If a roll call of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s performing Ministers is made today, the likelihood is that the Minister of Works, Dave Umahi, will make the list. The former governor is one of those we can call a square peg in a square hole. I have followed the way he has been going about discharging his duties. His on-the-spot assessment of projects under his ministry has revealed the canker-worms of corruption and abuse of office that have eaten very deep into the fabrics of our society. For anyone familiar with the system, civil servants are, perhaps, the most corrupt section of the society. They are the engine room of corruption but undue attention is, unfortunately, devoted to politicians. Not that those ones, too, are not corrupt but the system works in such a way that without the connivance and active participation of civil servants, it will be difficult, if not impossible, for politicians to steal a dime. Who teaches the politicians how to steal? Who shows them the way? Who leads the way to the common till? Who knows where the pounds and pennies are stored? Who prepares the papers and helps the politicians to cover their tracks? A thieving civil service is the bedrock of corruption in Nigeria.

In one video of Umahi I watched inspecting a road construction project under his watch, the Minister lampooned the site engineer for incompetence, unprofessional conduct, disobedience of lawful orders, connivance at the application of substandard materials, manipulation of relevant information and cover-up – all of which were tailored towards cutting corners to save costs and achieve poor quality delivery to feather the nest of contractors and the collaborating civil servants. Good quality materials are quoted but poor quality materials are used instead. Quality and quantity are compromised and the country is thereby ripped off to the tune of millions, even billions, in local and foreign currencies.  What is creamed off is shared between the collaborating and conniving contractors and civil servants.

We pay through the nose for good quality jobs but end up getting poor quality jobs. We lose on both ends. Contracts here are usually inflated. The cost of five, six or even 10 projects elsewhere is the cost of one here. After which we end up with poor quality jobs and get no value for money. A road that is meant to last, say, 10 years hardly lasts ten months – or even weeks! Infrastructure is decrepit here because of over-invoicing and poor quality delivery.  In every sector, we should have more to show for the quantum of resources poured into it. Take, for example, the billions in hard currencies that have been poured into power supply, only for us to sink deeper and deeper into the miry clay of power outages!

Sabotage, occasioned usually by those saddled with the onerous but sacred responsibility of watching our back, ensuring that the right thing is done and that we get value for money, is the reason we hear of trillion Naira budgets year-in, year-out but do not see commensurate results. Much of the money budgeted ends up in private pockets. Budget padding is just a tip of the iceberg. Budget round-tripping is worse than budget padding. What this means is that the same projects are circulated in the budget each year, money is voted and the money so voted is collected and shared but no sod is turned on the said projects. Year-in, year-out, the same ritual is performed. Like Prof. Wole Soyinka’s “Abiku”, such projects keep coming repeatedly, sowing tears and sorrows in the polity while a few elements smile to the bank with looted funds.

Umahi is a politician but it would appear he has a sense of duty. The way he interrogated the site engineers and contractors in one of the videos I watched gave me the impression he did not want to compromise professionalism on the altar of filthy lucre. He may not be an angel but, as they say, there ought to be some honour even among thieves. Honour appears to be glaringly missing among Nigeria’s teeming, thieving population. And this is where the First Republic politicians – and civil servants, to boot – were better, far, far better, than their current counterparts.

Corruption is everywhere but its colouration, texture and intensity differ from place to place. A story is told during COVID-19 to show how the same corrupt act was more damaging to Nigeria than Ghana: A group of foreign investors travelling to both countries forgot to take their COVID-19 vaccine. At the point of entry in Ghana, Ghanaian officials demanded a bribe from the foreigners, after which they were led to the appropriate vaccine centre to take the vaccine before being allowed into the country. On the Nigeria side, the foreigners were allowed to romp into town after settling the officials without being compelled to take the necessary vaccine. The foreigners were the ones demanding to be allowed to take the vaccine but the Nigerian officials insisted there was no need. “God will protect us”, they told the foreigners, and waved them on!

What went wrong? Is it poor workmanship? The contractors used were some of the country’s best; so, what went wrong? Is this a question of poor quality or substandard materials? A case of cutting corners? The usual Nigerian factor? What exactly went wrong? Is it inappropriate usage that is the problem? The indiscriminate traffic and parking of heavy duty vehicles constitutes a menace not only to other road users but also to the road itself. Every road is built to specification and failure to adhere can ruin such roads before their life span expires. Who exercises such control on the Lagos-Ibadan expressway?

The novice that I am on this subject, I ask questions, like Peter Abelard, so that I may get answers. Said Abelard: “Nothing can be believed unless it is first understood” And I have the confidence Umahi will be willing to look into this matter and offer illumination, like he did on the Lagos – Calabar expressway. The Lagos-Ibadan expressway is said to be the busiest road in the country. Often, our problem is also the lack of maintenance culture. We allow matters to get to a head before we act, whereas it is said that a stitch in time saves nine. The Ibadan-Ife expressway is another road that Umahi should take a look at. As it is today, that road is a dead trap. Efforts to rehabilitate it has woefully failed. Ditto the Ife-Ilesha junction axis of the same stretch of road.  Once a road expires, such as these ones have, the right thing to do is scrap them and lay new asphalt, and not waste money doing patch-patch work that does not work.  The cost of bad roads – in lives and limbs, time lost, maintenance and repair of vehicles and inconveniences suffered generally – cannot sufficiently be quantified in Naira and kobo.

Are contractors who do shoddy jobs made to face the music? Are their godfathers called to question? Site engineers who compromise on quality ought to be fired and not given a slap on the wrist like Umahi did to the ones in one of the videos I watched. Until people get punished for doing the wrong thing, we are going nowhere in this country!

• Says group are lightweights who should be ignored

 

Minister of State for Defence Bello Mattawalle has described the Northern Elders’ Forum as a political burden to the region, saying that they do not speak for Northerners.

He said the threats issued by the group against President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is “reprehensible and naïve”.

Mattawalle said in a statement that it is preposterous for a group of people seeking political relevance to overburden the system and create political disunity among Nigerians.

He described the forum as a political paperweight trying to embark on a destructive journey that will bring the North to disrepute for personal and selfish gains. 

Mattawalle said: “This NEF is more of a political burden to Northerners. The group is seeking to erode other people’s rights in order to be recognised or made relevant in the scheme of things despite the failure of their sponsored candidates in the 2023 general elections.

