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Abia State
commissioner for information and strategy, Anthony Agbazuere, has
debunked insinuations that two parallel Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)
primaries that produced Theodore Orji and Ikechi Emenike as candidates
held in the state.

Briefing the media
on Tuesday in Umuahia, the information commissioner said that the only
recognised PDP executive in the state was that led by Emma Nwaka, which
returned the governor.

Mr. Agbazuere said
that only three aspirants attended the screening in Enugu, after which
the state governor and Tony Enwereuzor were cleared.

He said that Mr.
Emenike was never an aspirant on the platform of PDP as he alleged and
did not participate or appear for the screening prior to the primaries.

“It is equally
important to state that the Independent National Electoral Commission
(INEC) monitored the exercise that produced Mr. Orji, so any other
primary could not have held,” he said.

Dele Momodu, the
Publisher of Ovation Magazine, was on Wednesday, elected the
presidential candidate of the National Conscience Party (NCP) at the
party’s national congress held in Lagos.

Mr Momodu beat two
other candidates, Martins Onovo and Atei Beredugo, to become the
party’s flag bearer in the 2011 presidential elections by polling 169
delegates’ votes. Messrs Onovo and Beredugo polled 8 and 14 votes
respectively. Mr Beredugo, a former Director of Planning in the Niger
Delta Development Commission, declared his intention to run for
presidential election last week.

Abolishing poverty

Mr Momodu summed up
his plan for Nigeria using the party’s slogan: abolition of poverty.
This, he plans to do through a “10-care programme,” which he said will
soon be made public. “Our founding father, Chief Gani Fawehinmi,
believed that no man was born poor but when you are born into a poor
environment where your leaders deliberately decide to make you poorer,
then we will be in crises,” he said. “One of the reasons we are in the
state we are, certainly, is that our leaders have done everything to
make us poor. I was at a local airport recently and saw many women
waiting for President Goodluck. I discovered they were recruited to
come and welcome Mr President and they were paid N1,000. When a nation
gets to a stage where you can get able bodied people on the street for
just N1,000, that nation is in trouble and I am fortunate to be in a
party that believes its priority is ‘abolition of poverty’.”

He, however,
emphasised that Nigeria’s poverty is not lack of resources but lack of
productive ideas by those controlling the nation’s affairs. “If the
president of an oil-rich nation goes to another oil-rich nation for
medical treatment, it is a clear example of poverty of ideas,” he said.
“UAE leaders used to go to Lebanon to enjoy life but they realised they
have to build their own nation when war broke out in Lebanon. Our
leaders also do that now but they don’t realise they have to build this
nation.” He also blamed President Goodluck Jonathan for the present
state of Bayelsa where “puddles still serve as sources of drinking
water.” “The road between Yenogoa and Port Harcourt must be one of the
worst in the world, not just in Nigeria,” he said. “In fact, Bayelsa
leaders now fly helicopters to their homes; they no longer use the
road.”

His chances

Mr Momodu said the
entire members of all political parties in Nigeria are not up to 20 per
cent of potential voters; therefore, his aim is to “target the 80
percent floaters.” “As from tomorrow, we are on the road to get people
to register,” he said, adding that he is convinced it is possible to
defeat the ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP), “which stay in power
for 12 years is its only credential.” “The only thing that makes our
leaders special is the fact that they have access to public funds,” he
said. “None of them has a special leadership character or pedigree. I
had been teaching A-levels as far back as 1982. Some of my students are
bank directors today. I have been in politics since 1983 and practiced
journalism since 1988. I was the highest paid editor in 1991 and a
founding editor of ThisDay (Newspaper). I have been publishing Ovation
since 1996. So, we have pedigree more than the so-called leaders.”

The Imo State
directorate of the NYSC on Wednesday charged corps members being
trained for the January 15 voter registration to take the challenge
seriously despite the constraints in various training centres.

Emeka Ukwu, public
relations officer of the directorate, told the News Agency of Nigeria
(NAN) in Owerri that NYSC is poised to actualise the federal
government’s plans for free, fair and credible election.

He said all the
corps members in Imo State were deployed to various training centres to
acquire relevant skills and knowledge to discharge the assignment.

The training is
being conducted simultaneously in the various centres, mainly Federal
University of Technology, Owerri; Federal Polytechnic, Nekede; Evan
Ewerem University; and Federal Government College, Okigwe.

“The Federal Government expects us to engage 10,569 corps members but we have very few training centres,” he said.

