To say Nollywood stars have had their fair share of trials and tribulations in the hand of the media is an understatement. Some have been through the fire and are still smarting from the experience. The latest to be hit is popular Nollywood star and Glo ambassador Uche Jombo.
Some weeks ago a certain media house, News of the People based in Ojodu, circulated a story that the actress had undergone an abortion at the advanced stage of 6months for a certain Okechukwu Uche. Shaken by the news, it was decided to track Uche concerning the matter and the actress who was most upset, denied the allegations vehemently. ‘How can I abort a 6 month pregnancy? It is a bloody lie! I do not know how someone can wake up in the morning and his plan is just to destroy others with his poisonous pen! I can not tell you how this story has affected me emotionally and psychologically but I have handed the matter over to my lawyer and it is in court now! When pressed further Uche said, ‘I have issued a press release to the necessary media houses and have also been advised not to discuss the details of the case but I can tell you that I am suing them (News of the People) for one hundred billion naira!
Further efforts to get her to speak were rebuffed with the actress informing me that she was going for a well deserved rest in the United States in the coming week. She however directed me to her lawyer, Victor Ukutt Esq. who she said will handle the matter from now on.
they tracked him down and he intimated me that the media house had already been written formally to retract and publicly apologize to the Star and failure to do this would result in them being served. When asked if the media house had complied and the lawyer said ‘No! So we have no option but to go ahead, sue them and summon them to court on the matter. We will do so formally on Tuesday 16th February 2010’. ‘And how much are you suing them for?’ He replies; ‘100 billion naira!’! I wonder if the media house can pay and voice that out to which he answers, ‘They should have thought of that when they were writing malicious stories about my client! We intend to pursue this matter to the fullest extent of the law till justice is done’. Meanwhile we at Nollywooduncut.com intend to keep you updated on this saga
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World Briefing By Paul Ohia email:paulohia@thisdayonline.com Tel:08034483595, 02.14.2010
Monday, February 15, 2010
If you have abundant money in your account, you are qualified for a British, American or any other advanced country visa but they do their best to restrict people with criminal intentions from getting entry into their developed world.
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Other checks outside these requirements are done perfunctorily and may not matter in your being issued a visa.
However, an indigent person can also gain access into those countries but the person must have a scholarship from a reputable organisation, country or individual but must be ready to evacuate himself from the country upon finishing his studies. He may also be invited by an affluent person.
After 9/11, those countries also started monitoring people with terrorism inclinations and have been doing what they consider the best within their means to stop such elements from gaining entry through their borders.
The dilemma of having a fat is that terrorists normally have big bank accounts to back up their applications for visa.
There are people whose works require travels like journalists, development workers and religious clerics but they may not have fat bank accounts. For instance, whose salary may be on the starting point needs to travel as much as the editor who may have a bigger pay. He may even need to travel more than the government official with a diplomatic or official passport. I have had many complaints from these categories of workers that their careers have been stunted because of the requirement by some embassies that one must have large money moving in and out of their account and once this is not there the response would be that you do not have enough to sustain you in their country. It may embarrass you with an additional comment; that you may not return if you found yourself in their country.
On several occasions they are even assured that the company would foot the bill of the traveller or that some organisations would bear the cost, yet they deny access.
Sometime ago, an American organisation needed to build mud houses and had nobody with the knowledge of doing it in their country hence they had to research and find suitable people in the Eastern Nigeria. The locals were given invitation to travel to the US but were stopped at the embassy because they could not speak English and cannot produce evidence that they would not disappear in a country where they cannot speak their language.
The latest issue on this matter is the British student visa which has been abused by terrorists who infiltrate the country as students. It is meant to favour the bourgeoisie in the sense that they are able to get their off-springs attend the best colleges just like those listed as the Highly Trusted Sponsors.
In this European country, it has not been proven that those who come for short courses who may now be subjected to tougher visa regimes are among the perpetrators of economic or security crimes. In my own view, the whole issue of visa review in Britain is based on hype. So is the fantasy about fat bank accounts.
If Mr. Balogun, a brilliant banker, is not comfortable with poor power supply in Nigeria and has the mind to escape to leave a better life in the Diaspora, nothing stops him from presenting his fat statement of account as a bank manager and taking along his family members to UK to stay forever and add to the increasing population there. Yes this scenario happens very often. Often times, those who escape to those countries are normally people who should be comfortable here also. Some have the poetic feeling that living in Europe or the Americas gives them some superiority like ancient French people who returned from Greece speaking Latin in the medieval ages. Many of them pride themselves with speaking foreign accents and making fun of local idiolects as if foreign accents are not some sort of idiolects themselves.
The point I am struggling hard to make here is that despite the fact that countries have the right to grant access their territories by issuing visas, tying the issuing of visa to a persons monetary, or with property background is not the best policy.
Visa officers should consider other issues like the person’s commitment to his profession and emotional attachment to his home country. Apart from these, experts should be called in to give their suggestions on the matter so that people who should otherwise contribute to the advancement of humanity by a broader interaction with civilizations elsewhere are not sidelined to a particular part of the globe because it appears they may lack the resources required for a traveler.
Adams Oshiomhole
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He has also criticised previous governments in the state for allegedly constructing hailed roads.
Oshiomhole, who disclosed this amount for the first time in a chance encounter with our correspondent said it was feat that must be accomplished through the regular payment of taxes and proper planning.
Oshiomhole spoke in Benin on Thursday night shortly after returning from Uzairue in Etsako West Local Government Area, where he inagurated the Ayogwiri-Apena Road project.
He said, "We are going to be firm in tax collection because with the construction going on everywhere, nobody will ask us why we are collecting taxes. We have done proper planning and we know what we required.
We have made adequate arrangement to fund the jobs as they come and I am very confident that we have made clear projections. For instance in the first qurater of the year, how much is required to do many of these jobs?
"We have specific commitments and as funds come, we already know what to do with them. So, you don't have the temptation of diverting resources to programmes that were not properly thought out. So, it is a deliberate approach to tie you to specific targets. We are not finished yet."
According to him, the state government is also focusing on education, health and rural electrification.
He called on the people to support the contractors handling the various projects, adding that the communities would benefit from them through job creation.