“Inasmuch as many have overlooked them in respect of their utterances, it is pertinent to underscore their overbearing attitude on issues that affect political unity and cohesion. 

“They cannot offer any positive idea or thought about the future of Northern Nigeria or, indeed, of Nigeria and its unity and togetherness.

“We all know President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR won the February 2023 presidential election convincingly. So, who is NEF to want to undermine the President’s victory and even threaten to unseat him?

“This same group of people has intentionally shied away from their responsibility of engendering unity in the North by appreciating the incremental development being brought to the region by Ministers appointed by President Tinubu from the North, especially North West.

“The NEF has not deemed it fit to seek audience with Mr. President to discuss issues affecting the Northern region despite the numerous challenges facing the North as rightly highlighted by the President and being addressed by him.”

He added: “The group is yet to visit any of the ministers dealing with issues of security, agriculture, water resources, police affairs, education, health, budget, foreign affairs, or any head of security agencies in the country so far for firsthand knowledge of government programmes and actions. 

“The majority of them are more interested in faulting the government so as to be recognised or accorded some relevance.

“Our region, the North, is united, disciplined and politically-driven enough not to listen and accept being teleguided by any group of elites who had fed fat in the past on the North’s resources and opportunities which had retarded development in the region and nation due to their selfishness. 

 “President Tinubu is poised to do a lot for the North as President of Nigeria, elected by the people of Nigeria, not by one ethnic group or the other.

“Therefore, anyone mistakenly seeing President Tinubu as a failure or a weakling is making a mistake and should rethink.

“Such a person or group is either blind or misguided and unable to see the new Nigeria that is emerging.

“Therefore, the NEF statement allegedly expressing regret for voting for President Tinubu is unfortunate.

“NEF is not more than a group that has refused to accept reality and is living in delusion.

“The truth is that the North is proud of its support and vote for President Tinubu and will continue to be proud of her relationship with the President given the enormous change and development his government has brought to the region.

“My advice to NEF and others alike is to support the present government and join hands with President Tinubu, GCFR in order to further move the country forward.”

[TheNation]

The National Identity Management Commission has revealed that the new national identity card is a single, multipurpose card and not three separate cards.

The Head of Corporate Communications at NIMC, Kayode Adegoke, disclosed this on Friday in a note titled “Key Facts About the Proposed New General Multipurpose National Identity Card”.

On April 5, the commission announced that it had collaborated with the Central Bank of Nigeria and the Nigeria Inter-bank Settlement System to launch a new card with payment functionality for all types of social and financial services.

Part of the note read, “The new national ID card is a single, convenient, and general multipurpose card, eliminating the need for multiple cards—not three.

“The single GMPC has multiple use cases: payments/financial, government intervention/services, travel, etc.”

According to the commission, only applicants for the card will have to request it with their NIN through the self-service online portal, NIMC offices, or their respective banks.

It added that the card would be issued through the applicants’ respective banks in line with existing protocols for the issuance of debit and credit cards.

“The card can be picked up by holders at the designated centre or delivered to the applicants at the requested location at an extra cost to be borne by the applicants,” it stated.

Earlier, the commission disclosed that the card, which would be produced according to ICAO standards, was positioned as the country’s default national identity card.

According to NIMC, the card shall enable eligible persons, especially those who are financially excluded from social and financial services, to have access to multiple government intervention programmes.

[Punch]

 

•No aid, no drug, no food – villagers lament plight in the bush 29 days after
•What we told panel – Okoloba Chair

INFORMATION that the Military Board of Inquiry, headed by Air Vice-Marshal David Ajayi, gained access to the Okuama community, Ughelli South Local Government Area, Delta State, locked down by soldiers on cordon-and-search operation since March 14, when 17 military personnel lost their lives in the riverside settlement, has sparked curiosity.

The concealed visit of the AVM Ajayi-led Board of Inquiry, constituted by the Defense Headquarters, Abuja, to Okuama before it commenced sitting last Wednesday in Warri, attracted more than a passing attention because the Army had earlier deprived the Governor of Delta State, who is the Chief Security Officer, CSO, Rt. Hon Sheriff Oborevwori, entry to the community.

Besides the governor, the Army practically barred the Commissioner of Police in the state, Olufemi Abaniwonda, from accessing Okuama.

The stopover of the military board has activated concerns about the neutrality of the Army in the inquiry it has appropriated, which many stakeholders have interrogated.

AVM Ajayi had told Oboreverowi a few days before the commencement of the sitting that the board was in the state to investigate the unfortunate incident that happened at Okuama.

His words, “We are here on a fact-finding mission and not to apportion blame. We are here to gather facts from security agencies, community leaders, and community dwellers.”

Why I did not visit Okuama-Oborevwori

Governor Oborevwori, who met with security heads at Bomadi, headquarters of Bomadi Local Government Area, and expected to have taken a speedboat to Okuama, some kilometres away, four days after the incident, to personally see things flew to Abuja the next day, Tuesday, March 19, to brief President Bola Tinubu on what happened.

He told reporters in Abuja that he was yet to meet with the people of Okuama, as the place was deserted. This was five days after the incident.

According to him, “When something happens like this, it is always not easy to manage tension. Yesterday, I was in that local government; I was in Bomadi for security meeting, to get full details and a briefing.

“So, some of those issues are security issues that you cannot discuss publicly. That is the truth, and we are managing the situation. Therefore, the issue of whether a place has been burned down or people have been killed; this has happened, but what is the way forward?”

Musa, CDS, modifies reason

Speaking on a television program earlier in the month, the Chief of Defense Staff, General Christopher Musa, gave a dissimilar reason. He stated that Oborevwori and residents of Okuama had no access to the community because security agencies were carrying out a “cordon and search” operation.

“We are currently conducting a cordon and search in the community. Cordon-and-search operation means we are searching every nook and cranny within the community because they have a lot of illegal funds from crude oil theft. They have bought a lot of weapons”, the CDs said.

“It is for us to thoroughly clean the community to ensure that no weapon no explosive is left in the community. I can tell you that at the end of the operation, residents of the community will always go back.”

However, the “cordon-and-search” operation was still on when the authorities that denied Oborevwori’s right of entry granted the military board of inquiry access to the community.

Police commissioner speaks for himself

In his case, the state police boss, Abaniwonda, said on a television programme: “We have not been able to move into this community (Okuama). Yes, it is our responsibility as the primary line of defense in internal security. However, when you have another sister agency conducting an operation, the reasonable thing to do is to wait for them to finish.
“We have not been able for now to get into Okuama because of the volatile nature of what is presently ongoing around that environment.