The national chairman of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), Ogbonnaya Onu warned the party’s presidential and gubernatorial aspirants screening committee not to clear any aspirant whose victory at the polls could be annulled by the tribunals or courts. He gave the warning while inaugurating the 21-member committee headed by a former governor of Zamfara State and Senate Minority Whip, Ahmed Sani.

The committee is expected to screen the party’s presidential and governorship aspirants ahead of its national convention slated for Friday in Abuja. “This screening is a very important one. We have selected the best people because the assignment is to show to the country that ANPP is serious,” Mr Onu said. “We want ANPP to make history. Our motto is justice and all aspirants will receive similar treatment. Any other matter, we should leave it to Nigerians to decide.

“All matters that will contravene our constitution please bring them out. We don’t want to win election that will be annulled in court. So we need the most qualified candidates.” Responding, Mr Sani noted that the task was a simple one promising that the committee members will be guided by the constitution of the country. According to him, “The constitution of Nigeria is clear on who should contest and who should not.

So, we won’t go outside the constitution.” He added that the committee will work on a zonal basis while retaining Abuja as the secretariat where any of the aspirants who wishes can come for screening.

Battle for Bauchi

Meanwhile, Garba Gadi, former deputy governor of Bauchi State yesterday returned his governorship nomination forms to the ANPP national secretariat. He recalled that as a founding member of the party, he has been committed to the success of the party and has on many occasions politely turned down overtures to him to contest for political offices until he finally agreed then to become the deputy governor. Mr Gadi explaining the reason why he refused to join his former boss in decamping from the party said that “I am committed to sincerity and other good that is expected of a leader that was why I refused to defect with the governor despite intimidations and persecutions.” “I told him (Mr Yuguda) you met me in my house and when you want to leave, good bye.” “Some people have said I am too slow to contest the governorship office and our Senator representing Bauchi Central, Senator Muhammad A.

Muhammad announced his withdrawal only if I am contesting and that he can only contest if I am not contesting,” Mr Gadi added.

Thirteen people
were killed in Wereng village, Riyom local government area near Jos, by
men wearing military uniforms in the early hours of Tuesday, according
to officers of the Plateau State Police Command.

The police also
confirmed that attacks were also reported in Fagawang where two persons
were killed, and Nyarwai, both in the Barkin Ladi local government
area, where three persons were killed.

According to a
police statement issued yesterday, 11 houses were burnt during the
attack in Nyarwai, and three in Fagawang villages, while a church was
burnt down in Ding village. A police source who preferred to remain
anonymous confirmed that the attackers used weapons including guns,
machetes, daggers, bows and arrows to attack their victims who were
reportedly taken unawares.

Cold blood murder

According to the
police source, the dead, who were slaughtered and left lying in their
own blood, had several knife cuts on their bodies. The corpses still
lay out in the open in the villages Tuesday morning as government
officials were awaited. An official statement by Obinna Simon for the
state police commissioner, Abdurrahman Akano, said no arrests had been
made, but urged “all those concerned to refuse burial until we perform
the autopsy.”

He said that the
autopsies would help authorities ascertain the source and types of the
weapons used. This, he said, would aid investigations and help
ascertain whether the attackers were real military officers.

A city shuts down

Meanwhile, business
activities were non-existent in the city as banks and other businesses
remained closed throughout Tuesday. With freezing temperatures around
16°C, the streets have remained empty, with only a few vehicles
venturing along specific routes. The city’s business nerve centre,
popularly known as Terminus, has become a ghost of itself. Ahmadu Bello
Way, Rwang Pam, Church, and Langtang Streets, and Old Bukuru Road,
routes that experience heavy traffic daily, are deserted.

Powerless Special Task Force?

The Ndigbo, the
umbrella body of the Igbo community in Jos, said that it has lost
confidence in the Special Task Force headed by Hassan Umaru, a
brigadier-general.

A statement by the
group’s president-general, Richard Wayas, and its secretary, Serbinus
Anyanwu, said that the Ndigbo condemned the cycle of crises, killings,
and the Christmas Eve bombings and called on the federal and state
governments to initiate urgent measures to end the violence.

“At the last count,
we have well over 40 corpses of our people deposited both at the
Bingham University Teaching Hospital, Jankwano, and Jos University
Teaching Hospital mortuaries, with several hospitalised,” the statement
read.

