UniAbuja Students Protest Lack of Water, Electricity

More than 1, 000 students from the University of Abuja gathered at the campus on Monday morning to protest the lack of power and water supply they had been experiencing for three months at the permanent campus site.

“We are left with no choice than to come out and tell the world our problems. We will not stop the protest unless our problems are solved," said theatre student Mike Ajeoja.

A female student said she had not bathed for days because there was no water, and revealed that they had been forced to use pure water sachets to bathe, cook and wash clothes.  

The Information Officer of the university, Mr Waziri Garba, appealed to the students to remain calm and assured them that the school management was already taking steps to resolve the problem.

Baro Ahmad from the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company in Gwagwalada, said that it was not true that the school had no power for three months, and stated that steady electricity will be restored to the campus by 4pm on Monday.

Villagers Fleeing Benue Crisis Take Refuge in Kuje

More than 200 people are taking refuge in Kuchiyako, in the Kuje Area Council of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) after fleeing from suspected Fulani herders who destroyed their villages in Benue and Nassarawa states.  

The refugees, who fled from Kaseyol and Gbajimba in Guma local government of Benue State ,and Azer village in Kadarko, Kumar, Azara district of Awe local government of Nassarawa State said they escaped when the attackers took over their villages, with one family of seven boarding a bus to Abuja leaving everything behind. 

 

An estate agent in Kuje, Prince Williams Nyiekaa, 35, has been housing 180 of the refugees in his house for the last three weeks, after he returned to Kumar village to rescue his extended family and other frightened villagers who were stranded and hiding in the bush jumped unto his vehicle and refused to get down.

“Some were crying and saying it is better for them to go and die of hunger elsewhere than to stay and die by the guns and machetes of suspected Fulani herders," he said.

Nearby churches and well-wishers have been on hand to help him with food and clothing, but he admits that looking after the 21 families has been the toughest experience of his life.

He said that he has written to the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and Kuje Area Council requesting for assistance and is hopeful that when it comes the situation of the refugees will improve.

Appeal Court Orders Retrial of El-Rufai's Case Against the Senate

Abuja’s Court of Appeal yesterday ordered the Federal High Court to re-hear the human rights case filed by former FCT Minister, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai against the Senate, revoking the judgment of the lower court which had thrown out the case in 2010.

The original suit was filed in August 2008 to challenge the decisions of the Senate committee established to hold investigative public hearings on the affairs of the FCT between 1999 and 2007, which was perceived to be targeted at Mallam El-Rufai.

The committee had invited the former minister as a witness and not as a defendant, but in its report, the committee recommended punishment and other sanctions against him without informing him of the petitions against him.

Mallam El-Rufai had approached the courts to defend and uphold his rights.

Court Orders 37 APC Reps to Vacate Seats

A Federal High Court in Abuja yesterday asked 37 members of the House of Representatives, who defected from the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC) to vacate their seats.

Delivering a judgement in the case instituted by the PDP, presiding judge, Justice Adeniyi Ademola, said the lawmakers no longer had any business in the legislature, having moved to another political party while their tenure had yet to expire.

“Having perused the arguments of counsel and the constitutional provisions, it is clear and unambiguous that the defendants were sponsored by the PDP and won the election on its platform,” Justice Ademola said.

“It is also the court’s opinion that their tenure has not expired and there is no division in the PDP. The defendants are therefore not competent to vote or contribute to any proceedings in the House of Representatives.”

Justice Ademola also issued a perpetual injunction restraining the defectors from effecting any leadership changes in the House.

No Photos Please, We’re in Abuja

The fear of Boko Haram is the beginning of wisdom. Or so someone said once. But the fear of Boko Haram is also the root of some unnecessary paranoia and ridiculous safety measures that impede on citizens’ freedoms to enjoy Abuja in all its glory.

 

Take last week for example, when we hit upon the idea to take guests around Abuja to show them some of the beautiful structures in the city. Of course the taking of pictures also came into play, especially as our guests wanted to show people back in England that there was more to Africa than mud-huts, and there was more to Nigeria than Boko Haram killings.

 Well, the irony was that Boko Haram ended up spoiling our plans. We had parked outside the ECOWAS headquarters in Asokoro, and there were very few cars and pedestrians around as we walked up to the front of the building to take some pictures, when somebody on the opposite side of the road shouted out “Hey, what are you doing there? Stop taking photos there!”

We looked to see who it was that was giving us an order to stop doing what we thought was completely harmless. In fact, we were engaged in enjoying the city and promoting it to outsiders, surely activities that should be encouraged not thwarted. The man on the other side of the road refused to stop warning us, so we put out camera away and cross the street to face this party pooper intent on spoiling our fun.

The gawky man, wearing a white T-shirt and sandals and carrying a duffel bag, did not look like an official; in fact he looked like a general bystander trying to make trouble. But he said he was a security man and he was ordering us to stop taking photos for security reasons. We were angry, and demanded to see his ID or any other form of identification that will give him the authority to stop us doing something so benign. But he refused to comply and instead grew nervous and frightened as we raged against his rudeness and threatened to have him detained.

It was then that we spotted some soldiers parked some distance away, so we held him by his shirt and marched him towards them so he could either ascertain his identity or be taken away for questioning. But after some heated exchange of words between ourselves, the man and the soldiers, I understood what had happened.

The man we thought was a nuisance was actually a security guard posted to a nearby building who, despite being off duty, was looking out for the capital in light of threats by Boko Haram against major landmarks, especially during the occasion of the on-going National Conference, which had been moved from its original venue of the International Conference Centre to the National Judicial Institute because of such threats.

