for Saudi Arabia, ostensibly, for medical treatments, due to his known imperfect health condition, no one of course, begrudges our president for his unfortunate health status.
Even as Nigerians in the millions pray ceaselessly in churches and mosques and other houses of worship, at home and abroad, President YarAdua remains incapacitated, indisposed and perhaps in a precarious physical health condition in far away Saudi Arabia.
President YarAdua’s absence from work, and particularly, his departure without following laid down constitutional procedure, has thrown up questions. What is the best way to resolve President YarAdua’s refusal and or neglect to have been in compliance with constitutional stipulations? The drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, intended to seamlessly address circumstances similar to the ones in which President YarAdua have found himself as a consequence of his recurring ill health and indispositions.
The irony and oxymoron in President YarAdua’s AWOL, should not be lost on anyone in Nigeria or thiis world. This is so, as President YarAdua, upon becoming president of Nigeria, claimed to be a believer of the Rule of Law and constitutionalism, to the applause and embrace by Nigerians, who believed him on these claims, claims, which have eventually, turned out to be a mere ruse in the first place.
It will be recalled that President YarAdua at the inception of his administration, loudly claimed that he was a man of the people and that he would be a listening president and the servant leader with obeisance to the constitution of Nigeria. Since his inauguration in May 2007 and up till his moment of departure to King Faisal Hospital in Saudi Arabia, our president’s actions and pronouncements were not illustrative nor demonstrative of his self-avowed claims to being an apostle and an adherent of the rule of law, constitutionality, nor his false pretense of being a listening president who is as well a servant leader.
Exigent circumstances now dictates that President YarAdua be wheeled off Nigeria’s presidency.
This is important, in order to avoid a void, and an unnecessary political vacuum. Nigerians, and all those who wish Nigeria well, have been worried sick over a now highly likely probability of political and constitutional crises. This festering crises atmosphere is already very ominous and looming larger by the day and portends evil.
These unnecessary constitutional and political toxic mix of conditions have been foisted upon Nigeria by, and through the unwillingness of President YarAdua to follow the clearly laid out constitutional process. President YarAdua have neglected and refused to abide by set constitutional provisions, every time he has been away from presidential duties. President YarAdua and his acolytes are clearly disdainful of section 145 of the constitution of Nigeria, which require a president to formally inform Nigeria’s National Assembly of absence from presidential duties.
Clearly, it should be emphasized that, the drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, anticipated a sitting president may embark on a vacation away from the seat of government in our nation’s capital, in Abuja; A Nigerian president may, therefore, for instance choose to relax in any part of Nigeria, such as a vacation in Yankari Game Reserve, Obudu Ranch, etc or in the rare event, embark on overseas vacation, perhaps to a gambling trip in Las Vegas, Nevada in the United States. It is also quite likely, that the drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, also anticipated a happenstance such as the physical impairment of a president, which is identical to the current situation in which President YarAdua is clearly categorized.
Clearly, it was the intent, of the drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, in inserting section 145 of our constitution, that in both it’s letter and spirit, there should always be an orderly devolution and succession of power, even in the short term.
It should be clear therefore, that the primary reading and the only interpretation possible, of section 145 of the constitution of Nigeria, is a desire, a strenuous and fastidious desire to avoid a constitutional power void and constitutional power vacuum
Naturally then, the creation of the post or office of the vice president to complement the office and position of substantive president is also a derivation of this natural constitutional aversion for power void and vacuum. The position of vice president in our constitution was not intended as a mere decoration or as a superfluous political ornament for Nigeria’s constitutional democracy.
These very same political and constitutional crises, which now looms larger and larger, as everyday comes to an end, were the very reasons why, the drafters of the constitution of Nigeria, created the position of the vice president
The position of the vice president is constitutionally analogous to the usefulness and importance of a spare tire in car. Car manufacturers create space for the storage of spare tire in vehicles, in order that motorists would not be stranded without recourse, in the event of a rupture, puncture, burst and flat tire.
A spare tire saves the day, as a temporary respite or permanent replacement, depending on the circumstances. But in all cases, being in the possession of a spare tire, ensure an orderly devolution or transition and the journey embarked upon by the motorist and passengers continues with minor adjustment or discomfort or dislocations.
In President YarAdua, Nigeria has had a motorist, who loudly proclaims himself as an excellent motorist. President YarAdua however drives a car which is not brand new, and in fact, a car known to have tires with advertised precarious condition and yet, this motorist who is quick to proclaim himself an excellent driver, frequently traveled with this car, bad tires and all, and yet, neglects to bring along the spare tire, every time he embarkson trips with the car, imperfect tires, bad road and all!
President YarAdua has analogously brought Nigeria to where we are today, because of his ego, his malice or because he is stubborn hard head, he traveled without a spare tire, prescribed , tried and proven efficacy, which is supported by scientific research, as an imperative by car designers and manufacturers and highly recommended for safety of driver and passengers. All passengers are now facing imminent dangers, all due to being without a spare or replacement tire and hence we are stranded
It is time therefore, for Nigeria to leave or jettison this stubborn, ego maniac, arrogant and self absorbed driver. It was he, who refused and neglected to travel with a road trip prerequisite, a spare tire. It must be realized that it his arrogance, neglect and or refusal, has the potential of subjecting the car to damage or theft. It must, additionally be realized, that the stubborn driver through his arrogance, neglect and refusal to imbibe the good driver conduct of taking the spare tire with him, and activating the spare tire as prescribed and as needed, subjects everyone in the car to unnecessary harm as well.
