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South East Economy: End of Sit-at-Home in Sight

Published

2 months ago

July 30, 2023

Eric

By Eric Elezuo

The turn of events in recent times is proving that the unpopular sit-at-home order of a faction of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), led by Finland based Simon Ekpa, may come to an end soon.

This is going by the welcomed intervention of the acclaimed Supreme leader of the group, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, through a handwritten letter directing the immediate end of the order. The sit-at-home order has been in place in the South East since August 9, 2021 to press for the demand of Mazi Kanu, who has been in the custody of the Department of State Services (DSS) after he was renditioned to Nigeria in June 2021.

Originally slated to be observed any day Kanu was billed to appear in court for trial in honour, the order extended to every Monday in addition to days of court appearance. With time, and with the alleged leadership of Ekpa from faraway Finland, the order has been called at random, sometimes extending to cover a whole one week.

Consequently, the observance of the forced holiday has grounded economic activities in the region, leading to an estimated loss of N7.6 trillion in productivity, as reported by The Guardian, potential investments as well as loss of lives and personal and government property.

But a twist recorded over the weekend showed that Kanu has come out to call the Ekpa-led group to order, describing it as infamous and reckless, and asking that the unholy order be dropped forthwith.

Confirming the authenticity of the letter by Kanu, IPOB, in a statement, by its Media and Publicity Secretary, Emma Powerful, emphasozed the importance of the letter, saying: “The global family and movement of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) confirms the authenticity of the handwritten note of our Leader penned to the Finland infiltrator and crime minister instructing him to end his infamous and reckless sit-at-homes.

“It is pertinent to make the message disassociating Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and IPOB from the senseless enforcement of sit-at-home public to avoid consequences on innocent citizens.

“Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, in his wisdom, communicated the message to the infiltrators through the right channel and a source they should trust. The claims that Mazi Nnamdi Kanu’s handwritten note is fake is part of their mischief to continue in their contract to blackmail IPOB and Mazi Nnamdi Kanu with the violent enforcement of the infamous sit-at-homes used to terrorise our people.

“We understand that a power-drunk crime Minister with his inconsequential kangaroo defacto government in exile will ignore the order for the fear of deflating his over-bloated ego.”

He explained that IPOB leadership initiated the Monday sit-at-home in protest of the abduction and rendition of their leader and to make sure that the Nigeria government arraigned Mazi Nnamdi Kanu openly, in a public court where they could see him.

“But our leader instructed that it be suspended so that we don’t torture our people.

“In line with the principle of command and control, we obeyed, and the sit-at-home order was suspended. However, infiltrators who don’t believe in the principle of command and control, which is a core value of IPOB, ignored the order from our leader.”

He said Mazi Nnamdi Kanu had sent messages through his visitors at the Department of State Security (DSS) detention camp to the infiltrators to stop the reckless sit-at-home several times, all to no avail.

“Senator Enyinnaya Abaraibe tabled this message in the red chamber of the Senate, what Mazi Nnamdi Kanu told them when they visited him in the DSS custody with Ohaneze Ndigbo delegates in the DSS headquarters Abuja, where he was illegally and unconstitutionally detained in DSS solitary confinement since June 2021.

“When our leader called for complete peace in Biafraland and to protect our people instead of killing them in one of his court appearances, he was referring to the infiltrators to stop their infamous enforcement of sit-at-home orders and enforcement. That call went on deaf ears. This last message in his handwriting is the last straw.”

Sn investigation conducted by The Guardian revealed that that “since the Monday sit-at-home started, productivity has seriously dwindled in the region; jobs are threatened; there is loss of confidence by investors; insecurity has increased; and there is a near collapse in the infrastructure of the region with the attendant spike in social vices.”

More revelations prove that “between the commencement of the exercise in 2021 and this year, 105 Mondays of the 520 working days have been lost in terms of productivity or any real economic activity. This leaves the South-east region with 415 days in which her people are expected to go to work. Of the remaining 415 days, public holidays declared by the government further deplete the available productivity period in the region.”

