2015: Jonathan to declare Nov 11

President Goodluck Jonathan will formally declare his intention to contest the 2015 presidential election on Tuesday, November 11, the Chairman of the Presidential Declaration Committee, Dr. Haliru Bello, has said.

Haliru spoke with State House correspondents on Friday at the end of the committee’s inaugural meeting at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

According to him, the President has not said yes to the clarion call to contest the 2015 election, adding that he would make pronouncement on that day.

Haliru, a former Minister of  is however, optimistic that President Jonathan will yield to the call by Nigerians that he should seek re-election.

His words, “The President gave us the task to organise the modality of creating a platform for him to meet Nigerians and announce his response to the various calls for him to come out and declare his interest in the presidential election.

“The President has not said anything yet but it is like all Nigerians have called on him. It is our honest hope that he will come out and say yes to the demand of multitude of Nigerians.

“We expect he will say yes but we cannot say yes for him. We will wait for him to speak.

“The date that is fixed is Tuesday, November 11. On that day, there will be a forum for the President to meet Nigerians to announce his decision.

“The venue is yet to be decided. That will be decided at our next meeting.

“When we come out on November 11, the President will face the people of Nigeria and say yes to their demand.

“If he says yes, it will be yes. If he says no, then it is negative. But you are aware that our party, the PDP in all its organs, from the caucus to the Board of Trustees, NWC had decided that President Jonathan should be given the first option of refusal with the PDP ticket.

“If he is going to contest, the PDP will give him preference. As the President, he has performed and we are satisfied with what he has done.

“It is only when he declines that we can look at any other contestant”.

The inaugural meeting was attended by most members including Governors Theodre Orji of Abia, Ibrahim Shema, Katsina; Ibrahim Dakwambo, Gombe; Olusegun Mimiko, Ondo and Liyel Imoke, Cross Rivers.

It will be recalled that the Presidential declaration Committee was set up at a meeting between President Jonathan and key chieftains of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Thursday at the Presidential Villa.

Mob burns lecturer to death for killing five pupils

Alhaji Kassimu Umar, a lecturer at the Taraba State College of Education, Zing, was on Friday burnt to death in a mob action after he allegedly hit and killed five primary school pupils with a vehicle he was driving.

Joseph Kwaji, the Police Public Relations officer of the Taraba State Police Command, confirmed the incident to the News Agency of Nigeria in Jalingo.

Kwaji said that the mob forcefully removed Umar from the Pupule Police Outpost, where he went to report the incident, and burnt him to death.

He said: “In the early hours of today, one Kassimu Umar, who is believed to be a lecturer with COE, Zing had knocked down five primary school pupils in Zing, who all died on the spot.

“After he reported the incident to the Pupule Police Outstation, irate youths in their hundreds, stormed the station, dragged him out and lynched him.

“Our investigation revealed that the lecturer was trying to dodge a trailer, when he ran over the pupils whose ages ranged between eight and 11 years.”

Kwaji said that the matter was under investigation, adding that no arrest had so far been made.

Conflicting reports over killing of Abubakar Shekau

No doubt, a prominent Boko Haram commander suspected to be the sect’s leader, Abubakar Shekau, might have been killed in battles with Cameroonian and Nigerian troops in recent days.

But who actually killed Shekau and where was he killed and how authentic are the claims?

These are the two questions military authorities in the two countries are providing conflicting answers to, thus creating a confusion and making it difficult for prominent news sources like BBC, CNN and even state run media sources like CRTV in Cameroon to pick up the story.

While the Cameroon Army on Sunday night claimed responsibility for killing Shekau with photos of the Boko Haram leader’s corpse to buttress their claim, the Nigerian Army same time is also laying claim to the same feat but without photographic evidence yet.

Besides, while the former said its troops killed Shekau at the Gamboru Ngala border town, the latter said its soldiers might have killed the sect leader in Konduga, a town some kilometres away from Maiduguri, the Borno State capital.

The Cameroon military revealed that Shekau was killed following an aerial bombardment of his hideout inside Nigeria, adding that the feat has now led to serious battle against thousands of Boko Haram fighters fleeing Gamboru Ngala trying to enter Cameroon through Fotokol, a border town.

On its part, the Nigerian military claimed that its troops might have killed Shekau on September 17 during a desperate attempt by the sect to capture Konduga as part of their plot to eventually march on and capture Maiduguri.

“It is getting more certain that the terrorists’ commander who has been mimicking Shekau in those videos is the one killed in Konduga on September 17, 2014,” the military revealed.

The military however cautioned that “the process of confirming that the dead body we have is the same as that character who has been posing as Shekau is ongoing. He is definitely a prominent terrorist commander. I don’t want to say anything about this yet please.”