“It is also
regrettable that a luxury bus (EKWOS) carrying mostly Igbo passengers
was attacked and burnt down by the same Hausa-Fulani youth along Bauchi
Road, Jos.”

Simon Mwadkon,
chairman of Riyom local government, described the incident as “very
unfortunate,” saying that injured persons had been taken to the Jos
University Teaching Hospital (JUTH). He said that the attackers invaded
the villages between 1 a.m. and 2 a.m. on Tuesday, setting houses
ablaze and killing the fleeing owners of the houses. Among the victims,
he said, were children and nursing mothers.

The chairman
alleged that security personnel were stationed “just 200 metres to
where the attacks were carried out but they did nothing to stop it. In
fact, a traditional ruler and the councillor, representing the area,
Mr. Victor Davou, rushed to the STF soldiers just by but they bluntly
refused to go to the scene after claiming that they were not given such
an order,” Mr. Mwadkon said.

Mr. Mwadkon,
however, promised that the council would do everything possible to
assist victims of the raid, and called on the state and federal
government to rise to the challenge and “do something drastic about the
incessant crises on the Plateau.”

Averting another crisis

The Bauchi State
Police Command said it has taken steps to prevent a spillover of the
Jos crisis into the state. The command’s public relations officer,
Mohammed Barau, an assistant superintendent of police, told the News
Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Bauchi yesterday that security was being
beefed up in all parts of the state, especially in towns close to the
state’s border with Plateau.

“The police have
taken proactive measures to prevent a spillover of the Jos crisis into
the state. We are ready to take action to forestall any breach of law
and order,” he said.

He added that there was now a better understanding between muslims and christians in the state.

The nation’s
inspector-general of police, Hafiz Ringim, urged residents of Jos to
resolve their issues without resorting to violence. Mr. Ringim made the
plea in a statement issued in Abuja by the force’s public relations
officer, Olusola Amore.

“The crisis in Jos
should not be seen as a police/security problem but a
community/political problem which all peace-loving people should strive
to resolve without resorting to rancour,” he said.

“Nigerians should learn to live together in peace in spite of differences in tribe, language and religion,” he added.

The inspector general assured the people of the state and its
environs of 24-hour patrols to forestall the breakdown of law and order
in Jos. He said the police and other security agencies have been doing
their best to contain the crisis and that 15,000 police officers and
other security personnel had been deployed to Jos to restore peace
since the crisis began.

The attempt by the
leadership of the Ogun State Chapter of Action Congress of Nigeria
(ACN) to impose State House of Assembly and House of Representatives
candidates, under the guise of consensus, has yesterday resulted into a
protest by party members.

Trouble started at
the party secretariat, located on Moshood Abiola Way, Abeokuta when the
national youth leader of the party, Segun Adesegun who claimed to be
representing the party hierarchy, started announcing the names of the
approved flagbearers for the race.

Mr Adesegun was
mid-way into announcing the list when tension from the restless party
supporters, mainly the youth, rose and started throwing stones into the
hall in protest against the arrangement said to have been concluded by
some leaders.

The protesters
disrupted the exercise, smashing the chairs, windows and the doors.
Sensing further danger, the party chairman, Tajudeen Bello and other
party leaders sneaked out through the back door to escape being lynched.

The presence of the
police at the venue did not stop the angry protesters from carrying out
their action, as the policemen just stood by watching the protesters.

Undemocratic arrangement

Some of the
protesters argued that the arrangement was not democratic and that they
will resist it till the state leadership of the party carries out a
proper congress.

‘We will not agree
with this ‘Baba sope’ arrangement,” one of the protesters said under
condition of anonymity. “We are at another level in politics and we
should make everything democratic, else we shall work for the
opposition party in the forthcoming elections by embarking on protest
votes.” Meanwhile, Next learnt that an arrangement to pick a consensus
governorship flagbearer for the party was going on as at the time of
this report through a meeting convened by the party leadership, with
all aspirants in attendance.

President Goodluck
Jonathan yesterday emerged from the People’s Democratic Party
presidential screening session after about one hour with the panelists,
to describe the exercise as “rigorous.” Mr Jonathan arrived at the PDP
national secretariat in Abuja at about 12.40pm accompanied by his
deputy, Namadi Sambo, state governors, ministers and officials of the
Jonathan/Sambo Campaign Organisation and went straight to the office of
the national organising secretary where the screening was conducted. He
emerged from the exercise at exactly 1.32pm.