Asked to comment on his vision for Edo State in the years ahead, Oshiomhole replied. "This is not campaign time; by our actions, you will judge where we are going. It is action time and we are taking our time to design. Some of the roads done by our predecessors have already failed. Even at that, we are working on the basis of knowledge, not intuition."
Other ongoing road proejct are Ewohimi-Agadaga-Igueben road; Igueben-Ewohimi-Ohordua-Emu-Okhuesan road; and Isua-Arue-Uzenema-Egbele road.
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Olliance will be running a series of CEO Interviews throughout the year. I sat down with Brian Gentile, CEO of Jaspersoft ( www.jaspersoft.com ), to get his thoughts on Open Source software and current market trends. This is the first in a two part series with Brian where he shares his thoughts.
Part 1: A discussion on open source today – challenges and learnings for commercial Open Source vendors and customer CIOs.
Miriam – Some analysts believe 2010 will be a year of explosive growth for Open Source. What are your thoughts on the 2010?
Brian – Gartner recently issued an open source business intelligence report forecasting a 5-fold increase in the next three years. 2010 will be the third consecutive year where there will have been large jumps in the successful use of open source products; so yes, I am bullish about the up-coming year.
Above the infrastructure layer, more than ever open source will become necessary – more than acceptable . . . expected, mainstream and validated. It is important to distinguish between open source as an underlying infrastructure layer and the layers of software above that are more application like. This marks an important transition in the adoption and use of open source software.
Miriam – So you think that the Open Source B.I. space has moved out of the early adopter stage and is now moving to the top of the curve from a Crossing the Chasm perspective?
Brian – I would say it is early majority – it has crossed the chasm and is now in the early majority. That’s important socio-graphically, because now not just “Type A” customers (those companies and IT teams who see innovative information technology as the means to competitive advantage) are adopting, but “Type B” as well.
Miriam – How many years has it been for the Open Source B.I. segment in the market place – from when it started out in the marketplace to get to that point up the curve? Four years?
Brian – The earliest point would be late 2001 when the first mainstream open source BI project appeared, called JasperReports. Early users were developers that used this open source reporting engine and library. Then, I’d estimate that mainstream use of open source BI began in 2005, when Jaspersoft introduced the first full-fledged BI Server (JasperServer) and other vendors appeared as well.
Miriam – That’s part of cycle maturity, when multiple vendors are in the market. What about other segments above the infrastructure? What are the characteristics that you think would make it possible for another segment to become like Open Source BI?
Brian – Not all software sectors necessarily represent a good market for the open source model. There are characteristics that make certain sectors better for open source.
Miriam – What are they?
Brian – Firstly, the software sector has to be at a maturity level where you don’t have to explain what the software is, what it does, and why it is beneficial. Open source companies don’t have the time or money to educate. You won’t see successful open source companies in new software categories where you have to prove that the software is necessary.
Secondly, it has to be a big enough market where the volume needs of a commercial open source company can be met.
Thirdly, incumbent players should be leaving a portion of the market under-served or over-charged. If these three market characteristics are in place – it can be very fertile for an open source company to come in.
Miriam – What about the customer side? What are the attributes that you have to look at from the customer side in order to benefit from open source.
Brian – The early adopter market was a technical group. Technical audiences – the developers of the world, have historically consumed successful open source projects. In 2010, business users will more and more advocate using open source. It’s kind of like the early days of SaaS where end users said “I am not going to pay the internal IT prices for access to Siebel or Peoplesoft. I am going to use Salesforce because it is a better product and I can use it today not in 6 months.” The business benefits of open source are being widely recognized by business users who will pressure IT to use open source to benefit their business.
Miriam – The open source mantra has always been that the buyer and downloader of the product is technical. As it crosses over to the business side, is there a certain business function that is going to be more predisposed to come to the community, sign up, download, etc.
Brian – I don’t think so. I think that we are now technically savvy enough in every department to be able to do this. So, I think you’ll see pockets of business user adoption and endorsement across all functions in an organization.
Miriam – Even in sales? LOL?
Brian – Yes. There are big pockets everywhere and those pockets grow as the demographics in the workforce change. The most significant demographic shift of all time, at least in the western or developed economies, is underway. It is going to continue to have a dramatic effect on the technical skills of the individual knowledge worker.
Miriam – Jaspersoft is your first Open Source company as a CEO. What were some of the areas that you found critical? Lets start on the sales and marketing side. What are the unique challenges of the open source model from a sales and marketing perspective?
Brian – The biggest challenge is to recognize the value of the open source model and the community that forms over time – it requires patience. You must have an investment and operating model that allows you to get out there with a product in volume that is essentially free and solves some real business problem.
Sales and marketers want to sell something to everybody. Many are just not going to buy your product but they are going to use your product – this is discomforting to sales people. They have to be patient– because if they aren’t, you won’t have a successful open source model.
Secondly, you have to find clever ways to have that community collaborate with you on the product. Product development can’t be fully in charge of the features of the product and where it is going.Your development model must embrace that and take back contributions that originated with the community. That’s uncomfortable for everyone if you have never done it before but getting good at it is a distinction between successful and mediocre open source companies.
Miriam – Your second point is particularly interesting. Many organizations hit two walls – the first how to scale. Once people do want the commercial edition, it can become a people intensive business. How do you scale from 1 to 100 to 1,000? You also have to change the support and services model. Any insight around those challenges?
Brian – The bigger the community, the greater the need for scalable services. One must spend meaningful time trying to put in place mechanisms for community self support and knowledge-based services. So it has to be organic and scalable. There are absolutely acceptable distinctions between classes of services for a community user and commercial customers. Done correctly, it actually becomes a benefit to the P&L. Done incorrectly, it could sink a company.
Miriam – Lastly, how is product management different – you have a background in marketing and product management – you’ve done it both in a traditional company and an open source company. What are the critical success factors?
Brian – In a proprietary software company, the product management function is essentially a guardian of the secrets of where the product is going. The watchwords for open source companies are transparency, participation and collaboration. The product function owns transparency and collaboration. The beginning points for community development is where the website becomes an ideagora – a gathering place for swapping ideas. The product management function has to provide dialogue and the community has to be invited to engage. Using the ideagora, there is voting and dialogue about the direction of the product. The combination of these principles can create unparalleled value – again, if done correctly.
