I want all well meaning and loving nigerians to open an honest, non tribal debate to the solutions of our national issues that affect our present and if not dealt with it will propably even be more damaging for the future.

Let us start by first and foremost forget the debate about separation and division etc. There are external political reasons why the 'external enemy' will like to see Nigeria split into factions based either on religion but most likely on tribal grounds. quite frankly what happens to former USSR will happen to us in a more devastating way if we drifted into that belief. Regional strenght yes, but dividsion NO.

However, and I take it that most people posting things on this site are young people who should be taking over Nigeria now and in the immediate future.

If suddenly we are asked to lead our own people at local state or even as the president what are we going to do. unless you don't have faith in hope, you may be called upon to serve in whatever capacity, what are you going to do, what would you be able to change.

Part of the obj administration major failure despite it success is that for 8 years he cannot fiix electricity. Whatever any excuses offerred it is a major failure and that alone does not entiltled the PDP to campaign for election not alone win(either geninuenly or through rigging).
The other major failure is not setting a visionary agenda to build infrastructure. The majority of corruption to some degree is borne out of lack of security(if you have sound school, health system, good prosepect of employment, good transport network and affordablity, then quite frankly corruption will become a posion for whoever is thinking of it- of course the grrd will not stop but they will be isolated

It was good obj paid our national debts which is a major boost too this country, not many country if at all has done that in Africa and the reserve is good and we should all open our eyes and see if Yar Adua can resist the past 'family support' mentality that comes from majority of our former leaders(with greatest of respect majority from the North and some West and east of long throat exract.

Secondly, all this power rotation is because of lack of competence, and i submitted respectfully that obj could have run 10 terms(if he is alive then) if he was bold enough(and have the intellectual ability to use the power as commander in chief( as he did on the economy- privatisation and reforms of the banking and insurance sector.

Moreso, PDP pact which says that presidency to go to the North is an insult on the rest of the other parts of Nigeria especially the people of the Niger delta or the South south. I am worry that if power is to be rotated on ethnic or tribal basis it should have been the Igbo's or South east. but there are credibilty problems in terms of having solid candidates that we denounce all these Biafaran thing. Biafra in my humble opinion at the time may be a good idea but I still consider it  a mistake but how everybody wil be able to partake in Nigeria without your tribal thing becoming an issue. You will not be able to become president of nigeria and have biafra as an agenda. You will be surprise if we have biafra today, there will be ciafra and diafra and so on and so forth from Biafra. The solution is provision for ordianry Nigerians irrespective of the tribe etc

The issue of rotation of presidency is basically due to two factor.

1. incompetency of succesive northern Head of state or president   and most importantly, the
so claim by the north of

2. Born to rule.

IF you remember that leadres like General Gowon and Murtala did not let us to be thinking about tribe, once you are competent and can do the job, Nigerians don't care, infact nobody will notice what region or tribe the leader has come from. the only problem is that once leader is not competent or strong enough, I think they will start to look for support among their own tribes or region with the wrongful consequences.

In summary, the way things are at present it is prudent to give yar adua a chance but unless he come up with honest debate about running the country properly, the future is not looking good but I hope, wish, prayed and looking forward to a great and wonderful Nigeria. The people on this site give me hope, if they will not indulge in abuse, make your point forcefully as you can and respect others opinion even if you disagrees which u may end up learning from it now or in the future.

In conclusion, the power of the presidency is awesome for a country like Nigeria without the proper checks and balances, there is a not strong official opposition party in the two chambers of legislature. Thank God the judiciary is bold and some credit to obj, he is geninue and did not undermine them even most of the time he has not respect there judgement

I have a lot I like to share but I will like all of us to start how take Nigeria from these people who are leading us nowhere.

Long live Nigeria and God bless all her people

All good! Where do we start from? What is the greatest problem Nigeria has now? I think it is tribalism! How do we overcome such a vice so we can be like other multicultural nations?

Shall we start by identifying the problems( or I prefer to call it challenges)

1. Fear of the truth

2. Mediocares

3. Too knows knowing little

4. sutainable and future based vision - ie forward palnning for 50-100 years with ease.

