EFCC vs Jang: Judge chides EFCC for delaying proceedings

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BY Unknown Wednesday, July 18, 2018 0

EFCC vs Jang: Judge chides EFCC for delaying proceedings

Jos—Plateau State High Court sitting in Jos, yesterday, threatened to strike out criminal case against former governor of the state and Senator representing Plateau North in the National Assembly, Jonah Jang, by Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, if the commission continued to delay proceedings with flimsy excuses.
He was reacting to the plea by counsel to EFCC, Mr. Henry Ejiga, who said the commission could not produce the witnesses in court, yesterday for security reasons. The case was slated for Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. The judge said if, for security reasons, the commission could not produce the witnesses in its custody, it should have produced the ones not in the commission’s custody, who were not at any security risk. He added that he was neither for the prosecution nor for the defence, but that he was out to use the Sword of Righteousness. Ejiga had cited security reasons why the EFCC could not produce the witnesses to testify in court, saying: “We are of great constraint as we have made effort to ensure that we produce the witnesses so that proceeding can go on. But unfortunately, we were informed of some security challenges, as a result, we are unable to present the witnesses today (yesterday). Infuriated by the delay in proceeding, lead counsel to the defendant, Mr. Robert Clarke (SAN) warned that “criminal trials are enjoined by the law to be speedy, because of that presumption that we are still innocent, we should not be treated as criminals. Justice delayed is justice denied.” Ruling, Justice Longji adjourned the case till October 30 and 31, and November 1, 2018, warning the EFCC and its counsel not to find reasons to ask for another adjournment.

Killings: How does Buhari sleep at night?

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BY Unknown Wednesday, July 18, 2018 0

Killings: How does Buhari sleep at night?

Joel Nwokeoma

Worried, or so it seemed, by the deluge of complaints by workers over unpaid salaries and allowances by many state governors, in spite of the interventions by the Federal Government, President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday, October 17, 2017, asked a select governors under the aegis of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, who visited him in Abuja: “How can anyone go to bed and sleep soundly when workers have not been paid their salaries for months?”

As it would appear, that was the “human side of the President” at its fullest as the poser he made to the governors at that august meeting could be said to be one of genuine concern. That notwithstanding, it is not clear, months after that meeting, if the governors lost any sleep at night as workers are still being owed arrears of salaries and allowances in many states till date.

However, what makes this incident important, and worth recalling now, is how much one can pose the same question to the President against the backdrop of the killing of innocent Nigerians in recent times.

So, asked differently, how does the President sleep soundly in the night, when lives of innocent Nigerians, women and children inclusive, are freely wasted across the length and breadth of the country, most especially in the Middle Belt, since January 1 when 73 were killed by suspected Fulani herdsmen in Logo and Guma LGAs in Benue State? How does the President find sleep and comfort in the “other room” knowing, as a former Governor of Jigawa State, Alhaji Sule Lamido, said on Monday, “Nigerians are now sleepless; they are watching, they have so many things in their minds whether to go for what they know is safety, security and prosperity or to go for this culture of violence which is now defining Nigeria as a country”?

For all you care, you may wilfully dismiss Lamido’s apt observation as the ranting of a “desperate opposition politician” out to score cheap political goals, or even as the President’s spokesperson, Femi Adesina, said to critics of Buhari’s tepid response to the unsettling orgy of killings in the land, on Monday, what is clear to all is that Buhari is presiding over the ceaseless and systematic killing of Nigerians at a rate, perhaps, never witnessed in the country’s history and in a way that exposes the helplessness of the Nigerian state. According to a Sunday Vanguard report on March 14, 2018, 1,351 Nigerians were killed in various violent incidents across the country “in just about 10 weeks” in the year. These include, 676 in January; 526 in February, and 146 in March. The statistics showed that the North-East remained the killing field with 591 deaths, followed by the North-Central, 270; North-West, 193; South-West, 136; South-South, 131 while the South-East came last with 30. But if the reported cases of killings in recent months are anything to go by, the figures would have become more mind-boggling now.

In the words of Adesina, however, “Securing the length and breadth of the country is a continuing commitment…when the administration emerged, the security situation was in tatters. It pulled up its bootstraps, rolled up its sleeves, set to work, and the Boko Haram insurgency was beaten back. It was eventually degraded…”, but as Lamido simply put it, “You see, today, we are under siege. It means all the key security chiefs appointed by this government have failed to deliver…”

Strikingly, what should worry many is not only that the Buhari Government has so far failed, or neglected, to fulfil its primary purpose for existence, which is the protection of lives and property of Nigerians, given these reckless killings, but also that the Nigerian sovereign has himself resigned to infantile religiosity by resorting to “pray to God” to solve a lingering security challenge he was touted to be capable by reason of his career as a retired General to contend with. This much we can glean from the President’s remark when he visited Plateau State penultimate Tuesday on the heels of the killing, yet again, of over 150 persons by suspected Fulani herdsmen in 11 communities of Barkin-Ladi and Riyom Local Government Areas of the state. According to the Commander in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Nigeria, “There is nothing I can do to help the situation except to pray to God to help us out of the security challenges. What has happened is a very bad thing.” What? Did I just read the President say he would do, “…nothing except to pray to God…”? Just like that?

