Yet Mandela is simply a human being imbued with human frailties. His two marriages crashed before he found renewed love in the hands of Graca Machel, widow of the unforgetable African freedom fighter, Samora Machel. Quite humorous; when he knew his old age can no longer carry his punishing local and international schedules, he told the world: “Don’t call me, I’ll call you”.
IT is exactly 60 years today November 18, 2009 when armed British colonial policemen opened fire on defenceless coal miners in the Iva Valley mine in Enugu. In those moments of collective colonial insanity, the colonialists within minutes murdered 21 Nigerian workers and injured 51.
SOUTH Africa has again postponed the target date of its land reform programme. In its post apartheid election manifesto, the ruling African National Congress (ANC) had promised to redistribute 30 percent of agricultural land in its first five years in office. But by 2001, some seven years later, less than two per cent had been distributed.
PRESIDENTIAL spokesman, Olusegun Adeniyi is an intelligent person. That was why I was disappointed when he joined the chorus of government officials who argue quite illogically, that the scarcity of petroleum products which government attributes to hoarding and fraudulent activities by oil marketers, is a justification for the deregulation of the petroleum sector.
WITH all its pretentions to international democracy, liberty and the brotherhood of man, France on Tuesday October 27, 2009 opened its presidential doors to Mauritanian coup plotter, General Mohammed Ould Abdel Aziz. The General had on August 6, 2008 overthrown the democratically elected President, Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi.
In the maze of the woes the political elites have sunk the Nigerian people, good news comes our way only once in a while. Such was the case when the Supreme Court sent an usurper, Andy Uba packing from the Anambra State Government House and restored the legitimate administration of Peter Obi.
THE only group that seems clear about what it is doing in Afganistan today is the Taliban. The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) waits on the United States (US) which is itself confused, while the puppet Hamid Karzai regime, caught rigging elections, faces credibility problems and a run-off on November 7, 2009.
WE need to thank the Honourable Members of the House of Representatives who passed for second reading, the patriotic bill to deregulate the immunity clause. It is patently unjust and undemocratic for only the President, his Vice, state governors and their deputies to enjoy constitutional immunity.
I AM not a Catholic, was never one and may never be. But one of my
childhood heroes was a man called Father Damian. I am not sure whether in the innocence of childhood, I ever associated him with Catholicism.
By Owei Lakemfa
NIGERIA was “elected” into the 15- member United Nations (UN) Security Council last Friday and there was a big jubilation in government circles. It was hailed as proof of the country’s growing international status, thanks to President Umaru Yar’Adua’s outstanding leadership qualities.
Foreign Affairs Minister, Ojo Maduekwe, located our election partly in our peace-keeping [...]
