The next election is going to be between darkness and light. It is going to be between a cosmopolitan highly-focused Ph.D holder and a semi-literate jackboot.

The national leadership of the Peoples Democratic Party has said that its presidential candidate in the forthcoming election, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, will be contesting against a semi-literate candidate.

Ostensibly referring to the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), the party also said the election would be between Jonathan and   “a military jackboot.”

Buhari, a former head of state, is the only presidential candidate who has a military background .

Section 131(d) of the 1999 Constitution allows anyone with school certificate qualification to contest any elective office in the country.

The PDP, through its National Secretary, Dr. Wale Oladipo, said when some leaders of the PDP in the   Diaspora visited its national secretariat in Abuja on Monday     that there was no way the President would not win the election.

It   said, “The next election is going to be between darkness and light. It is going to be between a cosmopolitan highly-focused Ph.D holder and a semi-literate jackboot.

“Our candidate is a man who believes in integrating the economy of Nigeria into the world economic order. He is   a man who believes that the power sector should continue to be reformed so that we will attain the level of power generation and distribution that is commensurate with our aspiration in terms of industrial development. Nigeria cannot afford to go back. We will continue to move forward.”

The party said having won three presidential elections in which Buhari ran on the platforms of different political parties, there   was no way it would not floor the APC which had decided to field   the former military leader as its     presidential candidate.

Describing the APC as a party not ready to offer alternatives,   the party advised Nigerians to remain with it.

It said, “Even though we are not a perfect party,   our mission is perfect.

“We do not belong to any religious organisation and we don’t belong to any ethnic group. In preparing for the next election, which is not going to be like previous ones because for the first time, the opposition has coupled together a contraption that is called the APC.

“They have passed through the motion and endorsed their perennial candidate. We have beaten him three times, we are going to beat him once again.

“The APC is not a political party that is ready to offer an alternative to the teeming masses of this country. The only agenda they seem to have is to see our back.”

The PDP said that God had decided that Nigeria would not only continue to wax stronger,   he had also “decided that this country will not go back to 1983 when we had to start doing trade-by-barter with Brazil; when we went back 500 years to start practising what our ancestors practised when there was no currency in this country.”

“God has decried it that we   will continue to pilot the affairs of this country and continue to implement the transformation agenda,” the PDP added.

But the Director of Publicity of the Buhari 2015 Support Group Centre, Dr. Chidia Maduekwe, expressed shock about the PDP comments, saying they showed the depth of their understanding of Buhari.

He said, “How can the PDP refer to a man who had his initial military training   in Nigeria and the best officer cadet training institutions in the world as semi-literate. They are so lazy that they can not check Gen. Buhari’s profile in this     internet age.The general went to the Military Training College in Kaduna; the Mons Officer Cadet School in the United Kingdom; the Defence Services College in India and the Army War College in the United States. The certificates given by these institutions are equivalent to university degrees.

“If they want a copy of the general’s CV(Curriculum Vitae), they are welcome to have one.”

The BSGC boss advised that it would better serve public interest if the record of performance of Buhari was put side-by-side that of   Jonathan.

According to him, it was pedestrian for the PDP   to reduce the issues at stake to educational qualification.

Maduekwe said, “Buhari had the opportunity to govern this nation in the past and his records are there for all to see.

“He managed our economy very well and paid up our debts and built up our foreign reserves. This was a man who was in charge when our refineries were built; this was a man who was in charge of the PTF(Petroleum Trust Fund) and left an enviable record.

“Contrast him with our Ph.D holder (Jonathan) who has run our economy aground and our foreign reserves depleted and we are today raking up debts.

“Under this Ph.D holder, Nigeria has come last among nations in the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals with a 2015 deadline. Nigeria came last because; we have a PDP government which is visionless. Nigerians certainly do not want a continuity of this suffering.”

