When some intelligent activists come on television accusing the federal government of not developing the oil producing communities, its laughable because the first question should first go to the state governors, but they can’t point fingers at the governors at that local level because they will take you out so easily and the police will do nothing about it. To put more money into the hands of these governors under this current arrangement and government structure is like pouring water into a leaking basket. Corruption in Nigeria is not by chance. It is a deliberate well thought out scheme by public officers, a machinery that is in motion against its people that is why the President recently advised all opposition politicians to join his party the PDP so that there will be no opposition to this strategy of ruins. Recently the governor of Bayelsa state constituted a committee against rumor mongers – This is what his priorities are, when governors like him all around the world have conquered space and building paradise on earth, his government is inaugurating committees on rumor mongering. In Delta State, the state of the former James Ibori, the ex governor currently in jail in the UK who handed over to his relative Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan: this was our observation. Going through a chronicle of the state budget and actual work done, we observed the following – Reactivation of Aviara Fish Farm. Was allocated N10m ($62.5k) in 2012; N90.9m ($568k) in 2011 No work was done. Project lies abandoned. Renovation of Ika Grammar School Boji Boji, Owa. Got N3.7million ($21.9k) in 2012 as budget and N5million ($31k) in 2011. Nothing was done Agbor Fish Hatching- N2.5m ($15.6K) in 2012 and N2.6m ($16.25k) in 2011. No work was done, not a single fish was seen. Renovation and Equipping of Owhelegbo Grammer Sch, Isoko North. N35m ($218k) in 2010 & N2m ($12.5k) 2011. Project was not implemented. Fencing of Ndemili Cottage Hospital N5.4million ($34k) allocated in 2011. On visit we saw this old collapsing fence and gate. Rehabilitation of Primary Health Centre Umuaja N10million ($62.5k) in 2011 & N28million ($175k) in 2010. No work done Renovation and Fencing of Nshiagu College, Ugwashi-Ukwu. N22m in 2011 and N35million (138k) in 2010. No work done Construction of Examination Hall, Akwukwu-Igbo Grammar School. N8m ($50k) in 2011 & N15m ($94K) in 2010. Building already collapsing In 2012, Delta Governor presented a budget of N383.3b ($2.4B) to the Assembly; they added another N54b ($337.5M) for no reason saying budget was not enough. In the 2012 Education budget of Delta state, 66.8% of projects allocated funds had already been allocated funds in previous budgets years. In the 2012 Delta state budget for health out of 254 projects, only 13 are new. The rest have been receiving funds in previous years! Internally generated fund in Delta State is negligible. Delta is the most secretive state in the Niger Delta. They never made budgets available on their website, and when we asked for it at the ministry, we got criminal treatment, first question they ask is “What do you want it for?” “Who sent you?” Very scary! After all these wastage and looting, the Debt Management Office declared on its website that Delta State owes external debts to the tone of $18.9million. The minister for information in Nigeria recently carried our a good governance tour we they celebrated mediocrity all through: Citizens’ report is what we need in Nigeria not governance tour. In Akwa-Ibom State, the richest oil producing state in Nigeria, and the state that prides itself with the slogan “uncommon transformation” – this was our discovery. In 2012, Akwa-Ibom budgeted N2.4 billion ($15M) for an Ibom Science Park; in 2011 they budgeted N2billion ($12.5M); in 2010 – N2.5billion ($15.7M) – That science park lies long abandoned in a thick bush in Uyo. No money was expended in 4 Years. In 2012, Akwa Ibom state budgets N200m ($1.25M) to transport school kids. In 2011 – N200m ($1.25M); 2010 – N195m ($1.2M). Not a single bus was purchased. The 2012 budget provides for school feeding – N40m ($250k) in 2011 and N300M ($1.9M) in 2010. Not one spoon of food has ever been given to the pupils or secondary school students of Akwa-Ibom State. Akwa-Ibom Budgets for free exercise books for school. N1billion ($6.25M) in 2010 and N500m ($3.2M) in 2011. Not one was printed. Building a Model Sec. School at Ekparakwa: N1b ($6.25M) was budgeted in 2011; N500m ($3.2M) in 2010. This Project was long accomplished by the previous administration of Victor Attah but abandoned in a forest. Nothing has been happening there in 4yrs.This school for physically challenged was allocated N60million ($375k) in 2012. Nothing was done. Akwa Ibom government says 3 of these solar panels cost N150million ($940k) in 2012 This skills acquisition centre in Abak – the government said it was renovated with N300million ($1.9M). Nothing was done 80% of budgeted projects in Akwa Ibom are never executed, a legacy of wastage all