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Nigeria and Cote d’Ivoire have stressed the need for African countries to find solutions to their developmental challenges.

The Vice President,
Namadi Sambo disclosed this at the weekend after a closed door meeting
with President Lauren Gbagbo of the Republic of Cote d’Ivoire, at the
Presidential Palace, Abidjan.

Mr. Sambo was in Cote d’Ivoire for the golden jubilee independence anniversary celebration of the country.

Cote d’Ivoire got
her independence from France on August 7, 1960. It is one of the 17
African countries celebrating their half century independence
anniversary from the clutches of colonialism, this year.

African solutions to problems

The vice president
said both countries find it imperative for cooperation among themselves
as to overcome all the developmental challenges they are facing. He
said “we discussed the need to use this important occasion of our 50
years anniversary to add more cooperation between the ECOWAS countries
and to from now onwards ensure the source of African solution to
improve our socio-economic status and build our sub-region.” He added
that Mr. Gbagbo used the occasion to “call on Nigeria to be used as a
pad for cooperation and development in the West African sub-region.” In
his support for the celebration of the golden jubilee, despite the huge
developmental challenges facing the countries, Mr. Sambo said the
celebrations offers the opportunity for countries to meet, reflect and
chart a new direction so that “we can transform our society and drive
away poverty among our people.” The high points of the celebration was
the parade of friendly nations’ flags including that of Nigeria; the
parade by the wives of military and paramilitary personnel and that of
a crop of 50 youthrepresenting the next 50 years of that country and
also the conferment of national honours on some deserving foreign and
Ivorien citizens.

The Vice President
was accompanied by the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Idi Hong,
Special Adviser to the Vice President on Special Duties, Isaiah Balat
and other top government functionaries.

Opposition
parties in the country are worried over the increasing defection of
elected public office holders, especially the federal and state
legislators, from the parties under which platform they were elected to
others.

They are also
lamenting the failure of the National Assembly to amend the provisions
of the constitution to make it possible for politicians, particularly
lawmakers, to lose their seats if they decamp to other parties.

Sections 68 (g) and
109 (d) of the 1999 Constitution says a member of the Senate or of
House of Representatives or State House of Assembly shall vacate his
seat in the House of which he is a member if “being a person whose
election to the House was sponsored by a political party, he becomes a
member of another political party before the expiration of the period
for which that House was elected: Provided that his membership of the
latter political party is not as a result of division in the political
party of which he was previously a member or of a merger of two or more
political parties or factions by one of which he was previously
sponsored.” During the just-concluded constitution amendment, the
National Assembly had proposed to alter the sections to make it
possible for lawmakers to defect without losing their seat. The
proposal, however, did not get the support of two-third majority of the
36 State Houses of Assembly. Following the rejection, the sections were
left intact.

But officials of
opposition parties who spoke with NEXT said the rate at which elected
office holders are defecting to other parties, particularly the PDP
could turn the country into a one-party state.

They also said that
the failure to change the law, by the federal and state legislators,
during the recently concluded amendment of the 1999 Constitution, has
not helped to deepen the nation’s democracy.

Sabo Muhammad, the
National Director of Publicity of the All Nigerian Peoples Party, said
his party is sad that the amendment of the clauses did not sail through
during the exercise.

“You know that is
what we have been canvassing. The ANPP under the leadership of Edwin
Ume-Ezeoke, and Saidu Umar, from the onset has been in the forefront of
the campaign to curtail the cross carpeting of politicians because ANPP
has suffered much from this unfortunate thing. And so, you don’t expect
us to be happy that the amendment was not carried through,” Mr Muhammad
said.

Money-bag politics

The national
chairman of the Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA), Lisu Akerele
described the failure of the amendment as unfortunate. According to
him, the defection of members of a political party to others is
promoting money-bag politics, and it would not give room for
ideology-based political parties to thrive.

“The question of
jumping from one party to another has to do with money politics and
that is the problem we are having,” Mr Akerele said.

“It is not good for
the development of party politics. You have to stand for something and
not for naira, not for money all the time. It is either you are on the
left or on the right. Because of the way people are looking for money
you find that they lack principle and keep moving from one place to
another. Is that how to play politics. How do we grow?” The PPA boss
said if sanity is to be restored to the nation’s polity, the defection
of politicians must be curtailed. He disclosed that his leadership has
been trying to build a serious party to which everyone will not only be
proud to belong but also find it difficult to decamp to other parties.

Ifeanacho
Oguejiofor, the spokesman of the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA)
and his counterpart in the Conference of Nigeria Political Parties
(CNPP), Osita Okechukwu also regretted the increasing rate at which
politicians are decamping, adding that it is weakening the opposition
parties.