Impunity taken too far...Who is fooling Who

THE Peoples Democratic Party Fund Raising Dinner held at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, to boost President Goodluck Jonathan’s campaign war chest has been attracting public attention. The event, which took place last Saturday, was attended by business people, multinational organisations, interest groups and individuals who donated a sum of N21.27 billion to support his campaign for the 2015 presidential election.

But the President and his party will definitely have trouble explaining away this latest bizarre development in regard to the law of the electoral game and the morality in politics.

Though how a political party’s candidate raises his or her campaign funds is the party’s affair, the process must comply with the extant laws and pass the integrity test. First, Nigerian laws are unambiguous on campaign expenses and funding. The 1999 Constitution in Section 221 clearly states: “No association, other than a political party, shall canvass for votes for any candidate at any election or contribute to the funds of any political party or to the election expenses of any candidate at an election.” The Companies and Allied Matters Act also expressly forbids companies in Section 38 (2) from funding or donating gifts, property or money to any political party or association. Then the Electoral Act 2010, as amended, specifies in Section 91 (2) that “the maximum election expenses to be incurred by a candidate at a presidential election shall be N1 billion.”

But Jonathan, the ruling PDP and its 21 state governors took lawlessness to a new height on Saturday when one Tunde Ayeni, leading other donors, gave N2 billion on behalf of himself and his unnamed “partner” and “friends.” Jerry Gana, a permanent fixture in successive governments, announced N5 billion on behalf of his equally mysterious friends and “associates in the power sector.” Not to be outdone, oil and gas sector “friends” also pledged N5 billion; real estate and building sector, N4 billion; transport and aviation sector, N1 billion; food and agriculture, N500 million; power, N500 million; construction, N310 million; road construction, N250 million; National Automotive Association, N450 million; and Shelter Development Limited, N250 million. Going by the Electoral Act, which caps the donation an individual could make at N1 million, 5,000 donors must have been behind Gana’s N5 billion gift.

There is no doubting the fact that these donations raise salient questions verging on transparency. At a period when the government should be taking interest in enforcing compliance with the money laundering laws, people should not come out to announce donations on behalf of themselves and their “friends,” without actually naming those “friends.” It should also be of interest to know if those donors and their anonymous “friends” have complied with appropriate tax obligations. International best practices stipulate this as the minimum irreducible requirement.

Many Nigerians will also be interested in knowing how the Board of the Niger Delta Development Commission, which was credited with producing N15 million, came about its donation. As a government agency, where did it derive such powers to donate to a political party from? Having done this for the PDP presidential campaign, will the commission also make a similar amount available to other parties?

As for the sectoral donors, there is also the need for total disclosure. Who were the actors in the oil and gas sector that donated N5 billion? If they are publicly quoted companies, did they get the approval of their shareholders before going on the spending spree? How did the power sector that has not been able to muster enough investible funds come about a N500 million donation? With the automobile industry donating N450 million, it is no longer surprising that it benefited so much from the government’s controversial waivers.

Ayeni, a legal practitioner whose consortium recently acquired NITEL and Mtel, is also the chairman of Skye Bank Plc and a director in the Ibadan Electricity Development Company. Given that these big time sectoral players have suddenly become the big donors to the President’s campaign, what is the guarantee that regulators would be able to control them? It is little wonder that the government, after selling the power sector to private operators, is still interested in arranging a N213 billion bailout for them.

So, except the players in the various sectors donated their own money, they have brazenly violated the law if they did so on behalf of their companies. The relevant authorities should demand their tax returns. As of 2010, domestic airlines collectively owed banks and regulators over N300 billion. To say the least, this is another outrageous example of brazen impunity in government.

Indeed, a string of ugly scandals has dotted the Jonathan administration. Among the most unsettling cases is the N2.53 trillion paid out in 2011 as petrol subsidies to cronies and “ghost” businessmen when the National Assembly approved only N245 billion that year. We also recollect the mind-numbing loss to the national treasury of some questionable waivers that cost the country N64 billion in first six months of the year. Funds that disappeared from the public till can now find their way back as campaign donations. There is also the unresolved issue of missing billions of dollars at the state-owned oil company.