” Efforts are being made to ensure that the perpetrators of this heinous crime are brought to justice. We are working in conjunction with other security agencies and I can assure you that we are making progress.”

Abaniwonda, who acknowledged that the major line of defence in internal security was the responsibility of the police, said, “In the Okuama incident, we have an ongoing military operation there. We have been on the ground, and we have been supportive. We have not been missing in action. Technology has been an integral part of present-day policing. These individuals are being tracked.”

Objection

However, there is no question about the propriety of the military panel visiting Okuama to find facts. The question is why the same military deprived the governor of visiting a community in his state where such a tragic incident that warranted the people fleeing the town occurred.

It was highly unconvincing that Oborevwori’s visit to Okuama on March 18, when he visited Bomadi, would have interfered with the cordon-and-search operation by soldiers. The military, obviously, has another reason for stopping the governor.

The Army did not even respect the words of the governor, who guaranteed after his closed-door meeting with Tinubu that soldiers would not carry out reprisal attacks.

Oborevwori told reporters: “What is happening now is something that we did not bargain for, but we want to assure everybody that there will be no more attacks on the villages, if there’s been anyone that has happened in the past…”

If they denied the governor access, which is objectionable, why also deny entry to the head of the security agency principally responsible for the investigation of such an incident in the state?

Invasion continues

Up till Thursday, the military has not ceased attacks on villages in Ughelli area over the killings; the most recent was Olota community, 50 kilometers from Okuama, but the Army authorities confirmed that the soldiers who arrested some people recovered arms and ammunition.

Twenty-nine days after the villagers, including mothers and children, fled their homeland and took refuge in the forests, aid agencies have not been able to reach them with food, drugs, and other relief materials, essentially because of the fear of soldiers who are busy invading communities and harassing residents in the name of the cordon-and-search operation.

A leader of Okuama, who spoke to Sunday Vanguard, said the Army had levelled virtually all the houses in the community, except schools and churches.

They also alleged that the military brought in caterpillars and other earth-moving equipment to dig the ground to bury their dead, which was the reason it has continued to deny the governor and residents access to the community.

The community rebuffed appearing before the military panel, citing impartiality on the part of the Army, which they termed the accuser, investigator, prosecutor and judge.

Military panel purportedly ruffled by the level of destruction

Informants, who preferred anonymity, told Sunday Vanguard last week that the level of destruction on the ground rattled members of the military panel when they visited Okuama community before coming to the Government House Annex, Warri, for sitting on Wednesday.

They whispered that the panel shut out reporters from the sitting because of what they saw.

“We read they met for over five hours at the Government House Annex, Warri, before reluctantly allowing stakeholders from Okoloba to meet them. They announced through a civilian government official on security to the journalists that they do not require their presence,” one of the informants said.

“What is the military hiding? Why shut out the media from the place? In the past panel of inquiries, with the governor and others, principal officers of the military lead media houses to see and explain what happened.

“In Rivers State for instance, when the Army destroyed houses in Yeghe community in search of repentant militants, they still took journalists there to explain their actions.

“In the era of Governor Chibuike Amaechi, he came with the army and journalists and the community, before the military and governor narrated their losses, and even provided pictures of those killed.

“In this case in Delta State, they shut out the media and kept stakeholders who came at 10 am and waited till after 3 pm. One would like to ask what the panel members were discussing for that long, if not what they beheld traumatized them.
“They should just open the community to natives and allow the people to pick the pieces of their lives; after all, they have razed their homes and identified the killers of their men, who are not even from the community.

“The only offence of Okuama people is that they committed the crime on their soil, but is it those mothers and children who are suffering in the forests that killed the soldiers? Why should they make them pass through such difficulties for more than one month running?”

What we told military panel—Koki, Okoloba chair

The chair of the Okoloba community in Bomadi Local Government Area, Mr. Clement Koki, whose age-long land dispute with Okuama culminated in the March 14 massacre, led his community’s delegation to the military panel.

The panel rounded off inquiries and hearings from the community leadership around 6.45 pm.

Koki, speaking to one of our reporters after the meeting, disclosed that it was all about asking questions to know how trouble started between the two communities, and what led to the ill-fated incident at Okuama.

His words: “They asked us how the misunderstanding between the two communities started, and we told them everything. We gave them the information they wanted to hear from us. More so, we presented all the necessary documents to them”.

We will speak after conclusion of findings —Uzor, Special Adviser

The Special Adviser to Governor Oborevwori on Peace and Conflict Resolution, Chief Edwin Uzor, also said, “The process is still ongoing and we will speak to you after findings are concluded”.
Expectedly, by last Friday, according to media reports, the panel would have proceeded to Bayelsa State, in continuation of its investigation.

Vanguard News Nigeria

The African Union (AU) has condemned the suspension of political activities in Mali by the military junta. 

On Wednesday, the military junta issued a decree suspending, until further notice, all activities by political parties and groups on the grounds of “maintaining public order”.

In a statement issued on Saturday, Moussa Mahamat, chairman of AU, expressed “great concern” over the decree, asking the Malian authorities to provide a post-coup transition roadmap to return the country to democratic rule.

“The President of the Commission expresses his serious concern about this suspension which is likely to hinder the implementation of an inclusive transition process in the country,” the statement reads.

“The President of the Commission strongly underlines the right to citizen, religious and political participation as a fundamental right and calls on the transitional authorities to reconsider the said decision and to work on a road map aimed at completing the transition process in course.”

Mahamat reaffirms the AU’s continued support to the Malian people, saying the organisation is desirous to “work with the transitional authorities and all Malian stakeholders to restore constitutional order, within the prescribed deadlines, with a view to promoting lasting peace, stability and development in Mali”.

The West African country has been under military rule since the coup in 2020 that ousted Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta.

In September 2023, the ruling military junta postponed the country’s presidential election earlier scheduled for February 2024.

The military government is yet to announce a new date for the election.

In February, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) lifted some sanctions imposed on Mali, Niger Republic, and Burkina Faso — member nations that are ruled by the military.

[TheCable]

“We do not have evidence of Israel committing genocide in Gaza”- Gen. Lloyd Austin, Secretary of Defence of the United States of America.

Never in the history of humanity and in the comity of nations has such an asinine, puerile and indefensible statement been made by a high-ranking Government official.