It is worthy of worth that successive governors have either attempted to put a stop to the crisis, or buckled under threats of reprisal. Most citizens of the five South East states of Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo, who at one time or another another to flout the order and open for business, have either have their businesses destroyed or loose their lives in the bargain. A cross section of Nigerians have mocked the governors, holding that Ekpa is the authentic governors of the South East.

But with the arrival of Governor Peter Mba of Enugu State, moves were made to arrest the crisis. Stakeholders have however, argued that the government of Enugu State has put the cart before the horde as they went after the people instead of after of the perpetrators of the crime.

“What I think the Mba-led government should have done is found a way to tackle the menace through outright military incursion or negotiation. He can’t just ask people to flout the order and go their businesses when stories abound as to the consequences of the act. Most people have e in the past been summarily shot and killed. So it was not nice for the governor to ask the people to take such huge risk when there is no safety measures remotely or physically put in place,” a resident told The Boss.

While Anambra state governor, Prof Charles Soludo had during his swearing in on March 17, 2022 stated that every day that there was sit-at-home, the poor masses of the state lose as much as an estimated N19.6billion, the governor of Enugu said that state ‘loses N10 billion every Monday that people observed sit-at-home in the state, stressing that the trend was endangering the $30 billion GDP projection of his administration’.

Mba noted: “It should never be heard that we were cowed because of the threat of violence by these criminals”. He added “the poverty that will befall us for sitting at home will kill us even faster.

“We are losing over N10bn every Monday that we sit at home. Enough is enough. This foolishness must end and it must end now. We cannot marginalise ourselves and still complain of marginalisation.

“So, we must say no to sit-at-home because what it means is that we are destroying our employment, our economy, and our GDP. We must erase it from our memories. We should see it as our shameful past, which we do not want to remember. We must put it behind us and forge ahead, ensuring that we work every working day of the week.”

The abject poverty the exercise has bestowed on the people of the South East remains rather unquantifiable as it has encroached into the education of the pupils and students of the region.

In solidarity with Kanu’s reverse order, Enugu youths, on Saturday, stormed the streets in peaceful protest with inscribed placards reading: “Even Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is Against Sit-at-Home” and “Sit-at-Home Discourages Economic Progress”.

Others are: “We say NO to Enemies of our Dear State and region”; “Sit-at-Home Affects our Mental Health”; Sit-at-home is Affecting our Children Education” and “We Cannot Continue this Way” among others.

It is believed that compliance with the instruction of Nnamdi Kanu through the handwritten letter will bring about a boost in the economic activities of the region and ensure revenue turnover.

The way it stands, everyone in the South East is tired of the ‘illegal sit-at-home order’, and wishes a reverse. And with Kanu’s dissociation of himself from the act, it is now a between behind the South East regin and Simon Ekpa.

Featured

The Travail of Tinubu’s Tourism Minister, Lola Ade-John

Published

19 hours ago

September 30, 2023

Eric

By Eric Elezuo

Just weeks after her confirmation as the Minister of Tourism, seasoned banker and foreign-based tech investor, Lola Ade-John, has been hospitalised in Abuja following reports of acute poisoning she suffered from unknown origins, says a Peoples Gazette report. The medium added that her family members and immediate colleagues fear that time was running against their efforts to save her life.

The Boss learnt that Lola Ade-John, who is 60, was rushed to the Federal Medical Centre, Jabi, Abuja, shortly after she started manifesting symptoms of her poisoning, according to family sources familiar with her ordeal. As the time of filing this report, a source says that the minister has spent five days at the facility as at Saturday morning.

The source further revealed that Ade-John, who is a career banker and tech expert, has been on a machine to aid her breathing. The specifics as to what substance she ingested and how could not be immediately established by The Gazette, which broke the news. The paper also revealed that the Police and the State Security Service did not immediately return a request on whether or not any investigations had been opened into the matter.

