Ige's death, security and Nigeria's 2001 Lie of The Year
By Ugo Anakwenze
Special to USAfrica The Newspaper, Houston
USAfricaonline.com,
NigeriaCentral.com
Ige's death, security and Nigeria's 2001 Lie of The Year
By Ugo Anakwenze
Special to USAfrica The Newspaper, Houston
USAfricaonline.com,
NigeriaCentral.com
The assassination of Nigeria's Attorney-General Bola Ige should be
another opportunity for the peoples of Nigeria (especially the
current leadership) to honestly re-examine the future of conditions
that bind them. 
Retired
Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo's increasingly violent government needs to
seriously allow Nigeria's nationalities to find a new, better formula
for co-existing without the current obsession to control the central
government by any means possible including the killing of opponents
and destruction of whole communities.
In my view, the Obasanjo government's attempt to market the joke about Bola Ige's security detail/staff ALL going to dinner at the same time is simply incredible and ridiculous.
The Obasanjo spin masters should be able to do much better than that. A person in the position of former Governor Ige and an AD chieftain usually has several (at least 10) federal mobile police officers, a couple of SSS agents, regular Ibadan based police and soldiers protecting him. Combine that with the hangers-on and party thugs, OPC hoodlums, praise singers and others around his castle. At 8:30 pm, he certainly still has a large number of political allies seeking advice, goodwill, support, protection, contracts and new ways to please Ige for future appointments. That all these people decided to go out for food at the same time, in my view, is Nigeria's 2001 Lie of The Year.
Obasanjo's PR folks can certainly do much better than this story. Anybody who is able to penetrate that personal shield and kill him in his bedroom must have an inside knowledge.
Meanwhile, as we await what could be the new rounds of Ibadan-Yoruba riots (previous 1960s conflicts in the same area destroyed Nigeria's first effort at democratic rule), Obasanjo can only diffuse the conflict by convening a National Conference to restructure and reduce the overbearing power of the central government. Otherwise, I feel extremely sad for the Igbo population in the Yoruba southwest of Nigeria because they are likely to bear the brunt of the next round of brutal conflict. Somehow, some people will float the the news in the Lagos/Nigerian media about the so-called sky rocketing prices of goods. It's the prologue. Then, they begin the basic attempt and process of establishing the "right environment" to take out the Yoruba frustrations on their unfortunate Igbo tenants, and sometime benefactors.
I believe that if nothing happens to occupy the energy of the Yoruba leadership soon, their attempt to brutalize each other will most certainly open up the Igbo business community to paying the "big price." I doubt the Igbos will tolerate or stomach any more of such hostilities, as they showed during the tit for tat Sharia-related events of early 2001
|
ARINZE: Will he be
the FIRST
BLACK AFRICAN
POPE?
By Chido Nwangwu
These views were
stated during an interview CNN's anchor Bernard Shaw and
senior analyst Jeff Greenfield had with Mr. Nwangwu on
Saturday November 18, 2000 during a special edition of
'Inside Politics 2000.' |
USAfrica
The Newspaper voted the "Best Community
Newspaper"
in the 4th largest city in the U.S., Houston. It is in
the Best of Houston 2001 special as chosen by the editors
and readers of the Houston
Press,
reflecting their poll and annual rankings.
Winnie Madikizela-Mandela's burden mounts with murder charges, trials Why Bush should focus on dangers facing Nigeria's return to democracy and Obasanjo's slippery slide Acts of Cowardice. By Jonathan Elendu, contributing editor of USAfricaonline.com. USAfricaonline.com is listed 
among the world's leading web sites by the international
newspaper, USAToday.
 Recent
and continuing crises regarding Sharia in northern Nigeria
and security of lives in Nigeria highlight the other issue
whether the Obasanjo's government has failed to enforce
basic human rights of all Nigerians? See the
USAfrica
Special reports.
Sharia-related killings and carnage in Kaduna reenact deadly prologue to Nigeria-Biafra war of 1967. Is Obasanjo really up to Nigeria's challenge and crises? By USAfricaonline editorial board member, Ken Okorie. His commentary appears courtesy of our related web site, NigeriaCentral.com Investigating Marc Rich and his deals with Nigeria's Oil DIPLOMACY
Walter
Carrington:
 African-American
diplomat who put principles above self for Nigeria
(USAfrica's
founder Chido Nwangwu, left, with then U.S. Ambassador
Carrington at the U.S. embassy, Nigeria)
|
CONTINENTAL
AGENDA
he
said that "Africa will not be an area of priority" in his
presidency has been questioned by
USAfricaonline.com Publisher Chido
Nwangwu. He added that Bush's "pre-election position was
neither validated by the economic exchanges nor
geo-strategic interests of our two continents." 