It reflects the dishonesty, wickedness, insensitivity, depravity, deceit, hypocrisy, double standards, moral bankruptcy, unconscionable inhumanity, malodorous disposition and spiritual turpitude of the Biden administration.

You cannot wish away or dismiss the truth no matter how bitter and you cannot deny the facts no matter how ugly.

Andrew Mitrovika, a columnist with Al Jazeera, captured the events in Gaza graphically and clearly when he wrote the following. Permit me to quote him extensively. He wrote,

“The cataclysm that you and I are witnessing in Gaza is a genocide in the awful making.

It is not an “onslaught”. It is not an “invasion”. It is not even a “war”. It is a genocide.

The apocalyptic scenes and sounds in Gaza are proof that a cruel, occupying army is intent on achieving its overarching aim: the annihilation of what remains of an already shattered slice of land and the indiscriminate killing of helpless, exhausted children, women and men.

Over decades, a succession of immune Israeli governments and their useful proxies, the rampaging settler militias, have waged incremental genocide, bit by bit, with the explicit approval, consent, and encouragement of Western governments – who, in a predictable show of performative solidarity with a ruthless ally – have bathed their tourist attractions in blue and white or the Star of David.

Go ahead, you craven enablers, show the world your true and rank colours. We will remember.

Make no mistake: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – along with his racist gang of brutish (by nature, temperament, and vernacular) cabinet ministers – have been aching, for a long, frustrating time, to abandon the let’s-teach-Palestinians-a-lethal-lesson spasms of violence in favour of the much more satisfying wholesale destruction of the Gaza Strip.

The monstrous plan is as plain as Netanyahu’s wretched character: Be done with Gaza by erasing Gaza.

Anyone, anywhere, in any forum who denies this fact is either a liar, blind – or willfully, happily, and comfortably both.

This is not “righteous” payback or vengeance. It is – I repeat, for the legion of complicit hacks and stenographers who, remarkably, have never noticed, let alone given a damn, about the perpetual suffering and trauma of Palestinians – a genocide.

If my blunt indictment stings, I challenge any of the historically illiterate columnists and American TV news celebrities who have rushed to Israel to burnish their credentials as “foreign correspondents” – with their hairstylists, makeup artists and writers in tow – to disabuse me, and much more importantly, the Palestinian diaspora and their allies, of our belief that a murderous genocide is unfolding in that besieged enclave.

These insufferable hypocrites are again tarring Palestinians as “evil predators” while praising Israelis as “solicitous saints” for warning grateful Palestinians in Gaza that they’re going to kill them en masse.

These fawning Israel loyalists have likely not once stepped inside the barbed-wired walls and fences that encircle Gaza or interviewed any of the millions of human beings who, for generations, have endured the loss, theft, deprivations, indignities, humiliations, and, of course, lethal ferocity committed by an apartheid state.

It is a familiar, surreal minstrel show that reduces an old, complex story into a pat, easy-to-digest clash between black and white for countless equally callow, geography-allergic Americans who are convinced that carrying a passport is “woke”.

The white hats – the Israelis – are always the innocent victims. The black hats – the Palestinians – are always the guilty perpetrators.

Hence, the cavalier disregard for the almost incomprehensible human consequences of Israel’s blatant annulment of that, by now, silly, anachronistic term: international law.

Stop the stuff of life – food and water – from getting into captive Gaza. Fine.

Stop fuel and electricity from being delivered to homes and hospitals. Fine.

Bomb United Nations schools sheltering desperate Palestinian families from the incessant carpet bombing. Fine.

Attack ambulances to bar them from ferrying mangled children to darkened hospitals where they require urgent care. Fine.

Unleash white phosphorous to burn Palestinians to the bone. Fine.

Dispense with the canard of “precision strikes” to prevent “civilian casualties” and revel, instead, in turning Gaza into Fallujah, circa 2005. Fine.

Seal the prison that is Gaza tighter to make escape and hope impossible. Fine.

Then demand that 1.1 million people move to nowhere within hours or face, in all likelihood, a certain death. Fine.

On appalling cue, the usual gallery of preening presidents and prime ministers has deplored the atrocities committed by the black hats – while applauding, as a necessary and welcomed rebuttal, the atrocities committed by the white hats.

So please, would fantasists stop imploring the International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague to do something, anything, to hold “both parties”, including, Israel, to account?

It has not happened and will not happen because the ever-compliant ICC knows that it must not offend, and will not offend, the powers that be in Washington, DC who run the whole fraudulent farce.

Meanwhile, Netanyahu – who, just a few weeks ago, was excoriated for being an indicted crook facing a corruption trial on a slew of fraud, bribery, and breach of trust charges as well as having an authoritarian’s DNA – has been rehabilitated by US President Joe Biden and obsequious company as the Middle East’s shining avatar of resolve, resilience and morality.

Such is the diseased “moral” compass of Biden and his pedestrian confederates in London, Paris, Berlin, Brussels, Canberra and Ottawa.

Still, it’s hardly surprising that feral colonial powers – given their hideous record of killing and disfiguring so many innocents, in so many scarred places – would offer their blanket endorsement to another colonial power responsible for killing and disfiguring so many innocent Palestinians in Gaza and beyond yesterday, today and tomorrow.

But know this: Biden et al do not speak for millions of citizens who they purport to represent, but who will continue to stand steadfast with unbowed Palestinians and their just and humane cause.

Despite all the nonsense and posturing by the “international community” about “resolving the crisis through diplomacy”, this dystopian-like horror has been the “end game” all along: pulverise every square inch of Gaza and its people into dust and memory.

The risible “two-state” solution is a sick illusion promoted by slick, Ivy-league-educated diplomats like US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the other Israeli war-crime apologists who preceded him – fused, as they were and are, to their “partners” in Tel Aviv like conjoined twins.

Blinken has travelled to Israel at the behest of his boss to “greenlight” genocide. We will remember that, too.

A malignant regime, motivated by a poisonous combination of ultra-nationalism and fanaticism, knows that its sinister goal is in tantalizing sight.

There will be more horrors to come. But Palestinians will not be broken. They will persevere and prevail. It will be hard and take time, but they will rebuild” (CONCLUDED).

Andrew Mitrovika, the author of these powerful words, has hit the nail on the head.

His views and indeed his conclusion that genocide is indeed being committed in Gaza represents the thinking of millions of people all over the world.