“The exercise was
rigorous,” the president told journalists who wanted to know how he
fared during the screening. On crisis trailing the party’s primaries
across the country, Mr Jonathan said: “Whenever you have a general
election in a party as big as PDP, across the states, be it House of
Assembly, House of Representatives, Senate, gubernatorial or
presidential primaries, there is bound to be disagreement. We have some
flashpoints that the party is looking into but, on the average, I think
it went down very well.”

Governors who came
with the president were Godswill Akpabio of Akwa Ibom State, Timipre
Sylva of Bayelsa State, Ibrahim Idris of Kogi State and Liyel Imoke of
Cross River State. Information and communication minister, Labaran Maku
and his petroleum resources and finance counterparts, Diezani
Allison-Madueke and Olusegun Aganga, were also among the president’s
entourage. The director-general of the Jonathan/Sambo Campaign
Organisation and former works minister, Tony Anenih, also came with Mr
Jonathan.

Atiku, Jibril are satisfied

Atiku Abubakar,
former Nigerian vice president and another presidential hopeful, told
journalists after his screening that the exercise went well, just as he
dismissed speculations that he would be disqualified. Mr Abubakar
arrived at the PDP secretariat in a black Lexus jeep at 1.54pm and left
at about 3.50pm. His entourage included a former Senate president, Ken
Nnamani; former minister of state for foreign affairs, Dubem Onyia;
former Central Bank of Nigeria governor, Chukwuma Soludo; and former
special adviser on women’s affairs to ex-president, Olusegun Obasanjo,
Titi Ajanaku.

“I was asked about
my return to the party,” Mr Atiku said. “It went well. I was asked many
questions. I was asked how would I unite the party. I was asked about
the critical comments I made about the PDP in the past and so on and so
forth.”

Asked about his impression of the Aminu Wali-led panel, Mr Abubakar said: “I think the screening panel is a good panel.”

On what he would do
if disqualified, the aspirant responded: “No, they cannot disqualify me
because they don’t have the power to do that. They asked me questions
about my person, but they are not a court, they are not a tribunal,
they are not a panel of inquiry and they are not competent to do that.”

The PDP’s only
female contestant, Sarah Jibril, told journalists after her screening
that the “the exercise was detailed and thorough.” She said that the
panel asked her why she wanted to be president and questioned her on
the sincerity of her ambition, adding that there were other technical
and political questions.

Dissatisfied Dutsinma

Another contestant,
Sani Aminu Dutsinma, however shunned the screening. Mr Dutsinma, who
showed up at the PDP Headquarters at about 4.30pm but declined to
appear before the panel, said he had gone to court to seek an
interpretation of Section 7.2c of the party’s constitution. In a letter
to the PDP national chairman, Okwesilieze Nwodo, which Mr Dutsinma also
gave to journalists, the contestant described the screening as a breach
of the party’s constitution and other laws. He accused party officers
of not adhering to what he called the party’s “policy of zoning and
rotation of party and public elective offices.”

“However, should you decide to drop Dr Goodluck Jonathan from the exercise, I will be most willing to participate,” he said.

The letter of
recognition granted to Lead City University, Ibadan, may be withdrawn
if by two weeks, the institution’s management fails to close down the
Law Faculty and School of Postgraduate Studies allegedly run illegally,
the National Universities Commission (NUC) has said.

Alhassan Bichi,
director, Academic Standards at the NUC who briefed the press on Monday
in Abuja said that the NUC feels slighted that in spite of several
directives given to the management of the institution to close down the
School of Postgraduate Studies and the Law Faculty, it has gone ahead
to graduate students from the two streams.

“The Management of
NUC was therefore embarrassed to read in Vanguard Newspaper of
Thursday, 23rd December, 2010 that the Lead City University had in
their last convocation ceremony graduated from Faculty of Law and the
Postgraduate Studies, eight (8) PhDs. National Universities Commission
maintains that the Postgraduate School and Faculty of Law of the Lead
City University are illegal and must be closed down immediately,” he
said. “Failure will leave NUC with no option but to begin the process
of closing down Lead City University.”

The Commission has
also declared illegal, certificates acquired by students from the two
programmes saying they will not be recognized for the purpose of
employment or further studies adding that students undergoing courses
in the programmes mentioned above will bear the consequences in future.

Mr Bichi disclosed
that following series of reports and petitions that inundated the
commission from various sources expressing serious concern on the
premature establishment of a Postgraduate School in the university, a
special monitoring team was set up in 2007 by the NUC to find out the
veracity of the information.

