:(For those of you that killing is better than forgiveness, yall are the one that deserve to die. if there was enough sharing there wouldn't be problems like this. nobody was born a thief, or was born to waste their life. may God forgive us all. [/b][/color][/size][/size]

A network of civil society groups has urged the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Bello Adoke to prosecute a former military president, Ibrahim Babaginda over alleged mismanagement of funds.

The coalition, in a letter addressed to the justice ministry in Abuja, requested that Mr Babaginda be brought to book over mismanagement of funds running into about $12.4 billion earned from the sale of crude oil during the Gulf War in 1991 The group asked the Minister to, “urgently and fully implement the recommendations of the late Pius Okigbo Panel report which indicted the former military leader of corruption and mismanagement of the oil windfall.

The panel was set up in 1994 by the late Sani Abacha, another former head of state, to probe how the $12.4 billion oil windfall earned by Nigeria during the first Gulf War was spent.

The groups said they were concerned about the failure of successive governments to act on the report and the non-adaptation of a White Paper since the report was submitted to the ruling government in 1994, with the last administration of Olusegun Obasanjo reportedly claiming that the report could not be found.

The group, which claims to be in possession of the report, alleged that “the Babangida administration operated ‘a second but undisclosed budget’ with the then Central Bank of Nigeria governor, the Abdulkadir Ahmed...and the operations of these accounts were fraught with irregularities as the proceeds of the sale of the crude were not shown in the revenue side nor were the expenditures reflected in the expenditure side of the budget.” Claiming that corruption is well entrenched in the country, the group said “fighting it requires being ready and able to confront powerful interest groups that clearly benefit from the status quo.” It therefore urged the government not to let the allegations against Mr Babaginda go unverified.

14 days ultimatum

The activists said if nothing was done until the expiration of a two weeks ultimatum, they will “take all appropriate legal actions nationally and internationally to compel you to comply with Nigeria’s voluntary international anti-corruption commitments.” The letter was signed by heads of Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP); Access to Justice (AJ); Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC) and Nigeria Liberty Forum, London. Others are Women Advocates and Documentation Centre (WARDC); Human and Environmental Development Agenda (HEDA); Committee for Defence of Human Rights (CDHR); Partnership for Justice; Nigeria Voters Assembly (VOTAS) and Centre for the Rule of Law On-line campaign.

The group also said it will “mobilise Nigerians through online campaign tools such as Facebook, You Tube, MySpace, and other platforms to ensure that sufficient pressure is mounted on the government to implement the long-standing recommendations of the Okigbo report.” It also threatened an online campaign on the social networking media, Twitter against the much rumoured candidacy of Mr Babaginda ahead of the next general elections.

Yesterday, Lagosians got some relief as beef made a return to their meals. This is because the cattle sellers at the Lagos State Government Abattoir Complex, Oko-Oba in Agege, allowed the animals they had in stock to be sold and slaughtered, after the Cattle Dealers Association (CDA) and Food Stuff Merchants' Association of Nigeria reportedly suspended their seven-day warning strike over the weekend.

Beef and tomatoes became scarce since early last week as the transporters, who brought them in from the northern part of the country, stopped transporting the commodities into the markets in the South-West region due to what they called the ‘exorbitant taxes and levies' imposed on them by the state officials. Although the Lagos State governor, Babatunde Fashola, on Wednesday, attempted to persuade the striking cattle transporters to resume their trade immediately, the strike stretched into the weekend, causing residents to resort to alternative options.

Comeback beef

However, it was a welcome cacophony of meat hacking and price haggling as hundreds of cattle were slaughtered at the Oko-Oba Abattoir, even if it was still above the usual price. This place had been devoid of activities since last Tuesday as no cattle was killed there. The northern cattle traders allowed the sales because, as NEXT gathered, it was becoming too expensive to feed them, while the negotiations continued.

"The cattle owners said they didn't want the cows they brought in to die for nothing," a butcher, Akeem Alake, said in Yoruba. "They said the money they were using to feed them was too much so they are selling them off." The butchers, however, complained that they were buying for far above the normal market price.

The pace of work at the meat market was markedly higher than normal, as butchers, porters, knife carvers, and drivers of meat delivery vans tried to make up for lost time. However, an old hand in the market, Mumeni Ashipa, called for caution.

"With the rate at which people are buying and killing these cows, the whole thing may finish before night, because, as I'm talking to you right now, no truck has entered Lagos yet. All cattle you are seeing here are those brought in before the strike and they cannot last more than today," he said.

NEXT found very few tomatoes, pepper or beef for sale over the weekend and Monday at the markets in the Agege Local Government Area. When found, the price was too high for consumers.

"The tomato seller said two (fruits) for fifty naira," a bachelor, Ayo Oriola, said. "I couldn't buy it, so I'm going to buy tin tomatoes and turkey wings now."

Paying too much

A cattle trader, Quaseem Olushola, who brings in his animals from Gombe, said he supported the strike. He said it costs him more than 300% to pay officials for his cargo to pass through states in the south than in the north.

"A trailer will carry maybe 30 to 50 cows and the state will collect N10,000 as ‘Veterinary money" from us, no matter how many is in the trailer," he said. "In the north, they collect about N1, 500 but once we get to Kwara (State) we begin to pay big money."

Reports say the state government is currently trying to meet the demands of the traders to forestall a repeat of the action.

Nigeria's presidential vote will be held on Jan. 22, 2011 or April 23 depending on the outcome of electoral reforms before parliament, the West African country's electoral body said on Tuesday.