Miriam – So when we look forward to 2010, what do you see as the opportunities and challenges for Jaspersoft and for open source software market in general.
Brian – For 2010, we have five strategic company objectives. They are aligned with where we think the market is going. One of our five objectives is to diversify our revenue stream – ensuring a growing commercial contribution from Latin America, Asia Pacific, and Europe.
Miriam – So do you think 2010 will be easier in terms of the market and the economy – from a software sales perspective.
Brian - I think we will see continued recovery – and as we move through the year, we will pick up momentum. It won’t be a banner year – it will be a solid year but an important one to lead into even bigger growth in 2011.
Poets, novelists and songwriters have described it in countless turns of phrase, but at the level of biology, love is all about chemicals.
Although the physiology of romantic love has not been extensively studied, scientists can trace the symptoms of deep attraction to their logical sources.
"Part of the whole attraction process is strongly linked to physiological arousal as a whole," said Timothy Loving (his real name), assistant professor of
human ecology at the University of Texas, Austin. "Typically, that's
going to start with things like increased heart rate, sweatiness and so
on,"
When you catch sight of your beloved and your heart starts racing, that's because of an adrenaline rush, said Dr. Reginald Ho, a cardiac electrophysiologist and associate professor of medicine
at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Here's how it works: The brain sends signals to the adrenal gland, which secretes hormones such as adrenaline, epinephrine and norepinephrine.
They flow through the blood and cause the heart to beat faster and
stronger, Ho said.
The response is somewhat similar to a fast heartbeat while running on a treadmill, although exercise has other benefits, he said.
For people with serious heart problems, love could actually be dangerous, Ho said. That's because when the heart rate goes up, the heart uses more oxygen, which can be risky for
an older person with blood vessel blockages or who has had a prior
heart attack. But good medicines such as beta blockers help curb the
adrenaline response, Ho said.
It is also likely that norepinephrine, a stress hormone that governs attention and responding actions, makes you feel weak in the knees, said Helen Fisher, professor
at Rutgers University and author of the book "Why Him? Why Her? Finding
Real Love by Understanding Your Personality Type."
Fisher's research team did brain imaging of people who said they were "madly in love" and found activity in the area of the brain that produces the
neurotransmitter dopamine. Dopamine and norepinephrine are closely
related.
"What dopamine does is it gives you that focused attention, the craving, the euphoria, the energy and the motivation, in this case the motivation to win life's greatest prize," she said.
This norepinephrine response has never been precisely studied in relation to romantic love, but the system seems to be more activated in people in love, she said..
Also likely involved is the serotonin system, she said. Some data from an Italian study indicate that a drop in serotonin levels is associated with obsessive thinking.
The stress hormone cortisol has also been shown to have implications for love, Loving said. His lab showed study participants who had recently
fallen in love a picture of a romantic partner or friend, and had them
describe or "relive" the moment of falling in love or wanting to be
friends, respectively. Those who recalled falling in love showed an
increase in stress hormones such as cortisol even 30 minutes after they
were asked to think about it.
Generally, there are three brain systems involved in romantic love: sex drive, love and attachment, Fisher said. The sex drive evolved to get you to look for a lot of partners, the "love" portion is for focusing mating energy on one specific person at a time, and
attachment is for allowing you to tolerate the partner -- at least,
long enough to have children with him or her.
These systems are often connected, but can operate separately, she said. That means you can start out with one of them -- casual sex, or an intense feeling of
love, or an emotional connection -- and move on to the others. For
example, what may start out as a one-night stand may feel like more
because the hormones oxytocin and vasopressin, released during orgasm,
make you feel deeply attached to someone. You may feel in love after
that, or instead feel somehow responsible for the person, because of
these hormones.
Fisher's team has found that romantic love doesn't have to die -- they found the same activity in the brains of people who said they were in love after 20 years of marriage as in
people who had just fallen in love. This brain area makes dopamine and
sends it to other areas.
In the days of early humans, in hunting-and-gathering societies, these qualities were especially advantageous for finding a person to bear and raise children with, she
said.
Why, then, do small children fall in love if they are not trying to reproduce? Fisher hypothesizes that kids -- even 4-year-olds -- practice at love and learning more about themselves
before it begins to become important to them.
Love also has health benefits for people who have aged beyond their reproductive years, she said. Being in love makes people feel optimistic, energetic,
focused and motivated, which were all positive for health and societal
contribution in the early days of humans, she said. So, it makes sense
evolutionarily that people can still fall in love after their
childbearing period.
Romance also is good for you. Studies have shown that people who have frequent sex are generally healthier, with a longer life, fewer coronary events and lower blood pressure. A 1995
study in the journal Demography found that marriage adds seven years to
a man's life and two years to a woman's.
Loving's team is studying how people who have recently fallen in love respond to stressful situations. They hypothesize that people for whom the love is
still new will respond to the stress and recover from it quicker than
those who have recently been in a breakup or have been in a relationship for a long time.
"The guess is that when individuals are falling in love, they are walking around with rose-colored glasses," he said.
You might be rocking away, and it might feel like you're getting somewhere; but in the end, you are exactly where you started.
With the state of the economy and the unemployment rate, it's easy to worry.
Most of us remember the first time we heard officially on the news that our economy is in a recession. But did you know that the next morning, the birds still woke up and sang? They didn't fall off their branches in unbelief and start flying around here and there worrying, stopping their song.
No, the little birds sang and the big birds sang, and it was like a beautiful symphony.
You might be thinking, "Joel, that's great, birds singing and all; but come on, our economy is in a crisis."
Listen to what Jesus says, "Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father keeps feeding them. Are you not worth much more than they? And who of you by worrying and being anxious can add one unit of measure to his stature or to the span of his life? And why should you be anxious about clothes? Consider the lilies of the field and learn thoroughly how they grow; they neither toil nor spin. Yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his magnificence was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and green and tomorrow is tossed into the furnace, will he not much more surely clothe you, O you of little faith?
Do Not Worry..
