A foreign investor’s view on investing in “Africa” – Thoughts?

This piece was originally published on n+1 magazine, a print magazine of politics, literature, and culture. The piece below is the excerpt from a recently published book, Diary of a Very Bad Year: Confessions of an Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager. HFM in the interview stands for Hedge Fund Manager.

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African Outtake

From Diary of a Very Bad Year

n+1: Did you travel to Africa a lot?

HFM: I did. Quite a few times.

And the countries are all different. You go to South Africa and it has many aspects of a developed market. You go to Nigeria and it’s weird. Lagos looked to me like a city where aliens had come and built the city and then left, and then just sort of let it decay. People kind of wandered in from the outskirts, squatted in the city. So you had this strange juxtaposition of what was clearly modern infrastructure that had just been kind of abandoned to decay—and then total squalor. You’d go one block off a main thoroughfare and the road is dirt. You go to a nice neighborhood, all the houses are behind walls and outside the walls there’s somebody cooking on a garbage fire, right outside the walls of some big house. It’s like nothing I’ve seen anywhere else.

n+1 And yet they had a lively banking sector?

HFM: If you went there it would be clear to you that there’s no way that those banks could deploy the kinds of capital that was being pushed in.

On the other hand, there’s something very attractive from an investment standpoint of going to a place like Lagos. You’d go to an office building or a hotel and in the course of the day the power goes out six times and the generator kicks on to power the building, and that generator is powered by diesel, and you see all these fuel trucks all over the place that have to bring diesel to fuel the generator, and the generators are noisy and loud. You’re like, “Wow, there’s an obvious opportunity here. Somebody should build a reliable power plant! It would just be tremendous, a tremendous economic efficiency, because you wouldn’t need all these diesel trucks zooming around, you wouldn’t need all these generators, and by the way Nigeria has all this natural gas that’s just being flared so if you burn that in a power plant you’re using a resource that’s just being flared!”

Or you drive in the city and there’s one bridge from the mainland to Victoria Island; everyday it’s backed up for hours. It’s like, “You know what? I could build another bridge next to this bridge, I could charge a huge toll!” This is a country that needs everything. There’s so many obvious opportunities to invest and really increase efficiency. Physically invest. I’m not talking about the ability for a country to absorb capital institutionally, but like physically.

n+1: But?

HFM: But then you realize that it’s not like they can’t figure this out. It’s not like they don’t get the fact that it’s pretty annoying that the power goes out six times a day and it’s pretty annoying to have six fuel generators humming all the time. The reason investment doesn’t happen is because it’s in some powerful person’s interest that it not happen. There’s some guy who controls the diesel trucks who makes tons of money from being a diesel distributor, and there’s a guy with all these generators who would be out of business if power plants were built, and he stands in the way. There are people there, there are corrupt government officials who know how much value can be created by a power plant, but they want to extract it for themselves. That’s why the country needs everything.

n+1: What were the difficulties, when you say there were difficulties in getting involved in the market—

HFM: It was just like mechanical difficulties. This wasn’t like going on Fidelity and saying, “Enter the six-month T-bill auction in Gabon.” There were times where to participate in an auction you’d have to get a whole like packet of documents together, signatures and everything and fax them to the central bank of the country. Sounds simple, right? Well the phone lines don’t work there half the time. So you have to fax between this hour and this hour to be eligible, but you just couldn’t even get the fax machine to pick up, or your fax transmission would be halfway through and you’d get cut off. Sometimes you have to get special approval as a foreigner to invest in these markets, and we’re navigating a big bureaucracy. So we would do all that, but once we do that, then we’d have permission to participate in the market, and it was worth it.

n+1: What would you do when there was a fax crisis?

HFM: A fax crisis wasn’t an option, because you know you couldn’t not get a fax. You’d call and try and find somebody, you know, “Could you see if the fax is working? Give me another fax number.” And it was kind of silly. But then that’s why the returns are there. How many people are going to put up with that nonsense?

When they finally improved their systems and you could email things or do things electronically or there were investments banks that would alleviate those trades for you, the opportunity disappeared.

n+1: Couldn’t you just fly there and delivery the papers?

HFM: Well you wouldn’t know, you wouldn’t know until you tried if the fax machine was going to work or not.

n+1: That’s true.

HFM: These are the kinds of trades I love. Where the success or failure is determined by whether the fax machine works, not whether the guy you just hired’s a crook.

n+1: Is this Nigeria you’re mostly talking about?

HFM: No, that’s some other countries we had this issue with, smaller countries.

n+1: What other places did you go that were interesting?

HFM: You name the country in sub-Saharan African, we either did some small trades there or looked into doing some small trade there. We were pretty promiscuous. By the time the bull market came around, we only had some small investment in Nigeria and Ghana.

n+1: How was Ghana?