Western leaders and all those that are still lost in their vain and self-inflicted fantasy of “no evidence of genocide in Gaza” should read his powerful and insightful words carefully and come to the conclusion that what is happening in Gaza is downright evil, ought to be described for what it is and roundly condemned.

Claiming that there is no evidence of genocide in Gaza is like saying that there is no evidence of the holocaust in Nazi Germany and that there is no evidence of the trans-Atlantic slave trade or slavery in America, Europe and the Caribbean in the 18th and 19th century.

It is like saying that there is no evidence of the hideous atrocities, horrific barbarity, daylight robbery, psychological torture, emotionel abuse, wholesale deprivation, unalloyed humiliation, shameless graft and mind-boggling pillaging that the western colonial powers of Great Britain, France, Holland, Belgium, Portugal, Italy, Spain and Germany unleashed and foisted on their former colonies in Africa, Asia, South America and the Middle East.

It is like saying that King Louis 11 of Belgium did not kill 10 million Congolese Africans, that Vladimer Lenin and Josef Stalin did not kill 25 million Russians, that Pol Pot did not kill 2 million Cambodians, that the Hutus of Rwanda did not kill 1 million Tutsis, that the Turks did not kill 1 million Armenians and that the Americans did not literally exterminate the Red Indian population in their country.

It is like saying that there was no terror attack in New York on 9/11 and that there was no terror attack in Moscow a few weeks ago.

It is like saying that the Spanish did not eliminate a quarter of the native and indigenous population of South America, that the British did not wipe out millions of the Irish and 3 million Bengali Indians, that the Serbs did not murder 20,000 thousand Bosnians and that Argentina did not exterminate its entire black population.

It is like saying that 20 million people were not killed in WW 1, that 50 million people were not killed in WW11 and that America did not drop a nuclear bomb on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki killing hundreds of thousands.

It is like saying that the ethnic cleansing of 80,000 of the Herero and Nama people of Namibia by the Germans never took place and it is like saying that the mass murder of 3 million Igbos by Nigeria never took place.

It is like saying that the war that is being waged in Gaza by Israel is against Hamas and not against the Palestinian people.

It is like saying that the war started on October 7th after the attack on Israel by Hamas and not 75 years ago after the unleashing of the horrific Nakba on the Palestinians and the illegal occupation of their land by the Jews.

It is like saying that the Israelis have always owned all the land in Gaza and that the Palestinians never lived in or had a historical stake in it.

It is like saying that the Zionists did not murder hundreds of innocent and defenceless Palestinians in the village of Deir Yassin.

It is like saying that the Christian Falange Lebanese militia, with the full support of the Israelis, did not butcher thousands of Palestinian Muslims in the refugee camps of Sabra and Shatilla.

It is like saying that the 1948 “Nakba” in which 750,000 Palestinians were butchered and ethnically cleansed, forced from their homes and scattered and displaced by the Zionists never took place.

It is like saying that the terror attack by Hamas in Israel on October 7th in which 1000 Jews were killed never took place.

Finally it is like saying that the air strike by the Israeli Airforce on Eid in which three sons and three grandchildren of the leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, were targetted and murdered never took place.

Those that insist on perpetuating the monstrous mendacity that there is no genocide in Gaza and that indulge in such egregious falsehood, self-serving perfidy and outrageous lies are not only malicious, mischevous, malevolent, ignorant and sociopathic but also totally and completely insensitive, misinformed and possibly insane.

They look but they refuse to see and they listen but refuse to hear.

They have no truth in them and they are nothing but ferral psychopaths and intellectual barbarians.

They are a coven of dark, dangerous and deviant manipulators and an unholy gathering of shameless and sinister cultists, charlatans and gangsters who are in the grip, power and service of satan.

That is precisely why many refer to them as agents of the dark forces and acolytes of the principalities and powers that rule our world and refer to the Zionists whose interests they seek to further and protect as founding fathers of the Synagogue of Satan and devil worshippers.

For the record there has never been a war in history like the one in Gaza in which 80% of the country has been decimated, 100% of the population displaced and 50% of those that have been killed are children.

In his contribution, Christian Hedges, an American jourmalist, whilst on his assignment and coverage of the war in Gaza said “children have been shot in other conflicts I have covered but never have I watched as soldiers enticed children like mice into a trap and murder them for sport”.

All this and yet the American Secretary of Defence, General Lloyd Austin, has the effontry and nerve to proclaim that there is no evidence of genocide in Gaza!

Someone needs to ask this misguided and facetious man just how many Palestinians need to be slaughtered before it fits into his definition of genocide!

It is painfully obvious that he has a low intelligence quotient, he has a myopic and shallow mind and that his reasoning and logic is little better than that of a village idiot.

Only the cruel can deny the horror of Gaza and claim that what we are witnessing there today is anything other than mass murder, ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity, war crimes, collective punishment, starvation and genocide all of which constitute specific and clear violations of both international law and the law of war and all of which have made Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his Ministers, his Intelligence Chiefs and his Military Commanders candidates for prosecution at the International Criminal Court at the Hague.

Those that claim that this is not the case are devious-minded specious liars and blood-lusting warmongers who are feeding fat on the blood of the women and children of Gaza and who deserve to burn in hell.

The blood of 35,000 innocent and defenceless Palestinians, including 15,000 children, are on their collective hands.

This blood will cry to God in heaven for vengeance and speak against them into eternity.

Joe Biden and his administration will ultimately regret the blind, irrational, inexplicable, indefensible, unjustifiable, unrestrained, unconditional and relentless support that they continue to offer the Jewish state which, given the events of the last six months, has transformed itself into a murderous, totalitarian fascist apartheid settler- colonial state and a hideous enclave of bloodthirsty genocidal maniacs, child killers, mass murderers, land grabbers and vicious, cold-blooded Nazis.

It is fair to say that all the demons have left hell and now reside in Israel.

Have you been wondering why things are not the way they used to be between you and your wife? Is she giving you cold shoulders instead of warmth? Hugging her pillows instead of you? Ah, you should worry. Do you have more one-word answers from her instead of full sensible sentences? She spends more time on the phone talking to people than you her husband. She spends more time on Netflix, African Magic and Zee World than she does with you. She sits with the children in their room while you also watch football or play video games in another part of the house? Then, she waits for you to sleep off before crawling into bed. Trouble is brewing. A storm is gathering and you should worry.