With security on high alert, we had been confused for Boko Haram supporters taking pictures to aid in terrorism and the man wanted to conduct a citizen’s arrest, but whilst he had the initial confidence to begin, he lacked the conviction to conclude it.

Vigilance over Boko Haram attacks had interrupted our site seeing, and it was both saddening and maddening. From then on, we drove around the city less carefree and more morose, suddenly fully aware that Abuja was a city under threat, and that not too far away, enemies of the state were killing, maiming and razing whole villages to the ground.

Abuja didn’t seem so modern and safe and wholesome anymore, and we didn’t take any more pictures outside.

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The Health and Human Services Secretariat (HHSS) of the Federal Capital Territory Administration has confirmed that no cases of Ebola virus were diagnosed in the city as reported by some media organisations.

This was contained in a statement signed by the Public Relations Officer of the HHSS Mr Badaru Yakasai. It said the suspected case that was referred to Irrua Specialist Hospital was tested for Lassa Fever (which has similar clinical presentations as Ebola) and the test result was negative.

“The FCT Department of Public Health under the Health and Human Services Secretariat, whose mandate is to investigate and report outcome of all suspected outbreaks is in contact with Irrua Specialist Hospital and the Centre confirmed that no Ebola has been confirmed in this case,” it said.

It however stated that samples have been taken to a more specialised Centre for further investigations.

SSS Jailbreak: How Wendell Simlin Feeds Our Scepticism

It’s been 33 days since presidential aide Reno Omokri was exposed as Wendell Simlin, a pseudonym he tried using in linking suspended Central Bank Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi with the spate of terror attacks in February. Reno Omokri got caught, so thankfully the conversation he sought to get started with his Wendell Simlin email never really started.

He instead helped start a conversation around the motive of the presidency with respect to the continued terror attacks in Nigeria. On that 26th day of February 2014, Reno Omokri showed what many had suspected, that the presidency uses the terrorist attacks as a political tool for its own gains. That Reno Omokri got caught helped prove this to a large extent because Reno Omokri works directly with Oronto Douglas, the man many consider as the brain of the Jonathan administration.

There are few strategic or tactical political moves made by the presidency that are not moves orchestrated by Oronto Douglas. This explains why the presidency has kept a loud mute since Wendell Simlin got unraveled as Reno Omokri. That silence will always come at a cost as long as it remains.

The Financial Times, the BBC, Thisday, Daily Trust and several other newspapers, magazines and columnists have written about the presidency and its silence on Wendell Simlin, yet that silence persists. This is one reason why the “attempted jailbreak” claimed by the State Security Service as the reason for the gun battle that ensued at its Head Quarters holds little water. Marilyn Ogar, the SSS spokesperson said, “At 07:15 hours, the Service suspect handler went to the detention facility within the Headquarters to feed the suspects.

“One of the suspects attempted to disarm him by hitting him at the back of his head with his handcuff. His attempt to escape drew the attention of other guards at the facility who fired some shots to warn and deter others.

“The gun shots attracted the attention of the military with which we have an understanding of mutual assistance in the event of any threat. The Army immediately deployed a team to reinforce our perimeter guards to forestall any external collaborators. The situation has since been brought under control.”

There are holes all over this statement. Were it a movie script, it would have been a poorly written one. The SSS is claiming a handcuffed man overpowered its own operative, shot same, and freed other inmates. Where did the other inmates get the guns and bullets they used in engaging the SSS in a prolonged gun battle? How did these inmates breach the SSS’s revered impenetrable security system?  And that attempted jailbreak has since left 22 inmates dead? Never to speak, never to reveal whatever they knew about Boko Haram and their sponsors? Surely, there is more to this jailbreak cover up.

The military needed RPGs and Armoured Personnel Carriers to quell the battle, yet the SSS wants us to believe this was just a jailbreak? A jailbreak that showed that, had the military not been in tow, the SSS would have been overpowered. So then, the escaping inmates suddenly possessed more weapons than operatives of the SSS?

You would notice several theories are already developing around what truly happened. Many have refused the cock and bull tale shared by Marilyn Ogar for obvious reasons; it just didn’t represent the truth, or at least the whole truth of what happened on Sunday morning, 30th March, 2014. Our government should be concerned about this sort of skepticism from the general public, a skepticism that continues to be fed by their insistence on playing pranks with national security.

Had the government for instance distanced itself from Reno Omokri’s Wendell Simlin email, and followed suit with a sacking and investigation of the incident in question, it would have laid down its own commitment towards the fight against terrorism and its insistence on ensuring that Nigeria’s fight against terrorism is not politicized.

It is too late now as the politics of terrorism in Nigeria had its ante raised by the Wendell-Reno-Omokri-Simlin email. When the President once said he had Boko Haram members in his cabinet, he made a statement that put members of his cabinet and his aides in a big box of suspicion. 

When former NSA, General Azazi blamed the PDP for the escalation in terror attacks, that box got even bigger. One would have expected that the presidency would take up the Wendell Simlin incident as a marker to show others that it would not condone the use of terrorism as a political tool.   

So then, the silence of the presidency on Wendell Simlin continues to read loud and the presidency would always be suspected when incidents like the supposed SSS jailbreak happen – or are made to happen. Now, how will a government fight and win the war against terrorism when it cannot be trusted with the fight?

Reno Omokri did not only shoot himself in the foot with his Wendell Simlin stunt, the silence of the presidency continues to fire repeated shots on the foot of the presidency with every decibel of sound that continues to be subjected to the shackles of silence.