That Trump – Buhari Phone Call: Taking Local Pranks International.

by Eze Eluchie,

In his letter to the Nigerian Senate announcing his temporary abdication from office to embark on a vacation, Mr. Mohammed Buhari had in keeping with Section 145 of the Nigerian Constitution, handed over his Office to the erstwhile Vice President, Professor Yemi Osibajo. In Buhari’s own words: “In compliance with Section 145{1} of the 1999 Constitution as amended, I wish to inform the Distinguished Senate that I will be away on a short medical vacation from Monday January, 23 to February 6^th 2017 and while I am away, the Vice President will perform the functions of my Office”. Since the transmission of the initial letter above to the Nigerian Senate, Mr. Buhari has neither returned to Nigeria, nor resumed his Office but has infact, via a second letter to the Nigerian senate dated.... indefinitely extended the period of his abdication from the Office of President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Technically, practically and otherwise, from the moment Muhammadu Buhari signed the letter handing over Presidential Powers to the Vice President, to act until such time as he, Buhari, returns from a protracted medical vacation abroad and proceeded on his 'vacation', Muhammadu Buhari ceased to be President of the Federal Republic. Buhari will however regain his position upon his return to Nigeria to assume the Office of President of the Federal Republic.

If as is being peddled around by the highly unreliable and established fabulists manning the Presidential Media team, the United States President, Donald Trump, was made to have a phone conversation with Mr. Buhari at his place of convalescence outside the shores of Nigeria, under the guise of having a phone call with the Nigerian President, then a fast one was played on Mr. Trump!

Mr. Trump, presuming he spoke with Mr. Buhari, did not speak with the President of Nigeria!!Mr. Trump had been '419ed'!!

Since his departure from Nigeria on the 19^th of January 2017, ostensibly for a ‘medical vacation’, the handlers of the Nigerian Presidency have been engaged in desperate efforts to convince Nigerians that all is well with the former President. Some of the antics deployed by the Presidency’s media team and the Information Ministry include surreptitious release of pictures ostensibly taken in the course of visits by some Nigerian politicians to the ailing Mr. Buhari, pictures showing Mr. Buhari in postures depicting a person in good health and of relaxed disposition.  Each picture of a ‘healthy’ Mr. Buhari, released by the Presidency’s handlers merely seemed to raise more doubts amongst discerning Nigerians as to the true state of affairs of Mr. Buhari’s health status.

Most Nigerians felt the scenario playing itself out was a poor imitation of the dire episode which occurred during the terminal days of late President Umar Yar’Adua when several antics were deployed by the former First Lady and some of her close associates to continue to maintain a facade of wellbeing and normalcy, whereas Umar Yar’Adua, who was on the throes of death, had become mentally and physically incapable of continuing in office as President. The facade allowed unprecedented fleecing of public funds under the authority of a non-existent President.

Though an unsavoury course, Nigerian have gone down this path of not knowing the whereabouts and health status of political heads before and are taking it in their strides in the believe, that sooner or later, the truth of the health status of Mr. Buharri will surface. To however take the pranks of projecting an ‘all-good’ image of Mr. Buhari to the international realm, insinuating a camaraderie between Mr. Buhari and Mr. Trump (as per alleged summaries of the phone conversation announced by Buhari’s Media and Publicity Adviser, Femi Adesina) and misdirecting foreign Heads of Government (President Donald Trump) into speaking with someone else under the guise of a phone call with the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria is detestable, reprehensible and unfortunate.

Picture: Buhari and Trump.

Wanted Back in Nigeria: Dead or Alive, preferably alive.

by Eze Eluchie,

Have you seen the man whose picture appears below?

Mohammadu Buhari, President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, was last seen in public by Nigerians boarding a Presidential jet at the Nnamdi Azikiwe Airport, Abuja, Nigeria, ostensibly for a 10-day vacation in the United Kingdom.

The 10-day vacation expired on Monday, 2^nd February 2017. Mr. Buhari failed to return to Nigeria, show cause why he did not return as he had earlier stated, and continued to maintain an ominous silence towards the people of the contraption over which he ‘presides’.

Since the public departure on the 19^th of January 2017, several suspicious photographs have been published by the Nigerian federal Government ostensibly to convince Nigerians and the wider international community that Mr. Buhari is alive and healthy.