Therefore, do not worry and be anxious, saying, "What are we going to eat? Or "What are we going to have to drink? Or, what are we going to have to wear? But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things taken together will be given to you. So do not worry or be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will have worries and anxieties of its own." (Matthew 6:26-30, Amplified)
Friends, nothing is new under the sun. They might not have had economists back then with the term "recession", but there have been many who've gone before us that worried about what to eat, drink, wear, where to live, where to send their kids, how to pay for this or that; but God lovingly reminds us that He takes care of the flowers in the field and the birds in the air. How much more valuable are we to Him?
Jesus made it so clear about worrying. How many more days to our life will we added by worrying? Are you going to grow taller? Are you going to grow smarter? Are your problems going to disappear? Worrying does us no good! But what does us good is when we magnify God and not our problems. The Bible even says, "Do not fret, it only leads to evil."
So what are we to do? Trust God, and just like the birds, praise Him. Keep that song of praise in your heart. When the praises go up, the blessings come down. His joy is our strength through the hard times. When you spend your time worrying, you're not putting your faith out there.
Worry says, "I'm not going to get a job. I'm never going to get my retirement back."
The garment of praise says, "Father, I thank you for the victories you've already brought me. Thank you for the favor. Thank you that you're turning my situation around."
One thing I've learned is that you can't worry and praise at the same time.
You can't say, "I know You're on the throne, and You're good all the time. You always cause me to triumph. You make a way when there seems to be no way," and then worry and think, "I don't know how this is going to turn around."
Supernatural things will happen when we praise. Supernatural things do not happen when we worry. Worry does nothing but rob your joy.
You might feel like worrying is getting you somewhere, but it does nothing but zap your strength. We need our energy for the battles in life, and we need the knowledge of who God is during these difficulties to keep singing.
Suddenly, God can change your situation around like Paul and Silas when they were in prison. In the midnight hour, they were set free. But was it from them crying, fretting and wringing their hands, being in despair and complaining? No, they were praising God and the prison door went wide open.
No matter what the news report says about how many points the Dow Jones is down, each day, wake up with great faith and keep your joy and praise God.
And don't forget to enlarge your vision. You can't do that when you're worrying. You might have lost a lot in the stock market, but God can cause you to make back everything you lost, plus more. There is no limit to what God can do. But what does limit Him is when we don't believe, and we allow worry to rob our joy and faith.
This is what Scripture says in Jeremiah 33:11, "'…Give thanks to the Lord Almighty, for the Lord is good; his love endures forever. For I will restore the fortunes of the land as they were before.' says the Lord."
That means when you wake up, praise God. Believe Him for restoration in your retirement and savings. Believe God for restoration in that business you lost. There is nothing too difficult for God to do. Everything that was stolen can be restored in your life. God always gives us double for our trouble, and He likes to outdo Himself. The question is do you believe He will?
Keep your hopes up. Don't let worry have any room in your heart today.
Keep a song in your heart. And when you wake up in the morning and hear the birds singing, let it remind you to praise God during these difficult economic times. He has the whole world in His hands. In fact, He has you in the palm of His Hand. Nothing is a surprise to Him. If you will stay full of hope and praise, God will show Himself strong in your life, and you will not be disappointed!
JOEL OSTEEN
Joel Osteen is pastor of Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas — a vibrant and diverse church that Forbes calls the largest and fastest-growing congregation in America. Joel shares a positive message of hope and encouragement that extends all around the world. This message reaches all across America and 100 nations of the world. Joel's books, Your Best Life Now and Become a Better You, quickly became #1 New York Times Bestsellers and are distributed worldwide in several languages.
Aliyu Muhammed Gusau
Aliyu Gusau has always been in the precipice of power. Commonly referred to as the ‘spy master’, this retired army general has constantly had a role to play in the balance of power in the country. The recluse former intelligence officer first rose to prominence when he was made the Director of Military Intelligence under former President Shehu Shagari.
Mr. Gusau and Oladipupo Diya, another retired general, were also said to be masterminds behind the fall of the Ernest Shonekan-led Interim National Government. Under the Ibrahim Babangida regime, he became the Chief of Army Staff and was appointed National Security Adviser under former president Olusegun Obasanjo.
Adamu Aliero
Adamu Aliero was born on January 1, 1957 in Aliero Local Government in Kebbi State. Mr. Aliero graduated from the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, with a Bachelors of Science degree in Political Science. His political career took off in 1998 when he contested for a senatorial seat under the banner of the United Nigerian Congress Party (UNCP). Mr. Aliero, a former customs officer, was elected governor for two terms of four years each on the platform of the opposition All Nigerian Peoples Party (ANPP) but switched loyalty to the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) at the end of his second term as governor and was elected into the Senate in 2007. He, however, vacated his seat in the senate when he was appointed Minister of the Federal Capital Territory in December 2008.
Sule Lamido
Born in April 1948, Sule Lamido was appointed minister of foreign affairs in 1999 by former president Olusegun Obasanjo and Mr. Lamido retained that position until 2003. Mr. Lamido was the National Secretary of the defunct Social Democratic Party during the Third Republic and was heavily criticised for his handling of the botched June 12 1993 presidential elections believed to have been won by the late Moshood Abiola. He was, however, imprisoned in 1998 by the late dictator Sani Abacha for criticising Mr. Abacha’s plan to perpetuate himself in office. He was elected governor of Jigawa State in 2007. Mr. Lamido has been involved in politics for more than 30 years. His political career dates back to his days in the defunct People’s Redemption Party (PRP)..
Jubril Aminu
Born August 1939, the senator representing the Adamawa Central Senatorial district attended the University of Ibadan, where he graduated in 1965 as a medical doctor. Mr. Aminu was the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Maiduguri between 1980 and 1985, and has been education minister and also petroleum and mineral resources minister under the Ibrahim Babangida regime between 1989 and 1992. He was also Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission and then Nigerian Ambassador to the United States between 1999 and 2003.
Mr. Aminu was a delegate of the Nigerian National Constitutional Conference from 1994 to 1995, and has been a senator since 2003 on the platform of the People’s Democratic Party. Chairman of the senate committee on foreign affairs, he was mentioned in a German court as one of the beneficiaries of the $12.7million bribe allegedly paid by Siemens between 2001 and 2004 to top government officials to secure contracts in Nigeria.
