I was in Abuja last week with my nose to the ground as usual and to get in touch with scouts in various ministries when this story came out in the Peoples Daily, a paper most people don’t read but which carries a lot of interesting news. And, the news popped out of several. The Ministry of Petroleum, as my readers must know by now, is hot bed of spies for International Oil Companies, IOCs, and unpatriotic Nigerians ready to sell Nigeria to their paymasters. I quickly got in touch with a few people who confirmed that it is true that the ministry has started to spend money meant for the implementation of a bill that has not even been passed.

“Presido, RE: PIB. What u said about Mark and Bankole is, as usual, monumental. They can make history & name. Let us watch and see what they do.” Chukwukere, Garki.

President Goodluck Jonathan did not give $9,000 to PDP delegates for their votes. That is authoritative. But, some people, from shady sources including, perhaps, donations from some international oil companies and beneficiaries of inflated contracts combined with his campaign organisation to give out real American dollars to delegates. The least given, from my own sources, was $9,000; some received as much as $20,000.

“Traitors….are an unfortunate class of people. If they weren’t, they wouldn’t be traitors. They conspire to bust up a country; they fail, and they are traitors. They bust her, and they become statesmen (and women) and heroes (and heroines). (Translated from original).
Artemis Ward, 1872, in “The Tower of London.”

“Who calls them the happy people of Columbia?” I asked.
“Everyone’, said Dudley. “That’s why nothing ever happens here. The government doesn’t do anything here. They don’t have to. They know the people are happy, so they don’t give them anything”.