Following the unsavoury precedent which occurred during the dying days and eventual death of former President Yar’Adua when the former President had also undertaken a ‘medical vacation’ to Germany and Nigeria was ostensibly ruled for a period of time by a combination of the trio of the widow and senior security officials and the corpse of the then deceased President, Nigerians are expectedly apprehensive that history may be repeating itself.

If you have seen the Nigerian President, kindly get in touch with any Nigerian (not Nigeria’s federal Government or any of Nigeria’s foreign missions) or preferably take a picture of him and post on the various social media sites. In taking such pictures, you must ensure that the man whose picture appears below is captured in a manner that depicts the date the picture was taken.

The Nigerian President is wanted back home to basically come and complete his tenure, a tenure which has thus far, in its less than 18 months of nightmarish existence, turned around what was once the largest and fastest growing economy in the African continent to an economy in a vicious recession; increased divides along ethno-religious lines amongst the various peoples of Nigeria; witnessed the enthronement of deception and sly propaganda as a cardinal fulcrum of governance.  Buhari should come back and repair this mess he created, fostered and encouraged. If otherwise, the contraption will forge on.

It is also hoped, whether Mr. Buhari eventually returns back to office or answers the ultimate call of nature, that the Nigerian contraption spares itself of this seemingly endless embarrassment of senior government officials junketing to foreign lands to cater for basic health care needs. A territory which is forever enmeshed in seeking to know the whereabouts of its President is not likely to inspire much confidence in foreign investors.

When one recollects that in the 1960’s, the Saudi Royal family used to visit the University College Hospital, Ibadan, for their health care and medical needs, then one truly appreciates how far the Nigerian contraption has sunk and continues to sink.

Picture: One of the pictures of President Buhari released by Nigeria’s Federal Government as proof of the President being in good health in his London, UK, residence.

Imprisoning the Future – Worrisome Situations in Nigerian Prisons.

by Eze Eluuchie,

Below is the basic data on inmates at the Owerri federal Prisons in Imo State, South Eastern Nigeria: 
          Prison Maximum Capacity:         540 inmates

          Presently accommodates:         2, 260 inmates

          Convicts:                                       216 inmates

          Non-convicts/Awaiting Trial:    2,044 inmates

The Owerri Federal Prisons presently accommodates 418.5% above the number of inmates it was built to hold. 90.44% of the inmates in the Prison are merely awaiting trial and have no business being in the Prison in the first place – until and if they are convicted.

Some persons awaiting trial have been detained at the Owerri Prisons for over 10 years.

In the course of interviewing some of the inmates or going through their case files (for those who still have case-files). a startling revelations immediately becomes apparent: quite a great proportion of those merely awaiting trial have not only stayed in custody beyond the period they would have served if they had actually been convicted, and secondly, some were just detained, on framed up charges by some 'big-man', which in some cases can be as mundane as an uncle who wants to do away with a 'troublesome' youngster who refuses to let his late fathers property be wrongly taken away. And pronto the youngster is thrown in to the prison and rots away there ad infinitum.

Earlier pro-bono efforts, under the aegis of the Prison Decongestion and Human Rights Program (PDHRP of PADDI Foundation) aimed at ameliorating the dire statistics above and ensuring that at the very least persons awaiting trial who had spent overly long periods in the Prison were released were frustrated by bureaucratic bottle-necks, demand of gratification by officers of the judiciary and the general decay of the Nigerian system.

Though Owerri Prisons stands out as having the worst Prisoner : Awaiting Trial Men (P:ATM) ratio among Nigerian prisons, the pattern is reflected across all prisons in Nigeria to a lesser level.

We shame ourselves and humanity by our treatment of those who we have, rightly and at times wrongly, consigned to the prisons. A place that ought to serve to reform and probably make better, is transformed to a pit where the negative is multiplied and society eventually pays a high price for allowing evil to flourish.  

One really wonders where all the millions of dollars in developmental aids and donor grants accorded to various government agencies and ‘human right protection’ or ‘civil liberty’ non-governmental organizations by foreign governments, development partners and donor organizations filtered to.

The real sorrow for the peoples of Nigeria is that whilst some pick-pockets, small time bandits are wallowing in our jail-houses, the mega criminals who rape the contraption blind, pillage the treasury and launder their loot in foreign territories and sponsor mass atrocities in a desperate bid to hold unto political power are escorted around our poorly paved streets in siren-blaring convoys, maiming and killing at will.  

For the sake of those who are saddled with citizenship of Nigeria, the Nigerian contraption simply needs to be restructured and renegotiated.

Picture: Inmates in a sleeping position at a Nigerian prison.