Jonathan is Victimizing Rivers - Amaechi

Rivers State Governor Rotimi Amaechi has spoken on his frosty relationship with President Goodluck Jonathan, saying the state is being victimised.

The state is neglected by the Federal Government, which ceded its oil wells to neighbouring Bayelsa State, the governor said.

 Amaechi, who is also the Chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), noted that he left the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for the main opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) to protect the interest of Rivers.

 He urged Rivers indigenes to be politically-conscious and become agents of progressive change, thereby voting out the ruling PDP at the federal level.

 The governor spoke on Wednesday at the Government House, Port Harcourt, the state capital, while interacting with medical doctors.

 Amaechi said the APC held the light to the country’s rapid development and to reducing the general impoverishment in the country.

 He said one of the reasons for his disagreement with the Federal Government was the Soku oil wells in the Kalabari area of Rivers State, which were ceded to Bayelsa State and which the Rivers State government contested in court.

 The NGF chairman said: “For Rivers State, basically that is the cause of the quarrel and you have a choice to make. The choice for me is to vote out PDP and there is no sentiment about that.

 ”Legally, we have not lost Soku (oil wells). We have just lost Soku to the fact that the President is from Bayelsa. When a President that is not from Bayelsa comes, he will look at the facts and the facts are there.

 ”The Federal Government, in writing in the court, said to the court: ‘sorry, court, we made a mistake; we will correct the mistake’ and we have told the Federal Government: ‘don’t call us for a meeting; go and correct that mistake. How could you people wake up in 2011… suddenly changed the map of Nigeria and take Soku into Bayelsa State?”

 Amaechi also said the Jonathan administration failed to execute a road project awarded by the Olusegun Obasanjo administration to link the oil-rich Bonny Island in the state.

  He said: “That road to Bonny was awarded by former President Olusegun Obasanjo. They started; they have done just one bridge. The road has been abandoned. Yar’Adua tried to restart it, but he stopped.

“President Goodluck Jonathan has forgotten about that road completely, despite the fact that part of the money that feeds the Nigerian economy comes from that place, Bonny. That’s where you have the natural gas plant.”

 The governor said the Federal Government had not reimbursed the state for the N105 billion spent on the Port Harcourt-Owerri federal road, Eleme and Agip flyovers in Port Harcourt, among others.

 On his administration’s bid to secure a loan to provide potable water for residents, Amaechi said the loan was being held up because of the challenge posed by the Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, whom he noted had not signed off on the loan.

 Amaechi said: “I will start from water. We got African Development Bank (ADB) and World Bank to give us a loan, for which we will pay 0.4 per cent for 40 years, which is a wonderful loan and we planned to give Port Harcourt people water first.

 ”If everybody in Rivers State is drinking (potable) water that will reduce the number of patients that go to Braithwaite Memorial Hospital or any other hospital. World Bank agreed; Federal Government agreed; ADB agreed. They said, ‘go and do due process’. We have finished due process. What is remaining is for the Minister of Finance to just sign off.

 ”In fact, you know, like I tell people, I have no appetite for money, they can award the contract to whoever they want; all I want is water, because that will impact on other sectors of the Rivers State economy. ‘Oh, you are quarrelling with the President, we will not sign’; that is why they have not signed.

 ”Should the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria that schooled in the University of Port Harcourt, worked at OMPADEC, Ministry of Education, University of Education or College of Education (COE) sit down there and deny Rivers people water?”

 The people chorused ‘No’. “Should I remain in that kind of government (party)?” Again, the people chorused ‘no.’

Amaechi said his decision to join the APC was not for his personal interests, but for the state. The people of the state to discourage politics based on tribe or region and play politics for the collective interests of the people.

 He said: “It is not about Ijaw. It is not about Southsouth, because the first question I will ask myself is ‘what have I benefitted in the government of President Goodluck Jonathan?  We gave him between 1.5 million to 2.1 million votes. What have we got?  What has the Federal Government done for Rivers people?” ”Nothing,” the people chorused.

 Amaechi also decried the grounding of the state’s aircraft by the Federal Government and its refusal to sign to allow the state to bring in two surveillance helicopters from the United States to check kidnapping and other crimes.

 The NGF chairman also stated that his critics in the state had been angry with him for his refusal to be corrupt, stressing that the Police Commissioner, Mbu Joseph Mbu, was influenced in his actions by the Presidency.

 The Rivers Chairman of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA), Dr. Ibitrokoemi Korubo, assured the governor that they would continue to support his good policies.