Murtala Nyako
Murtala Hammanyero Nyako, a retired vice-admiral of the Nigerian Navy, was elected governor of Adamawa State in 2007 on the platform of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP).
Mr. Nyako, born on August 27, 1943 was appointed Chief of Naval Staff in January 1990 and Deputy Chief of Defence Staff in 1992 before retiring from the Navy in 1993.
Mr. Nyako’s election as governor, in the 2007 general elections, was nullified by the the Adamawa State Election Petitions Tribunal. He, however, won the re-run election held on April 26,
2008. He was a member of the National Security and Defence Council (NSDC) which annulled the June 12, 1993 presidential election.
Despite the jostle for an imagined vacancy in the office of the vice-president by cronies of ailing president Umaru Yar'Adua, Acting President Goodluck Jonathan could run a one man presidency until 2011, legal experts and political insiders say.
Highly connected sources, who spoke on conditions of anonymity, told NEXT at the weekend in Abuja that the friends of Mr. Yar'Adua, now notoriously called the ‘cabal,' are actively seeking to insinuate a friendly party into the presidency.
Mr. Jonathan, who only became Acting president after 78 days of obstructionist politics by the cabal, has through some obscure arrangement, been allowed a 40-day window to select a deputy from a list of Yar'Adua loyalists. The five frontrunners for this job, whenever it becomes viable, are the governor of Katsina State, Ibrahim Shema; the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Yayale Ahmed; Aliyu Gusau, Nigeria's former army and intelligence chief; and Sule lamido, the incumbent governor of Jigawa State, our source said.
But while the group continues to ignore the constitutional implications of their ambitions, lawyers argue that Mr. Jonathan does not have the powers to select a vice president as no vacancy currently exists for the seat.
According to the lawyers, while Mr. Jonathan now serves as the commander-in-chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces, there currently exists no vacancy in the vice presidency, the position Mr. Jonathan occupied until last week when a resolution by the National Assembly declared him the Acting President of the country. The lawyers said that Mr. Jonathan will continue to run the presidency without an official deputy until 2011 unless the ailing president, Umaru Yar'Adua, ceases to be president as a result of his impeachment or permanent incapacitation.
"It is envisaged that the president is alive; it is envisaged that the President is not permanently incapable; it is envisaged that he is only temporarily incapable and so whenever he comes back, he becomes the president while Jonathan returns to the position of Vice President. So if the president does not come until the 2011 elections or whatever, there will be no Vice President, that office becomes permanently vacant," said Bamidele Aturu, a prominent Lagos based human rights attorney.
A senior Advocate of Nigeria, Ricky Tarfa, described the scramble by the politicians for the office of the Vice-President is ‘an act of illegality and unconstitutionality'.
Vice-presidency for the North
In the miasma of events leading to the political arrangement that saw Mr. Jonathan become Acting President is an obscure pact that the Acting President should pick a deputy from a myriad of names, all northern elites, in the event that the vice-president slot does become open.
While it is not clear in what manner such a position will become vacant, politicians are frenetically pulling strings in Abuja, positioning themselves for the job.
Mr. Yar'Adua's friends continue to push forward names of close allies and in a bizarre move, some have even nominated the wife of the president, Turai, for the No.2 position.
Sources say that the unconstitutionality of the selection of a vice-president is a matter which the absent president's kitchen cabinet had not initially put into consideration.
"There now exists a renewed challenge in the wake of the Goodluck presidency," our sources said, adding that there is the likelihood that Mr. Jonathan may remain as the Acting President until 2011, when the next presidential elections will take place, because of circumstances beyond his control.
Still, reluctant to lose their influence, Mr. Yar ‘Adua's allies who have been worried that power appears to have slipped from the northern elites following the crucial memo from the National Assembly, continued their manoeuvres at the weekend, narrowing their options around Mr. Shema, the youthful governor of Katsina State and an acolyte of the ailing president.
Mr. Shema is believed to have the backing of the northern governors who, in a desperate need for political survival, threw their considerable support behind Mr. Jonathan's presidency, effectively negating the Yar ‘Adua presidency.
The Shema candidacy
All this however comes with its own complications and embarrassment. Already, an intense political warfare is raging in Katsina, home state of Mr. Yar Adua. Political insiders suspect that political fratricide is destined to consume Mr. Yar Adua's own three political godsons of whom Mr. Shema is the most prominent at the moment. The two others are Tanimu Yakubu, the economic adviser of Mr. Yar Adua, and Abba Ruma, his agriculture minister, both of whom are also eyeing the governorship of Katsina State.
If Mr. Shema ultimately loses it, People Democratic Party insiders told NEXT last weekend, the only reason will be because "he was marginalised these past 78 days and Tanimu and Ruma were closer to the first lady who never really wants Sherma for a second term as governor let alone something as high as the vice presidency.
Shema too, may be a victim of the principle of elimination by prominence since his early promotion as a candidate may be a strategy destined to sideline or even damage his candidacy" said our source.
There are other contenders however, and the name of the current secretary to the federal government, Mr. Ahmed had been promoted with the same fervour as that of Sule Lamido, the current governor of Jigawa. Both men are credited with experience and good judgement. Mr. Ahmed comes from Bauchi, which together with Jigawa shares the same zone with Katsina in the country's geo-political zoning block.
Constitutionality or Unconstitutionality
Some lawyers however condemn not only the current quest for the vice presidency by the politicians but also the very resolution that has made Mr. Jonathan the Acting President.
"Mr. Jonathan can continue as Acting President till next elections or until either President Yar'Adua comes back or until after the elections, or until a court declares his emergence unconstitutional. Because the way he was appointed is not legal, strictly speaking, it's not constitutional. The constitution was not followed, because no letter was written. The National Assembly said the broadcast on radio is deemed to be a letter. I do not know how you can do that, but they said the doctrine of necessity is a constitutional necessity," said Charles Musa, another human rights lawyer.
Like Mr. Musa, the opposition Action Congress (AC), has also condemned the National Assembly resolution..
"Our party, the AC, believes in constitutionality and the rule of law, hence our stand is not determined by what is popular but by what is legal and Constitutional," said the National Publicity Secretary of the party, Lai Mohammed.