HFM: That particular investment did not work out so well. As an economy overall it’s hard to say. It was less corrupt than Nigeria, more democratic than a lot of places we operated, but it was still Africa, right? The economy was still a little bit chaotic, statistics were poorly kept, transparency was poor and the economy’s subject to a lot of volatility. There was a thing at the end of last year where there was a devaluation of the currency. There was an election and the campaign spending went out of control, the incumbent tried to buy victory for his party’s candidate. He was unable to. So I mean, it’s Africa.

n+1: Of all the places you’ve dealt with, Africa was just the least developed, is that the main thing?

HFM: It’s the most chaotic. People talk about corruption, but like really effective corruption requires something like organization. Like Argentina. It’s organized, it’s very organized corruption. Even a lot of Russia, to a certain extent. Very organized corruption. Africa is certainly corrupt. But it’s more that it was chaotic. The infrastructure is poor, volatility is high. Whereas in Argentina you can predict that you will be screwed. You just know it. In Africa, anything can happen.

Like one day you’re trying to transfer funds out of out of the country and suddenly they say, “Oh, sorry there are no dollars available.” And you know if somebody said that to you in Argentina, it would be like, “Because I want you to buy the permission or whatever.” In Africa they are just, “No, there are no dollars today,” and the next day they’ll call you up, “Oh yeah there are dollars now.” There are things that happen there that in other places I would chalk up to an attempt to shake me down. There, it was often just chaos and disorganization.

n+1: You were the only ones willing to sit on the fax?

HFM: No, in Angola we had to get literally a presidential decree.

n+1: [Laughs.] How did you get that?

HFM: It took us lobbying for like two years.

n+1: You would, how would you—

HFM: When they would come to the UN or World Bank meetings, you’d meet with them, we met the ambassador, we were like, “Look, we want to invest in your country, but we want to get started with something simple so we want to be able to buy T-bills. Don’t worry, we’re not hot money, we’ll keep the money in for a long time.” Which we did. They let us in, they gave us a very small capacity, but we were involved in their T-bill market for like two years.

n+1: And that’s considered a considered a long time?

HFM: Yeah, that’s a pretty long time.

n+1: And they love you? They love you in Angola?

HFM: I don’t think they remember us anymore. It was a long time ago. Actually the ambassador that we—was it the ambassador or the finance minister?—one time we went to the ambassador or the finance minister and then the finance minister at that time was later arrested.

n+1: Why wouldn’t they let you in?

HFM: That’s the thing, it was just chaos. They’re just like “What’s the upside?” They’re just kind of suspicious. And like, “What’s a hedge fund? And if something goes wrong I’m going to get in trouble.”

n+1: Uh huh.

HFM: “Yeah, it could be good for the country to have foreign capital involved but there’s nothing in it for me, so why should I exert myself?”

n+1: Couldn’t you have bribed them?

HFM: It’s illegal!

n+1: Where?

HFM: It’s illegal under U.S. law for a U.S. citizen to pay bribes to a foreign officials.

n+1: [Scoffing chuckle.] Even if you’re over there?

HFM: Wherever you are. The government is very strict about that and we are very strict about that.

n+1: Are there places that aren’t?

HFM:

n+1: Does that put you at a disadvantage?

HFM: Theoretically. But if my business were based on paying bribes I wouldn’t want to be in it.

n+1: Did you sense that they were expecting bribes—

HFM:

n+1: They’d be like, “You should contribute to my charity fund,” or how?

HFM: It’s kind of like, “Well what’s in it for me?” “Do you mean, ‘What’s in it for your country?’” “No, what’s in it for me?”

n+1: How do you ignore that?

HFM: You say, “It’s a very good thing for your country if this investment goes forward.”

CPA

France Okays Gay Marriage

Gay marriage and adoption bill has been signed into law in France.

French President Francois Hollande signed the bill a day after the country’s Constitutional Council threw out a legal challenge by the conservative opposition.

Hollande, trying to turn the page on months of bitter opposition to the measures, said it was “time to respect the law and the Republic”.

The Constitutional Council approved the bill on Friday, which was also the International Day Against Homophobia.

The ruling cleared the way for France to become the 14th country to legalise same-s*x marriage.

French deputies approved the bill in parliament last month after a several days of often stormy debate.

Recent polls suggest that opinion in France is fairly evenly split on both gay marriage and adoption.

The main opposition UMP party of former President Nicolas Sarkozy immediately challenged the move on constitutional grounds.

Friday’s statement by the Constitutional Council, however, said same-s*x marriage “did not run contrary to any constitutional principles”, and that it did not infringe on “basic rights or liberties or national sovereignty”.

The council did say that gay marriage did not automatically mean the “right to a child”: the “interest of the child” would be the overriding factor in such cases, it ruled.

Reacting to the ruling Friday, Jean-Francois Cope, UMP party chief, told TF1 television: “It is a decision that I regret, but that I respect.”