Ms. Akinjide says she wants to help Jonathan succeed.
The Minister of State for the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Olajumoke Akinjide, has vowed to stick with the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and President Goodluck Jonathan, despite her husband’s defection to the All Progressives Congress, APC.
Mrs. Akinjide’s husband, Ahman Pategi, was one of the 37 ex-PDP members of the House of Representatives who defected to the APC on Wednesday.
Mr. Pategi, who was elected to the lower legislative chamber on the platform of the PDP, represents Edu/Moro/Pategi federal constituency of Kwara State. He is the Chairman of the House Committee on Water Resources.
Mrs. Akinjide, who hails from Ibadan in Oyo State, responded to a PREMIUM TIMES enquiry via a text message. She dismissed speculations that she was going to join her husband in the APC. She vowed to remain in the PDP to work for the success of the president, the Transformation Agenda, and the party at future polls.
The minister, who is the daughter of the Second Republic Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Richard Akinjide, added that her entire family dynasty remained loyal to the ruling party and the president.
“I’ll never ever leave the PDP,” she said. “The Akinjide family is loyal to the PDP and loyal to President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan. My father, Richard Akinjide is a founding member of the PDP and a member of the PDP Board of Trustees.”
“I am the arrowhead of the PDP in Oyo State as the minister in an opposition state. I will continue to work hard to ensure the success of Mr. President, the Transformation Agenda, and the success of the PDP at the polls in the 2015 elections.”
While presenting items to some PDP members in Ibadan earlier in the year, Mrs. Akinjide had asked the president to contest the 2015 presidential election.
The minister belongs to one of the several factions of the party in Oyo state. Reports say she and a former deputy governor of Oyo State, Taofeek Arapaja are leading one camp, while a former governor, Adebayo Alao- Akala, and former Senate Leader, Teslim Folarin, lead two other camps.

Keshi: I would have stopped Iheanacho’s Man City move if…

Coach Stephen Keshi has insisted that he would have resisted the movement of Kelechi Iheanacho to Manchester City, if the player had been in camp earlier.
According to the Big Boss, there was nothing he could do about it because a process was already on before the 2013 FIFA U-17 Most Valuable player was invited to senior national team “there is no way we could keep Kelechi. It is because there was something in the pipe line before now.
So we had to allow him go. But if not, I would not have allowed him go at least for now, because, in as much as the club needs him, so do we also. I would not say I would miss him in the team, because, I am just knowing him for only some days. He is good a player, with a lot of potentials. He is an asset to the country, and we pray for him to succeed in his career. As a human being, I will miss him among the family”.
The former Super Eagles Captain said that he is in constant talks with the players in camp to ensure that many of them stay around till January when the CHAN championship would be played, “ as regards the the older players, we are pleading to them to delay their movements for now, and they have agreed, while the new players we would talk to them to know their mind set. It makes our job more difficult” he bemoaned.
It would be recalled that Stephen Keshi led the exodus of players out of the local league after he was axed by the football federation in 1985 alongside his team mates in the then New Nigeria Bank of Benin. They failed to report to camp at the stipulated time.
Keshi left for Cote d’ivoire enroute to Belgium, opening professional windows for other Nigerian players.

St. Theresa Catholic Church Christmas Bomber Kabiru Sokoto Gets Life Imprisonment

A federal high court in Abuja,  Justice Ademola Adeniyi has found Kabiru Sokoto guilty of the crime of terrorism and murder. Sokoto was the mastermind of the deadly Christmas day bombing of St. Theresa Catholic church that killed at least 44 people  in 2011.
Sokoto was a member of the Shura council of Islamist sect Boko Haram according to his persoanl testimony during the trial.

Tambuwal Rejects Plea By Tukur, PDP Governors To Declare Seats Of Defectors Vacant

Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Tambuwal, in the early hours of Friday brushed aside pleas by the leadership of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as well as the party’s governors to declare the seats of 37 PDP lawmakers who recently defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC) vacant.
The speaker’s resistance came at the meeting the PDP’s national chairman, Bamanga Tukur, and members of the party’s National Working Committee (NWC) had with several top lawmakers at the Hilton Hotel in Abuja. The meeting started Thursday evening (Nigerian time) and ended in the early hours of Friday.
Mr. Tukur, who arrived at the venue of the meeting with some members of the party’s NWC, set the ball rolling by telling the lawmakers that the meeting would be frank. Before journalists were asked to leave the venue of the meeting, the PDP chairman stated that the meeting was a family affair. Speaking in a similar vein, the House Leader, Ms. Mulikat Akande, said the meeting would create a synergy between the legislators and the leadership of the party.
Two sources who attended the meeting told SaharaReporters that atmosphere became tense when Mr. Tukur demanded that the seats of the defected lawmakers should be declared vacant. “A majority of the lawmakers shouted him down,” said one source.
Exasperated, the national chairman placed a telephone call to Governor Godswill Akpabio of Akwa Ibom State. Our sources said the governor rushed to the venue of the meeting with his counterparts from Bauchi (Isa Yuguda), Katsina (Ibrahim Shema) and Cross River (Liyel Imoke). Governor Seriake Dickson of Bayelsa also joined the meeting later.
The atmosphere at the meeting was so charged that neither Speaker Tambuwal nor Governor Akpabio was enthusiastic to speak to the media at the end of the parley.
Mr. Tukur’s media aide, Oliver Okpala, did not allow most of the gathered journalists to ask Mr. Tukur any questions at the end of the meeting. Mr. Okpala only allowed a reporter from the government-owned National Television Authority (NTA) to ask Mr. Tukur two inconsequential questions.
Approached by reporters, Governor Dickson stated that Mr. Akpabio was the person to speak. However, Governor Akpabio ran from one exit door to another in order to avoid reporters.
SaharaReporters learned that, prior to meeting with the legislators, Mr. Tukur had met behind closed doors with the party’s governors at the Akwa Ibom Governor’s Lodge in Asokoro, Abuja. A source at the meeting told SaharaReporters that many of the governors were not happy with Mr. Tukur’s management of the political crisis that has torn the party apart.
However, after the meeting, one of Mr. Tukur’s aides, Cairo Ojugboh, told some reporters that the governors had passed a vote of confidence in Mr. Tukur. “What Cairo Ojugboh told the media is a fabrication of what happened at the national chairman’s meeting with the executive governors,” one source said.

Beyonce finally reveals why she featured Chimamanda Adichie in her new album

Multiple award-winning American singer, Beyonce Knowles has explained why she featured Nigerian writer, Chimamanda Adichie in her new album. Explaining why she featured the Half of a Yellow Sun author in one of her songs entitled: Flawless, Beyonce in a chat with UK Mirror said, “I was going through videos on feminity on Youtube, when I came across this video of this incredible Nigerian author, Chimamanda Adichie. “Everything she said is exactly how I feel. My message in this album was finding the beauty in imperfection,” Bey continues. “I had this image of this trophy and me accepting these awards and kind of training myself to be a champion and at the end of the day when you go through all of these things, is it worth it? I mean, you get this trophy and you’re like, ‘I basically starved, I have neglected all the people that I love, I’ve conformed to what everybody else thinks I should be and I have this trophy. What does that mean? “The trophy represents all of the sacrifices I made as a kid, all the time I lost being on the road in the studios as a child and I just want to throw that s**t up!” The star also spoke about her daughter, Blue Ivy and hubby Jay Z, and what she’s up to lately. Hear her, “I have a lot of awards and I have a lot of these things that are amazing and I worked my ass off, I worked harder than probably everybody I know to get those things, but nothing feels like my child singing ‘mummy’.” The megastar mum-of-one then goes on to say she’s striving for for love, happiness and fun. “No, nothing feels like when I look my husband in the eyes, nothing feels like when I’m respected, when I get on the stage and I see I’m changing peoples lives. Those are the things that matter and at this point in my life that’s what I’m striving for – growth, love, happiness, fun.” She also gave one final piece of advice to her fans, “Enjoy your life – its short. That’s the message!” she added.

Sheik Gumi Reacts Says Iyabo Obasanjo As ‘Victim Of Westernization’

Gumi

Sheik Ahmad Abubakar Gumi said today that Iyabo Obasanjo, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo first child who wrote a scathing letter against him on Tuesday, is a victim of Westernization.
The respected cleric made the observation in a social media post, in which he described it as “apolitical, irreligious and un-African,” noting that the letter had exposed the Obasanjo family feud.
“The letter became a distraction from a previous one written by her father addressing very important national issues,” Gumi wrote.  “Obasanjo is not a saint, neither is she one nor most Nigerians are.
But what is worth noting is that, at a crucial time when the nation is gripped by official criminality of bloodshed, financial misappropriation, and moral decadence she now sees the opportunity to blast her father.”
He expressed the view that the letter also shows Iyabo lacks proper religious upbringing.
“This is the segment that stirred my attention. I don't think any person with proper religious upbringing will ever do that to his parent. I once heard in the CNN a British girl calling her Yemeni father an evil man because he took her sister back to Yemen to marry.  Evidently afraid for his daughter the moral decadence of the Western society. Iyabo is a victim of westernization. One thus wonders what the Western life does to humanity.”
The cleric argued that respecting one’s parents is among the Jewish ten commandments which was also endorsed by Jesus, “Thou knowest the commandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Defraud not, Honour thy father and mother” Mark:10:19: and in Matthew 15:4: “For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.”

Source: Sahara reporters