You are steadily, totally becoming your wife’s flat mate. You are losing her. She has simply stopped arguing with you. She agrees with everything you decide, instead of trying to state her points or correct your errors or mistakes. You are in trouble and you know it. She is leaving you while living with you. Your relationship is now on silent mode and trust me, if you value that marriage, you will swallow your ego, eat your pride and roll up your sleeves to repair what’s left of your home.

Let’s look at some little foxes that trouble homes and marriages quietly, smoothly, silently until everything is all done and gone. Let us be frank, there are old fashioned wives, raised by traditional mothers who deal with bad husbands and bad marriages without raising their voices. Today, we will not focus on their old-school ways. No. Today is about the type of husbands who push their women and marriage into the silent mode.

1. The Mean Landlord

This is the husband who bullies and threatens his wife with quit notice at every turn. Here are some of his favorite refrains;

“I’ll soon send you back to your parents. "

“Keep talking to me like that and you will be needing another accommodation soon”.

“In my house? Do you want me to kick you out”?

“If you close from work late tomorrow, don’t come back here”

There are husbands who stop at just the threats. But there are those who go all the way. These are the ones who lock their wives out, throw their wives belongings in the rain at every opportunity, after very quarrel.

If you, dear husband, treat your wife like this, any number of things can happen to you, and believe me, the silent treatment is the least of them. Remember, not all wives are brought up to nicely stay on their lane in a bad marriage.

2. The Unprotective Lover.

This one wants to be called “Lord” but can’t protect his clan and family. He just doesn’t know that being called husband goes beyond whisking out your whip and giving your woman the best time in-between the sheets. He’s clueless when it comes to shielding his wife from the elements, and I don’t mean the rain, wind and sun.

Bro, your mother loves you to bits and this is the first time she’s sharing you with another woman, your wife, that is. She will lovingly want to continue to protect her son, because that is what she has always done. It’s part of her job description. She will lovingly try to elbow your beautiful wife out of the way, even out of her kitchen. She may even want to continue to shop for you, pick your ties and sit with you for hours after work. She does not hate your wife, she is just being Mummy. But your wife is the Lady of the Manor, this new manor. Not your Mum, not your sisters. Nicely, gently tell your family that your wife is the First Lady. Do not allow her in-laws to frustrate her, talk down on her, make her feel like an alien in her own space. Be the crown that you ought to be. Don’t let her withdraw into her shell. Don’t let her rechannel her love into her job or business. Don’t let her stop being the girl you married. You won’t like the other version of your wife. Protect the version you married, please.

3. The Financial Bully

This one starves his wife and family of comfort, just to prove that he’s the boss and breadwinner. Every quarrel has financial implications. Heard of a man who went to lock up his wife’s shop and shut down her business because she was beginning to do well and could pick her bills herself. The guy felt he was losing his grip on her. So he shut her business. After all, he set it up. The financial bully if offended meted out such punishment as going to work with the keys of all the cars in the house.. His wife must jump “okada” and “Keke Napep”. That’s her punishment for being rude, for talking back, not getting dinner ready on time or allowing the househelp to make his soup.

4. The "Pagan' Husband

This one leaves all things spiritual to his wife. All he wants to do is make money and provide comfort for his family. He believes money answers all things. Good guy. Good provider. He’s lucky if his wife is “spiritual” and always around to raise the children the right and godly way. But if the wife is like him, the children are left to societal vagaries and peer pressure. Then he just wakes up one day and find out that the child he named ‘Samuel’ is now an Atheist. The one he named Kabir has 10 piercings, wears lipstick and hides to eat and smoke during Ramadan. This husband is simply unavailable and his comeuppance, his amen junction is usually very traumatic later in life. Because he throws money at his problems, his wife and children tend to seek comfort far from him, many times in places and people he’d never touch with any kind of pole.

There are many things a man should know before going into marriage. There are many things fathers should teach their sons, little things mothers must impress on their boys. Though they may look little, however, they are lessons that must be leant because they can make or mar the best of marriages and good intentions.

For instance, the financial bully most likely will find out that his wife, after years of frustration, has built a four flats somewhere and has a secret business. The mean landlord may one day kick his wife out and find out she does not come begging with her friends and family. She just moves out and move on.

So which of these groups do you belong? Which of these sins are you guilty of?

THE Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) aroused the rage of Nigerians this week when it revealed in its periodic newsletter called “EFCC Alert” (which it shared with news organizations on Monday) that it had recovered up to 30 billion naira of the money allegedly stolen by suspended Humanitarian and Poverty Alleviation minister Betta Edu.

The rage wasn’t directed at the EFCC, of course. It was directed at Betta Edu for the deficiency of morality it must take for her to steal that much money in just six months of being a minister. The rage also comes from people’s extrapolation of how much unconscionable theft of our public wealth must be going on in this administration undetected. What sort of moral climate conduces to such stratospheric pillaging of the public till without a tinge of compunction or fear of consequences?

Just when Nigerians were roiling in the storm of EFCC’s revelations, Edu’s lawyers denied them and threatened to sue the BBC for publishing them, even though scores of news outlets also published the same story.

Her lawyers allege that the story about the recovery of N30 billion from her and the investigation of 50 banks connected to her, which we read inseverallegacy and digital-native news outlets, was repurposed from the BBC.

Well, that’s not accurate. As I indicated earlier, EFCC’s bulletin, called the “EFCC Alert,” is the source of the story, and it was shared with multiple news organizations, including the BBC.

If the information about the extortionate amount of money allegedly recovered from Edu is false, the blame for this should go to the EFCC, not the BBC—or, for that matter, any news site.

In order to write this column, I searched for the EFCC Alert to see what exactly it contains. I would have reached the same conclusions about Betta Edu as the BBC and other news organizations did if I were still in the news business.

Here’s the original, verbatim wording from the “EFCC Alert” that informed the BBC story:

“Update on Betta Edu investigation. We have laws and regulations guiding our investigations. Nigerians will also know that they are already on suspension, and this is based on the investigations we have done, and President Bola Tinubu has proved to Nigerians that he is ready to fight corruption.

“Moreover, concerning this particular case, we have recovered over N30 billion, which is already in the coffers of the Federal Government.

“It takes time to conclude investigations; we started this matter less than six weeks ago. Some cases take years to investigate. There are so many angles to it, and we need to follow through with some of the discoveries that we have seen. Nigerians should give us time on this matter; we have professionals on this case, and they need to do things right. There are so many leads here and there.