Her worsening situation has further set the family against the government, with the permanent secretary of her ministry said to be in disagreement as to whether she should continue receiving treatment at a public hospital or be moved to a better-equipped private facility downtown.

The permanent secretary, Ngozi Onwudike, it was further stated, was said to have insisted that the minister should not be transferred because the FMC is a public hospital and its services wouldn’t attract substantial charges to the government, a position her family rebuffed. But they remained with her as they could not raise funds to move her to a private hospital, our sources said. A phone number for the permanent secretary did not connect on Friday morning.

A spokesperson for the FMC did not immediately return a request seeking comments from The Gazette about Ms Ade-John’s condition.

Ms Ade-John was appointed as a minister by President Bola Tinubu in August. She was immediately touted as one of the few cabinet members appointed from outside the political beltway. She was based in London for years before she was asked to return to the country to serve by the president.

Stakeholders in the Tourism told The Boss that Ade-John was expected as a special guest software honour at the just concluded World Tourism Day held in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, but she failed to turn up raising concerns as to her health.

A source from the Tourism sector, who craved anonymity lamented that it was a very healthy Ade-John that took over the ministry in August, but wondered why just a few weeks after, she is battling for her life over alleged poisoning.

“Though there is no available medical information, but it is heavily suspected to be poison,” a Tourism sector source told The Boss.

However, a family source, who also prefers to speak behind identity revelation, has revealed that the report of poisoning is true, but not the poisoning as most people know it, saying that it is a case of ‘food poisoning’, adding that the report of conventional poisoning in the media space is a product of ‘junk journalism’.

“She has had a bad case of food poisoning compounded by bad malaria. She hasn’t been poisoned by anybody at all. That’s junk journalism at work!

“Also, she’s in a private hospital not a government hospital and no problem at all about funding from her private resources. Further junk journalism! She is receiving treatment and on the way to recovery, no life threatening situation.

“Temi, her daughter, came into Nigeria yesterday because she was understandably concerned about her Mother,” the source exclusively revealed to The Boss.

But the Commissioner of Police, Federal Capital Territory Police Command, Haruna Garba, has ordered the State Criminal Investigation Department to immediately take over from the Mabushi Police Division, on the ongoing investigation into the alleged poisoning.

The FCT Police Command Public Relations Officer, SP Josephine Adeh, revealed the development on Saturday in an exclusive telephone interview with The Punch.

“The CP has ordered the Mabushi Police Division that was investigating the matter to immediately transfer it to the SCID,” SP Adeh was quoted as saying.

Lola Ade John is a 1984 B.Sc graduate of the University of Ibadan, who majored in Computer Science. Her exceptional performance in her academic sojourn earned her the honour of being the top graduate of her class that year.

Presently, Lola Ade John is the Principal Consultant at Novateur Business Technology Consultants, a company she founded in 2014. The firm specialises in providing technical management and consulting services to both private and public sector clients, helping them improve their operations and performance through the application of technology systems knowledge and operational techniques.

She was invited from her base in the United Kingdom to come and serve in the Tinubu-led government.

Featured

Rotary Africa Donates $25k, Mobilizes Funds, Support for Morocco

Published

2 days ago

September 29, 2023

Eric

Rotary International Zone 22, which covers the whole of Africa, has made an initial donation of $25,000 to help the disaster relief effort going on in Morocco while also calling for more funds, donations and support for the people following a devastating earthquake.

According to statement by Rotary International Director, Patrick Chisanga, “Rotary stands in solidarity with the people of Morocco as we witnessed the unprecedented devastation caused by a catastrophic earthquake. Our hearts go out to the affected families, and we mourn the tragic loss of lives.

While the 5th All Africa Zone 22 Institute was ongoing in Lusaka, on 8th September, and with members from across Africa in attendance, we received the distressing news of this earthquake, and our immediate response was to offer support and comfort to those affected.