The opposition against the constitutional propriety of Mr. Jonathan's emergence is currently running askance with the popular mood. "If the opposition can just take time to read the currents well" said Hassan Ado Ibrahim, an Abuja policy analyst, "they will see that the currents are so strong that even our parliamentarians and the governors have read the trend so accurately, and have opportunistically grafted their own interest into the mix."
Mr. Ibrahim believes that the Jonathan presidency will ride this wave of popular will long enough to make the question of a deputy needless, adding that "no one caused this problem anymore than the Yar' Adua people who abused the intelligence of the whole nation for so long that they whipped up so much negative sentiments against their patron and their platform."
He said, "from all indications the governors were genuinely angry that they got no access to the ailing president, and had no credible report on his status forcing them to switch loyalty to Mr. Jonathan" but added that they, "craftily yoked this objective grounds for outrage with their selfish desire to get someone that will sign off on the excess crude account which is their main motivation; and their selfish desire to change some of the people they had nominated to the federal cabinet."
Additional reporting by Idris Akinbajo and Ifedayo Adebayo
Germany's multi-year reign as the world's No 1 exporter is officially over, with the crown formally passing to rising China after new figures showed that German exports slid by nearly a fifth in 2009, the biggest decline in 60 years.
Tuesday's German government figures only confirmed an open secret: China's runaway growth and resilience amid the financial crisis put its exports ahead of Germany, which suffered a severe recession before returning to growth in last year's second quarter.
Last month, China's customs reported that total 2009 exports were more than $1.2 trillion, well ahead of the 803.2 billion euro ($1.1 trillion) that Germany reported Tuesday.
For Germany, the figure was a drop of 18.4 percent from 2008, although exports returned to year-on-year growth in December.
"The crisis has accelerated the shift in power in world trade toward the emerging countries," said Anton Boerner, the head of Germany's BGA exporters' association.
However, "the fact that we are passing on the title of world export champion to China doesn't cause us any worries," he added. "The growth of the Chinese economy will also secure our growth and jobs in Germany for long years."
Boerner noted that in December demand for German products from all parts of the world was up on the year.
Declining imports indicate that "large parts of the economy are still in neutral," Boerner said. "Everything must be done to encourage and stabilize the upturn in exports."
Germany took over the top spot in terms of exports in 2003, surpassing the US.
China's newfound status is mostly symbolic but highlights its growing presence as an industrial power, major buyer of oil, iron ore and other commodities and, increasingly, as an investor and key voice in managing the global economy.
Its ability to unseat longtime export leader Germany reflected the ability of agile, low-cost Chinese manufacturers to keep selling abroad even as other exporters have been hammered by a slump in global demand.
The change is the second time in three years Germany has been overtaken by China.
In 2007, China surpassed Germany to become the world's third-largest economy, just behind No. 2 Japan and the United States, which holds the top spot.
China's growth also benefits other companies and countries, particularly those in Germany, because of its voracious demand for raw materials, consumer goods and more.
Germany's leading luxury car makers, Mercedes-Benz, BMW AG and Audi AG, all have reported that their sales in China more than doubled on the year last month, helping them to improve their global performance.
Germany, and Europe, is also noted for quality and craftsmanship.
Nick Reilly, the new chief executive of General Motors Co's German-based European unit, Opel, said Tuesday he believes that "manufacturing must have and will have a bright future in Europe."
"Yes, wage rates are higher here than in other countries, but productivity, production excellence, logistics costs, quality and the work force's outstanding skill base largely offset that cost disadvantage," said Reilly, who was previously the US automaker's Shanghai-based executive vice president of international operations.
He pointed to "Opel's German engineering" as an asset to GM.
By Ofonime Umanah , Bureau Chief, Port Harcourt
Port Harcourt, the Garden City was plunged into mourning on Saturday after an early morning downpour felled some electricity poles in the Trans-Amadi area of the Rivers State capital.
While eyewitnesses put the death toll at 40 with several critically injured, the government confirmed the death of 10.
The rainfall lasted from 7.25 a.m. till 12.38 p.m. on Saturday.
An eyewitness recounted to Sunday Independent that the victims got electrocuted while walking past the drenched road.
He said at least 25 others were critically injured and have since been taken to the hospital.
“The tragedy occurred when a thunderstorm accompanied by a downpour struck down a tension line belonging to the PHCN (Power Holding Company of Nigeria) in the industrial haven of the city,” the eyewitness said, adding that construction workers have started rescue operation.
Most of the dead were children, Sunday Independent gathered.
Officials of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) and top government officials rushed to the scene to cut off power supply, an intervention that eyewitnesses said saved several other lives.
The PHCN, meanwhile, had opened investigation into Saturday’s snapping of its high-tension wire in the city, hours after the incident.
John Onyi, a Senior Public Relations Officer of PHCN in Port Harcourt, told newsmen that the wire snapped following a heavy downpour.
He said the company had isolated the Oginigba and Slaughter areas of the city where the wire broke to save lives and property.
The Rivers State Police Command’s spokeswoman, Rita Innoma-Abbey, a Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP), confirmed that the police recovered 10 bodies, but noted that the death toll was still being counted. She also said 12 persons were in critical condition at press time. The dead bodies, Innoma-Abbey said, were deposited at the Braithwaite Memorial Hospital in Port Harcourt.
An angry Rivers State chapter of the Action Congress (AC) pilloried PHCN over the incident. The party’s spokesman, Eze Chukwuemeka, said in a text message that the deaths would have been avoided if the agency had taken steps to ensure that their facilities were in good shape.
The party called on the state government to probe the incident to ascertain the extent of PHCN’s culpability.
The party, however, sympathised with the families of those whose relatives were affected.
The state government however claimed only 10 lives were lost and that it would make efforts to give medical care to those injured.
The Commissioner for Information, Ibim Seminitari, said in a live radio programme that the government was unhappy over the occurrence.
Earlier, Secretary to the Government of Rivers State, Magnus Abe, visited the scene of the incident and the hospital to assess the degree of damage.
Though a construction worker told Sunday Independent that he counted 40 dead bodies at about 4.20 p.m., Abe told reporters that the police and the hospital management confirmed only 10 persons dead.
He reiterated that government will pick the bills of all those injured in the incident, noting that efforts were being made by government to contact the families of the deceased.
