Month: October 2022

By Muhammad Abubakar

The news of the severe flooding in Jigawa State is depressing and alarming. I initially thought the report had reached every nook and cranny of the country. But the reverse is, unfortunately, the case. I was amazed to realize that the news has not gone very far in the country. Worse still, it is said that the state governor himself is currently out of the state.

I recently checked a couple of our local media sites to know more about the ongoing flooding, only to find out that; most of the news updates there have nothing to do with this deplorable disaster currently ravaging the state. It’s heartbreaking how many on-and off-line news outlets pay only lukewarm attention to this issue, although it should be discussed more than any other.

Jigawa State has never experienced such an alluvial disaster in its history. Many houses and villages collapsed; properties submerged; roads, bridges and farmlands were washed away, and crops ruined. Some have become orphans all due to this flooding!

The situation has reached the extent that the people of the affected areas can no longer move into their towns or travel out of the villages because their roads are not motorable. Also, thousands of people in the affected communities have been displaced. Canoes capsized. Lives were lost. Almost anywhere in the state has been negatively affected.

The most affected areas include Gumel, Mallam Madori, Auyo, Kaugama and Kafin Hausa local government areas. The flood has not only stopped here, but it also touched almost every part of the state. But yet, no tangible action has been taken on that by the government.

The federal government should therefore join hands with the state government to do the needful; deliver food, clothes, drugs and other useful items to the victims. May God, the omnipotent and omnipresent, end all the hardships we are going through in this country and the world.

Muhammad Abubakar wrote from Jos, Plateau State, via muhammadabubakar01002@gmail.com.

By Aliyu Nuhu

While congratulating the families of train victims for the safe return of their relatives, something very sad came to mind about the whole tragedy.

1- The ultimate winners are the terrorists. They achieved all their objectives without retribution. They have all their inmates released, collected hefty amounts of money in billions of Naira and foreign currencies and went away without losing a soul. Meanwhile they inflicted damages on Nigeria. They killed passengers, destroyed a train and stopped it from operation for seven months and instilled fear in the minds of Nigerians.

2- The biggest tragedy is that all the captives were released through payment of ransoms which impoverished family economies, some might never recover. The last victims were released by military committee which means more money were paid and the military might have also cornered part of the ransom money. In the whole saga there was no shooting, no arrest, not even declaring some people wanted. What kind of country do we have for God’s sake? Time will tell the kind of arrangement reached for the release of the victims.

3- We just have a paper military. What is there in a military that cannot use force on terrorists. There is nothing impressive about military that abandoned its trade and go to terrorists and pay ransoms. It is really a shame on NIGERIAN government.

4- As long as people benefit from train attacks and kidnapping there will be no end to this kind of tragedy. The terrorists have made a good, safe and profitable venture and have probably gone to plan another attack. Security agencies that benefit from it will be too willing to be part of the next attack. The Mamus that made billions from ransom negotiation will be waiting to make ransom harvest. A kidnapping Industry has been created by government’s inability to deal ruthlessly with criminals.

By Uzair Adam Imam

The presidential candidate of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, consoles with the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), saying their genuine requests had met with deaf ears in Nigeria.

Atiku Abubakar stated this in a statement he issued and signed on Wednesday in celebration of the United Nations’ World Teacher’s Day.

Abubakar’s impassioned statement decried about the incessant strike which has been eight months now since lecturers shut down public universities to press their demands home.

He stated, “I wish to observe this all-important day by identifying with Nigerian teachers. I wish to identify with them in their moment of grief occasioned by poor working conditions over the years.

“Specifically, I use this medium to console Nigerian university lecturers whose genuine requests have met with deaf ears, and who have now stayed for over seven months without salary.

“Teachers are the backbone of a nation. They are the bedrock on which national development rests. Indeed, many educators have opined that, no nation can rise higher than the quality of its education system, and no education system can rise higher than the quality of its teachers.

“This means that no nation can make any meaningful progress in any sector without having well-trained, experienced, happy and well-remunerated teachers. A situation where some states are owing teachers’ salaries of up to five months, or even more, is unacceptable,” he stated.

By Mohammed Aliyu

The National Peace Committee, headed by the former Head of State, General Abdulsalam Abubakar (retd.) and other elder statesmen would have been more respected and crucial had they played the committee with the grandeur it deserves. Established in 2014, the committee has not achieved anything following its record. As such, its function is nothing but a jamboree, where aspirants meet and share some private moments, thereby deceiving the gullible who trusted them by their words.

