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My Ordeal at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport by Konyinsola Olukoya

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I disembarked from the BA 083 flight on Friday, 16th of September, 2022 at 04.45am and headed straight to the Port Health Services desk. An official requested for my permit to fly( QR code), so I presented it to her. Not satisfied she requested for my COVID 19 vaccination card, I presented her the soft copy but she said it was incomplete hence inadequate. She then requested for the hard copy, so I told her I didn’t have it and if the soft copy I presented to her was inadequate it wouldn’t have generated the QR code. She insisted I presented it and I told her it was at home. I was asked to either ask someone at home to bring it to me at the airport or send someone to pick it up for me at home. I told her nobody had access to where the card was kept except me. She was very polite while all that ensued.

She then referred me to a lady, called Fatima, another Port Health Services staff. So I was led by Fatima to an inner room where some other passengers were sat and was asked by a man called Fortune to sit. Mr Fortune and Ms Fatima were both very rude and hostile not just to me but other passengers. After a long wait pandemonium erupted in the room because the passengers didn’t understand why they were being treated rudely in their own country. We sat without being told the next line of action. So I sought to know the next line of action from Mr Fortune the personnel in the room. He handed me a form to fill. I looked through the form and realized it was the same form I had filled in London which generated the QR code I had presented to them. So I asked him what the next line of action would be if I filled the form again. He rudely told me I would be unvaccinated!!
I was confounded and then asked him how that works. He told me that was all he could do. I then reiterated that I had been fully vaccinated and went on to tell him the centers I got vaccinated. He wouldn’t bulge. So I asked him if he was going to drain the vaccine in my system to unvaccinate me.

Exhausted and enraged, I left to meet Ms Fatima to ask if I could hand in my passport to her so that I could be released to go home to pick up my passport. She acceded to my request. I brought out my passport and my family friend who works at the airport collected it from me and handed it to Ms Fatima in my presence. He had come in to look for me because he was curious when he saw my luggage unclaimed. Whilst Ms Fatima held on to my passport some British Airways senior staff well known to me, saw me there and asked what was going on. They pleaded with Ms Fatima to release me to go home to pick my vaccination card and that they would act as my sureties. She refused and asked that Mr Kenneth called her boss, Dr Izu. He spoke with Dr Izu and passed the phone to me. My conversation with Dr Izu further enraged me because I got to know from him that if I had paid for a COVID 19 test I would have been let off the hook immediately. So I told him in my several hours of waiting and subjection to his colleagues; being spoken to with belligerence no one mentioned the option of paying for a COVID 19 test!!! Which for me would have been an easy pass. I was upset and asked if they were employed to humiliate citizens. Because I did not understand why none of them mentioned the option of paying for a Covid test while all the drama ensued. I’m not a recalcitrant citizen, I would have paid for a Covid test immediately knowing I didn’t have the hard copy of my vaccination card on me but I wasn’t given the option. I was only told I would be unvaccinated. Dr Izu, apologized on their behalf and released me. At this time my passport was still with Ms Fatima. I requested for it to proceed to the immigration desk. Then she started searching for it. Ms Fatima had no explanation for where she placed my passport. No one amongst everyone at the desk stepped out except Ms Fatima. So we all wondered how the passport disappeared! At the time my passport was handed to her all the passengers but 3 had left. My passport was only with her for some minutes before I asked for it, so what did she do with my passport? At this point I was agitated and told Dr Izu I had to get off the phone because Fatima seemed to be up to no good with my passport. He insisted on explaining about the situation at the airport to me. So I told him I had to get my passport and he was trivializing a major issue. I then hung up on him and requested for my passport from Fatima. He called me back again and told me to go home, he will get my passport back to me that afternoon. Not satisfied I waited to see if she would bring it out. Her other colleagues also searched for it. I emptied my handbag to ascertain my passport wasn’t in it. This went on till about 8.30am.