Hollande had given warning that he would brook no resistance.

“I will ensure that the law applies across the whole territory, in full, and I will not accept any disruption of these marriages,” he said.

Gay rights groups hailed the decision as a watershed.

“Now it’s celebration time,” said Nicolas Gougain, spokesman of the LGBT association representing the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities.

Gay rights watchdog SOS Homophobie added: “Our country has taken a great step forward today although it’s regrettable that it was taken in a climate of bad faith and homophobic violence.”

The issue of gay marriage has divided France, which is officially secular but overwhelmingly Catholic. Protests against the bill drew hundreds of thousands, with a handful of hard-core protesters clashing with police.

Late on Friday, between 200 and 300 protesters gathered in central Paris to denounce the ruling backing the bill and calling on Hollande to resign.

One police officer was injured after a flammable liquid was thrown in his face.

Earlier, a group of bare-chested men wearing white masks staged their own protest against gay marriage on one of the bridges over the Seine. They call themselves the “Hommen” – a riposte to the bare-breasted feminist protesters known as the “Femmen”.

Opponents of the law plan another major protest rally in Paris on May 26.

As the French bill got the green light to become law, a report by the European Union’s Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) highlighted the problems that gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people still face across Europe.

It said two-thirds of the community were still afraid to show their s*xuality in public – and a quarter had been victims of physical or verbal attacks.

 [AlJazeera]

Embarrassingly, Nigeria Sets A New Record On Corruption Every Year – Onuoha

Rt. Rev. David Onuoha

Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Okigwe South, Rt. Rev. David Onuoha, has expressed worry over how deep corruption has eaten deep into the country, as he says it is posing a serious threat to our corporate existence as a nation.

The cleric said this in his address at the second session of the seventh synod of the diocese held at Saint Matthew’s Church, Umuezeala Nsu, Ehime Mbano local council area of Imo State.

“It is no longer news that our country sets a new record on this every year and all efforts at reducing the incidences of this national embarrassment succeeded only in the breach,” the bishop lamented.

“The issue is not these mind-boggling annual revelations. What should disturb us as a nation are the denials, the reb*ttals and deliberate refusal to acknowledge an obvious fact”.

Speaking further, Onuoha said: “What this clearly indicates is that this nation and her leaders are not in a hurry to fight this malaise. That we are in a society where funds meant for projects and services that will benefit all and make for national growth are brazenly stolen by a privileged few and still people from the same society appear to quarrel with views of massive corruption in Nigeria calls for a great concern.”

He however advised Nigerians to pray for the country and shun corruption always.

InformationNigeria

Abubakar Mamman Ngulde: The Igbos will never rule Nigeria again

By Abubakar Mamman NguldeNigeria is a multi cultural society made up of over 300 ethnic groups spread across the entire landmass. The Igbo people constitute the third main ethic groupings and are found mainly in the south eastern part of Nigeria. They constitute about 18% of the Nigerian population which amounts to about 30 million people according to a recent estimate (CIA 2012 World Factbook). The Igbo unlike the other two major ethnic groupings in Nigeria have traditionally been loosely fragmented politically. There had never been any centralized system of government but each settlement had always existed largely independent of those surrounding it in small units constituted mainly of lineages, clans and villages. There were variations in culture such as dialects, attire, art styles and religious practices amongst such villages and this is still noticed even today.

The Igbo are virtually the most popular set of Nigerians and perhaps the most travelled of them. There is hardly any part of Nigeria no matter its remoteness you don’t find an Igbo man. The Igbo man can travel as far away from his home as possible as long as he can find business opportunity. It is often joked that the Igbo can be found everywhere in the world as long as a black man can survive there. It is therefore not an exaggeration to say that for every five African men you find in Diaspora, one is Igbo. This is not unconnected to the fact that the Igbo man finds it easy to acclimatize to new environments much faster than most Nigerians do. This perhaps must be the reason why the Igbo are the most popular ethic group outside of Nigeria. Don’t be surprised if people in the Diaspora continue to wrongfully consider them the largest tribe in Nigeria; who wouldn’t when they are the most visible. The Igbo have always been known for their ingenuity. You hardly find any group in the whole of the African continent more creative and more industrious. Hardly would you ever find an Igbo man idle. He is always involved in one money-making venture or another. That perhaps is as a result of the norm in Igbo land which usually frowns at the laziness. Everyman was expected to fend for himself for dependency in Igbo land was abhorred unlike what is obtainable in other cultures. A typical Igbo man would therefore do virtually anything to make money because his life, dignity and respect within his community largely depended on it. Compared to other parts of Nigeria, the Igbos can be considered to be fairly educated with even the first full-fledged Nigerian university, University of Nigeria, Nsukka located within their territory.