round the country. Akwa Ibom is one of the states that don’t have its budget online, not even the governor’s budget speech – Very secretive. In 2012 Akwa Ibom state government passed perhaps the largest supplementary budget for a state. N125b, ($782B) bringing its 2012 budget to a total of N522b ($3.3B).Much higher than a lot of countries in Africa. Poverty has so stricken the people that the basis of evaluating performances of leaders is not based on a well thought out vision for the state and a strategic plan of reaching those goals but leaders a praised based on some infrastructures here and some there while the bulk of the funds are looted. This is the phenomenon all over the country, the debt management office of Nigeria released on its website the level of indebtedness by the country, all the 36 states, the federal capital Abuja and the federal government are all owing huge amounts that the next generation would have to cope with: External debts alone, as at dec 2012 are as follows. Mind you, domestic debts are far higher, and more secret Kano owes $61.7million Katsina owes $74.6million Akwa Ibom owes $61.6 million Cross River owes $113million Kebbi owes $47.8million Kogi owes $33.8million Imo owes $51.9million Kwara owes $45.5million Lagos owes $611.2 million Nassarawa owes $36.9 million Kaduna owes $215.6million Niger owes $29.7million Anambra owes $26.7million Ogun state owes $102million Ondo owes $51.8 million Osun owes $62.7million Oyo owes $76.6million Plateau owes $21.9million Rivers owes $36.6million Jigawa owes $33.6million Gombe owes $31.7million Enugu owes $50million Delta owes $18.9million Ekiti owes $36.1million Edo owes $42.7 million Ebonyi owes $41.5million Bayelsa owes $28million Bornu owes $24.1million Benue owes 28.4million Bauchi owes $67.1million Adamawa owes $30.2million Abia state owes $35.9 million At the subsidy protest of January 2012 one of our great musicians Femi Kuti made a comment that when he was a little boy, it was still these same problems of corruption and lack of accountability that his father the Legendary Fela Kuti fought and sang about, he is fifty years old and its still the same story. The British bequeathed to us a system that worked and was sustainable through hard work and production, the military came and destroyed it and today governance has been reduced to mere transactions. This blatant display of corruption by the ruling elite has become a culture in Nigeria, even as we speak – the PDP stalwarts, governors and public officers have started looting seriously in preparation for a violent contest of the 2015 elections; a period when militants are paid as oil barons to stake there lives for a corrupt politician; no decent and intelligent person can participate or function in such a political terrain, this is the reason the system brings up a lot of political rascals. The reason for Bokoharam or the Militants of the Niger Delta today is not totally because they are fighting to make the government and society saner, its simply because the sponsor that arm these youths think those in government have stolen so much and its their turn to administer the treasury and get their share of the spoils of government; the militants and terrorists are just tools of violence owned and used by the political elite to negotiate with the government in power. Some call for amnesty for the militants, some are calling for amnesty for the terrorist organization killing innocent Nigerians daily for no reasons, some are calling for the international community to label Bokoharam a terrorist organization – truth is they are all one and the same category of elites, the only difference is that some are in power and some are fighting to get into power for the same purpose, because the institutions are broken and they like it that way, to get what you want through violence. It’s almost impossible for the average Nigerian people to fight them, because they feed into the poverty that they have created in the system. It’s called divide and rule –when some Nigerians come out to genuinely condemn these atrocities, the politicians out of the much that they have stolen would dangle some money to the poorest and least credible persons in our midst and Nigerians start fighting themselves under the façade of tribe and religion. This fraternity of politicians is on the verge of converting our entertainment industry (The Pride of Nigerians, born out of the resilience of the average Nigerian) into mere campaign tool, even when Nollywood decides to stand up against misrule and a government that does nothing while our brothers and sister are slaughtered everyday by terrorists; the president donates some money to the association and those without integrity in Nollywood would end up betraying the whole vision. The president will not come out to set up a lasting structure that would enable the industry thrive and acquire technologies to compete with the best movie industries in the world. He prefers Divide and Rule. Today there is so much violence in the air, the