25-Year-Old Emerges PDP National Youth Leader

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25-Year-Old Emerges PDP National Youth Leader

25-Year-Old Emerges PDP National Youth Leader

 25-year-old Mohammad Kadade Suleiman has been elected the National Youth Leader of the Peoples Democratic Party. He was elected at the just-concluded national convention of the party in Abuja.

NIGERIANS Moving forward please START PROMOTING PEACEFUL SEPARATION for healthy development.

 News

NIGERIANS Moving forward please START PROMOTING PEACEFUL SEPARATION for healthy development.

NORTH,  WEST and  EAST 

SEPARATION DOES NOT HAVE TO BE ABOUT WAR, IT HAS PEACEFUL ASPECT:

In 1776, the USA split from the UK

In 1830 Belgium separated from the Netherlands

In 1965, Singapore split off from Malaysia 

in 2002, East Timor got split off from Indonesia

In 1921, Ireland split off from the United Kingdom, and (possibly in the future) there will be secession of Scotland.

In 1944, Iceland split from Denmark with remarkable ease.

In 1905 Norway split from Denmark

In 1905, Norway and Sweden also peacefully split ways. One got the car. the other got the kids.

In 1947, the British India Dominion was partitioned into India n Pakistan. In 1971, Bangladesh secceeded from Pakistan.

In 1992-93, the two parts of Czechoslovakia agreed to each go their own way. Thus were born the Czech Republic and Slovakia after what's been named the “Velvet Divorce”., About the same time, another kind of separation occurred, of course, in Yugoslavia. This one led to a bloodshed.

in 1965, Singapore split from Malaysia for a variety of reasons, including religious (Malaysia is majority Muslim, Singapore isn't), ethnic/racial (Singapore has a very large majority Chinese population) and concerns over the Malaysian Bumiputra policy, which was (and is) basically a form of "Affirmative Action" for Muslim Malaysians - who make up the majority population in Peninsular Malaysia.

Ethiopia and Eritrea

Sudan and South Sudan are now separate countries

USSR is now broken down into several countries.

I see separation as an avenue for a healthy competition for development as the case of Singapore and Malaysia, India and Pakistan, Norway/Denmark/Switzerland.

In the case of Nigeria, I am sensing a healthy competitive development among the original component part, the North/West/East each making useful progress while competing with the others.

It is not about war after all there is nothing wrong for one to decide he is no longer comfortable with the union and therefore want to opt out.

LETS GIVE PEACE A CHANCE AND SEPARATE HONORABLY.

This is worth sharing over and over again...

British named them Burma. They rejected it, restructured & renamed themselves Myanmar.

-British named them Upper Volta, but they rejected it, restructured and renamed themselves Burkina Faso - Land of Incorruptible People.

-British named them Gold Coast, they rejected it, restructured and renamed themselves Ghana.

-British named them Southern Rhodesia. They rejected it, restructured and renamed themselves Zimbabwe.

-British named them Northern Rhodesia. They rejected it, restructured and renamed themselves Zambia.

-British named them Tanganyika. They rejected it, restructured & renamed themselves Tanzania.

-Germans named them colony of South West Africa. They rejected it, restructured and renamed themselves Namibia.

-France named them Dahomey. They rejected it, restructured and renamed themselves Benin.

-Belgium named them Zaire. However, they rejected it, restructured & renamed themselves Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

-Britain named a bunch of people - Nigeria. They rather kill to preserve it than restructure and give themselves a befitting new name.

"It is only an animal that bears the name that is given to it by his enemy" (Proverb).

THE FUTILITY OF PRESERVING NIGERIA

My angry reaction earlier today on APC UK platform:

Most of the Diasporans here living in Europe. Can you show me one multi-ethnic state in Europe where one group is positioned to dominate the rest that hasn't broken up?

For those who do not know, what you call ethnic groups in Nigeria are called nations in Europe.