Nigerians are the passengers in the car being driven by President YarAdua. He is an arrogant, ego maniac, stubborn and self absorbed driver who have, despite advise and available data, disregarded the imperative a spare tire. Nigerians are now stranded with the president on a deserted road in a desert and in the middle of nowhere, all puns intended. Our presidency is stranded in the desert in the Middle East region and far away from home. While government policies and programs, including the current budget stalls in abeyance.
How long can Nigeria afford to leave presidential duties in the limbo? Another 30 days? Another year?
Nigerians, it must be said, have in the circumstances, been very patient for these long 30 days, waiting for solution. But we are still stranded in the middle of nowhere, we are running out of water, food, and all other necessities and it is time to live the arrogant, and stubborn driver to his own devices in the desert. And his will not judge us as harsh. After all, it is the fault of this arrogant and stubborn driver who neglected to equip the car with manufacturer scientifically predetermined prerequisite for road trips by car, spare tire!
It is now time to consider our self-preservation. We must now bid the arrogant and stubborn driver farewell and a goodbye, leave him with the car, bereft of spare tire, food and supplies. We cannot afford to remain in flux or cast adrift as a consequence of our driver’s arrogance and stubbornness.
It is time to leave our driver. He will be stranded, but we must leave and wish him the best of luck.
After these long thirty days of hunger and thirst. After these long thirty days of uncertainties. After these thirty days of feeling like a nation about to implode. And After these long thirty days of being held hostage due to the arrogance neglect and or refusal to comply clear constitutional provisions.
Presidential duties are not part time within the constitution of Nigeria. Nigerians must therefore completely and totally disregard the inanities of Mr. Michael Aondoakaa, Attorney General and Minister for Justice as when he recently lectured Nigerians to the effect President YarAdua can govern Nigeria from Saudi Arabia. As if Nigeria is still a colony and being governed in absentia, by a monarch President YarAdua, and he Mr. Aondoakaa is the potentate governor-general or divisional officer on the ground handing out “the law” to the locals in locales.
If President YarAdua is not totally incapacitated or comatose, he should immediately, from his hospital bed in Saudi Arabia, write a letter to the National Assembly to formally inform them that he has proceeded on medical vacation. After all, Nigerians have been lectured by the AGF Aondoakaa that our president is well enough to manage Nigeria from his hospital bed? This means he can write a letter to Nigeria’s National Assembly at the very least. When the president so writes, the current anomalies with be corrected and resolved.
This would clear the current lacuna and pave the way for Vice-president Goodluck Jonathan to take over presidential duties, until the return of the president when and if, he is able to do so. In writing to the National Assembly, President YarAdua would have retroactively or in retrospect, complied with section 145 of the constitution of Nigeria, as he should have, from the onset of his trip to Saudi Arabia and eventual hospitalization since.
It is now obvious to all, that the daily business of governing Nigeria at the presidential levels have grinded to a halt. Our nation is left in limbo and left to totter and wobble, due to the vacuum and void, created by the absence, and then, neglect of President YarAdua to abide by and with section 145 of our constitution.
The seal of the president is needed to formalize the 2009 Supplementary Appropriation Bill. Similarly, the so-called amnesty program for members of MEND or the phenomenon of militants in the Niger Delta agitation for improved conditions still awaits full implementation and presidential oversight
Others have pointed to numerous other pending or shelved events such as the 2009 National Honors Award which cannot be conferred because the substantive president is AWOL and the vice president have no constitutional instrument conferring substantive powers on him, again, due to the egregious omission by President YarAdua prior to his departure from Nigeria.
Furthermore, there are the matters of appointments of the new President of the Court of Appeal and the Chief Justice of Nigeria have been duly confirmed, but still await the proper administration of their oath of office, and these are constitutionally stipulated to be administered by the President.
Currently, the vice president have been presiding over the Federal Executive Council , but it must be stated that as a matter constitutional law, and by virtue of Section 148 of the 1999 Constitution, it is the case that, only the president can preside over the Federal Executive Council (FEC) he is chairman of the board so to speak. Other than these, there sundry policy matters of national importance, including, domestic and foreign policy matters which demands presidential assent or approval. And no one Nigerian should hold the lives, the health, wealth and happiness of 150 million Nigerians hostage or to ransom.
It is not in Nigerians’ and Nigeria’s best interests to wait indefinitely for what happens or becomes, the outcomes of the President YarAdua circumstances. If he loved Nigeria, he would have followed the provisions of the constitution of Nigeria, whether he was in perfect physical health condition or impaired.
The National Assembly of Nigeria should now intervene to avert looming political and constitutional crises and probable catastrophes, which may ensue, due to the acts and omission of President YarAdua.
President YarAdua should be removed from office as a result of his haven been indisposed for so long, and, due to his precarious and steadily ebbing state of physical health. Nigeria is a nation, and not a personal estate or fiefdom. And Nigerians have been kept in the dark for too long. And for all we know, he may now in fact, be comatose or in vegetative state. And his handlers have refused to communicate and update Nigerians with his condition.
The Nigerian National Assembly should remove President YarAdua from office as a consequence on his refusal and neglect to comply with section 145 of the constitution of Nigeria.
President YarAdua should be removed from office due to his physical and mental incapacity to perform as president of Nigeria for more than 30 consecutive days.
President YarAdua should be removed from office because pertinently described exigent circumstances, and further, President YarAdua should be removed from office as president of Nigeria, for the protection and preservation of Nigeria and Nigeria’s national security and strategic interests.
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