He said the report
of the Special Team indicated that within two years of setting up the
institution, it had students in the College of Law at 300 levels and
that the postgraduate programmes were commenced without the approval of
the NUC and the School’s Senate.

“These clearly
contravened two conditions of their license which states that: the
start-up colleges will comprise Management Sciences, Information &
Communication Technology and some Departments in the College of
Humanities. The left-over Departments in the Humanities will be
established in the third phase. The Postgraduate School will also be in
the third phase. The College of Law is deferred.” He also said that
their operational license contains a clause which states that,
“Admission of students on transfer and direct entry in the first two
sessions after take-off is unacceptable.”

He equally stated that during a meeting of the Governing Board of
the Institution and NUC in December 2010, the Commission directed that
the Law programme and School of Postgraduate Studies be closed down
immediately. He said the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board
(JAMB), National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) and the Federal Ministry of
Education were appropriately informed on the directive. He described as
untrue information carried in some quarters by the School management
that the NUC visitation panel gave the University clean bill of health,
saying the NUC letter dated 2nd June, 2008 and signed by the director,
Academic Standards on behalf of the Executive Secretary, NUC clearly
stopped the University from running the Law programme.

More candidates have emerged to represent the Labour Party in the Ondo State House of Assembly at the general elections.

In some of the results of the party’s primaries released Tuesday, Gbenga Edema emerged as the candidate to represent Ilaje Constituency II in the state parliament.

Mr Edema, who recently decamped from the Peoples Democratic Party to the ruling Labour Party, polled 16 votes to beat his closest rival, David Kudehinbu who scored 11 votes ahead of Kunle Odidi who presently represents the constituency in the assembly. Mr Odidi had 10 votes to come third in the keenly contested primary. Also, Oyebo Aladetan won the primary of the party to pick the ticket to represent Ilaje State Constituency I in the assembly.

Mr Aladetan, the incumbent lawmaker who got to the house on the platform of the PDP was among the lawmakers that defected to the Labour Party late last year. Mr Aladetan scored 30 votes to emerge victorious ahead of Ogunyemi Johnson and Gbayisemore John who both scored three votes respectively.

Speaking to reporters shortly after their emergence, both Messrs Edema and Aladetan promised to bring dividends of democracy closer to their constituencies if elected at the general elections. The two assured their people of adequate representation in Assembly and promised to sponsor motions that will have direct impact on the lives of the people of Ilaje communities.

They also commended the state governor, Olusegun Mimiko, for allowing the wishes of the people to prevail in the recently conducted primaries of the party in all the 18 local government areas of the state.

The influence of the former chairman of
the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), Bode George, on the Lagos State
chapter of the People’s Democratic Party, became apparent yesterday
when the just elected governorship candidate of the party, Adegboyega
Dosumu, paid him a visit at the Kirikiri Maximum Prison.

Mr George is serving a jail term for financial misdeeds during his tenure at the NPA.

When NEXT called at Mr Dosumu’s office on Tuesday afternoon, supporters at the office said he went to visit Mr George.

“He (Dosumu) went to greet Bode George.
Everybody here is also waiting to see him,” said one of the supporters,
who did not disclose his name.

Mr Dosumu’s emergence as the party’s
flag bearer is barely 12 hours before making the said visit. Some of
his opponents said his victory at the party’s primaries owes a large
part to the support from Mr George’s supporters in the party.

Meanwhile, members of the PDP in Lagos
were yesterday shocked by the sudden death of the party’s national
youth leader and a former aide of Mr George, Muyiwa Collins. Supporters
of the party, who are still basking in the happiness of a successful
and peaceful gubernatorial congress, became subdued as news of Mr
Collins’ death broke.

The deceased, a former journalist and
former publicity secretary of the Lagos State chapter of the party, was
said to have died after being rushed to hospital, probably owing to the
relapse of the heart condition he was said to have overcome.

NEXT learnt that Mr Collins had already
dressed up to catch a flight to Abuja to participate in the national
convention of the party when he suddenly slumped and was rushed to the
hospital where he died. Mr Collins turned 49 last December. The
Secretary of the Lagos State PDP, Tunji Selle said the death was
shocking and came at a wrong time.

“The party will miss him. This is not
the time to lose a valuable member of the National Working Committee
who has always given the best of his ability for the party,” he said.