There's nowhere in the world where the white man accepts domination from another white man in perpetuity.

It used to be so under the Roman empire and the like. Not anymore. The Communists tried it, dividing society into capitalists and proletariats, deluding themselves that ethnicity is effectively swept under the carpet, but what followed? The Communist edifices in Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, and the big brother, USSR, all collapsed, while the two Germans that are ethnically the same but split by communism vs capitalism were reunited. Such is the power of ethnic nationalism.

Czechoslovakia was made up of two ethnic groups,  the Czech and the Slovakians. Both separated peacefully on 1st January 1993. The former is today 10.6 million people and the latter 5.4 million. Added together,  they're not up to Lagos. Yet, they split for peace. Two masters can't be in the same house.

Yugoslavia in 1991 was 23.2 million, barely more than Lagos population. It broke into six countries same year - all along ethnic lines, namely: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia.

Then the big brother, USSR. It had, at least, the following ethnic groups identified by their languages:

Regional languages:

Ukrainian

Belarusian

Uzbek

Kazakh

Georgian

Azerbaijani

Lithuanian

Moldavian

Latvian

Kyrgyz

Tajik

Armenian

Turkmen

Estonian

Minority languages:

Abkhaz

Bashkir

Buryat

Chechen

Finnish

Volga German

Korean

Ossetian

Tatar

& various others.

Today, your fingers will not be enough to count the number of countries that have emerged from the USSR.

Sit down there and be preaching unity in Nigeria as if you're the kindest gentleman on earth while you have no solution to the genocide in Southern Kaduna, the illegal but officially condoned arms in the hands of killer herdsmen roaming the country, and be condemning those better informed about the fact that the country is undergoing the strains of a forced union and should be peacefully restructured or let people go their separate ways.

In Europe, the two best examples of fairly stable multi-ethnic states are the UK and Switzerland.  The former is led by reasonable men who permitted regional autonomy to the Irish, the Scots and the Welsh, while the English dominate Westminster. That's something some of us are asking for, but you're fighting against it in your own country wracked by ethnic crisis. Your own people are better off under oppression of fellow black men because your people have bad leaders who can't do better than their new internal colonisers.

The latter country, Switzerland, has four ethnic groups. Each of them rotates the presidency annually through seven cantons that constitute the federation units. All the four languages of the four ethnic groups are recognized as official languages and school languages to boot, namely: German, French, Italian, and Romansch that has just a few thousand speakers!

There's nowhere in the world where the Caucasians allow the domination of their group by another.

In Canada, Quebec is the only full French-speaking province, aside a little section of New Brunswick.  The other seven provinces are English-speaking.  Yet, Canada is bilingual for the sake of Quebec! And each of the provinces is largely self-governing. 

Here we are in Nigeria,  you have people arguing vehemently that a decrepit,  structurally-flawed, and crisis-prone artificial contraption badly configured by the British only needs good people to survive. Why not centralise the powers of the British regions to London and see what happens?

My Conclusion:

When many commentators read and repost  or share your articles  with many of their friends and contacts, they do so because they want others to learn.

NIGERIA'S 36 STATES & FCT RANKED IN ORDER OF LAND SURFACE AREA (KM²)