“As it is now, we are investigating over 50 bank accounts that we have traced money into. That is no child’s play. That’s a big deal. Then you ask about my staff strength.

“And again, we have thousands of other cases that we are working on. Nigerians have seen the impact of what we have done so far, by way of some people being placed on suspension and by way of the recoveries that we have made. You have seen that the programme itself has been suspended. We are exploring so many discoveries that we have stumbled upon in our investigation.

“If it is about seeing people in jail, well, let them wait. Everything has a process to follow. So Nigerians should wait and give us the benefit of the doubt.”

It’s entirely possible that the EFCC meant that in the past six weeks, it has recovered 30 billion naira from multiple corruption cases of which Betta Edu’s is one. There are many clues to that in the “alert.”Perhapsthe EFCC chairman has challenges with articulate, elegant, and clear communication in the English language.

However, in the absence of any countervailing facts, it’s reasonable to assume that the EFCC Alert meant that 30 billion naira was recovered from Betta Edu and that more than 50 bank accounts belonging to her are being investigated.

After all, the title of the bulletin is “Update on Betta Edu.” It also talks of “suspension” (and Edu is the only public official we know of that is on suspension on account of corruption), although it uses the pronoun “they” to refer to the subject of suspension, implying that it could be more than one person.

Nonetheless, in referencing the recovery of 30 billion naira, the EFCC Alert talks about “this particular case”; it doesn’t say“these particular cases.”So, it’s wholly within the bounds of reason to conclude that “this particular case” refers to the title of the news bulletin: “Update on Betta Edu investigation.”

I hope the EFCC will clarify this issue for us—and, of course, be more careful in its public communication in future.

But it doesn’t really matter if Betta stole 30 billion naira in six months and salted away money in 50 bank accounts. The truth is that the ministry she supervised is a cesspool of some of the most fetid and audacious corruption that Nigeria has ever seen since the restoration of civilian rule in 1999.

Right from its inception, it was conceived as the hotbed of graft, as the featherbed of in-your-face venality. Its origins are traceable to the Muhammadu Buhar regime’s National Social Investment Programme (NSIP), which was conceived to putatively contain poverty and deprivation in Nigeria.

NSIP had within it such programs as the N-Power Programme, the National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme (NHGSFP), the Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programme, and the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme (GEEP), which is made up of the MarketMoni, FarmerMoni, and TraderMoni schemes.

Former Vice President Yemi Osinbajo headed NSIP. But the Buhari cabal later realized that NSIP was a prolificcash cow that lined several pockets and missed its supposed targets. I was one of the earliest people approached to expose what the cabal was convinced was humongous corruption in the NSIP that ran into tens of billions of naira—complete with what seems like fool-proof documentary evidence.

As I said at the time, I refused to be used to amplify the internal discord of the common oppressors of the Nigerian people. When Osinbajo was using TraderMoni to induce poor people to vote for Buhari, the cabal had no problem. They only discovered his “corruption” after the fact.

So, they reached out to other fringe sources and figures to give publicity to the corruption in NSIP, which caused Osinbajo to threaten to sue a whole bunch of people. They achieved their aim of calling attention to the rot in NSIP, which justified taking it away from the vice president’s office and constituting it as a separate ministry.

Thus, the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development was born. The Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration renamed it as the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation.

Because it was conceived in corruption, born in more corruption, and nourished in even more corruption, it can’t be anything but corrupt. It has become the posterchild for bizarre, eye-watering, consequence-free corruption.

Recall that on April 10, 2020, Maryam Uwais, then Special Adviser to the President on Social Investment, told Channels TV’s Sunrise Daily program that she couldn’t account for the billions that she and the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs putatively gave to weak, poor, and vulnerable Nigerians to ease the hurt of the coronavirus pandemic because, “Those who benefit from the conditional cash transfer of the Federal Government as palliative to cushion the effects of the lockdown caused by the deadly Coronavirus don’t want to be addressed as poor people. That is why we can’t publish their names.”

For her part, Sadiya Umar Farouq, Uwais’ superior, turned heads when she said she expended billions to feed schoolkids who weren’t in school because of COVI-19. Betta Edu was merely walking a well-trodden path in the ministry.

If Tinubu wants to be taken seriously, he should not only outright terminate Edu’s appointment as a minister, but he should also scrap the entire ministry she heads. That ministry has no reason to exist.

The conversation about an Inland Port facility in Onitsha, Anambra State is not New. And it came up last week at a private gathering. Many will recall that the ‘port’ was formally commissioned by late Dr Alex Ekwueme, Vice President to late Alhaji Shehu Shagari. It never really functioned in real terms. It is still the pet dream of many and all issues pertaining to it are presumably being discussed on the platforms feasibility, economic common sense and basic marine science and knowledge of regional ecology.of plain and verifiable aquascience.

We submit here that the project is a desirable one. It is also feasible from the angle of provision of port infrastructure. It has, in addition, been routinely declared desirable from the standpoint of those who are quick to point to the volume of container traffic from Lagos to Onitsha and other parts of the South East. But isn’t it possible that this is already beginning to look like a White Elephant Project that would be counted as a major investment in the South East, if successfully executed? Just asking.

What needs to be re-evaluated, perhaps, fully is its feasibility from the angle of security of goods and route; as well as its viability from the angle of the simple required maritime ecosystem. For some people, the mere fact that it was conceived to ease trade, reduce the cost of imported goods in South East markets, create jobs and generally enable the South East and environs realize their full economic potential makes it an eternally important economic infrastructure.

Papers have been written on it over the years, with Environmental impact assessments (EIAs), cross references with nations that had to devise means of raising water levels when needed; and a near-consensus among experts on the economic benefits.  

One of the major overlooked, and largely unacknowledged, problem is the probability of not ever really getting enough water for the primary business of a port. You need water for a river port and the Onitsha end of the river Niger does not have enough. Dredging is a good idea, but it will give you a bigger ditch and wipe out the means of livelihood of water dependent local economies.

The confirmed practice elsewhere, of “gating” and later discharging the water to secure enough depth, is usually on the cards whenever this matter is on the table. All things considered, the challenges that come to mind regarding the proposed Onitsha River Port are: (1) How the river dams along the Niger, Benue and their many tributaries have reduced available water at onitsha by over 68%; (2) Possibly unrealistic projections about the prospects of the project; (3) The credibility of some of the existing Environmental Impact Assessment (AIE) reports, especially against the background of climate change and other environmental factors; (4) Direct politicization of the economic value of a river port in Onitsha, as against Port Harcourt and Calabar.

