Kabiru Danladi Lawanti

Dear Sir, Iread your column today (The Nation, Tuesday, July 21,2009) Our country today is filled with funny characters. I think we (in the media) share in the rascality, in one way or the other. David Mark himself is a 419er, because he was in the senate through a controvercial election, which even the verdict of the tribunals is still debatable. But that not withstanding we should not take his comments for granted, or brush them aside, because we feel 'His Excellency', Right Honourable David Mark said them. There are quacks, fraudsters and 419ers in the media. In fact, Sir, you know better. The rot in the media is so pervasive that comment like this keep on coming. And I mentioned it in an article I wrote sometimes last year, where I specifically mentioned your name, and other prominent journalists in the country, that you are the only people that can resque the profession. You know how it started and what led to the present state of things, especially of poor pay,the hirel...

In an ideal democracy, in which political parties are built based on ideology and the desire to provide public service, one could say our political landscape is widened, given Nigerians more alternatives during elections, with the registration of new political parties by the Independent National Electoral Commission. Last week, four additional political parties were registered by the electoral body, bringing the number of political parties in Nigeria to 54. These newly registered parties are United National Party for Development (UNDP); National Movement of Progressives Party (NMPP), Kowa Party (KP) and People for Democratic Change (PDC). A cursory look at all the registered parties one find it difficult to identify where they differ, in terms of ideology or programmes, they are only associations that revolve around individuals, who were aggrieved, because they were denied tickets to contest elections, or are paid by the People’s Democratic Party to cause further division in the oppos...

To say the generation of Northern elite, from 1970s through to 1980s to the present, have failed the region in virtually sphere, is an understatement. We have, in the North today elite, that takes pride in seeing fellow citizens live in abject poverty and squalor; elite that is happy to be the only educated and enlightened ones in their villages and neighbourhoods; elite that prides itself of being the richest in their communities, while majority can’t afford to feed their families. Northern elites have failed the North; I say this, times without number and with all sense of responsibility. We deserve better in the North. The North has all that is needed to solve its economic and social problems. But look at the North today; go round the states, the local governments; check the indices of education, check the state of our public schools, hospitals, look at our industries, check out how we are fairing in agriculture, etc. But what are the elites doing? To secure a position in either th...

In a survey conducted by the Federal Ministry of Education sometimes in 2006, a very alarming rate of youth unemployment emerged in the country of over 60%, in which, although the figures might be higher now after three years, it is an indicator to the crisis in which this country finds itself. With a population of over 140 million and a youth population of 80 million, with 64 million unemployed, also with an estimated graduate turnover of over 600,000 graduates yearly, the Nigerian labour market is in crisis. We have every reason to sound an alarm bell especially in a situation where over 70% of working people are either unemployed or underemployed. For instance, in the same report by the Ministry of Education, it is estimated that only 4 million people were on paid employment, while over 60% of youth ages 15-29 are unemployed. For the nation to get out of the current unemployment crisis according to Dr. Magnus Kpakol, the National Coordinator, Poverty Eradication Programme, 3 millio...

That President Mamadou Tandja of Niger has succeeded in destroying all democratic institutions in his country for his selfish ambition to rule the West African nation till eternity is no longer news. What is news however was the effort of AU and ECOWAS in trying to stop him. ECOWAS or AU could have stopped him long ago in order to avoid plunging the country into chaos and political crises. However, due to what analysts see as the moral burden of legitimacy hanging on almost all the leaders in the West African sub-region and the continent in general, most of them kept quite. To me the only leader that has the moral authority to talk to him or challenge this illegal move in ECOWAS is the Ghanaian President, Professor John Atta Mills, who the whole world acknowledged came to power through free and fair election. Tandja felt that since majority of his counterparts came to power through either fraudulent elections or imposed themselves on their people through military coup, nobody can lect...

When Sir Abubakar Balewa, Nigeria’s first Prime Minister, delivered his first speech to the nation on October 1, 1960, he had no fore-knowledge of the situation in today’s Nigeria. However, the last statement quoted from the speech, 49 years old today, captured our situation today as if the former Prime Minister was referring to today’s Nigeria. Sir Tafawa Balewa, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Dr Nnamdi Azikwe and their ilk, were men of honour and integrity who sacrificed their entire life to make Nigeria a great country. A country that can stand in the comity of nations, where the right of its citizens is well respected, their lives valued and where access to education, health and basic necessities of life is ensured. But alas, contemporary political leaders deviated from the Nigerian dream; they changed and alter the foundation which these men of integrity laid for the country and its citizens. What we see today is a political leadership guided by greed, selfishness and highest sense of irr...

So much has been said about Magnus Kpokol and the agency he runs at the beginning of this year that one expected he should have been rusting in the Kirikiri or Gashua jail by now. However, like other corruption cases, raised by the National Assembly, since the era of probes began; the NAPEP probe has been buried and forgotten in the nation’s corruption cases archives. On February 2, 2009, several national dailies carried a news report, which stated that the Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekweremadu has presided over a plenary, where the Senate approved the motion to probe the activities of the National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP). NAPEP, according to the Senate Committee on National Planning Commission, lacks direction and suffers from administrative perfidy. The Committee also accused it for failure to register a formidable impact on the lives of the Nigerian populace, in spite of the alleged huge budgetary allocations made available to it by the Federal Government. Th...