1. Niger State 76,363KM²

2. Borno State 70,898KM²

3. Taraba State 54,473KM²

4. Kaduna State 46,053KM²

5. Bauchi State 45,837KM²

6. Yobe State 45,502KM²

7. Zamfara State 39,762KM²

8. Adamawa State 36,917KM²

9. Kwara State 36,825KM²

10. Kebbi State 36,800KM²

11. Benue State 34,059KM²

12. Plateau State 30,913KM²

13. Kogi State 29,833KM²

14. Oyo State 28,454KM²

15. Nasarawa State 27,117KM²

16. Sokoto State 25,973KM²

17. Katsina State 24,192KM²

18. Jigawa State 23,154KM²

19. Cross River State 20,156KM²

20. Kano State 20,131KM²

21. Gombe State 18,768KM²

22. Edo State 17,802KM²

23. Delta State 17,698KM²

24. Ogun State 16,762KM²

25. Ondo State 15,500KM²

26. Rivers State 11,077KM²

27. Bayelsa State 10,773KM²

28. Osun State 9,251KM²

29. Federal Capital Territory 7,315KM²

30. Enugu State 7,161KM²

31. Akwa Ibom State 7,081KM²

32. Ekiti State 6,353KM²

33. Abia State 6,320KM²

34. Ebonyi State 5,670KM²

35. Imo State 5,530KM²

36. Anambra State 4,844KM²

37. Lagos State 3,345KM²

Anambra + Enugu + Abia + Imo + Ebonyi = 29,525KM²

Kogi = 29,833KM²

Ogun + Oyo + Osun + Ondo + Ekiti = 76,320KM²

Lagos = 3,345KM²

Niger alone = 76,363KM²

Niger State = Entire Southwest States - Lagos

The entire Southeast 

is a little less than Kogi State only.

Just for our record

The North Has enough land for ranching and cattle colony. 

We in the South West have little land mass. PLEASE LET US BE; LEAVE US ALONE TO MANAGE THE LITTLE LAND WE HAVE

 GLOBAL CATTLE BUSINESS: FACT SHEET

A. Top 10 NATIONS in terms of cattle inventory (2017).

1. INDIA 303 million 

2. BRAZIL 226 million

3. CHINA 100 million. 

4. USA 93 million. 

5. EU 89 million.

6. ARGENTINA 53 million

7. AUSTRALIA 27 million

8. RUSSIA 18 million

9. MEXICO 16 million

10. TURKEY 14 million.

B. TOP 10 MILK EXPORTERS

 

1. NEW ZEALAND  $4.4 Billion

2. GERMANY  $2.6 Billion

3. NETHERLANDS  $1.9 Billion

4. FRANCE  $1.5 Billion

5. USA  $1.4 Billion

6. BELGIUM  $1.2 Billion

7. AUSTRALIA  $852 Million

8. BELARUS  $637 Million

9. UK $569 Million

10. SAUDI ARABIA  $556 Million

C. TOP 10 BEEF EXPORTING NATIONS (2016).

1. AUSTRALIA  $5.6 Billion

2. USA $5.2 Billion

3. BRAZIL  $4.3 Billion

4. INDIA $3.7 Billion

5. NETHERLANDS  $2.7 Billion

6. IRELAND  $2 Billion

7. NEW ZEALAND  $1.9 Billion

8. CANADA  $1.5 Billion

9. URUGUAY  $1.4 Billion

10. GERMANY  $1.3 Billion

Additional Considerations

1. Nigeria is not among the top 20 nations in the global cattle business. 

2. Non of the top cattle producing nations create cattle colonies or engage in primitive cattle grazing. All the top cattle producing and exporting nations utilise  modern technology and ranching methods to maximise production and profit.

3. Non of the top nations earning billions of dollars annually from the cattle business condone the killing of citizens for cattle.

4. Nigeria's cattle business requires a complete re-think now and not later, for posterity's sake.

Knowledge is power,

Share to educate our leaders and citizens!

Andy Uba (APC), Charles Soludo (APGA, Valentine Ozigbo (PDP) are set to go head to head at Anambra gube election debate. Photo credits: Charles Soludo, Valentine C Ozigbo, Senator Emmanuel Andy Uba

 Politics

Ahead of the November 6 governorship election in Anambra state, a debate has been set up to quiz the top candidates about their plans for Ndi Anambra if elected.

Though there are 18 candidates participating in the election, the debate which is organised by Arise News TV focuses on the candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Andy Uba, the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Charles Soludo, and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Valentine Ozigbo.

From 12pm to 3pm on Monday, November 1 (today), the three governorship candidates will go head to head answering critical questions about what they plan to do for Anambra and why they should be voted to succeed Governor Willie Obiano.