But the spokesman
of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Ahmed Rufai Alkali, whose party
has been a major beneficiary of defections in the recent past, said the
failure to make the amendment was the wish of Nigerians, adding that
the party would abide by whatever law is made by the legislature.

“If that is the
decision of the legislature, we will go along with it,” Mr Alkali told
NEXT. “It is the wish of Nigerians that the National Assembly is trying
to reflect. I think they are handling the amendment well as
representatives of the people. We have confidence in them.”

Jumped ship

Since 2007 when the
present National Assembly was inaugurated, no fewer than 13 senators
and 15 members of the House of Representatives have decamped to other
parties. Among the senators who have dumped their parties are Patrick
Osakwe (Delta), Uche Chukwumerije (Abia), Patricia Akwashiki
(Nasarawa), Satty Gogwin (Plateau), Suleiman Nazif (Bauchi) and Sahabi
Yau (Zamfara). Others are Hassan Gusau (Zamfara), Alphonsus Igbeke
(Anambra) and Otaru Ohize (Kogi).

In the House of Representatives, those that moved are Uche Ekwunife (Anambra),

Ahmed Wase (Plateau), Abubakar Bunu (Zamfara), Mohammed Takoki (Zamfara),

Suleiman Abdul (Kogi), Salihu Abdulkareem (Kogi) and Bello Moriki (Zamfara).

Idris Keta
(Zamfara), Zubairu Dahir (Zamfara), Kareem Abisodun (Oyo), Patrick
Obahiagbon (Edo), Samson Osagie (Edo) and Ibrahim Misau (Bauchi) also
decamped to other parties. All of them still maintain their seats in
the parliament.

Hundreds of state legislatures as well as four state governors have also defected and are still in office.

The
expected defection of the Abia State governor, Theodore Orji to the
Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) less than a month after he cross
carpeted to the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA) from the
Progressive Peoples Alliance has thrown politicians and the electorate
in the state into confusion.

The discordant
tunes at the weekend came to the fore when Uche Chukwumerije, senator
representing the Abia North senatorial district, was mandated by his
constituents to dump APGA which he recently declared for, along with Mr
Orji, for PDP.

At a meeting in
Umuahia of politicians from the five local government areas in the zone
to discuss the direction of the political wind that is blowing across
the state since the July 3 defection of the governor, they passed a
motion for Mr. Chukwumerije to join the PDP, arguing that they no
longer want to be in a minority party.

The same
constituents had, last month, directed Mr. Chukwumerije to move to APGA
with Mr. Orji after he left the PPA’s platform that gave him the
governorship ticket for Abia in 2007.

Mr. Chukwumerije,
at the meeting, intimated his constituents with political developments
in the state as it affects and will affect them.

After the analysis
and rationalization, his constituents insisted that he also moves with
the governor into the PDP – recalling that in the same July when they
mandated him to join APGA, they also directed him to always be in the
same political party/camp with the governor.

The chairman of the
meeting and a legislator in the Abia State House of Assembly,
Princewell Onyegbu, and two other colleagues, Matthew Ibe and Orji
Lekwauwa, said the people were constrained by the drawbacks of
belonging to a minority party which they had been in the past three
years and thus have no choice than to mandate their senator to pitch
camp with the PDP.

“This time around,
we must belong to the ruling party at the centre and thus return to the
mainstream of the Nigeria politics and from within, not from outside,
fight for our rights and dues and no more from the opposition that we
got nothing other than denial of our dues. Opposition has never helped
us,” he said.

Enter the mainstream

Seemingly
disappointed, perhaps thinking or expecting that his constituents’
reaction would be that he remain in APGA that many tagged to be the
Igbo party, the Senator became rather dumbfounded.

But the supporters
said the condition on which the men would join the PDP, which might not
be compromised, was that of giving automatic tickets to Messrs Orji and
Chukwummerije to represent the PDP, as they already have these tickets
in APGA.

Meanwhile the expected entry of Mr Orji to the PDP and the condition
of allowing him to control the party structure in the state, which the
party at the national level is acceding to, especially with the sudden
dissolution of the state executive of the party last week, is
generating bad blood as some members have headed to the court to
challenge the dissolution.

The Japanese
government has called for more support from partners on yam research to
prevent the threats of food crises in Africa.

The Japanese
Ambassador to Nigeria, Toshitsugu Uesawa, made the call at the
commissioning of Japan-assisted projects in IITA-Abuja station at the
weekend.

Mr. Uesawa lauded
the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture for its cutting
edge research in root and tuber crops which has produced several
innovative outputs such as the propagation of yam through vine
cuttings. “IITA’s efforts have contributed towards sustainable
development of agriculture in developing countries,” he said.

He emphasized that
“IITA’s role has been great,” but said more attention should be given
to the project. Part of the facilities commissioned by the Japanese
envoy included a root and tuber processing centre with processing
machines, soil preparation shade and a screen house.

