A Fraud questioning the integrity of a State?

by Eze Eluchie

Why should Nigerian authorities allow a fraud-prone quasi-criminal contraption like FIFA (the Federation of International Football Associations) continually threaten Nigeria's interests?

Members of the FIFA cabal, inclusive of FIFA President, Josep Blatter, and Confederation of African Football (CAF) President and FIFA Board Member, Issa Hayatou, under normal circumstances, have severally committed acts that could qualify them for incarceration in various jurisdictions - yet these characters dare to malign and threaten Nigeria?

The effrontery of FIFA to issue contemptuous ultimatums against the Nigerian State discountenancing judicial and constitutional processes and rather seeking to ensure the continuation of criminality in our football administration is mind-blowing,  a feat only surpassed by the willingness of some in our clime to harken to the whims of the FIFA mafia. This same FIFA suddenly develops cold feet and becomes inactive when litigation over football issues are ongoing in other countries.

Call the bluff of these miscreants and let us look inwards and build our potentials.

With the advent of the new Cold War and FIFA's decision to accord Russia hosting rights for the 2018 edition of the World Cup, the United States will certainly have greater cause to move after and expose the criminality inherent in the FIFA cabal - their sun appears to be setting.

Picture: Capones of the FIFA Mafia - FIFA President, Sepp Blatter and FIFA Board Member/CAF President, Issa Hayatou.

Nigeria’s “Safe School Initiative Project”: A poorly conceived lame duck idea!

by Eze Eluchie

As part of its response to the several cases of mass killings and mass abductions of students in educational institutions across Nigeria North East zone, the Nigerian Government has in a move which defies logic and common sense, embarked on a novel plan to relocate students from such war-torn areas to other parts of Nigeria where Boko Haram is not perceived as ‘strong’ to enable the children, who are willing, to continue with their education.

Who in heavens name conceived the so-called ‘Safe Schools Initiative’ Project?  Was it ex-British Prime Minister Gordon Brown or Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala?

You want to provide a ‘safe school’ in a war-torn environment?

Whatever happened to efforts to end hostilities as soon as possible?

The perfidy has been upped by moves to send students in the war-torn areas to schools outside their native environments, where the war has, as at yet, not extended to? Really?

And what happens if Boko Haram activities overrun the various ‘unity schools’ to which these children are transferred? You relocate them to yet other schools in other locations? Certainly, this idea is worthy of not just a Global Prize but also an Inter-Galaxy or Inter-Planetary Prize@#%

Relocating these children without taking into consideration the welfare and upkeep of their parents and other family members exposes a fatal flaw in the thought process of those who conceived the ‘safe school initiative’ project. Is the main idea merely to appear to be supporting ‘formal education’? Even where such efforts are at the detriment of the youngsters’ emotional, psychological and social development?

As this piece was about being published, news of a deadly bomb blast targeted at students who were convening for daily morning assembly at the boys-only Government Comprehensive Senior Science Secondary School in Potiskum, Yobe state, North Eastern Nigeria surfaced - already, the death toll has surpassed 50 (students) with over 70 injured. Perhaps we have one more group of students to relocate under the ‘safe school initiative’ project.  But for how long will this continue?

Have these guys thought about a SAFE SOCIETY PROJECT?




Picture: Corpses of some of the 59 students killed by Boko Haram terrorists at the Government Secondary School, Bunu Yadi, Yobe State. . 

Speaker of Nigeria’s House of Representatives Vacates Seat.

by Eze Eluchie

By announcing his membership of another political party prior to the expiry of the tenure of the House for which he was elected, in the absence of either a division or factionalization in the party which sponsored his nomination into the House of Representatives, ex-Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr. Aminu Tumbawal, has vacated his seat in the House of Representatives as a Member representing the people of “Sokoto Kebbe/Tambuwal Federal Constituency” of Sokoto State, north-west Nigeria!!

The provisions of Section 68{1}(g) of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution is explicit and requires nothing else to ensure its enforcement – the pronouncement, by ex-Speaker Tumbawal, of joining the membership of another political party suffices for law enforcement and other agencies of government charged with the enforcement of the Constitution to ensure that the spirit and letters of the Constitution of the Federal Republic is respected and enforced.

Mr. Tambuwal's continued pretense at occupation of the revered position of Speaker and membership of the House of Representatives, after his public pronouncement of becoming a member of another political party other than the one which sponsored his election into the present House of Representatives must be swiftly corrected and visited with the necessary legal and penal consequences, least of which are for impersonation and fraudulent misrepresentation.

An excuse that this explicit provision of our Constitution had not been previously enforced is a non-starter. We must enforce clear cut provisions of our Constitution to avoid the stigma of being regarded/treated with disdain and nonchalance by other actors in the international community and perceived as a ‘banana-republic’.

If we do not begin to take ourselves and our Constitution serious, we may wake up one day down the road from now, only to discover that the President of the Federal Republic, the President of the Senate, a State Governor or other high ranking elected public official has ditched his Nigerian citizenship in favor of a foreign nationality and we will be ruled over by a non-Nigerian, in violation of our Constitution, and be stuck with the lame excuse that previous violations of constitutional provisions as the qualification for contesting or remaining in elective positions had previously been violated without any consequences to the violator.

For starters, the various security agencies must withdraw the retinue of operatives previously attached to Mr. Tambuwal by virtue of his previous position as Speaker of the House of Representatives; the Clerk of the National Assembly must ensure that all properties attached to the Office of the Speaker of the House of Representatives are recovered and kept in safe custody pending when a new Speaker emerges.

Again, where is the Federal Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation?

Let us begin to take ourselves and our laws serious for once!

Picture: Former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr. Aminu Tumbawal.