His genre of music was refreshingly different, so was the lyrics, simple and uncomplicated. His name is Chris Okotie and he came with a new swagger that was uncommon with the music industry of the 80s.
Apart from his music, he led the revolution that introduced solo career and almost extinguished band music, a feature that was common in that era. His debut album, I Need Someone, not only took the industry by storm, it also redefined the music industry.
Pastor Chris-Okotie
Thirty years after, Chris who has since become a fisherman for Christ opens up on his life as a secular musician. It ‘s explosive an
We hear that your ministry will be 23 years old this month….
In fact today. We started our church, the Household of God Ministry on February 1, 1987. So, we are actually 23 years old today. We have started a programme to mark the anniversary and it will run through the month.
How has the journey been?
The journey has been that of grace. I think that is the best way to put it. The journey has been that of mercy of the faithfulness of the Almighty God, the plenitude of His grace. I think that is just the way to put it. It has been grace, grace all the way.
In retrospect, how did you arrive at where you are today?
(Laughs) There are two systems of life on earth—the physical and the spiritual and most of the time when we are not aware we, live only in the physical system but when a man confronts the spiritual world, he recognises that it is actually the spiritual system that is more authentic than the physical one.
It is in the spiritual that we come recognise what God has done for us by way of salvation—sending Jesus to die for us. And when I heard the gospel, I recognised the need to adjust to the spiritual reality of man and that by accepting Jesus as our Lord and Saviour. Which was what I did in 1983.
Were you running away from something then?
Not at all! If people think that I stopped playing music because I became a Christian, it is the wrong order. I stopped playing music before I became a Christian. That is what happened. I had already made up my mind that I have had enough of music and decided to go back to school and pursue my law degree and it was in the process that I got saved.
How did your music career start?
We have been musical in our family. My father really liked music and he used to sing a lot and I think I got that from him.
Just like sister Loraine. He wasn’t a professional singer but he was into music, singing at home and sometimes he would get his friends together and they would do their music thing; that’s how I used to call it then. They had their music thing going.
I think I got the music gift from him. I used to belong to the music band in those days at Edo College where we were doing thongs from James Brown and others of that time. My father didn’t like that because he felt that getting into music would take you away from your academic work and the seriousness needed for you to become a success. So, he was very opposed to that. But by 1979 when he died and coming from a polygamous family, I knew we had to fend for ourselves and the only thing I knew I could outside of going to school was music.
So, I went to the studio on my own, did a little work with some friends of mine which became my demo, which I brought to Lagos to show Mr. Odion Iruoje who was the most promising producers of the time. He was Decca at the time but later moved to Phonodisk. He heard my work at the time and told me that when the company was ready to take on new artistes he would get in touch with me.
And he did. So, by 1980, he came to meet me on campus and told me he had arranged with BLO, one of my favourite bands at the time, to do my backup for me. That’s how we came to Lagos and in 10 days we had done every thing and it was fantastic.
And where did you get your inspiration from?
It is difficult to say. Let me put it this way, I believe that everything I did in music was ordained by God and I tried to mess it up just like Adam tried to mess up God’s work originally. He accepted the course for my life but wanted to use music to bring me to the place of visibility for the work He had called me to do.
Because you see, you are ordained by God before you are born, like He told Jeremiah, ‘Before I formed you in your mother’s womb, I knew you, I ordained you a prophet to the nations.’
Pastor Chris
So, He gave me that ability because He recognised that I would need it to come yo a place of visibility where I would be known and on that platform begin the work of the gospel. And from there build to a place of political leadership. So, I found myself driven, not just by the circumstances, because I could sustain myself even if I didn’t do the music. But I felt compelled to do the music and the music came to me.
I remember the song, I Need Someone, I heard one afternoon when I was sleeping during my siesta period on campus. Somebody was singing it and I got up and I recorded it. I will not call myself the inspired artistes who seats down and starts to contemplate the circumstances or picks up inspiration from them. Mine is slightly different. It comes to me, almost already packaged even till tomorrow.
Even the songs I do in church now and things like that. That’s the way it has always been. Every time I try to do myself, I find that I just can’t. But most artistic people can always seat down and say, let me go and write a song…but I have never been able to do that.
It has to come and once it comes the melody, then I start to work on the lyrics to try to find out the message behind the lyrics.
I knew someone, something going to change my life completely forever and it took me a while to decide on it.
And I always knew it has something to do with God even though I was not a believer then. When He eventually spoke to me the night I got saved He mentioned to me that He had done it all, and I knew He did. There were human excesses involved but the substance and inspiration were definitely of Him.
You came into the music scene when there were music bands doing their thing. You didn’t have a band and you chose the medium of pop when every other persons were doing something different—soul and what have you. Why?
That is why I am saying that He wanted to make me visible, because if I belonged to a band, I would have been like may be OFEGE or BLO and all that but He wanted my name because that is what He wanted to use. He wanted to use Chris Okotie as a name, because that is what He wanted to use. Sometimes, people think it is one name, the way they call me.
He wanted to use that name to achieve His own purpose here in this country and so, He didn’t want me to belong to a band. He arranged it Himself and that’s why He used Mr. Odion Iruoje and He organised and orchestrated the whole process.
The kind of songs, they were very simple but very melodious songs. They didn’t really have too much of a meaning to me then. But, I believe that anything I would have done at that time would have been successful because that was how God ordained it to be…for a purpose beyond me. It wasn’t for me, but for Him. And so when He was ready He came to claim what belonged to Him.
Please confirm the story that you actually used your producer’s jacket.
(Laughs) Yes! You know; because I was student at the time and I didn’t really have a lot of clothes because my father died and we didn’t have a lot of money.
So, Mr. Iruoje actually gave me that coat which I ended up giving to Felix Lebarty because he also was holding on to it in one of his works. I had friends then, Jide Obi, Felix Lebarty and a few other people who were close to me and I always wanted them involved in anything I was doing. Mr. Iruoje and I became friends. I discovered him to very sincere, upright, principled and those qualities appealed to me.
How were those days?
Very simple days! When I look back now, what I can recollect is the simplicity of the Nigerian society. The fact that people just accepted you for who you are and there was almost that universal fidelity; some kind of trust people had.