The current presidential term in Africa's most populous nation ends in May 2011 and elections are due by April next year under the present system. But a reform bill before parliament could bring the polls forward.

The chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Maurice Iwu, said that until a notice of poll is issued either on Aug. 2, 2010 or Nov. 1, the provisional dates could still be modified.

"We have prepared two provisional schedules for the elections," Iwu said at a presentation in the capital Abuja, which was attended by a representative of Acting President Goodluck Jonathan.

"What this means is that whatever the National Assembly comes up with, it is incumbent on the commission to modify these dates to accommodate the provisions," Iwu said.

The presidential poll would be preceded by elections into the federal and state assemblies, and state governorships.

Jonathan took over executive powers a month ago in the absence of ailing President Umaru Yar'Adua, who has since returned from three months in a Saudi hospital but remains too sick to govern the OPEC member nation of 140 million people.

Jonathan's takeover as acting leader ended immediate concerns about stagnation in government business but did not resolve the broader issue of who the country's next president will be, a decision which will determine whether economic and political reforms accelerate or stagnate.


ENSURE ELECTORAL JUSTICE

Nigeria's political kingpins are jockeying for influence over who the ruling PDP party's presidential nominee should be and some say an early election would end the uncertainty sooner.

Jonathan said in a speech read at the presentation that the government wanated free and fair elections. A meeting of all political parties to discuss credible elections was being planned.

"We will do all within our powers to promote free and fair elections and we will insist on electoral justice," Jonathan said in a speech read by Justice Minister Kayode Adetokunbo.

The elections that brought Yar'Adua to power in 2007 were so marred by vote-rigging, voter intimidation and ballot-stuffing that European Union observers dimissed them as not credible.

Parliament is considering electoral reforms including a suggestion made by former Chief Justice Muhammadu Uwais that elections should take place at least six months before the presidential term expires, allowing time to settle any legal challenges before the new president is sworn in.

The aim is to avoid a repeat of the legal battles that dogged the first half of Yar'Adua's term and undermined his authority.

With the release of the timetable, campaigning for various political offices would soon kick-off in earnest in Africa's top oil and gas producer, slowing down government business.

Reuters

Last week’s killing of two politicians in Oyo State was politically motivated, Baba Adisa Bolanta, the Commissioner of Police, Oyo State Command, has said. Mr. Bolanta told journalists at the command headquarters in Ibadan on Wednesday, while parading some 36 suspects, that the extent of investigation carried out, and discoveries made therefrom, convincingly established that the killing of the two politicians in Oyo and Ibadan last week had political undertones.

He also informed that their investigation had led to some arrests, but refused to be specific on the number of arrests and the exact level of their investigations.

Ademola Adegbile, chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Atiba local government of Oyo State, was, last Wednesday night, assassinated in his sleep at Isale Oyo, Oyo Town, allegedly by a gang of four armed men; while Taiwo Falade, an Action Congress (AC) chairmanship aspirant in Ibadan metropolis, was equally killed on Friday by yet-unknown gunmen while hosting a political meeting at his residence at Odo Oba area of Ibadan.

Mr. Bolanta, however, assured that the police would do its best to fish out the killers and bring them to justice.

“The killings are politically motivated. It is the wrangling within the political fold that led to the assassinations. But we will not leave a stone unturned in our efforts to get to the root and let the culprits face the music,” he said.

Play by the rule

While assuring that the details of police findings will be made public at the appropriate time, the police boss urged politicians to always play by the rules, as that was the only way to make the nation’s democracy beautiful.

The command also showcased some of the successes it had made in the last two weeks in its effort to combat crime in the state. Among the 36 suspects paraded were suspected armed robbers, ritualists and local arms manufacturers.

Mr. Bolanta said though the command had been able to get substantial facts to confirm the involvement of the suspects in the offences for which they were arrested, investigations were still ongoing.

“They will be charged to court as soon as the police is done with them,” he said.

The Lagos State Police Command has presented to the public a nine year old boy, Sunday Ajayi, who after playing football two weeks ago, lost his way back home.

Master Ajayi said on the day he got missing, he went outside to play football with some little children around his neighbourhood, somewhere in Ladi Lak in Bariga Local Government Area, but could not retrace his way home thereafter.

“Some children were going to play ball so I followed them. But I don’t know anywhere. So when we finished and I wanted to go home to my mother’s house, I didn’t know the way,” he lamented.

Master Ajayi said his father is a driver and his mother a petty trader. He said he was in primary four in an Anglican school in Ekiti State; but that sometime in February this year, his mother brought him to Lagos and was to soon resume his schoolling.

Confused and distressed, he began crying until a Good Samaritan picked him up and took him to the Police.

Presenting the youngster, the Lagos State Police spokesperson, Frank Mba, said the Police have kept Master Ajayi in their custody for the past two weeks, since he was rescued. He asked members of the public to assist the Police in locating Master Ajayi’s parents.

“The Information Department of the Lagos State Police Command presented the boy, who has been in police custody for the past 14 days. We are appealing to Nigerians to help the police locate the parents of Sunday,” Mr. Mba said.

Mr. Mba also said Master Ajayi represents the one-too-many children who have got missing in the last few months. He implored parents and guardians to keep a close watch on their children and wards.

“It is becoming very alarming to discover that parents don’t keep proper watch over their children anymore. Everyone has a responsibility to be his brother’s keeper to ensure such a situation does not arise again,” Mr. Mba added.