I was exhausted, confused and frustrated. Dr Izu asked me to leave that he would ensure my passport was found. The crux of the matter was how I was going to be let off the airport without a passport. Fortunately, the immigration officers at the airport were very discretionary and compassionate. Apparently informed about my ordeal, once I approached them, they empathized with me and told me they will let me out because they had established that I’m a Nigerian.

Then I called Dr Izu in the afternoon of that same day. He pleaded with me not to report the case to anyone, that I should give them 48hrs grace to get my passport to me. The person who came to help me at the airport was blackmailed to beg me to stay action on my threat to report the incident to the relevant authorities. On Saturday I told Dr Izu I had informed some government officials and he was unequivocal about his displeasure. He told me he had advised not to report the incident to anyone, so I told him it was my passport and I had every right to do everything to get it back.

By Monday, Dr Izu stopped answering my calls, so I made further calls to get some high level intervention because I had assumed that all responsible and patriotic government officials will find this situation very embarrassing to the nation and at least be compassionate enough to understand that it could happen to anyone, even a foreigner. My aunty got the DSS involved. I was asked to write the Inspector General of Police, which I did. I informed all the Ministers who should be directly involved with this matter. Only one of them has repeatedly and kindly called to get an update!

On Thursday, 22nd September, I was told the CCTV footage was going to be viewed and I insisted on being part of it, the Director of Port Health Services at the airport, called me and agreed to wait for me to view the CCTV footage. It was watched by everyone involved, including security agents. It was seen and established that Fatima collected my passport and at no point did she return it to me or anyone. She was only seen going out of the hall after she had collected my passport and when she returned she claimed she couldn’t find it!

To my utter shock, her boss Dr OYOH has only been pre occupied with re writing the incident. He’s most interested in lying to cover up for the Lady who stole my passport. I was even accused of being in possession of my passport and claiming it was stolen. I was spoken to rudely in the presence of the DSS boss in his desperate bid to cover up. He even told me; his words ‘ Madam there are things you let go, let this go’! Then the DSS official told him it wasn’t in his place to say that to me. He even boasted about how the Minister of Aviation could not have gotten me to view the CCTV footage at the airport in front of the DSS director. He said he had several passports with him between 500 to 3000 passports. Where in the world will that happen, except Nigeria?! A health worker?!

It’s been a month and a day today. Fatima is still moving around freely, going to work despite stealing my passport. I trust that the DSS is carrying out a thorough investigation to get my passport out, the Nigerian Police Force has commenced investigation. I’ll sue Fatima and the Port Health Services. I MUST GET MY PASSPORT BACK! I’m so distraught! This is unbelievable!!! Incomprehensible!

PORT HEALTH SERVICES’ Staff are a Menace at the Abuja airport. Not all but majority are inept, inscrutable; they lack emotional intelligence and arrogantly ignorant….. They are Certified crooks. I have never in my life experienced anything like this.

My sin is that I’ve been civil with them. If I had shut down the airport that day. I wouldn’t be without my passport today.

So I’m advising the public to be careful with the Port Health Services staff at the airport, please ensure they have nothing to do with your passport as it’s clear to me that there’s a syndicate involved in passport trafficking amongst them.

My passport has several multiple entry visas on it. This situation has been so disturbing and distracting.