The vulnerability of the committee was so evident in 2019 when one of its members was seen dancing with another aspirant and denouncing the other candidate rather than playing neutral by preaching the peace he claimed to be advocating. Such an immodest attitude alone can create chaos, put doubt in the minds of other aspirants, and ridicule the entire process. Again, no need to mention names but a committee like this ought to have credible individuals that are all respected, who are also mindful of their utterances, actions and even public image – by extension, be less controversial.

To revisit the past, in 2015, President Goodluck Jonathan accepted defeat on his own without any influence from any quarter, as he stated in his book Transitional Hours. In 2019, electorates massively voted for President Buhari, yet no crisis was recorded. Still, the committee’s capacity has not been proven, although they claimed to have calmed Atiku Abubakar, who insistently went to court on his own but failed there.

The 2023 election that brought religion into politics is perhaps dosed with fear of violence, and this is the moment that the peace committee may save the country, but will they? The National Peace Committee is the initiation of some individuals that called themselves ‘Elder Statement’, and members were selected without merit. The peace committee is concerned with only the aftermath of election violence and not other forms of insecurity, let alone proffer solutions to lingering critical issues that the country is bedevilled with now and then. Like the present ASUU strike, agitations, persistent farmer/herder clashes, communal clashes, religious intolerance, and other vital issues that threaten national peace and security that may even not allow any election to hold.

To send a message that the peace committee is not credible, in 2019, PDP presidential aspirant Atiku Abubakar failed to attend the accord signing for reasons known to him. Instead, he went after the public ceremony. Bola Tinubu, another aspirant of APC, again failed to attend the September 2022 Peace Accord. Instead, he sent his running mate, Kashim Shettima. All this weakens the credibility and popularity of the committee. The priority given to candidates rather than parties is a clear sign that the peace agreement has lapses that must be corrected if they want to be relevant in the future. Electorates choose a party, not a candidate, even though they are by extension. Candidates are identified by their parties because, without the platform, they are idle. The peace committee must look inward and prioritise party chairpersons during such occasions. That way, they are dealing with an organisation, not an individual.

In my opinion, the National Peace Committee should be changed to the National Council of Elders, and their mandate should be transformed so that it will have a national look and have representatives from all sections of the country. The members should be credible people who are respected. They should advise the government on solutions to bring lasting peace before, during and after the election circle.

However, the interest of the National Peace Committee is not for peace to reign, nor for good governance but for the personal interest of what they may get in the new government. As such, expect nothing but flaws in their shoddy policies. While they are signing the accord in Abuja, I wish my fellow compatriots would do the same locally since we are the anticipated thugs that will cause violence.

Mohammed Aliyu wrote via aliyu.wasilu@gmail.com.

By Uzair Adam Imam

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has warned Nigerians against circulating fake recruitment links on social media and some online platforms.

The commission on Wednesday said the link, ‘inecnigeria.govservice.site’, is fake and aimed to defraud unsuspecting citizens.

It also reiterated that its original links remain: pres.inecnigeria.org and inecpress-app.com/pres, respectively.

It stated that its ad hoc recruitment exercise is free of charge, and no payment of any kind is required throughout the process.

“Our attention has been drawn to a fake ad hoc recruitment link being circulated on various social media platforms, frequently visited sites and blogs with the intention to defraud unsuspecting citizens.

“We implore Nigerians to disregard the fake link and avoid falling victims of swindlers,” the notice said.

Abdelghaffar Amoka Abdelmalik, PhD.

The major newspapers published the speech delivered by the president at the “Fourth National Summit on Diminishing Corruption in the Public Sector” on the 4th of October 2022. In the speech, the president said, “corruption in the education system from basic level to the tertiary level has been undermining our investment in the sector, and those who go on prolonged strikes on flimsy reasons are no less complicit.” The Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU, is the union on strike, so the newspapers reported it with headlines that “Buhari accuses ASUU of corruption”.

The president definitely does not have a thorough understanding of the issues that led to the strike else he won’t call the struggle for the proper funding of the universities, better conditions of service for lecturers, the release of the white paper on the visitation panel reports, among other important demands as “flimsy reasons”. It is sad and most unpardonable that the president has got no proper information on the structure and workings of the university. Otherwise, he would have queried that ridiculous and false statement when the speechwriter presented the speech to him for presentation. So unbelievable that our president is not aware that ASUU is not the same as the university management.

To correct this unfortunate misinformation from the president, in the university, there are heads of departments who are academics who receive N50,000 every 3 months for operational expenses. We have the Deans and Directors who are also academics which is the next level of leadership in the university. The Directorates receive N60,000 every 3 months for operational expenses. Is the misappropriation of these N20,000 per month, which comes irregularly that is corruption by ASUU members?