5. corruption

6. Born to Rule mentality and tribalism

7. Thought of disunity

8. What our we going to contribute to our country and NOT NATIONAL CAKE

9. Misappopriation of Income form natural and(to some extent underutilisation of human resources) which leads the country not to be able to call for Taxation

10. Power hungry Governors/president that are Not LEADERS

I can go on and on. As economist would tell you 'micro' economics is the input that create 'macro' economics


Suggested solutions.

1. Selflessness and ability to do self assersment and admit unplatable truth. The followers in Nigeria most of the time create a monstrous leaders. WE must have LEADERS and not GOVERNORS and PRESIDENT wich is simply a colonial derogatory words to put down the colony, even colonier master stop using it.

2. Accountability- If someone say they are going to do something fro the country or state, first what is their track record, and how are they going to pay and thier timetable of delivery in months and quarters and years with reports on progress on monthly and quarterly basis.

3. Relationship with constituents- funny that we are not in parliamentary democracy but we can borrow 1 or 2 things from there- 1. the House to have official oppositon party who are strong and paid accordingly to opposse the goverment.
2. every member of the House to use 1 day propably mondays to attend thier constituency
surgery and see their constituents
3. It may be good for our democracy that alternative election methods be consider, not
necessary frist past the post, i.e proportionate system

4. Apart from the university system and to some extents the NYSC, the goverment should devise a programme that encourage each tribes to cross see each  others regularly to improve tribal relationship

5. Farming on large scale that food becomes more than abundant

again ther are so much in the tank that i will propably do more reserach and write a book one day NOT primarily for sale but as a contribution of my qouta to the urgently needed honest and non tribal debate

Again my people come on let debate to the point that our 'leaders' begin to hear and take us serious. GOd bless Great Nigeria

Don't forget education. We need an overhaul of our educational system starting now. Retraining workshops for those who got half baked education so they can blend with the new breed in the next 10 years! We need to invite the Chinese to give us a model.

We also need to strengthen our military and police especially police but also make them be accountable.
And lastly for now, we need to abolish traditional rulers that are based on heridity because thats where that idea of president for life manifested and they bring economic division, demographic attention, oppression, tribal awareness, assist in election frauds, and is another government within a government. When they are abolished it will not have an immediate affect for two to three years but when people starts seeing their powers are diminished they won't be of value to their previous extent. This issue alone can by itself solve tribal issues at a great lenght and of course with the implementation of other issues like roads, manufacturing, water, innovation, education, etc.
  Nigeria is fit for the task but we are scared to experiment and we don't believe in ourselves. We shouldn't also forget our neighbors as in treating them with respect and buying their trust because we will definately need them along the line. Don't forget this century just started.

Oh Niajaway, please let us leave the traditional rulers oh! They do not do much like the English monarchy. These only serve for culture and tourism, for tourists to take pictures with. Also to act as relics of the old traditions that our grandchildren and greatgrandchildren can point at. Or we will just disappear like "akata' people them and start celebrating "kwanza"!

It just goes to show that we have a lot of rebuilding to do in Nigeria.  We have to start from somewhere.  We need sound people in all areas of the society to have collective growth and development.  If Y'ardua fails like OBJ, then we will sink further into oblivion!  With what all the few somewhat "good" guys did in Nigeria like Duke, Soludo, Akunyili, Okonjo-Iweala and co, the average Nigerian cannot feel the impact.  We need massive progress so no area lags behind. I still cannot understand what Ribadu did.  Being IG makes me scratch my head and butt all night!

Saving traditional rulers is saving poverty, is saving hatred, is saving disunity, is saving the status quo, etc. Is like saying lets save our old toilets instead of flushing toilets, is like saying lets save darkness because electricity is modernization, is like saying lets all be slaves to the commands of these traditional rulers, is like saying lets save our roads thats not tared because we want to show our kids, is like saying lets throw out our spoons and forks cuz is modernization, and the list keeps going on and on. Nigeria has a lot of traditional rulers and at the same time have a lot of local government chairmen; Which one is the ruler? or let me rephrase it, which one is the legit ruler to you? One who is elected or one with heridity? If you choose one with heridity, then you shouldn't complain about people in power for so long.

I know traditional rulers are of no use.  Just let us save them for the costumes and regalia they wear.  Quite rich and entertaining!  So we can use then for our cultural and literary dance clubs. Just confine them to their palaces and use them for local disputes of goats and yam robbers!