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Opinion

Fani-Kayode: The Man and His Belly

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By Danjuma Garba
We are disturbed by the recent inciting comments by a former Aviation Minister and Director of News Media, All Progressive Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council, Femi Fani-Kayode.
Recently, the media has been awash with reports of Fani-Kayode’s inciting rhetoric targeted at causing ethnic disharmony and widespread violence across the nation. We can no longer continue to ignore his excesses as they pose a grave danger to our democracy, unity and security.
Recall that his ethnic profiling and inciting statements fuelled unprecedented violence against non-Yoruba voters in Lagos State at the just-concluded governorship poll. We find totally unacceptable, his recent threat to make the country ungovernable should Bola Ahmed Tinubu not be sworn in. This is a threat against national peace and security and should not be ignored by all relevant security agencies.
Already, his rancorous and misguided outbursts had attracted the attention of the international community. A British envoy addressed him and pointed out the dangers of his inciting statements. However, instead of retracting his statements, he went wild against the envoy with derogatory remarks and tirades unbefitting of a supposed statesman.
Femi Fani-Kayode is infamous in Nigeria for his opportunistic political misadventures. He is a rabble-rouser whose only political value is the noise he makes and the ripples of disaffection it causes.
He has never contested, won or lost an election. His is to parasitically attach himself to the winning side and look for any available financial opportunity to sustain his extravagant and drug-ridden lifestyle.
He is a craven man who rides behind the trails of valiant men to glean the spoils of war. And while waiting for the spoils, he can go to the extremes of verbal assaults, name-calling and denigration of opponents.
His method of political engagement is crude, savage, hostile and barbaric. He does not spare vices however indecorous in his quest to appear loyal to his paymasters.  He is a known groveler who does the “dirty jobs” for his paymasters in return for “food”. Former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo’s description of him as a foodie who does the bidding of anyone who gives him “food” is very apt. He is a man with zero integrity and decorum.
As a result of his unprincipled approach to life in general, and to politics in particular, he has no allegiance to any political party or ideology. He has loyalty only to his stomach. And when he is done eating, he scatters the table and spites the host. His eloquence is fuelled by the sight of food rather than being inspired by a cause, reason or logic. He is a political pariah who, like a hawk, flies about looking for only what to eat.
Femi Fani-Kayode is such a despicable figure that is awful and abhorrent in private life and unfit for public offices.
No wonder, he has been married four times, and all four women left him. No one can cope with Femi’s childish, belligerent, narcissistic and immoral behaviour. His mouth is full of bile proceeding from the dark enclaves of his bankrupt and untutored soul.
One wonders what a man who has failed in virtually everything, is doing in the corridors of power. For being unable to lead his private life, he is totally unfit to lead others. He is a confirmed public and private failure.
The incompetent junkie once blamed

witches for the plane crashes that happened under his watch as the aviation minister.
But how did Femi Fani-Kayode come about? Available records show that he was born to Chief Remilekun Adekunbo Fani-Kayode. Femi trained as a lawyer, a supposed educated man.
In age, Femi is supposed to be a man in his sixties being born on 16 October, 1960, but in character and conduct, he is a delinquent adolescent always running in and out of trouble with his unbridled tongue.
With his unstable and volatile character, one doubts if his education goes beyond his ability to read and write. Education is beyond mere literacy; it refines character, shapes perceptions, enhances tolerance and imparts civility.
The sum total of these is what is called civilization. But Fani-Kayode lacks the basic ingredients of true education. His uncouth manners speak more of a pretentious barbarian at the gate of civilization than of a truly educated and civilized person. His ethnic bigotry smacks of a pre-historic man in a band of hunters and fruit gatherers. His level of clannishness and intolerance is totally antithetical to civilization.
What an educated head ruled by a bankrupt mind and moribund soul! He refused to allow his intellectual engagements to tamper with his ethnic crudity and absurdity.
He represents the fading generation of African elites who continue to hold on to sentiments that are intolerant of others and inimical to a free, fair and inclusive society. They are the worst hindrance to inter-ethnic harmony and national unity in Africa.
Femi pathetically carries underneath his flamboyant attire, a deeply troubled, stark naked, abysmally wretched and utterly miserable soul. Such a pity!
It is against all sensibility that such an unhinged and irresponsible fellow should be elevated to the point of having political visibility in a civilized and democratic society. In saner climes, moral imbeciles like him are quarantined as societal outcasts and persona non grata.
Though his ill-fated foray into politics began quite early, whatever patronage he has enjoyed came on the heels of his family’s name and influence rather than on the strength of his personal merit or capacity. He lacks in totality, the character and conduct of an adult, let alone the attributes of a statesman.
We, therefore, call on the ruling party to amend their initial mistake of appointing Femi Fani-Kayode into their campaign council by distancing themselves from his inciting and bigoted comments.
He is such a political liability and should not be considered for any political appointment in both the nearest and distant future. Already, he is trying to cause a diplomatic row between Nigeria and the United Kingdom with his recent tantrum against the British Deputy High Commissioner to Nigeria, Ben Llewellyn-Jones, who tried to address his excesses.
We would be forced to believe that Femi Fani-Kayode is doing the biddings of the ruling party to destroy Nigeria if drastic punitive actions are not taken against him.
Finally, we call on the Inspector General of Police, and the Directorate of State Security (DSS) to arrest within 48hours, Femi Fani-Kayode for posing a grave threat to national security with his ceaseless inciting statements and ethnic profiling. This is to serve as a deterrent to other tribal bigots, and overzealous politicians.