Then, we have the principal officers, which include the Vice-Chancellor (an academic), the Registrar (a non-academic), and the Bursar (a non-academic). There is also the Council chaired by an appointee of the government. You can’t appoint politicians looking for jobs as University Council chairs and blame ASUU for corruption. ASUU is just a union and does not manage the affairs of the university. Then, there is the Presidential visitation panel that is meant to visit the university every 5 years to check the management of the resources of the university.

It’s true that the management of the university could be corrupt. There is no doubt about it. But since the administration of President Buhari took over in 2015, the “corruption fighting” president seems to have found accommodation with corruption in the university that it failed to send a visitation panel to any federal university. ASUU was worried about that, and part of the demands of the 2020 ASUU strike was the constitution of the visitation panel to all federal universities. Paradoxically, it took the strike by the union of supposed “corrupt lecturers” for the anti-corruption FG to send visitation panels to the federal universities in 2021 to check “corruption”.

However, a year after the panels submitted their reports, the same FG that is accusing ASUU of corruption has refused to release the White Paper on the panels’ reports for implementation. Part of the demands of this strike is for FG to release the White Papers. The “corrupt ASUU” is pushing the anti-corrupt government to fight corruption in the university. Isn’t that amazing? It goes without saying by its inaction, indifference, and condemnable refusal to set up visitation panels and release the White Papers after ASUU forced it to set up visitation panels to all federal universities, the FG under President Buhari is aiding corruption in our universities.

Meanwhile, you can’t be complaining of corruption but rewarding alleged corrupt people. The former VC of the Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, that was accused of academic fraud, financial embezzlement, and administrative impunity by the ASUU branch of the university, made the list of the people to be awarded a national honour by the president. Same with the former Council Chairman of the Lagos State University, who, with the VC, deployed the pension of Staff for the purchase of luxurious cars.

Does it make sense to accuse the university managers of corruption and then nominate university managers that were accused of corruption for national honours without taking steps to investigate these allegations? That’s a joke. By the way, what is the correlation between the poverty wages of Nigerian academics with corruption in the universities? Does that explain why Nigerian lecturers are one of the poorest paid in the world?

The president further said that he task our academics to attract endowments, research, and other grants to universities, polytechnics, and colleges of education similar to what obtains in other countries. It has been rightly said that “if wishes are horses, beggars too will ride”. It does not take rocket science to know how those universities referenced achieved that. An endowment is not attracted by academics but by the university council and management. President Buhari should stop his trademark and uninspiring blame game and should be talking to the people he appointed as Council chairmen for our public universities.

The truth is, research grants are not attractive using an empty room as a lab. No international donor will fund empty space. Only the existence of avalanches and modern facilities are used to attract grants. When I got a PhD grant in 2008, I took the grant to a university in the UK because they have the required facilities for the research. For the 3 years, the UK university got thousands of pounds through me. That’s a return on investment. What have we put in place to attract such? That’s what we should be worried about. That’s why ASUU is asking for the required funds to be injected into the system to make our universities attractive for grants, as it’s obtained in other countries.

Despite the horrible condition of service of academics in the country, Nigerian academics are winning research grants. An Associate professor at Bayero University Kano recently received a research grant of £969,680 from Wellcome. A senior lecturer at Ahmadu Bello University Zaria recently won a research grant of about 48,000 USD from Geophysics Without Borders. Other researchers from the Federal University Dutse won a grant of $59,930 from The World Academy of Science (TWAS) and €220,801 from the African Academy of Science on renewable energy. These are just a few of the grants won by academics within the strike period.

The president’s speech was focused on ASUU, and the speechwriter chose his words with the utmost malice and mischief. There are sex scandals in every sector of the country. The rehash and blackmail of sex stories in the universities have become much like an expired drug with no potency. The stories of sex for jobs and contracts and sorting jobs and contracts in Abuja are in public space. Every sector has got the good, the bad, and the ugly. So, academia can’t be immune to the ills in our society.

But then, universities are still much better. They have rules and regulations that guide their operations, and they are enforced. Several lecturers have lost their jobs due to sex scandals or other similar offences. But we have a minister in this government that was accused of sexual harassment in 2020. If a student is a victim of such an act on campus and he or she refuses to report for appropriate actions to be taken, then you can’t blame ASUU for it.

Our Union frowns on sexual harassment in all its ramifications in our universities and is up in arms combating this evil. Hence, this speech which is similar to the words of their filthy-mouthed attack dog and other government agents at the presidency at this time, is an indication that it is either the people around the president are not telling him the truth about the strike or the depth of the poverty of sincerity is underestimated.

It is equally indicative that the administration has run out of ideas and initiatives to resolve a simple issue like the ongoing strike action. The Speaker of the House of Representatives, in an effort to bring an end to the 7-month-old crisis, has met with the president. Let’s hope that those agents of destruction around the president will allow him to think.