The military source insisted that the resemblance between Shekau and the corpse in their custody is too striking to be a coincidence.

They cited his facial marks, beards and teeth in addition to the recovery by the Nigerian troops of some of the Armoured Vehicles and Hilux jeeps that had featured in previous videos of the prime suspect.

The source said the Defence Headquarters will soon address the nation after full investigation of their latest discovery.

Curiously, the Nigerian military had on the September 17 they claimed to have killed Shekau issued a statement announcing the capture of a top commander of the sect who was being treated in a military medical facility.

The statement, also published by iReports-ng.com, is reproduced below:

“Wednesday, September 17 was a particularly bad day for Boko Haram fighters operating in the North East as they lost scores of their members during repeated attempts to enter Konduga, about 70 kilometres to Maiduguri, the Borno state capital.

“But the icing on the cake of Nigerian troops victory of the day was the capture of ‘a high ranking terrorists leader’ who was seriously wounded and is currently being treated in a military medical facility.

“Military sources stated that the terrorists’ leader whose name is still being kept secret was captured after the second but more fierce battle waged by the insurgents to capture the town following their earlier routing by the military. Among those captured Wednesday in battles were over 60 terrorists who were shot dead in gun duel.

“In addition to losing scores of their fighters, the terrorists also lost weapons and equipments including 24 riffles, five rockets propelled grenade tubes, two machine guns as well as a Ford Ranger vehicle while another Ford Ranger vehicle was destroyed.

“During the first battle of the day, which lasted over 12 hours, scores of the terrorists were killed.“Right now, our troops are combing the vicinity of the battle scene in a cordon and search operation to determine the exact casualty figures suffered by the terrorists in the encounter.”

Cameroon Concord.

Boko Haram sponsors: Beyond Stephen Davis’ revelation

 

The dust raised by the stunning exposé of Australian independent negotiator, Dr. Stephen Davis, on the alleged sponsors of the Boko Haram Islamic sect, indicted former Chief of Army Staff, General Azubuike Ihejirika (retd), the usual suspect, Senator Ali Modu Sheriff, former Borno State governor, and an anonymous senior official of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) may not settle any time soon as fingers are now being pointed at the Presidency for hobnobbing with accused sponsors of immitigable and unmitigated terror unleashed on Nigerians.

Dr Davis alleged that prominent politicians are the chief sponsors of Boko Haram and that they channel their fund through the CBN so it appears to be legal. The official in charge of the transactions, Davis alleged, currently works in the currency operations division of the CBN. One would think the President would order security operatives to swoop on the CBN official and the two other accused persons. Hell no! Not here. The presidency would rather regard Davis’ exposé as an attempt to bring down the Goodluck Jonathan government.

Whatever must have emboldened the Hostage negotiator to name names, he has broken the official taboo against exposing persons behind atrocities like the Boko Haram menace. And Davis can’t be wrong. He has worked for three successive presidents. Even if the Jonathan presidency denies it, there is incontrovertible evidence that he was part of negotiators contracted to broker the release of the abducted Chibok girls. His revelation gives us an opportunity to nail the sect’s backers. However, there was nothing he said about the sponsors that was new.

Senator Ali Modu Sheriff has been in the news, not once or twice, for alleged links with the rampaging Jihadist fundamentalists. The sect blossomed to full terror under his ‘stewardship’ as governor of Borno state. Sometime in 2011, Senator Sheriff was named as an alleged sponsor of the sect in a confessional statement made by one Sanda Umar Konduga, an arrested spokesperson of the Boko Haram. As ex-governor, he was arrested on March 28, 2012 in Cameroon on the grounds that he was sponsoring terrorism in neighbouring Borno state. Like a tail that wags behind a dog, the tag of a Boko Haram sponsor would not sever from Modu Sheriff anywhere his name is mentioned.

Nevertheless, the hostage negotiator’s claims against Gen. Ihejirika, former Chief of Army Staff, the CBN official and Modu Sheriff are mere allegations and should be treated as such until proven otherwise.

Have we not read reports severally in the media by local mediators and military sources that Boko Haram sympathisers are in the military? Are these not indicative that the Nigerian military’s rank and file has been infiltrated by the terrorists? So, what did Stephen Davis reveal that we didn’t have the slightest hint? President Jonathan had also admitted in January 2012 that members of Boko Haram sect had infiltrated his government. The intelligence and security agencies have been infiltrated, as well.

If this war is to be won, it goes beyond naming those who fund the ceaseless bloodbaths, abduction of adolescent girls as sexual slaves, arson, maiming etc by an Australian, American, or Nigerian. The beginning of the end of this insurgency is bringing their sponsors, home or abroad to justice.