This scale of campaign slush funds and illegal contributions in return for some political and economic favours is deeply worrying. On moral grounds, leveraging on political power to raise campaign funds is corrosively anti-democratic. That it was done by previous administrations should not be a justifiable excuse for the flagrant abuse of power. There is next to no doubt that some of these funds are of doubtful origin. It is just sickening to find a President who claims to be fighting corruption fraternising with the venal high and mighty.

But a graver worry is how the toxic donations will further poison the electoral process and shore up the system of patronage. We are also faced with a total collapse in political morality, with corruption worn now as a badge of honour. It is sad to note that there is an instinctive conclusion among the Nigerian public that the Jonathan government is the most financially corrupt, fiscally irresponsible, politically insensitive and socially disconnected in Nigerian history. What a shame! The 21 PDP governors should also explain if their state legislatures approved the N50 million each they donated and whether they will extend the largesse to other parties.

In real democracies, laws regulate the conduct of candidates and international best practices demand transparency and specificity in campaign financing. In the United States, for instance, campaign contributions from government contractors, personal or business funds, individuals or sole proprietors who have entered into a contract with the government are prohibited by law. Any infraction or suspected questionable behaviour is investigated and culprits punished. This explains why French authorities since 2013 have been investigating Nicolas Sarkozy, the immediate past French President, over the allegation that he received €50 million from the late Muammar Gaddaffi as financial help for his 2007 presidential campaign. The US federal prosecutors have launched a clutch of corruption investigations against politicians such as Washington Mayor, Vincent Gray, and Virginia governor, Bob McDonnell, who received money from local businessmen they claim was in accordance with accepted campaign finance practices.

Impunity starts from little things left unpunished. These financial irregularities inside the Jonathan re-election campaign should also be investigated. While Section 8 (1) of the Federal Inland Revenue Service enabling law empowers the FIRS to adopt measures to identify, trace, freeze, confiscate or seize proceeds derived from tax fraud or evasion, Section 35 (3) says “…the Service may cause investigation to be conducted into the properties of any taxable person if it appears to the Service that the lifestyle of the person and extent of the properties are not justified by his source of income.” Most of the donors in this bizarre event fall within this category. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has sufficient grounds to investigate the suspicious financial transactions.

It is all evident that Jonathan has failed badly to build a credible, honest and minimally effective government for almost half a decade that he has been President. This is regrettable indeed.

IMAGINE IF THE 3 WISE MEN HAD BEEN WOMEN.

1. They would have asked for directions instead of following the star.
2. They would have presented gifts such as pampers, feeding bottle, napkins and so on.
3. After leaving one would have told the other; ''Did you see Mary'shoes, they didn't match her dress''.
4. The other would have responded; ''I heard Joseph is not working, how would they survive?''
5. Another would have also said; ''The baby doesn't even resemble Joseph, was she really a virgin?''
6. One would have replied; ''Virgin indeed, I knew Mary during her secondary school day".
WOMEN AND GOSSIP SHA.......... HMMM!!!! : 
Merry Christmas in advance

WHERE IS THIS COUNTRY HEADING TO ?

The Federal Government withdrew a total sum of N310.05bn from the Excess Crude Account within the first six months of this year, a document obtained from the Budget Office of the Federation showed.

The 2014 second quarter budget implementation report jointly signed by the Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, and the Director-General, BOF, Dr Bright Okogu, stated that the amount was used to settle various obligations of the Federal Government due to its inability to meet its revenue targets.

A copy of the report obtained by our correspondent on Sunday stated that the withdrawals for the first half of this year was significantly lower than the N1.257tn taken from the account within the first six months of 2013.

The ECA was set up in 2004 to serve as a stabilisation and savings account to protect planned budgets against revenue shortfalls due to volatility in crude oil prices.