What baffled me is the fact that the Visitor to the university is publicly lamenting when he has not taken any action for 7 years to address all his allegations against the University. You are the president, sir. Please use your executive powers to solve problems, not passing bucks. Dear sir, you lament everything from the economy to insecurity to education, but lamentations won’t solve our problems. You need to be proactive, sir. You are the president; time is almost running out. Better late than never.

Finally, despite the way that academics in Nigerian public universities are handled, our research outputs are visible in the global research database. If political office holders should make one-tenth of the efforts and sacrifices made by academics in our public universities, they will be celebrated as heroes in office.

Professor Abdelghaffar Amoka Abdelmalik wrote from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.

By Dr. Isa Muhammad Inuwa

We woke up to the maddening, stunning macabre and grim sorrow of the demise of Sheikh Dr Youssef Al-Qardawi, renowned scholar and jihadist of international repute. As we weep profusely, both internally and outwardly, over this irreparable loss, his death indicates that the sun has set down for yet another era of Islam, as yet another chapter is closed.

Late Al-Qardawi can go down in history as a titanic whale in the fathomless ocean of Islamic knowledge and jurisprudence. He authored many valuable compendia and an estimated 120 to 200 books, famous among which is Al-Halal Wal Haram, that addressed and gave solutions to vital lawful and unlawful issues in Islam.

He was a contemporary of scholars and jihadists of like minds such as Sheikh Hasanul Bannah, Sayyid Qutub, Sa’eed Hawaah, Kishk and the rest. The personalities mentioned above formed the nucleus of the Islamic Brotherhood movement’ ‘Ikhwanul Muslimuuna’ in Egypt around the 1950s to 1960s.

Ikhwan’s formidable movement under the late Hassan Al-Banna’s leadership served as an alternative political group that brokered power in Egypt by participating in the democratic process and contesting political posts. Former president Muhammad Morsi was a testimony to Ikhwan’s influence in the mainstream politics of Egypt.

More so, the hitherto Islamic movement in Egypt, administered by vibrant and agile youths, had impacted and triggered similar gestures in many countries and Muslim communities worldwide.

While some Ikhwan eggheads, such as Hassan Al-Bannah, were martyred amidst the struggle, others, like the late Youssef Al-Qardawi, survived, lived longer and contributed to humanity on many fronts.

May The Almighty Allah accept the late Sheikh Qardawi and uplift his status in the highest and exalted Jannah, amen!

Dr Isa Muhammad Inuwa writes from Bayero University, Kano, Nigeria, via ismi2000ng@yahoo.com.

By Muhammadu Sabiu

After losing 1-0 to Inter Milan on Tuesday, Barcelona is in danger of not making it out of their Champions League group.

They now have three points from three games as a result of the outcome.

At the San Siro stadium, Hakan Calhanoglu scored the game’s lone goal to give Inter all three points.

Bayern Munich leads the group with a perfect nine points after defeating Barcelona 2-0 in the most recent round of games.

With six points, Inter is in second place, ahead of Barca, as there is still no point for Viktoria Plzen.

Next week’s matchup between Inter and Barcelona will take place at Camp Nou.

Barcelona have also gone five games in a row in the Champions League without scoring.

By Ahmad Deedat Zakari

The Presidential Candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, has been conferred with honorary citizenship of the county of Dallas in Texas, United States of America.

Peter Obi disclosed this in a tweet on Wednesday, October 5, 2022.

“Today in Dallas Texas United States, I met with the Mayor of Dallas and his team. I had the privilege of being conferred with the honorary citizenship of Dallas. I also met with a select group of Texas Judges.” He tweeted

Speaking at the ceremony of the conferment, the Mayor of Dallas, Eric Johnson said that the Labour Party presidential candidate shall uphold a place of high esteem in the minds of the people of Dallas city.

“Without a piece of doubt, with this conferment, you shall uphold a place of high esteem in the minds and hearts of the people of this great city (Dallas). Congratulations!,” he said.

Muhammad Sabi’u

Two persons narrowly escaped death after a truck crashed into a submerged road in the Buji Local Government Area of Jigawa State on Monday, 3rd October, 2022.

This was contained in a statement obtained by journalists from CSC Adamu Shehu, the NSCDC’s spokesperson for the Nigerian Security and Civil Defense Corps.

According to him, the incident occurred when a truck with the license plate XP361EPE lost direction while crossing the section of the Sara-Gantsa road that was underwater and was filled with metal pieces.

He noted that, as soon as the NSCDC authorities received the report, they sped to the spot and were successful in saving the victims.

According to reports, the NSCDC had issued a warning to truck and long vehicle drivers asking them not to travel on the state’s waterlogged roadways.