“Rotary clubs in Europe and Africa including in Morocco have raised funds and mobilised material support for the relief efforts. An initial $25,000 was approved by the Rotary Foundation to immediately go to the disaster relief efforts and more grants are being developed.

“Our partner organisation, Shelter Box and others have supported in raising support for shelter and related needs of affected individuals.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of Morocco, particularly our fellow Rotarians, Rotaractors and their families who have endured immense suffering. We also wish a swift recovery to all those injured in this calamity.

In our commitment to making a difference in times of crisis, Rotary International is actively engaged in providing assistance and support to the relief efforts in Morocco. To this end, we have established direct communication channels for Rotary Districts willing to mobilize support in any form. Clubs and Districts can contact District Governor Saadia Aglif on +212 661 135750 for further information on how they can contribute to the relief efforts directly in Morocco.

Furthermore, the Rotary Foundation Trustees have set up the Morocco Earthquake Response Fund, a dedicated fund to provide immediate relief to those affected by the earthquake. Donors can contribute directly to this fund to aid the ongoing relief efforts. Contributions to this fund will be accepted until 31 December 2023. Districts are encouraged to apply for grants from this fund until 21 September 2024 or until the funds have been fully allocated. Any remaining contributions after 21 September 2024 will be directed to the general Disaster Response Fund, which supports disaster relief efforts worldwide.

· Rotarians can give online, by cheque or by transferring District Designated Funds through https://my.rotary.org/disaster-response-fund

· To give by check, make it payable to The Rotary Foundation or an associate foundation, and include a completed contribution form. In the DESIGNATION/PURPOSE section, choose “Other” and write the fund name (Morocco Earthquake Response Fund).

· To allocate District Designated Funds, district leaders can use the DDF contribution form.

· We also call upon individuals and organizations to join us in raising funds to support the Morocco Earthquake Response Fund. You can start a fundraiser on Raise for Rotary, a platform that currently accepts 12 currencies. Contributions made through fundraisers for this fund on Raise for Rotary will be credited and recognized and acknowledged as described on the Rotary website.

Rotary International Director (RID) for Africa, Patrick Chisanga urges everyone to come together in this time of crisis and demonstrate the true spirit of Rotary by providing much-needed relief and support to the people of Morocco. He said, “we believe that our collective efforts can make a significant difference in the lives of those affected by this tragedy”.

“The expertise of Rotarians and Rotaractors across Africa, will be available and essential in assisting clubs in Morocco respond effectively to the needs of their communities. RID Patrick has pledged the support of all Regional and Zone Coordinators’ in grants and projects development to support the clubs in Morocco during this crises”

Featured

Tourism Minister, Lola John Allegedly Poisoned, Fighting for Life in Abuja Hospital

Published

2 days ago

September 29, 2023

Eric

The Minister of Tourism, Lola Ade-John, has been hospitalised in Abuja after suffering acute poisoning from unknown origins, says a Peoples Gazette report, adding that her family members fear time was running against their efforts to save her life.

Lola Ade-John, 60, was rushed to the Federal Medical Centre, Jabi, shortly after she started manifesting symptoms of her poisoning, according to family sources familiar with her ordeal. She has spent four days at the facility as of Friday morning, The Gazette heard.

Ms Ade-John, a career banker and tech investor, has been on a machine to aid her breathing, our sources said. The specifics as to what substance she ingested and how could not be immediately established by The Gazette. The police and the State Security Service did not immediately return a request on whether or not any investigations had been opened into the matter.

The permanent secretary, Ngozi Onwudike, was said to have insisted that the minister should not be transferred because the FMC is a public hospital and its services wouldn’t attract substantial charges to the government, a position her family rebuffed. But they remained with her as they could not raise funds to move her to a private hospital, our sources said. A phone number for the permanent secretary did not connect on Friday morning.

A spokesperson for the FMC did not immediately return a request seeking comments from The Gazette about Ms Ade-John’s condition.

People’s Gazette