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Opinion

Open Letter to Bayo Onanuga by Richard Akinnola

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My dear Bayo,

I hope you are now happy and satisfied, that the National Broadcasting Commission(NBC) has sanctioned CHANNELS with a N5 million fine, following your petition over the Datti Ahmed’s interview on CHANNELS.

Chief Gani Fawehinmi and Dr Olu Onagoruwa ( both of blessed memories) were the best of friends for several years but that friendship was truncated when the latter decided to join the Abacha junta as the Attorney-General, churning out despicable Decrees. Their relationship ended and Gani publicly upbraided his erstwhile friend.

You and l have been friends for several years, fought many battles together against the military, particularly against their onslaught on the free press. I therefore feel terribly pained that l have to publicly upbraid you for your recent public statements, particularly your petition against CHANNELS tv, to the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC). Et tu, Bayo? I’m still trying to wrap my heads round your sudden 360 degrees against all you fought for under the military. You are yet to be in government and you have started exhibiting intolerance against the independent media, the same thing you fought for all your years, like Dr Onagoruwa did. I’m sure your principal, who has been a lover of free press, would be embarrassed by your position.

I watched the interview under reference and l must say, you are VERY UNFAIR to Seun Okinbaloye, the anchor man who repeatedly cautioned Datti Ahmed for making some seemingly inciting comments, to the anger and discomfiture of Datti Ahmed. So, in all conscience, what then is the basis of your petition to the NBC? Can you compare that to your recent incendiary post against an ethnic group? Why are you making enemies for your principal, instead of friends, in a country so polarized? While your principal is preaching unity and healing, you are busy trying to make more enemies for him. Yesterday, it was ARISE, today, it is CHANNELS. Is that a foretaste of what to experience in the incoming government? So, we should be fixated on NTA and TVC, isn’t that what you are trying to tell proverbially? To say that I’m totally embarrassed by your silly conduct, would be stating it mildly.

For eight years, despite all vitriolic attacks on the president, Femi Adesina, as Special Adviser, Media to the president, did not petition against any medium but you wey never enter, don dey censor the media. What a shame! I can expect the disaster that awaits us if you become the presidential spokesperson. Do l subscribe to unfettered press freedom? No. I believe every freedom comes with responsibility. However, when you create a perception that the incoming government would be intolerant of the free press, we need to sound the alarm bell.

My dear Bayo, it is often said that until a man tastes power or has access to money, you can’t judge his character. That may not be totally true because one of our mutual friends, Tunji Bello, has tasted both but has been his normal self that l have known for over three decades. His decent character has not changed, in and out of government. So, could it be that your real character is just unfolding? Just because you are now at the periphery of power, you are ready to obliterate all the values and principles you held all these years. What a shame!

TAKE NOTICE that we would fight this your planned “insurrection” against the independent media the way we, including you, fought Abacha’s dictatorship against the media.

RICHARD AKINNOLA

Postscriptum: Before l wrote this open letter, l had informed some of our mutual friends, so that they won’t feel embarrassed.

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Opinion

Voice of Emancipation: Who Will Pay Buhari’s Debt?

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By Kayode Emola

In less than two months, President Mohammadu Buhari will relinquish the exalted position of President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. He will however, not take with him the huge debt he bestowed on the country, and that would be left for both the incoming and future governments or their successor when Nigeria eventually breaks up to pay. The question remains as to who will pay this huge debt as there are over 130 million Nigerians living below the poverty line today.