 News

Senator Uche Ekwunife becomes the godmother of this little child

Senator representing Anambra Central Senatorial district Senator Mrs Uche Ekwunife yesterday at St Lawrence Chapel Awka becomes the godmother of little miss Chizitem Lilian Okoye.

Little Miss Chizitem is the daughter of Hon and Mrs Caesar Okoye from Nri in Anambra state.

 Education

Similarities between Halloween and our African Culture – Chukwudi Nwokoye writes

Between Halloween and Our Culture

(First published on November 2, 2010) By Chukwudi Nwokye

The last day of October, every year, to the people of Canada, Ireland, the United States and the United Kingdom, is the Halloween Day. This has its roots in the Celtic festival of Samhain. Halloween activities commonly inlude wearing scary costumes, attending costume parties, ghost tours, bonfires, playing pranks, telling ghost stories or other frightening tales, watching horror movies among other things.

According to historians such as Nicholas Rogers, “some folklorists detected its origins in the Roman feast of Pomona, the goddess of fruits and seeds, or in the festival of the dead called Parentalia. It is more typically linked to the Celtic festival of Samhain, derived from old Irish and means summer’s end. A similar festival was held by the ancient Britons and known as Calan Gaeaf. This festival of Samhain celebrates the end of the ‘lighter half’ of the year and beginning of the “darker half”, and is sometimes regarded as the ‘Celtic New Year’”.

The ancient Celts believed that the border between this world and the otherworld became thin on Samhain, allowing spirits (both harmless and harmful) to pass through. The family’s ancestors were honored and invited home while harmful spirits were warded off. It is believed that the need to ward off harmful spirits led to the wearing of costumes and masks. Their purpose was to disguise oneself as a harmful spirit and thus avoid harm. In a nutshell, Halloween is the celebration of ‘horror’, the dead, witches and wizards.

In Scotland the spirits were impersonated by young men dressed in white with masked, veiled or blackened faces. Samhain was also a time to take stock of food supplies and slaughter livestock for winter stores. Bonfires played a large part in the festivities. All other fires were doused and each home lit their hearth from the bonfire. The bones of slaughtered livestock were cast into its flames. Sometimes two bonfires would be built side-by-side, and people and their livestock would walk between them as a cleansing ritual. Another common practice was divination, which often involved the use of food and drink.

The interesting part is that this festival is generally accepted in the above mentioned developed world as a way of life. Even in churches, scary objects depicting spirits are hung in the windows and door in celebration of Halloween. They do not see anything wrong with the festival and whatever connotation would be drawn by other countries with regard to their beloved festival.

In Nigeria, we have lots of festivals that depict our cultures and traditions. We have festivals like “Mmanwu festivals like “Onwa Agwu” “Imo Oka”, Onwa Asato or Iri Ji (New Yam festivals), “ekpe” and “okonko”. During those festivals, activities include for instance masquerades which in most cases are used to drive away evil spirits. It is a festival that helps in enforcing laws, collecting levies, celebrating war victories and entertainment of people.

However, when Christianity came to our lands, everything was lumped together as evil. Masquerades were seen mostly as connoting evil, voodoo, and pagan (or unclean). Our people do not help matters. They forget that each nation have their own tradition that connotes their history as people. Even to cook and eat pounded yam in your house during those yam festivals, or to prepare a maize meal during the ‘okonko’ festivals people second-guess themselves. Even some people do not even celebrate it for fear of being labeled anti-Christ or pagan.