Politically, in the run off to the struggle for Nigerian independence, the Igbo have been known to have played key roles in the struggle and the subsequent gaining of independence. Prominent Igbo men like Sir Herbert Macaulay, Sir Nnamdi Azikiwe and Sir Festus Okotie-Eboh had been critical to birth of the movement for independence and had fought diligently for the success of the struggle. This perhaps is the reason why the first Nigerian chosen to head the colonial government and subsequently to lead Nigeria to its independence had been an Igbo. The Igbo have always been vocal and visible in virtually all important government arms including the military, police, civil service and administration in the pre-independence era. Why then has their status diminished so much to such a disheartening level within a very short span of time? Of the 52 years Nigeria has existed as a country, they have only had the opportunity to rule twice for a period of only 10 years. What does this portray for the image of the Igbo? Is he not capable of leading the country despite his seeming ingenuity in commerce and industry or is he not strong enough to struggle along with other Nigerians towards achieving the virtually elusive dream of every Igbo man to have a Nigerian President of Igbo extraction or perhaps could it be that the average Nigerian is yet to forgive the Igbo for the events of the 1970s civil war?

The Igbo man has generally been his own enemy. While people of other regions had managed to unite behind their candidate of choice in virtually all elections that had been held, the Igbo had always failed to do so. There was never a time in the history of Nigeria the Igbo emphatically agreed on a candidate of their choice neither have they been able to produce a candidate acceptable to the whole nation in the form of MKO Abiola, Obasanjo and the likes. When in 1979, the northerners rallied behind the President Shehu Shagari and his NPN, the party recorded overwhelming victory in the polls. An alliance of the North and West produced MKO Abiola’s outstanding victory, a feat repeated in 1999 when President Obasanjo was elected. In all these elections however, the Igbo failed to present a formidable candidate who could break ethnic barriers Nigerian politics has always known for neither were they able to enter into alliance with other regions of the country like others have been doing. Theirs has always been talks and threats of violence every electioneering year. Right from the first republic when the Northern People’s Congress (NPC) held sway in the North and the Action Group (AG) had the West completely under its arms, the East never had a strong Igbo National Party. Theirs were parties engulfed in one crisis or another and even up till today, this trend is visible in the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA) and the splinter party, the People’s Progressive Party (PPA). Despite the parties having strong followership amongst the masses, they have always failed to maintain its membership with its elected members always decamping to other parties especially the PDP immediately after elections are won. It has always been the tradition of the Igbo to agitate for an Igbo President but none of their sons has ever been serious enough to run a formidable campaign. The closest they ever got was when Alex Ekwueme contested the PDP primaries in 2003. Even that attempt clearly outlined the disunity amongst the Igbo leaders. It was said that PDP governors of Igbo extraction openly campaigned against their own son even at the convention in Jos. It is therefore this disunity that has always prevented the Igbo from making any serious attempt at the number one sit and if care is not taken, this problem might linger on for a long time to come. It is not out of place to say that the average Nigerian from other regions is yet to forget the events of the Civil war. Most people are of the view that the Igbo still harbour the inert desire of breaking up the country and allowing them the presidency might provide that elusive opportunity. Speaking to an average Yoruba man on the street will reveal that he trust the Hausa man better and will most likely enter into alliance much more readily than he will with an Igbo. The Igbo themselves have not helped matters. With groups such as MASSOB still agitating for secession at a time others are working towards unity, the fears exercised by others becomes quiet glaring. Another militating factor is the Igbo man’s seemingly intolerance of rule by other tribes. In the words of the Late Sardauna of Sokoto, Sir Ahmadu Bello he described the Igbo as too dominating. He went on to describe that “if you employ an Igbo man as a labourer, he will like to take over as foreman within a short while”. With such inherent mindset, it is not surprising other Nigerians continue to regard them with suspicion. Another inherent characteristic of the Igbo that so often prevents other Nigerians from trusting them is their inert desire for wealth acquisition irrespective of the means. This quality other Nigerians view as unbecoming of a leader whom is expected to sacrifice for the nation. The presidency with all its grandeur and limitless power some fear might end up being used for self enrichment at a larger scale than that we are already battling with. They therefore tend not only to deny the Igbo the chance but also try to prevent them from holding key financial positions. It is of note that majority of Nigerians being held in prisons abroad for one financial crime or another are of Igbo extraction and this adds to the stereotype already being presented about the Igbo man’s criminal mindset. Another important factor is the Igbo man’s none forgiving nature. Many are of the view that the Igbo having been denied the presidency for long and having suffered unimaginable pains from events of the civil war will go out on a massive revenge mission once they are given the opportunity. Some others believe the fear is more towards the execution of the secession agenda already started long time ago. The Igbo have always been the proponents of breaking up the country and some think once they get the chance, they will carry out their threat to the later. It therefore became imperative or “so they think” on proponents of “one Nigeria” to prevent the Igbo from ever ascending the presidency. With their regional leaders always failing to agree on matters of collective interest, they have always been left lagging behind in terms of government policies and projects. That of course has always had negative effects on development in the region. Even the so called Ohaneaze-Ndiigbo Cultural Organization has not been able to foster the unity desired within the Igbo community and has been engaged itself in one imbroglio or another over the years.