 Never in history has any sovereign for that matter openly expressed palpable helplessness in the face of a security challenge anywhere in the world. It is akin to a President Barack Obama, for instance, declaring to Americans he was clueless about handling the al-Qaeda or Osama bin Laden challenge. By the way, the last time I checked, Buhari was not elected to “pray to God” for Nigeria’s security challenges, or any other challenge for that matter, neither did he promise so in 2015. Instead, he promised to take the lead in solving the country’s existential challenges. And that is what leaders do, they don’t throw their arms in the air at the drop of the hat. George Bush Jnr exemplified this in 2011 at the wake of the 9/11 terror attack in the World Trade Centre when he promised Americans he would “bring the perpetrators to justice or take justice to them!” That is the stuff leaders are made of.

As if that was not disheartening enough, Garba Shehu issued a statement last week imploring Nigerians to be “patient” with Mr President in the wake of another killing of 42 people, in some accounts, including a district head, in and around Gandi village in Rabah Local Government Area of Sokoto State while “security teams crack (sic) their brains to put an end to this horrendous violence”. According to The PUNCH, Wednesday, July 11, Shehu said the President “threatened that any attempt to try his government’s will would be met with equal force” and “wondered why murderers would be targeting innocent people for no just cause.” Pray, is it the duty of a responsible government to live in “wonderment” on “why murderers would be targeting innocent people…”? Or, is it just occurring to this government that whatever remains of its “will” has been tried and found wanting, repeatedly, by bands of murderous bandits, terrorists, kidnappers, extortionists and anarchists from Ebonyi to Zamfara leading to the deaths of scores of Nigerians?  Is it unaware that, according to the United Nations, Nigeria has up to 350 million small and light weapons in circulation, in the hands of devious and criminal elements and sundry groups who kill with relish apparently because of the incapacity of the Nigerian state to contain them? We are talking about 70 per cent of the total arms in circulation in West Africa.

It is not enough for the President to resign to fate, or tell us how his security heads are “cracking” their brains to stop the killings in the land. He should no longer be at ease while Nigerians are killed by marauding criminals. Instead, he should begin to lose his own sleep and “crack his brain” himself, as Nigerians can’t afford the luxury of sound sleep anymore.

The starting point should be to do away with the inept security heads who have failed, evidently, to help him perform his primary duty of securing Nigerians unless he approves their ineptitude. Besides, the country’s police structure has proved, time and again, to be anachronistic and can no longer address the country’s extant security challenges. A centralised policing structure, the type the military bequeathed to us, is defective and dysfunctional in a federal state like ours and should be done away with fast. Why the President is not buying into the inevitable imperative of restructuring the country to allow the federating units to meet their security and policing needs and relieve an inefficient and overstretched centre beggars belief.

In fact, I don’t know how President Buhari manages to sleep at night given these endless tales of needless deaths of Nigerians under his watch. He needs to wake up now to the imperative of doing the needful or be woken up to more gory realities.

The Dead Dance With The Living In Madagascar

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BY Unknown Wednesday, July 18, 2018 0

The Dead Dance With The Living In Madagascar

Madagascar, also known as the "eighth continent", boasts of rainforests, beaches, historic burial grounds and plants that are found nowhere else in the world.

Named after the island in the same place, the country located in East Africa is home to the fourth largest island in the world.

Since the arrival of humans on the island in 350 BC, the island has witnessed the stages of civilisation and different cultures.

One of these is the 17th-century burial rite known as Famadihana which literally translates to "turning of the bones".

Famadihana involves the digging up a corpse to dance with it. The burial rite is done every seven years by the family of the dead.

Famadihana. Photo: dig

The celebration kicks off with music trumpets and chants of joy. While this is being done, digging commences. An elder, preferably one from the family, takes up the duty of invoking the dead body to join the living. This act is important: it is the only chance of the dead to revisit the world and relive his activities which they sometimes invoke through black magic

The body is cleaned and wrapped in expensive clothing like silk before they are raised high by relatives to dance around with it. Women who are not able to give birth cut a patch of the cloth and place under their bed with hopes of blessings.

Relatives also avail the opportunity to tell the dead the happenings they have had since their departure. Natives claim that the dead respond in acknowledgement.

After this is done, the bodies are turned upside-down as a seal of their journey to the spirit. It is only after this is done that the body can finally go to its resting place