Even it is only recently that beating of drums (igba) and other traditional musical instruments like ‘ekwe’ (wooden gong), ‘ogene’ (iron gong), ‘oja’ (wooden flute) were allowed in the church during services. They were seen as evil and as “iso ndi obodo wee mee otu ife afu”-to celebrate paganism with the heathens

It is wrong for us to put down our own culture and tradition that define us as people. The fact that we accepted Jesus Christ as our Lord and savior does not mean that we should jettison our way of life provided it does not run contrary to our beliefs. The Jews celebrate Passover and do not apologize to anyone for that to this day. Even Christ fully participated in Jewish festivals and saw himself as a Passover lamb prior to the ultimate sacrifice in the cross of Calvary. He always broke bread in line with the Jews’ way of life. On the Last Supper with his apostles and even after he rose from the dead, he broke bread. The Jews also celebrate Pentecost (Shavout) and Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot). During these pilgrimage festivals or “Shalosh Regalim”, the entire Jewish populace historically made a pilgrimage to the Temple in Jerusalem. Samaritans make theirs to the Mount Gerizim.

All these people up till now are very proud of their tradition and do not apologize for them, why should we be afraid to identify ourselves with our traditions? In one of the pictures I took during my initiation into manhood (age grade), I was wearing “mbe n’ukwu”-traditional skirt for the ceremony, and I posted the picture on my face book. Someone wrote me asking me whether I belong to ‘mmanwu’ society. When I told him that I thought he was of Igbo stock, he replied by saying that he is Igbo “but shy away from their culture because of Christianity

The above statement captures the ignorance, stupidity and the conflict we face about practicing our Christian belief and observing our tradition. I do not owe anyone any apology for identifying with my roots. When you ask people where the breaking of breads during mass comes from, they would not know that it was derived from the Jewish culture. People go to Olympic Games, without knowing that the Olympic was derived from Greek festival. The Olympics were of fundamental religious importance, featuring sporting events alongside ritual sacrifices honoring both Zeus whose famous statue by Phidias stood in his temple at Olympia and Pelops, divine hero and mythical king of Olympia.

Breaking of kola nuts to some depicts idol worships. Why can’t we break kola nut without thinking that we are doing anything wrong? Even why can’t we break kolanuts in masses instead of breaking bread or hosts? If Christ was to be an Igbo man, don’t you think that breaking of Kola nuts with his apostles would have been what he did on the Last Supper? What other significant was the bread over kola nuts? Our people living in foreign lands celebrate Halloween and Thanksgiving which are foreign to us. But when it is time for our own festival, not a lot of people even remember the time of the year we celebrate our festivals that define our way of life. Every culture is relative to the people that practice it (cultural relativism).

Our people should have a serious re-think about the way we jettison our own and swallow hook, line and sinker other foreign festivals. We should identify our rich cultural heritage and modernize some of them to attract tourists. Of everything the colonial masters did to our lands (and they are many), colonialism of the mind is the worst! It is mind-boggling. Tufiakwa!

Chukwudi Nwokoye can be reached at nwokoyeac@hotmail.com

 

Kyari not recalled by IGP Usman Baba: Frank Mba

Kyari not recalled by IGP Usman Baba: Frank Mba

Abba Kyari

 Nigeria Police Force has debunked reports that suspended Deputy-commissioner of Police Abba Kyari has been recalled to resume work.

Spokesperson for the police, Commissioner Frank Mba dismissed the report.

“How can the police recall an officer suspended by the Police Service Commission?, he said.

Kyari who was formerly OC SARS and commander of the Inspector-General of police Intelligence Response Team (IGP-IRT) had been under investigation after being indicted in a scam case involving Abbas Ramon, commonly known as Hushpuppi.

The FBI alleged that Kyari connived with Hushpuppi to defraud a Qatari businessman of $1.1m.

Giving an update on DCP Kyari’s case on Thursday, the IGP said the embattled officer had been queried and that the police were working with the office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation and the Attorney -General of the Federation for appropriate sanction on Kyari.

He also explained that the panel constituted to investigate the case had submitted its report to the SGF, Boss Mustapha, for vetting and advice on the findings.

The IGP said they recently got feedback from the SGF and were contemplating their next step.

He also said he has not received any extradition request for the suspended DCP.