What is the way forward for the Igbo? With the happenings we continue to witness and with the apparent lack of credible and acceptable leadership for the Igbo, it will take a lot more than a miracle for an Igbo to become the President of Nigeria anytime soon. Analysing all potential Igbo presidential candidates political party-wise indicate that there has not been yet any Igbo man that has seriously shown interest and willpower to win national support. With most parties showing signs of aligning behind the north as it bids for power to return back to its region, it requires a lot of doing for any southern candidate especially of Igbo extraction to counter the already mounting pressure. For the Igbo to be able to achieve that, they must be able to set aside this time around all political differences and present one strong candidacy that can give the north a run for its money taking into consideration the possibility of the Yoruba backing a northern candidate instead of their own and which, judging from the body language of Yoruba leaders such as President Obasanjo and Bola Tinubu, is almost a near possibility. The Igbo must be able to achieve this near impossible feat within a span of one year if their dream of an Igbo Presidency in 2015 is to be achieved; a Herculean task if the reality is to be said. Who then should the Igbo present as their choice? Presently, an Igbo leader acceptable to the whole of Ndigbo still remains a mirage. When in 2010, northern leaders like IBB, Aliyu Gusau and the likes perceived by many to be selfish agreed to step down for Atiku Abubakar in the run off towards the PDP Presidential primaries at the instance of the ACF, the umbrella association of the northerners, one begins to imagine who among the Igbo strongmen will agree to do the same? Is it Gov. Peter Obi or Gov. Rochas Okorocha whom are already engaged in the battle for the soul of the APGA or Victor Umeh who is still fighting for his party’s chairmanship sit? The Igbo must move beyond the traditional summits and meetings they have always been known for in the past and act. It has never yielded the desired result in the past neither will it now. They must solidly unite behind a formidable candidate irrespective of party affiliation if their dream is ever to be achieved. If the Yoruba could deliver President Goodluck Jonathan of PDP in 2011 despite having their own party’s candidate as a result of alliance with the South South , I see no reason why the Igbos cannot do the same but until then; the Igbo will never rule Nigeria again.

DailyPost

Battle of The ‘Evil Forest’: Edo police boss versus kidnappers, armed robbers

For  some time now, armed robbers and kidnappers  have taken  over an area referred to  as “Evil Forest” located along the Benin-City bypass,  and seen as  a haven for criminal activities. Luxury buses plying  the East-Lagos routes  have on many occasions been attacked,  passengers robbed  and women raped in the area. Those who resist are killed. Families of many kidnapped victims are asked to go to the  ‘Evil Forest’  to drop ransom. In the past, policemen dared not go near the place because they may not come back alive to tell the story.


However, since the coming of the current Commissioner of Police in Edo State, Mr Folunso Adebanjo, things have changed. After he assumed office early February, he read a riot act to criminals in the state to repent or flee the state. Many thought it was the usual bravado of a new officer posted to the state as it was in the past.

But  Adebanjo took the bull by the horn, mopping up huge assortment of weapons used by criminals in different hideouts in Edo. Sunday Vanguard  learnt that the CP relocated temporarily to the ‘Evil Forest’ with his men to confront armed robbers and kidnappers in their own domain. With  scores of detectives,  Adebanjo combed the  place in search of kidnappers, particularly those involved in the abduction of the family of  a Supreme Court Justice.

Officers of the Department of State Security Services, DSS, in the state are also not resting on their oars, following the arrest of nine suspected dare-devil kidnappers, penultimate week, allegedly involved in several abductions in the state in the past three years including the killers of  a  DSS operative  last year.

CP Adebanjo, who gave an insight into his battle with criminals at the ‘Evil Forest’, told Sunday Vanguard, “I have been there with about 100 men, comprising Mobile Policemen, SARS, Anti-Kidnapping and other officers, on that Expressway on  Iruekpen axis. I was there about a week ago and we have mapped out strategies to tackle the criminal elements.

If you have been following us, last week, we killed two of the suspected robbers in a gun battle with our men. “When they were robbing, there was a distress call, our men rushed to the scene, engaged them in a gun battle and killed two of them. And we have arrested so many others. We have our CIB men on ground. I think they always come from the Aduwawa area, that is where many of the people committing these atrocities come from, but, lately, I’m sure you have not been hearing so much of it”.

He added. “We are beefing up our patrol in that area, we are repairing some vehicles too so that there will be enough to patrol”.