Nigerians are not stupid to think this government and security chiefs do not know the real sponsors of terrorism. Otherwise, we don’t have any intelligence service in our country. Boko Haram’s political backers are the sacred cows that cannot be brought to book. Not until we cut the source of their supplies and get those who are involved, we cannot stop them. This is the level of insincerity with which the counter terrorism war is being fought by the present day government. The battle is being prosecuted even by the military perfunctorily. Soldiers won’t literarily be fighting with bare hands if some army chiefs have not been diverting billions voted for regular upgrade of military equipment over the years.

We can make revelations on Boko Haram all we want but until suspected persons are made to face the full wrath of the law we will only be going in cycles, as usual. Considering that the same government has not prosecuted any highly placed individual indicted of corruption since President Jonathan mounted the saddle, it might be wishful thinking to assume these accused persons will be prosecuted.

No amount of pressure, it seem, will compel Mr President to order an honest investigation to a logical conclusionof indicted persons with 2015 elections just around the corner. The strategy of the President’s men is to capitalise on the festering crisis in the North East to gain sympathy votes across the country in next year’s polls. Exposing the sponsors of terror most of whom are northern political figures will be tagged witch-hunting and tantamount to political hara-kiri for President Jonathan.

“There is some level of political undertone to the problem,”Late General Andrew Owoye Azazi, former National Security Adviser, opened up on the Boko Haram onslaught. He situated the Boko Haram scourgewithin the PDP as an aftermath of the internal wrangling for the presidency during the 2011 election. He promised to release a list of politicians allegedly backing the Islamic sect. Soon after those declarations, he was unceremoniously sacked by President Jonathan and thereafter came his mysterious death, with Governor Patrick Yakowa of Kaduna state in a copter crash. The official cause has since not been released.

The least expected of President Jonathan is for him to refer the suspects to the Special Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in view of the gravity of the allegations of crimes against humanity perpetrated by the political backers of the extremist group as any local investigation conducted by the federal government may be manipulated by vested political interests, radical lawyer, Femi Falana forthrightly advised.

There’s no better window than the heightened attacks to seize territories and declare caliphates of the past few weeks for the Commander-in-Chief and President to go after the sponsors of the sect. This government may risk being branded complicit if these allegations go uninvestigated especially as the present administration have chosen instead, to hobnob with persons indicted with allegations of terrorism, than shove them to justice. The sight of President Goodluck Jonathan all smiles with Ali Modu Sheriff in Chad sent niggles and ruckus back home. Mr Jonathan gave Sheriff the privilege of partaking in a closed door deliberation on terrorism he had with the Chadian President. Modu Sheriff, the de facto poster-politician allegedly sponsoring Boko Haram, as one writer described him, has since taken refuge in the ruling party by defecting from the APC, apparently to shield himself from prosecution.

Sadly, except these indicted persons are dragged before the International Criminal Court (ICC) by concerned Nigerians or civil and human rights organisations, we may not win this fight against insurgency in the remaining months of this administration.

Why Jonathan can’t prosecute Sheriff, other Boko Haram sponsors – Wole Soyinka

Nobel Laurette and social critic, Prof. Wole Soyinka, has adduced reasons why President Goodluck Jonathan is unwilling to prosecute alleged Boko Haram sponsors.

Chief, among this, Soyinka said in a statement on Saturday, was the 2015 re-election ambition of Jonathan.

Soyinka, in the statement, said Jonathan has compromised in the bid to push through his ambition despite evidences that have been made available to him by not just the Boko Haram Australian negotiator, Stephen Davis, but also himself, the international community and Nigerian security agencies.

Nobel Laurette and social critic, Prof. Wole Soyinka, has adduced reasons why President Goodluck Jonathan is unwilling to prosecute alleged Boko Haram sponsors.

Chief, among this, Soyinka said in a statement on Saturday, was the 2015 re-election ambition of Jonathan.

Soyinka, in the statement, said Jonathan has compromised in the bid to push through his ambition despite evidences that have been made available to him by not just the Boko Haram Australian negotiator, Stephen Davis, but also himself, the international community and Nigerian security agencies.

Davis had two weeks ago mentioned a former Governor of Borno State, Senator Ali Modu Sheriff; and a former Chief of Army State, retired General Azubuike Ihejirika, among the sponsors of Boko Haram.

To worsen matters, President Jonathan appeared in a photograph with Sheriff during his visit to Chad where he had audience with President Idriss Deby this week.

Soyinka said information available to Jonathan should have made him step out against Sheriff, Ihejirika and the other Boko Haram sponsors, including a highly placed official of the Central Bank of Nigeria, whose name was not given, but for his 2015 ambition.