By isolating government expenditures from oil revenues, the ECA aims to insulate the Nigerian economy from external shocks.

Shortly after the account was set, there was an increase in crude oil prices, which led to the balance in the ECA increasing from $5.1bn to over $20bn by November 2008.

But owing to declining oil revenue, which was caused by pipeline vandalism, oil theft and production shut-ins, the account recorded massive withdrawals, with the balance moving from $20bn in 2008 to $11.5bn at the end of 2012, and $2.5bn in January this year.

The drop in the account had led to disagreements between the federal and state governments, with the latter complaining about the way the account was managed.

But the budget monitoring report stated that while N310.05bn was the total outflows from the ECA, the government was able to ensure that within the period, the sum of N389.72bn was transferred into the account.

A breakdown of the inflow showed that the sum of N158.45bn was transferred into the account in the first quarter, while N231.27bn was paid into the ECA in the second quarter of 2014

The report stated, “The ECA was set up to serve as a stabilisation and savings account. Inflows into the ECA in the second quarter of 2014 amounted to N231.27bn.

“The inflow in the second quarter of 2014 was N72.82bn or 45.96 per cent higher than N158.45bn and N41.88bn or 15.33 per cent lower than the N273.15bn recorded in the first quarter of 2014 and second quarter of 2013, respectively.

“A total of N155.17bn was withdrawn from the account in the second quarter of 2014.”

A breakdown of the outflows of N310.05bn showed that a huge chunk of N213.3bn was used to augment monthly revenue distribution among the three tiers of government, while N93.2bn was withdrawn to pay for petroleum products’ subsidy.

The balance of N3.55bn, according to the report, was transferred into the Special Intervention Fund.

The New face of 100 Naira.

Do we really need this

NEW 100 NAIRA NOTE

The Central Bank of Nigeria said that the commemorative N100 banknote unveiled recently by the President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, is going into circulation from Friday.

This is contained in a statement signed by Ibrahim Mu’azu, Head, Corporate Communications, on Friday in Abuja.

It directed all branches of the bank to commence issuance of the currency in their respective locations.

“The commemorative note will circulate alongside the existing N100 note.

“The note, which is embedded with features to assist the visually impaired recognise genuine notes, also has other security features easily identifiable through look, feel and tilt of the currency note,” it said.

It recalled that the CBN Governor, Mr Godwin Emefiele, at the unveiling of the new banknote, explained that it was designed with enhanced security to offer robust resistance against counterfeiting.

It added that the authentication features of the note included window micro-optics, showing the national flag and numeral 100 indicating the value of the denomination and the attainment of the centenary period.

“The new design retains the portrait of Chief Obafemi Awolowo both in the ink, that is the inter-glow level, as a portrait and also in a paper as a shadow image.

“In addition, there is a spark feature of a rolling manila bar, which was the instrument of transaction during the slave trade era.

“At the back side of the currency is the introduced Quick Response Code, (QRC), a digital communication feature that highlighted and sourced all the information about the centenary, ” it said .

According to the statement, the QRC application, the bar code on the banknote, can be scanned by users to read a brief history of Nigeria.

It recalled that the apex bank, in 2010, issued commemorative N50 polymer note to mark Nigeria’s 50th Independence Anniversary celebration.

- See more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2014/12/new-n100-note-goes-into-circulation/#sthash.rMx76oee.dpuf

6 Management Lessons That Everyone Should Know.

clearer pix @

http://lindaikeji.blogspot.com/2014/12/police-allegedly-shoots-nigerian-artist.html#moreNigeria Police is a Question for all Nigerians

MIND YOURSELF.

In an interview on Channels TV programme Sunrise Daily this morning Dec. 15th, Presidential aide Dr Doyin Okupe likened President Jonathan to Jesus Christ. He made the remark while commenting on the state of the Nation 

"People do not understand the burden this president is bearing. He’s like Jesus Christ. He’s bearing the burden of everybody”