Asked if he was  not scared of being killed  when he passed the night  at the ‘Evil Forest’, the CP replied, “When I was posted here, I asked for protection from God because, without God, whatever you do is in vain. I was able to mobilise the DPOs and told them my mission and vision here, that the police cannot do without the people, that the people are key and once you have the people on your side, a lot of things will begin to take place and, with their cooperation, crime can actually be reduced.  I talk every Monday with all the DPOs in the city; then once in a month, all the DPOs in the state, we come together and review the situation. I outlined my vision; everybody must work hard. I go out in the night. I am not a CP that stays in the office. I go in there, everywhere, midnight, anytime. This kidnap of the Justice wife, I am just coming from the area (Evil Forest).
Yesterday I was there too. It is leadership by example. I go out in the night to check where my men are supposed to be. Then my telephone  numbers are all over the place. People are giving us information and that is why we are getting results.   I didn’t lobby to be here, I never knew I will be here; so I put everything in the hands of God  and I believe He protects me. Keeping crime low is my concern”.


So brazen were the criminals that they put their victims on notice, as was the case of a bishop in Benin-City. The bishop summoned the courage and complained to the police about the   kidnap threat messages and calls he was receiving from strange phone numbers. The police swung into action and arrested one Roland Aregbo (28), on May 3, who the Edo State Police Command said is helping in its investigations.

Announcing the recovery of a cache of arms in the state in the last two months, Adebanjo disclosed that the police command also arrested scores of suspected kidnappers, including “six dangerous suspects,” and recovered weapons used in carrying out their nefarious activities, including 113 AK 47 rifles magazines and seven boxes containing 6, 300 AK 47 live ammunitions.

According to him, the police made several other raids and recovered the following items: a locally made SMG machine gun, seven cut to size guns, one pump action gun, one locally made single barrel gun, live cartridges, one Audi car, an ash-colour Honda Civic car with registration no: Lagos DE 829 LND, a Toyota Hilux van belonging to Reynolds Construction Company Limited, with registration no: Lagos LND 631 XD, cutlasses and wraps of weeds suspected to be Indian hemp. He revealed that the command shot dead two armed robbery suspects who were part of a seven-member gang that barricaded the Benin-Auchi-Okene express road. He said the police, in response to a distress call, accosted the suspected armed robbers, who he said engaged his men in exchange of fire – two of the suspected criminals were gunned down.

He said, “It is our collective concern to ensure safety of lives and property in Edo State. The command has, in the last two months, put in measures to ensure the state is unsafe for criminals. On Monday, suspected dare-devil armed robbers alleged to have barricaded the ever busy Benin-Auchi-Okenne express road were shot dead by men of the Edo State Police Command. The heavily armed men, numbering seven, engaged the police, who were  responding to  a distress call, in a gun battle, following which two were killed, while others escaped into the bush.”

The CP added that the hoodlums attacked some commercial buses and their passengers at the Iruekpen-Ehor axis of the road where they robbed unsuspecting passengers of their money, mobile phones and other personal items.

Inspecting recovered arms

 

“During the operation, a distress call was sent to the police control room in Benin-City; the Ekpoma and Ehor Police Divisions were then informed about the robbery. The policemen moved swiftly to the scene, but upon sighting the police, the hoodlums opened fire. Police returned fire, leading to the death of two of the hoodlums. Some items recovered from them included N32, 583 cash, First Bank ATM card, voters’ card belonging to one Isioma Eyemolu Mercy, mask, cutlasses, daggers, touch light and bags containing victims’ clothes. The police then combed the bush where stains of blood littered the area, an indication that some of them escaped with bullet wounds.

The area is said to be notorious and prone to armed robbery attacks, as many passengers often times lose their money and valuables to hoodlums operating on the road.”

He further disclosed that men of the command, acting on intelligence reports, unmasked a three-man gang of car jackers and receivers of stolen goods. According to the CP, one of the suspects, Aba Josiah, confessed to receiving four Toyota Camry cars from one Emeka Onyeji, who he said remain at large.

He said: “Arrested is  one Ihejirika, who confessed to receiving a Toyota Camry 1992 model from the same Emeka Onyeji, at a price of N300, 000. The middle man to the armed robbers, one Uti Aigbovbiosa, has been arrested and is being interrogated. Efforts are on  to arrest other members of the gang. It is worthy of mention here that the Toyota Camry 1992 model  received by  one Ihejirika has been recovered.

“On March 16, upon information received by Anti-Kidnapping Squad 9, one suspect named Scot Omoefe Philip, who was earlier charged to court for an established case of kidnapping, but was granted bail in court, got the opportunity to commit more crime, and was re-arrested. Arrested along with him was one Monday Atimogie.”

•Commissioner of Police in Edo State, Mr Folunso Adebanjo,

 

Other recovered items listed by Adebanjo  include 24 live and five expanded cartridges, seven mobile phones, one ring, necklace and one dagger.
The CP said the battle against the armed robbers will continue.