Just this week, the Chinese government rejected Buhari’s further request for an additional loan of ₦10.1trn ($22bn), from the China-Exim Bank which was earlier approved by the morally bankrupt Nigeria National Assembly. The said loan was intended to fund the modernisation of the Kano – Kaduna segment of the Nigerian Railway. The obvious question to ask is, how much has that Railway line generated in the past 3 years to justify that humongous loan facilities for an outgoing government.

This is not minding the fact that Buhari is leaving the Nigerian people with ₦46.25trn ($101.87bn) external debt and a financially depressed nation. With the cost of living biting hard and many strong financial institutions around the world feeling the pinch, I believe it is time to take stock. We recall that Buhari came to power on a mandate of hope, however, if there is anything to go by in the last 8-years, it is anything but hope, in fact, I believe Nigerians should be very afraid of the direction the country is going.

A lot of the self-determination activists who are not well grounded in freedom struggle believe our quest for freedom stemmed from the extrajudicial killing by the armed Fulani militia. That is not the basis of our decision to leave an unproductive country like Nigeria. Many of our people are facing far more untimely death on a daily basis because of bad governance in Nigeria and this cannot continue without a permanent solution which is a total withdrawal from the Nigeria framework. The people in power are creating more havoc on ordinary Nigerians than all the armed terrorist groups put together.

This is a compelling reason why we must be more vocal and succinct in our message delivery to the ordinary man on the street, who is not well-versed or have reliable information. With our teeming population and abundant natural resources, Nigeria should be among the 5 biggest economies in the world. The recent developmental strides in Dubai and Qatar are supposed to be child’s play compared to Nigeria’s achievement in the last 62 years of independence. Our economy is however led by reckless government officials, who have riddled with loans that cannot be repaid if we continue on this trajectory.

To my fellow Yoruba countrymen who are happy that a Yoruba man is going to be President of Nigeria, a country with a fraudulent constitution, and hoping for a miracle. I will say, think again; as I pity our stupidity for lack of wisdom. We will come to bite our fingers in the nearest future if we don’t double our efforts right now to get out of Nigeria. If we remain trapped in this contraption called Nigeria for whatever reason, either by our own making or otherwise, then our children and future generations may never forgive our docility.

We cannot continue to live in a country where we the Yoruba contribute the largest share of its revenue, yet has nothing to show for it, order than parade political jobbers as an achievement. If that is not stupidity, then I will like to know what happened to free basic education and healthcare started over 70 years in Yorubaland by Chief Awolowo. Yet, many of our children are now out of school because their parents can’t afford exorbitant school fees in private facilities. Why are we allowing many innocent lives to die because of poor health facilities and a lack of adequate social amenities?

The lists of vices go on and on, which I wouldn’t want to dwell on. I will only want to drive home one fact, the only solution is the complete exit from the Nigerian structure. If anyone is thinking we can remain in Nigeria and develop our region, it is like eating your cake and hoping to have it again at the end of the day.

The time for ‘uhuru’ (freedom) is now and we must do everything within our power to get it. I see many power tussles going on in the self-determination struggle itself, and this is not a healthy environment to thrive. We need to consolidate our efforts, not by forcing people into submission but by dialogue, without which we cannot get a consensus. Without that, we will continue to toil endlessly with nothing to show for it.

I implore all the acclaimed self-determination groups to as a matter of urgency come together and chart a way forward for the Yoruba struggle. Without that, many people will be doing excellent work in their closest but may not be enough to reach the end goal which is a free independent Yoruba nation.

I hope talented people will be given the opportunity to thrive so that the necessary tools needed to accelerate our struggle are put to good use. The Yoruba nation is within reach, but it risks being jeopardised by many charlatans who know nothing about the struggle for an independent nation. We can continue to dance around, but if we don’t hit the nail on the head, we may remain on this mountain for a long time to come. My prayer is that we get it right on time so that we can save the millions of our trapped population in poverty with no hope of salvation.

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