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The Action Congress
of Nigeria (ACN) has advised President Goodluck Jonathan not to jump to
conclusions over Friday’s bomb attacks in Abuja, demanding that
investigators must be allowed to do a thorough job so they can fish out
the culprits.

This is coming just
as the Lagos State House of Assembly passed a resolution on Monday
demanding the apprehension of the perpetrators of the bomb explosion in
Abuja that almost marred the nation’s 50th Independence celebrations and
claimed about 10 lives.

The resolution,
passed by the lawmakers after deliberating on the event under matters of
urgent public importance, argued that many criminal acts have been
perpetrated in Nigeria with impunity and it is becoming a norm.

ACN’s national
publicity secretary, Lai Mohammed, in a statement, warned that “hasty
conclusions, like the one in which the President said the attacks were
not perpetrated by MEND but by a small group of terrorists outside
Nigeria, is capable of hindering investigations.

“This reminds us of
what the then President Olusegun Obasanjo said when Alfred Dikibo was
murdered on February 6th, 2004, that armed robbers killed the PDP
stalwart, even when no investigation had yet been conducted into the
murder! Such statements from highly-placed personalities as the
president are diversionary and have a way of prejudicing
investigations.”

The party also
expressed the hope that the federal government would not capitalise on
the bomb attacks to target the opposition, especially in view of the
kind of the strong rhetoric emanating from the presidency.

It said there is no
doubt that Nigerians were unanimous in condemning the killing of
innocent people for whatever reason, “and we join them in condemning in
the strongest possible terms the senseless killings in Abuja on October
1st. Nothing in the world can justify the mindless shedding of innocent
blood,” the ACN statement read.

The party, however,
expressed concern at the complacency of the country’s security agencies
which, despite admitting being alerted by foreign intelligence agencies
and with a prior warning from MEND, still failed to prevent the
explosions that spoilt the country’s 50th independence anniversary
celebrations.

Expressing worry
over the nation’s poor security, the party wondered that “if they
(security agencies) cannot ensure the protection of lives and property
now, what assurance is there that they can do so during the 2011 general
elections and help provide a conducive atmosphere for the conduct of a
free, fair, and credible elections?

“While it is
reassuring that the president has promised to overhaul the security
system, we must warn that overhauling the system does not necessarily
mean engaging in cosmetic changes like the recent change of guards in
the military, the police, and the SSS. It must involve issues of
training, equipment, and conducive work environment, among others,” it
said.

The lawmakers advised the federal government to enhance its security
systems and also called on Nigerians to condemn the incident and demand
nothing short of a thorough investigation that will yield a logical
conclusion.

Justice Okon Abang
of the Federal High Court Ikoyi, Lagos, yesterday discharged and
acquitted Amos Adamu, FIFA and CAF executive committee member alongside
ousted President of the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF), Aminu
Maigari and twenty seven officials of the NFF alleged to have defied an
order of the court restraining them from conducting elections into the
board of the federation.

The judge discharged the accused on the grounds that they were not properly served the orders of the court.

Mr. Abang explained
that though the court recognized that the NFF officials and members of
the Electoral Commission disobeyed the court, the conditions before
committal proceedings can be filed were not met by counsel to the
National Association of Nigerian Footballers (NANF), Aideloje Bello.

Meanwhile, the court
has fixed October 25, 2010 for hearing of the notice of preliminary
objection in the main suit which was pending before it.

NANF’s grudge

The association had
filed the suit against the football governing body and others, alleging
that the process of the election was perfected without recourse to its
members contrary to the clear wordings of FIFA statute and other extant
laws relating to football administration in Nigeria.

Joined as
co-defendants in the suit are NFF’s sacked president, Aminu Maigari;
President of the Nigerian Premier League (NPL) Board, Davidson Owumi;
the Minister of Sports, Ibrahim Isa Bio; Director General of Sports in
the Federal Sports Ministry; Patrick Ekeji and NFF’s electoral committee
chairman, Uthman Mustapha.

Mr. Abang had
earlier on held that it would be improper to allow the elections to take
place when there was a pending motion before them court. Specifically,
the court ordered parties to maintain status quo (ante bellum) pending
the determination of NANF’s motion.

The court had been
petitioned by NANF to restrain the newly elected body of the NFF from
assuming office because there had been a pending motion before a court
seeking to restrain the conduct of the elections that brought them into
office. All the parties were ordered to maintain the status quo until
the determination of the suit.