Vanguard

Why Prof. Ango Abdullahi Flunked His Test By Rudolf Ogoo Okonkwo

There are elders and there are elders. Prof. Ango Abdullahi is not an elder. A real elder does not pursue a rat while his house is on fire.
I needed to get that out of the way before those who excuse bad behaviors accuse me of abusing an elder.
In Nigeria, an elder is a washed up politician who is too old to be an ambassador and too young to spend his time making peace with his maker for all the iniquities he created. You see them all over Nigeria, east, west, north and south.
They call themselves elders yet their people keep drinking sand. Our people say that an elder does not stay home and allow a goat to give birth while still tethered.
The political history of Prof. Ango Abdullahi has not been an impressive one. The manner in which he treated students at Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, where he was Vice Chancellor from 1979 -1986 was horrific. Yet, Abdullahi’s voice is an important voice in the north. It has been for a long time. We dismiss it at our peril.
For seven years, as the vice chancellor of the most important university in Northern Nigeria, he helped mold opinions of many who are today running the affairs of Nigeria. He also had advisory role with various governments in Nigeria, particularly in the north. So if there is a mess out there, he was an integral part of it.
I have carefully followed the utterances of Prof. Abdullahi in recent times. When he presents written speeches, he often sounds articulate and thoughtful. But when he speaks to the BBC/VOA Hausa Service, or a newspaper/radio reporter, his faculty appears to have escaped him.
I must acknowledge that Nigeria has confounded the best of us. But in Abdullahi, the puzzlement is pathetic to observe. In a span of one year, he has sounded like a man having a national conference with the voices in his head.
On May 1, 2012, Ango Abdullahi gave a lecture at the International Conference Center in Abuja called: Nigeria 1914 to date – A Chequered Journey So far.” In Prof. Abdullahi’s assessment, the beginning of the Nigerian journey, the amalgamation of the Northern and Southern protectorates “was a great mistake.” Abdullahi wasn’t the first to say that and he would not be the last. He went on to ask Nigerian leaders to take steps to redress the “mistake of 1914.” News reports of that day did not specify what steps the eminent agriculturist recommended. The reports only mentioned that Abdullahi warned that, "delay would be late and dangerous". The only pointer to a solution was his suggestion to his audience to look at similar mistakes by the same British people who amalgamated Nigeria and how the mistakes were resolved with the splitting of India into three countries, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, UK into United Kingdom and Northern Island and Sudan into Sudan and Southern Sudan.
Two weeks before, Prof. Abdullahi had told the Arewa Elder's Forum that the North was not benefitting from her union with the South and would therefore lose nothing if the forced union – amalgamation- of Nigeria was broken up. Prof. Abdullahi rounded his lecture by saying, “things are more likely to become complex in the future. Until the correct things are done, we cannot ignore these facts or we continue to pretend as our leaders that this is a passing phase. The question of a likely disintegration is not a too distant future.”
If anybody paid attention, Abdullahi had made a similar statement to the BBC Hausa Service on April 18, 2012. In advancing his theory that “No one is afraid of Nigeria’s break-up,” Abdullahi told the BBC, “But the southerners that are propounding dividing the country should know that it is also not something that the north will not want. We can be on our own; we have not seen what the north is eating that the south is not eating. That the north is keeping quiet doesn’t mean we don’t know what we are doing. We want peace and unity but no one can intimidate us, let Nigeria be divided, who is afraid if it is divided? We have nothing to lose, and have been on our own for long. We are on our own and not at the mercy of other people.”
Fast forward to April 14, 2013. At the third annual lecture of the Arewa Media Forum, Prof. Ango Abdullahi gave a lecture on, “Crisis of Leadership as a Source of Conflict in Nigeria: The Way Forward.” After over one year of sustained destruction of Northern Nigeria by the Boko Haram group, Prof. Abdullahi became introspective.
“I get angry when I hear northerners complain about what is happening in the country,” he said. “We created the problems. All the groups: ACF, Middle Belt Forum, Northern Union and recently, the younger ones have formed their various groups to speak for them. They said we have failed them. The last time I counted, we have about 16 groups speaking about the challenges facing the north. How do we grow? If we come together under one umbrella, the north will shock the world come 2015.”
“They said we have failed them!” Have you, Prof. Ango Abdullahi? Have you and your generation served the youths well? Did you prepare them for the 21st century?
We have to almost feel sorry for this man. In moments like this he must be wondering if he was losing his mind or losing his world. Not an easy place to be.
And then, Alhaji Asari Dokubo struck. And Abdullahi lost it completely.
In an interview with Sunday Vanguard, as acidic as Dokubo’s press statement was on the end of Nigeria without Jonathan as President, Abdullahi’s reaction betrayed what remained of his intellect. He complained about the performance of President Jonathan, grumbled about the idea that Jonathan ran for president in 2011 and then, he fell on the sword that Dokubo left for him.
“My reaction is that but for the fact that I am aware that Dokubo is a spokesperson for the corridors of powers, I would have ignored him,” Abdullahi said. “But my reaction now is directed to their leaders, elders, including the president, that if it is their feeling that this is the way things should go, I am saying, on behalf of the Northern Elders Forum, NEF, that they should start the crisis now because I’m putting them on notice that Jonathan will not be president in 2015. So they can start now and we in the North are waiting.”
No, professor. You don’t say something like that when tractors are still digging mass graves for scores of people who died in your backyard. You don’t put people who cannot read and write on notice. This renowned agronomist should know that you cannot plant cocoyam and reap cassava.
One can understand the limitations of people like Ibrahim Babangida, Sani Abacha and their likes. But the failure of intellectuals like Ango Abdullahi is unforgivable. Their inability to soar above the cloud enveloping their environs is the bane of African intellectuals. It is the same across Nigeria.
The government of Nigeria has failed all Nigerians- East, North, South and West. If there is any semblance of decent life in any corner of Nigeria, it is life created by Nigerians in spite of their government.
Abdullahi is just being disingenuous when he said that “the north is not afraid of a split.” He knows very well that the North is the only part of the country that can choose to leave the union today and nobody will raise an army to stop them. I must add that a move like that may be more palatable to Boko Haram sect than amnesty. In fact, I make bold to say that the north going its way will end the Boko Haram insurgence overnight.
But the north leaving the union is not what most Nigerians want, not even Ango Abdullahi. The despicable things others did to the North are many. But the despicable things that the North did to itself are more.
In ideological terms, this is how Ango Abdullahi flunked his test. Though it is universally known that 'with privilege comes responsibility,' Abdullahi embraced privilege without responsibility. Given the chance to choose between responsibility and privilege, Abdullahi chose privilege. In practical terms, given the chance to choose between state police and state of emergency, Abdullahi chose state of emergency.
It must be true: old professors do not die- they just lose their faculty. Listening to Ango Abdullahi bark and flap his wings make me miss my good friend, Wada Nas.