political elite of this era blossom in an environment of violence and intimidation and not on the intellectual desk, as such they have succeeded in breaking down the police institution to become nothing more than their era boys, justice in the judiciary goes to the most powerful in government or to the highest bidder, and the law makers are about the most ridiculous, General Obasanjo referred to them as an assembly of criminals: a house were a lawmaker caught on video taking bribe of $620k to subvert a probe is still making laws for 160 million Nigerian, a senate where someone indicted of being a sponsor of Boko Haram is still making laws. A house that creates routes for escape for corrupt public criminals while the ordinary Nigerian that goes astray out of needs is meant to rot in jail. All the corrupt governors that have plundered the states are let go by a law that allows them to remit just a pinch of their loot, just one man raked all the pension meant for our retired senior citizens to the tone of N23Billion ($145M) and he is given just a slap on the wrist, a two years imprisonment or and option of N750k ($4,700). A generation of lawmakers who make laws not to build a nation but for their convenience incase they are caught by the security they will have a way out, with these gang of lawmakers there is absolutely no consequence for bad behavior. No nation can move forward this way, I write this article not to attack anybody but out of a strong desire for change. The normal Nigerian residing in the north or south is a happy, peace loving and industrious person, always filled with hope in the midst of so many economic attacks; we love our country and want to see the institutions work. Protesting on the streets has not yet worked instead we loose our brothers and sisters through trigger happy policemen serving the elite and military intimidation. In other to keep the peace and not beating drums of war like the politicians we resolve to wait till we get a chance to change the leaders through the ballot box, that’s if these same elites controlling the party politics for now want change and if the electoral body is not arm twisted, even though the politicians are still going to sponsor violence because with the system today, the most violent wins. This change the average Nigerian seeks could be quicker if the world decides to stand by the people of Nigeria and not the looters of public wealth. Its total betrayal of the moral values governments of developed countries preach when bankers in the UK, USA, China, Switzerland, Dubai and even South Africa help Nigerian government criminals keep this stolen money. As a leader in a developed society to keep quiet means you are not different in quality from theses present criminal politicians suffocating the poor in Nigeria. These politicians are not different from the likes of Mobutu, Ghadafi and Idi Amin, the only different is that they are many in Nigeria and they take there turns every four years and they have created a system that protects them. It is morally right to ask why a politician should be moving some incredible amounts of money all over the world when he doesn’t have a factory anywhere to generate such; if he claims it’s his salary as a politician, what gives him the right to pay himself that much in a country of so many poor people. The moral thing to do is to freeze the funds of Nigerian politicians (past and present) and retired generals amass abroad through their accounts or anyone they use to move huge amounts of money around for the next two years which would be after the 2015 elections so that the country can go through a period of self healing until the world and Nigerians regain confidence in our institutions and government becomes transparent and accountable and our press is free to report what happens all over the country without having fear for their lives; if these corrupt politicians are no longer celebrated, encouraged and accommodated by the western governments and their banks, Nigerians at home can have the hope to start a revival at home knowing that they have the support of the world. Nigerians do not advocate for war or drones or riots but a fair opportunity to renegotiate the destiny of the country out of the hands of political bandits in all the political parties that are beneficiaries of this broken system they created and have been enjoying since the 1970’s till today. I call on President @BarackObama to take this honorable step for the sake of the poor Nigerians living in Nigeria. We are praying hard, Christians and Muslims – that this political travesty created by the military and sustained by today’s’ elite which the retired generals spearhead would come to an end, and we know it will in a short while because Nigeria is so relevant to God in this age – but as the President of the greatest nation on earth being of African decent who knows why you are there at such a time as this.
Posted on: Tue, 18 Jun 2013 22:43:55 +0000
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