The projects were
financed at a cost of over US$82,000 from the Japanese Grass Roots
Project, which aims to improve the livelihoods of rural people.
Hidehiko Kikuno, a yam Physiologist at IITA, called on farmers to tap
the available agricultural innovations from IITA and also to maximize
the use of the facilities.

Mr. Kikuno, who has
successfully propagated yam through vine cuttings, advised farmers to
adopt the method saying that with the vine propagation technique, the
propagation rate would be high with a possibility to reduce the cost of
seed yam.

Fortified banana

Meanwhile, in a
major scientific breakthrough, IITA-Uganda crop scientists have
successfully transferred genes from green pepper to bananas to enable
the crop to resist the Banana Xanthomonas Wilt (BXW). The research to
fortify banana against BXW using genes from sweet pepper was initiated
in 2007.

BXW is one of the
most devastating diseases of banana in the Great Lakes region of Africa
that causes about half a billion dollars worth of damage yearly. The
transformed banana was infused with plant ferredoxin-like amphipathic
protein (Pflp) or hypersensitive response-assisting protein (Hrap) from
green pepper and they have exhibited strong resistance to BXW in the
laboratory and screen-houses. Some of the findings of the research have
been published in the Molecular Plant Pathology Journal.

The Action Congress (AC) has asked
regulatory authorities to act urgently to defuse the crisis at African
Petroleum Plc, as it is endangering the investments of thousands of
shareholders.

In a statement by its national
publicity secretary, Lai Mohammed, the party said it was compelled to
make the call because the company is of strategic importance to the
country’s economy.

The N150-billion company is a major
player in the energy sector and boasts nearly 97,000 shareholders.
Media reports accuse the company of manipulating their accounts to show
profitability and hide losses of up to N15 billion.

The party also said it is worried about
infighting among the company’s management, which resulted in the
termination of the managing director and the suspension of an executive
director and the company secretary.

“In all this, it is the shareholders
who are holding the short end of the stick,” said the party. “After
all, it is said that when two elephants fight, it is the grass that
suffers.”

SEC intervention

The party called on the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to investigate and take necessary actions to stem the crisis.

“SEC must play its statutory role so as
to avoid the kind of crisis that was witnessed in the banks, with dire
consequences to the economy and to hapless investors, due to poor
regulatory controls.”

However, it warned that the commission
might be hampered in carrying out its duties in the case because of the
perceived closeness of the company’s chairman, Femi Otedola, to
President Goodluck Jonathan.

“We are also worried by the insinuation
that this perceived closeness to power has bred impunity in [the
company], more so at a time the chairman was bestowed with one of our
country’s highest awards – Commander of the Order of the Niger (CON) –
by Mr. President,” said the party.

“We have no reason to believe that this insinuation is true, but Nigerians must be shown clearly that it is not.”

The National
Broadcasting Commission has described as illegal and unacceptable any
political broadcast aired by radio or television stations earlier than
three months to the 2011 general elections.

Chris Okotomho, who
represented Yomi Bolarinwa, the Director-General of the commission, at
a one-day political broadcast forum held in Benin also said the NBC is
worried by the way broadcast stations air political campaigns without
recourse for laid down electoral laws and broadcasting code.

He said if something is not done urgently to curb such excesses, broadcasting would be brought to disrepute.

“Contravening electoral acts is criminal, and whoever breaks the rules could be charged and prosecuted,” he said.

“Members of the public depend on broadcasters to show the way, but they collaborate with politicians who break such laws.”

According to him,
electoral laws stipulate that election campaigns will be aired from 90
days to such election and end 24 hours to the election. He said many
stations act as if they are appendages to certain political parties by
cooperating with them in breaking the law.

“Broadcasters are
in a privileged position and should be seen as such,” he said, adding
that the commission can no longer tolerate the lawlessness observed
recently.

“Political campaign broadcast now is criminal and a violation of broadcast code, which could attract sanction,” he said.

Guest lecturer at
the forum, Osakue Stevenson Omoera, said the performance of the press
decides the outcome of elections in United States of America, Germany,
Switzerland, and recently in Ghana. He said that if Ghana could do it,
Nigerian press has the more reason to abide by the rule.

Review the code

He advised that journalists should be well-remunerated to avoid being bought over by corrupt politicians.

The Zonal Director
of NTA, Layi Ademokoya, observed that the proliferation of private
broadcast organisations has not helped, as they promote the political
interests of their proprietors.

The Ondo State
commissioner for information, Ranti Akerele, called for the review of
the broadcasting code, which he said was made by the military who did
not know anything about politics or campaign.

He called on the NBC to urgently convene a stakeholders’ meeting
with a view to amending the broadcasting code, more so now that the
nation’s constitution is undergoing a review.