Saharareporters

Most Of The 150 Private Jets In Nigeria Are Owned By Fraudulent Fuel Importers – Falana

Human rights lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana, has said oil subsidy fund thieves own most of the 150 private jets in Nigeria.

He also said the ill-advice Nigeria had taken from the International Monetary Fund has encouraged corruption.

“I hope the Jonathan regime will have the courage to ask the IMF to name one country that has succeeded after implementing its anti-people’s prescriptions. There is no success story anywhere in the world,” Falana stated.

In his reaction to IMF’s recent call for the removal of fuel subsidy, Falana told Punch that the organisation had ill-advised the Nigerian government not to build refineries.

The IMF had urged the administration of President Goodluck Jonathan to remove subsidy completely to ensure fiscal adjustment.

Senior Resident Representative/Mission Chief of IMF in the country, Mr. Williams Rogers, recently insisted that the removal became necessary for planned savings in recurrent spending. He stated that Nigeria required public sector reforms.

Rogers also recommended that the Federal Government should mobilise non-oil revenues and strengthen oil-price rule and oil savings mechanism, while pushing for the maintenance of a tight monetary policy.

Falana, however, said, “Let the IMF be honest to tell Nigerians the cost of producing a litre of oil. You will be shocked. The IMF advised the government not to build new refineries, as part of the package of fraud to destroy the economy, even when it knew that the country needed to generate huge revenue from the sale of petrol refined locally.

“As the government needed to import fuel to augment local consumption, it enriched its cronies who engaged in fraudulent importation of fuel through fake mother and daughter vessels. Most of the 150 private jets in the country today are owned by fraudulent fuel importers.

“Last year, the IMF and its local lackeys claimed that the economy would collapse if petrol was not sold at N141 per litre. But with massive strikes and protests, the price was reduced to N97. Did the economy collapse? These are voodoo economists.”

Falana said IMF should have probed the foreign accounts where stolen funds are kept, including about $7bn made by oil thieves from the illegal business of selling stolen crude oil on the high seas.

He further alleged that the Federal Government had refused to reconstitute the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency “in order to sustain the fraud.”

The Senior Advocate of Nigeria accused successive presidents from the ruling Peoples Democratic Party of being responsible for the irregularities in the petroleum sector. He queried the basis for the establishment of Subsidy Re-investment and Empowerment Programme.

He said while the highest lending interest rate in the West was between three and five per cent, the IMF had allegedly insisted that it should be over 20 per cent in Africa. He added that the IMF and the World Bank allegedly conspired to impose the Structural Adjustment Programme on the economies of African countries in the 1980s. [Punch]