The suspicion that we have today wasn’t there. The WAZOBIA divide we have today wasn’t there and so you the liberty to leave in any part of this country. People loved you for what you could do, not your tribe or religion or something. It was very wonderful.
The acceptance was universal and almost overnight. Completely unbelievable. I remember, Mr. Iruoje took me somewhere when I came to Lagos about a month after the release of I Need Someone, and we were close to the School of Nursing in the Island and somebody recognised me and in five minutes barely all the windows were openly and they were all playing my music. I had to leave that place because I was so embarrassed. I hadn’t seen anything like it since then.
It wasn’t just about the music. It was just a kindred thing. It was as I was related to a people and that is the way some people relate to me since then. They get so personal about things that affect me. Somebody once wrote: “You can’t ignore Chris Okotie, you either love him passionately or you hate him passionately.” And I think that’s the way it has been with people. You have to take a stand when it comes to Chris Okotie!
How much did you make from I Need Someone?
I can’t recollect, but it was a lot of money. I was very rich particularly with my first two records because I became the highest paid artiste in the country at that time in terms of royalty and everything. And it is all thanks to Mr. Iruoje because he organised all that for me, but I was young and reckless and I spent the money without thinking…went to all kinds of places in the world.
I could afford anything I wanted. I think that it was also part of God’s plan that I would earn money on my own and loose respect for it, because it is important that as a minister of the gospel you don’t respect money. And I do not mean that you don’t put any value to it; you control it, you don’t allow it to control you. And that is why you can be become generous, because I have had so much money in my life that it is very easy for me to give it out.
It is very easy for me to do so, because from an age, it wasn’t money given to me by my parents or anybody. I remember when I went for a performance at Owerri and I was told that what the organisers had charged was too much for the young people to pay.
So, I called my manager to bring my brief case and I gave out the money they had just paid me for the performance so that the people could come in for the show. It was easy for me to do then and that is what I still do till now. But I think God wanted to use that to teach me to be generous, because when you know that what you have is given to you not because of anything…there are a lot of people who could do these things that I do.
But I haven’t been that blessed. It just helps me to see that money is a means to an end and not an end in itself. I’m happy with or without money. Money doesn’t determine what I do, it doesn’t determine the state of my mind or heart or my joy. It is freedom, because that is greatest power on earth—the power of money and I have been liberated from it.
You lived on the fast lane because money came when you were extremely young. When you look back now, do you believe that if God didn’t intervene at the time He did, the worst may have happened?
There is no doubt that if it were not for the divine intervention, I could have killed myself. No doubt about it because there were situations that I put myself into but the deliverance of God came in. When you have that kind of money and you have no parental guidance, no control…outside of Mr. Iruoje there was really nobody else who had enough wisdom to talk to me about the lifestyle I was leading.
Another thing that saved me was that, I am an introvert of some sort. They used to call me the hermit. If I were to be an extrovert, I probably would have exposed myself to more danger. I was always indoors. People came to me. I didn’t go to them, so it reduced the risk involved. I lived in that hotel for over a year.
It was the best hotel in the country at the time and I had friends—men and women who came to me, but the Lord still used that to prepare me for what I do now, in the sense that there is really nothing that I haven’t seen; that I haven’t done more or less.
So, the contentment that I have seen it all and I have come to a place of contentment and I am satisfied, totally and completely satisfied with the life I have today. Because, I have recognised that none of those things can give you happiness and when I met Jesus I recognised what I was searching for all my life, peace and contentment.
What are you referring to as ‘those things’?
The worldly acquisitions that we have; whether it is money or property. They make you comfortable, no doubt but they don’t give you joy and happiness because there is a void in the heart of everybody that God had placed there and until that void is filled with the love of God you will keep searching and craving.
Inordinate ambition is not man’s desire to just accumulate wealth, it is because he had no other choice. He is so empty within himself, so he thinks that as continues the journey of self aggrandizement and acquisition that he would find the balance of peace and joy; but he never does. The journey is futility, until he comes in contact with God through Christ Jesus.
Was there anything you did that you regret today?
Oh! Nearly everything I did I regretted. (Laugh) Recklessness. Basically, things that were done under the influence of alcohol which what a lot of young people do today under the influence of drugs. I was very fortunate that I didn’t get into drugs.
Can you list some of those things?
I’m too ashamed of them. They are not a testimony. Let me put it this way, the way of the transgressor is hard. (Laugh) There is a way that seemest right unto man, the end thereof is destruction. That is what I can tell you, because when you are young, your appreciation of life is so superficial. But for the love of God, there is no way I would have made it.
Did you do drugs?
Not at all! I knew I didn’t have the head. Even to smoke a cigarette was so difficult because anytime I smoked one I became dizzy, so there was no way I could have taken anything more than cigarette because I didn’t have the constitution for it. But, I drank! Out of burden, I drank beer or whatever. That is all I did.
Women?
Oh! Naturally, because I was a recording artiste and I was popular you meet a lot of girls and even boys who want to be friends with you and the reckless abandon and the characteristic of that age particularly when you have the additional comfort of money.
For some people, it is like that is the kind of life I want to live but if you look what goes on even in Hollywood and you see the level decadence and the depravity that is there; many times they lead to death—premature death. So, I thank God for His salvation.
Why did you abandon the music if it was a divine vehicle to something greater?
I haven’t. It is just a hiatus! You cannot abandon that stuff like that. It is part of you for the rest of your life. It is just that it is not necessary now. My music is still there. It is just that what I do now is just within the local assembly for now. It is an artistic gift that you have that is eternal.
You don’t believe that gospel music is a better tool of evangelism?
Yes! But when you are servant of God there is timing to everything that you do. The time hasn’t come. When that time comes we will do gospel music.
Will you say you made the right choice in marrying Stephanie?
Absolutely. I have always said that marriage is a personal decision. There’s perfect marriage; both of you have to take the time and work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
But I love the woman unconditionally. Marriage is not about what the woman feels for me; it is what I feel for her. It’s easy for people to love me because of the kind of a man that I am. When I talk love, I say I love her because that is the most important thing.
I think it is one of the best decisions that I have made in my entire life and I thank God for it.