We must also consider the following; (1) the game plans of individuals who wish to upgrade their relevance by fighting to secure vital “federal project for Ndigbo”, while sometimes knowing that it will either not work or that it will not bring the alleged benefits, and, also; (2) The questionable security along the inland waterways, especially with active militants, Egbesu Boys, and freelance oil bunkerers, creek-dependent mischief makers and others. Will the vessels really make their way through the creeks, while vehicles on our roads in broad daylight and even trains are unsafe?

Some of the discussions about Onitsha Port actually remind one of discussions about electricity supply a few years ago. The Federal Government was then building massive gas turbines for electricity supply. Everyone was talking about the mega watts that would be added to the national grid after the power-generating turbines were completed. But no provisions were made for gas. The then minister confessed at a private forum that there was also no “gas plan” and that much of our gas was already mortgaged to foreign customers. When he was pointedly asked: “So if the turbines are ready now, as we speak, they won`t contribute a single megawatt to national power supply, because no arrangements have been made for gas”? The shocking answer was “Yes”!

So those who are looking forward to a vibrant port in Onitsha should think of a “water plan”. The dams built across the rivers Niger and Benue, and their tributaries, over the years have reduced the overall water volume. There are now tiny islands, and unprecedented siltation, at the Onitsha end of the river. While the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources is serious about irrigation and dry season agriculture, it must remember that the long stretch of the Niger across Kebbi State, itself a veritable food basket unknown to many, takes more that its fair share of the needed water.

We may digress a bit here, to urge the Ministry of Environment to work more closely with the Agriculture ministry and the National Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA), because of the current global response to the devastating impact of dams on people and the environment within the past 60 years. It is a fact of our collective experience, across all continents, that dams have altered ecosystems, ruined food chains and obliterated local economies for hundreds of thousands of kilometres of waterways all over the world.

The confluence of some cold rivers with warmer ones have been permanently altered worldwide, while some flowing waters have been made to stagnate and create saturated water that wiped out fresh water aquatic life. Some rivers are now fragments of their former selves and others have dried up completely, as can be seen when you drive from Enugu, through Anyigba, to Abuja.

It is on record, for instance, that massive fish populations were killed on the Snake River, Idaho, in the US by dam construction; leading to the decimation of salmon species, among others. An Idaho State Senator, Frank Church, who originally supported dam building later rose in defense of natural waterways and spoke against dams. It was the same Frank Church who, after he saw the damage to the environment, eventually wrote the Wild and Scientific Rivers Act, passed in 1968.

No one can deny historic significance of the Suez Canal and its economic value to this day, but the general global concern today about the fate of streams, rivers and other natural waterways comes from the realization that long-term damage is being done to ecosystems, following the unsustainable violation of natural habitats by damming. The negative impacts on the global food web and even the climate are staring us in the face everywhere.

Available global evidence shows that one of the main reasons freshwater fish numbers have declined all over the world, leading to a loss of 80% of fresh water wild life since 1970, is the damming of rivers. Let us recall the verdict of the World Commission on Dams, in 2000: that dams had displaced between 40 – 80 million people, making it the single human activity with the greatest capacity to create Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs).

Even in the US, the initial excitement that greeted the epidemic of dam building in the 1940s and 1950s was followed by fierce and bitter battles between environmentalists and dam builders. The issue at the time was that dams blocked and impounded the waters of some of the most important rivers of the American west.

It was already established, years back, that over 22,000 kilometers of free-flowing rivers in the US are protected by Frank Church`s Act.

But our waterways are available for all comers. The fate of communities displaced by dams all over Nigeria today is rarely a topical issue. What does NIWA really do today? How many people still take a ride on sections of the River Benue that were once used for water transportation? Who drank up the water and created empty water channels and dry rivers with massive bridges between Lokoja and Anyigba, and all over Nigeria? I am certainly not the one!

Let those who, threatening to build a river port in Onitsha remember that there is also a scaling up of plans to build more dams across waterways that discharge into the Niger trough. Let them also not forget that this is happening years after the US came upfront on a campaign to “decommission” many dams. Recorded successes in this regard, with measurable positive environmental impact, include removal of the dam on the Elwha river in Washington State. One year after the last dam was removed in 2014, the Chinook species of fish, which had not been seen there for more than 100 years reappeared.

More than 4,000 Chinook spawners were counted above the former dam site. It is also in the US that people are taking proactive steps to reclaim their lives, by removing dams that interfered with their ecosystems and way of life. The Mohawks, in New York State, recently removed the Hogansburg dam on the St. Regis River, thus becoming the first US sub social group to remove a federal dam. This action of the Mohawks opened up nearly 700 kilometres of stream, liberated the natural habitat of migratory fish and restored many local economies.

After the last dam was removed from the River Elwha, for instance, river fish populations flourished. In a world where Brazil’s environmental agency has suspended the licensing process for the Sao Luiz Tapajos dam, the second largest hydroelectric dam in the country, we have no official attitude on dams. In a world where the World Bank recently suspended financial support for the Inga 3 dam on the River Congo, and where Chile`s largest power generator, Endesa, stopped six hydropower projects, we have no position on dams. Even the Chinese have stopped their plans to construct a series of dams across the country`s last free-flowing rivers, the Nujiang. The Peruvian authorities also suspended the construction of several dams across the Marañón River at about the same time that Geute Conservation Sur, an organization dedicated to the defense of ecosystems with high conservation value, is providing legal analysis to develop a new law for river protection in Chile.

The concern about water and free waterways is such that the world is focusing on transboundary cooperation between nations for conscious and deliberate management of the ecosystem and water volume throughout the length of major rivers. Are we doing the same in our country? The conflict between China and Thailand over development on the Lancang/Mekong River says a lot about what is going on all over the world in connection with waterways today. To think that the government of New Zealand has gone so far as to “recognize” the Whanganui river by giving it the same constitutional rights as a person? This was done as a way of showing that free-flowing rivers have great impact on food security, water access, biodiversity conservation and propagation of the overall global ecology.

In sum, and bringing the matter back home, let us think of think feasibility, viability and advisability of the port; as we think of dams, the environment, the disappearance of river-dependent local economies and the collapse or conspicuous shrinking of fish markets in various parts of the country.