A former chief of defence staff and retired general, Andrew Azazi, has been appointed as the new National Security Adviser.

Mr. Azazi replaces
Mohammed Aliyu Gusau who resigned his position last month to contest the
2011 presidential elections. He takes over from Kayode Are, a retired
colonel who had held the post in acting capacity after Mr. Gusau’s exit.

In a statement
yesterday, the spokesperson to President Goodluck Jonathan, Ima Niboro,
said the appointment is with immediate effect.

Rich military career

The spokesperson said Mr. Azazi joins the present “administration from a rich and illustrious career in the military”.

Mr. Azazi was the
chief of army staff and later chief of defence staff under the late
President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua’s administration.

The new presidential
aide, who hails from Bayelsa State as the President, was commissioned
into the Nigeria Army as an intelligence officer and rose to the
position of Director of military intelligence, DMI, from where he was
appointed General Officer Commanding, GOC 1 Infantry Division before
becoming chief of army staff. He retired from service on August 28,
2008.

According to the
spokesperson, Mr. Jonathan thanked the outgoing acting NSA, Mr. Are, a
former director-general of the State Security Services, SSS under the
Olusegun Obasanjo administration for his services.

The appointment of
Mr. Azazi as new chief security adviser is coming a few days after a
twin bomb exploded in Abuja during activities marking the country’s 50th
anniversary celebrations. The Movement for the Emancipation of the
Niger Delta (MEND) had claimed responsibility for the bombings. However,
Mr. Jonathan blamed the attacks on a foreign terror group with local
backings.

Tobacco industry watchdog, Corporate Accountability
International, and its allies, on Monday, released a report documenting
widespread tobacco industry interference in the implementation of the
global tobacco treaty (formally known as the World Health Organisation
Framework Convention on Tobacco Control).

The report’s release kicks off a string of grassroots
actions in dozens of countries leading up to November’s treaty meeting
in Punta del Este, Uruguay. At stake are nearly 200 million lives – the
number of lives the World Health Organisation projects would be spared
by 2050 if the treaty takes full effect – and the tobacco industry
interference remains the single greatest obstacle to this objective.
During this year’s 10th International Week of Resistance to Tobacco
Transnationals, which began on Monday, the anti-tobacco groups say that
their actions will expose industry obstructionism in countries around
the globe which they hope would build momentum going into the November
meeting.

Showing solidarity

The Week is also an opportunity for the global
community to speak out in solidarity with Uruguay; Philip Morris
International is suing Uruguay for implementing a treaty provision
requiring stronger cigarette pack health warning labels. “Big Tobacco
first tried to bully the global community out of advancing this treaty.
Now it’s attempting to bully countries out of enforcing it,” said Gigi
Kellett, the Director of Corporate Accountability International’s
campaign Challenging Big Tobacco. “Still, our findings indicate that the
industry’s resolve to defy the law is matched only by civil society’s
resolve to end industry intimidation,” he said.

The report cited some of the tactics used by the
tobacco industry to undermine treaty implementation to include the
donation of $200 million to the Columbian government by Philip Morris
International following the adoption of treaty implementation
legislation to “address areas of mutual interest;” the appointment of a
former British American Tobacco executive, Kenneth Clarke, as Justice
Minister – he would oversee a recent lawsuit by BAT and its competitors
against a new law cracking down on tobacco product displays; and
engaging in a string of lawsuits regarding tobacco product displays,
packaging, and health warning labels from Australia and the Philippines
to Norway. All of these tactics, the groups say, are in direct defiance
of the treaty, specifically its Article 5.3, which deems such industry
interference to be in fundamental conflict with the treaty’s public
health aims.

Slow progress

The report also finds that Article 5.3 is being used
to great effect globally to insulate the treaty’s implementation against
the tobacco industry. Action ranges from Mauritius becoming the first
country to ban all tobacco industry “corporate social responsibility”
schemes to Panama’s prohibiting government agencies and officials from
accepting tobacco industry contributions. “Those countries, large and
small, that refuse to be intimidated, are emboldening others to follow
their lead,” said Philip Jakpor, spokesperson for Environmental Rights
Action in Nigeria and the Network for Accountability of Tobacco
Transnationals (NATT).