He said: “Again, Goodluck Jonathan swung into a plausible explanation: it was Mr. Sheriff who, as friend of the host President Idris Deby, had traveled ahead to Chad to receive Jonathan as part of President Deby’s welcome entourage. What, however does this say of any president? How come it that a suspected affiliate of a deadly criminal gang, publicly under such ominous cloud, had the confidence to smuggle himself into the welcoming committee of another nation, and even appear in audience, to all appearance a co-host with the president of that nation? Where does the confidence arise in him that Jonathan would not snub him openly or, after the initial shock, pull his counterpart, his official host aside and say to him, “Listen, it’s him, or me.”? So impunity now transcends boundaries, no matter how heinous the alleged offence?”

Soyinka said it was also a shame that those close to the President could use the platform of his re-election campaign to mock a serious issue such as the Bring Back Our Girls Campaign with the banner of Bring Back Jonathan in 2015.

He said: “President Jonathan has since disowned all knowledge or complicity in the outrage but, the damage has been done, the rot in a nation’s collective soul bared to the world. The very possibility of such a desecration took the Nigerian nation several notches down in human regard. It confirmed the very worst of what external observers have concluded and despaired of – a culture of civic callousness, a coarsening of sensibilities and, a general human disregard. It affirmed the acceptance, even domination of lurid practices where children are often victims of unconscionable abuses including ritual sacrifices, sexual enslavement, and worse. Spurred by electoral desperation, a bunch of self-seeking morons and sycophants chose to plumb the abyss of self-degradation and drag the nation down to their level. It took us to a hitherto unprecedented low in ethical degeneration. The bets were placed on whose turn would it be to take the next potshots at innocent youths in captivity whose society and governance have failed them and blighted their existence? Would the Chibok girls now provide standup comic material for the latest staple of Nigerian escapist diet? Would we now move to a new export commodity in the entertainment industry named perhaps “Taunt the Victims”?”

The Nobel Laurette said the position of Davis on the alleged Boko Haram suspect should not be doubted by Nigerians.

He said he was sure of the pedigree of the Australian, whom he has worked with for several years.

He also gave his backing to the decision of human rights lawyer, Femi Falana (SAN), to head to court if President Jonathan does not commence the prosecution of the alleged Boko Haram sponsors.

FG to male survivors of Ebola: Don’t have sex for seven weeks

Dr. Bridget Okoeguale, the Director of the Department of Public Health, gave advice during interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Abuja on Wednesday that the Federal Ministry of Health has advised men who were treated and discharged of the Ebola virus to avoid sexual intercourse for at least seven weeks.

Okoeguale said this was in line with protocols issued by the World Health Organisation.

She said: “There are many literatures that say that after men are infected and the virus is not found in the blood, it tends to stay in the semen for about seven weeks to three months.

“We advice them to abstain from sex but where they cannot abstain, they are provided condoms and after the (abstinence) period, we double test to make sure they are free.”

On the treatment of Ebola patients, Okoeguale said no drugs or vaccinations were given to them, adding that health authorities had complied with WHO treatment protocol.

Okoeguale said everybody had his/her own body reaction, “so our own is to help build their immunity, give them fluid to replace lost fluid through vomiting and diarrhoea”.

She explained that the patients were also placed on electrolyte by intravenous fluid to avoid dehydration, adding that those who were anaemic had blood transfusion and that the supportive care that has helped us to be able to discharge more than five people,” 

The director also advised the general public to avoid crowded social gathering.

She said: “We are not advising people not to go to club or bar but if you have to just remember that you must keep your hands clean, avoid contact with as many people as possible.”

She urged Nigerians not to consider the disease as a death sentence and that recent cases had shown survival rates for patients were high with early detection and treatment.

Cameroon kills 27 Boko Haram militants in border clashes

The Boko Haram fighters were reported to have crossed Nigeria’s border into Cameroon earlier this week after attacking a military base and police station in Borno State, north east Nigeria.                  The attack was said to have apparently sent some 480 Nigerian troops retreating across the frontier.             

“Cameroon soldiers have killed 27 Boko Haram elements during an attack in a locality near Fotokol in the far-north,

It added that the deaths occurred on Monday and Tuesday but there was no word on any Cameroonian casualties.

A Cameroonian soldier in the region said the militants had been pushed back into Nigeria, with calm returning to the area on Wednesday.

In recent weeks, Boko Haram, which is seeking to carve out a de facto Islamic state in northern Nigeria, has stepped up attacks in Cameroon.

It has forced the central African country to increase deployments along its jungle border.

But Cameroon has not always been successful in fending off Boko Haram raids.

Last month, President Paul Biya dismissed two senior army officers following attacks in which at least seven people were killed and the wife of the vice prime minister was kidnapped.