“The success of the November treaty meeting will be
measured by the number of Parties that return to their countries with a
plan to root out industry interference. Millions of lives are on the
line,” Mr Jakpor said. In Nigeria, the Senate Committee on Health held a
Public Hearing on the Tobacco Control Bill in July last year and the
bill is still awaiting passage into law at senate’s plenary. Each year,
tobacco kills more than five million people and 80 percent of those
deaths are in low-income countries, where treaty implementation
represents some of the first efforts at tobacco control.

One hundred and seventy-one countries have ratified the global
tobacco treaty since its entry into force in 2005. Today, the treaty
protects more than 87 percent of the world’s population.

President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday
asked Babatunde Fafunwa, former minister of education, to apologise to
Nigerians over the failure of the 6-3-3-4 system of education.

Speaking during an interactive session
at the opening of the Presidential Stakeholder’s Summit, at the
Transcorp Hilton, Abuja, he said the system has failed to provide the
solutions to the Nigerian educational system.

From Mr. Jonathan’s position, there are
strong indications that the Presidential Summit may recommend reverting
the educational system in the country to what it used to be.

Self reliant youth

The 6-3-3-4 system of education came
into being in 1983 with the primary focus of meeting the educational
needs of its citizenry and equipping the youth with skills that will
make them self reliant.

Twenty-five years after, a new
educational system called the Universal Basic Education (UBE), otherwise
known as the 9-3-4, has been re-introduced, whose curriculum is
expected to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by 2020.

Florence Fabian, a participant at the
event, said the problems associated with education are not only peculiar
to education alone, but a general problem that affects the Nigerian
society, which can only be solved with good leadership.

She rhetorically asked if the president
was prepared to provide the required leadership that will transform the
system, since this was the solution the educational system needed.

Contributing to the debate, Ovie
Emmanuel Sideso Abe, corroborated Ms. Fabian’s view and urged President
Jonathan to do something different in moving education out of the
doldrums.

A traditional ruler, who spoke on the
need to “de-politicise education so that proper quality education is
handed down to Nigerians,” also dwelt on the need for comprehensive data
collection and quality access and equity in education, saying that this
may go a long way in improving Nigeria’s education system.

He called for a joint funding of
education and streamlined quality of education, suggesting that this was
one of the ways of repositioning education in Nigeria.

Faruk Lawan, chairman, house committee
on education, also supported joint funding, and went ahead to advocate
parental contributions, lamenting that the value of education and the
curriculum that is taught in higher institutions have become irrelevant
to the overall needs of the country.

The lawmaker discussed the issue of corruption in the education sector and called for accountability in the system.

Julius Okojie, the executive secretary,
National Universities Commission (NUC), spoke on the low quality of
entrance into universities, and the need for strict regulations.

Mr. Okojie said morality on the part of
higher education administrators is very important, stating that without
“morality there can’t be standard in the system.”

He further spoke on the quality of
lectures in the different institutions, and noted that “no system in the
world can develop when those doing the teaching are not qualified.”

Pitfalls of education

Dibu Ojerinde, JAMB executive secretary,
spoke on the factors militating against education in Nigeria,
especially the issue of space availability, discrimination in course
choices, and the quality of teachers, stating that “if these issues
aren’t resolved, education cannot move forward.”

He also spoke on the inconsistent
academic calendars and the years of graduation, and said “government
must do something to regularise it.”

Mr. Ojerinde further lamented the level
of examination malpractices in the education system and noted that
adequate punishment must be meted to culprits. He further attributed the
mass failure in the school system to lack of adequate teaching and
teaching infrastructure, adding that most teachers do not cover the
syllabus.

“It is difficult to curtail exam
malpractices when they can giraffe in open halls. If exams are well
conducted, we will get the best results,” he said.

He added that public exams bodies, like
WASEC and NECO, which are the gate keepers, would have the best results
if the right things are done.

Addison Wokocha, registrar, Teachers
Registration Council of Nigeria (TRCN), blamed teachers at all the tiers
of education, as been responsible for the poor education foundation in
the country.

He lamented that state governments do
not employ qualified teachers to teach in the respective state schools
and noted that in most cases, the state governments resort to deploying
members of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) to teach in state
schools, even when they are not qualified to teach.

The TRCN scribe further said they have
taken the decision to stop the deployment of unqualified teachers to
teach in any Nigerian school.