To Vigasimple,


If you want to open up an honest debate, you have to purge your self of rhetoric's, and be honest to the core, the Biafra thing you made mention of is one the areas we 've all failed, and it really gives an insight into Nigerians way of thinking, in a nut shell Nigerians are dumb and don't believe in system and Nigerians can not create system, Nigerians believe in already made things, Nigerians are waiting for God to come and solve most of their problems, and this is very evident in the way they are handling the south east, they believe in a more lazy man way out, ''lets ignore them and make sure they never get into the government'', a smart individual would know that this is the most dangerous and the most retardest thing to do, one would have known that to get to the bottom of this problem there a need to know the cause of the problem, any honest individual would have known that the Igbos are not really interested in seceding from Nigeria because igbos has far more investments all over Nigeria than any other group that ever walked the soil of Nigeria, the actions of the Igbos are just as a result of frustration which is natural of any marginalized group and this equally applies to the Niger Delta.


What i ve noticed is that if Nigerians were Americans, Nigerians in their dumbness would have handled the civil right movement differently, it would have been more of like, lets use police to dispel them each time they protest, but we should not really bother about the problem, and the problem would have escalated into something they would not be able to handle, Has any of you bothered to know how it sucks to be from the Minority groups, a group that is almost guaranteed not have any voice or a place in Nigeria politics, all the people that has ruled Nigeria so far not withstanding their ethnicity does not believe in one Nigeria, they 've always fed people with rhetoric's, they believe more on what they can grab for their ethnic groups while Nigeria lasts, any smart person would have known that one of the fundaments in uniting a multi ethnic  society like ours is to shift emphasis from heritage and lay more emphasis on place of birth and place of abode, this is very simple to achieve, first of all create a data bank of all Nigerians, create a registration system that people would have to acquire when they move to a new town or city, by such registration if you ve stayed more that five years in any Nigerian town you should have the same right the indigence of the place has, that would have solved the problem we had recently of some elders saying they don't want non indigence to rule in a particular state, if some one is born in a town or city where ever it is in Nigeria should be his home town, tribalism would been history long ago and that would lead to a more civil society with equal opportunity  wiping out the double standard of Minority and majority, ''Nigeria don't depend on fate believe more on legislation and planing ahead, with out this you cant survive''.

To

Ninetofive.

With respect you are missing the point.

I noted that once people start to talk about the rational behind Biafra they quickly think Biafra is the solution.

Let me tell you from the little I know about the people of the East(majority). They are still nourishing the idea of Biafra and at the same time want to be President of Nigeria, to be perfectly honest with you,the two are irreconcilable.

I spoke to a friend of mine from Imo state some days ago and he admitted what mosts Nigerains of diffrent tribe suspect or fear that the Ibo man wants to become president and launch Biafra.

Let me say to you if The South East succedded in Biafra today before 10 years there will be Ciafra, Diafra, Eiafra an so on and so forth. Every local govt area want to be president if only on 1 clan.

Also the Ibo's with sincere respect are the most clanish of all the tribe. If anybody be it Yourab, Hausa, Efik, Tiv were to spend 100years in Iboland , born bread and raised there he or she cannot become anything there.

The Hausa's if you speak their language and you are a moslem and call yourselves Aminu Bauchi, believe me you are theirs.

If you go to any Yoruba Town and make your point, grow up there and speak the language, you can do and undo especially if you know how to dance owanmbe, run your business and know the elders, There are small concern about being able to do things freely for diffrent reasons.

If an Ibo man and to some extent an Hausaman is in aposition they simply bring their own people even where they originally do not come from same area to the detriment of the other people.

Education, Education, education, Love and respect, intermarriage and Fear of God will unite us, not fear or some people promoting divison or break away

May God continue to bless Nigeria and her people and grant our leaders wisdom.

@vigasimple

That explains why none of the millions of people from over 200 ethnic groups in Lagos can never be Governor. That also explains why Igbos who live in the North and speak Hausa are killed because some clown drew up a cartoon in Denmark. That will also explain why Igbos have not gotten up to target any ethnic group for killing due to some frivolous reason.

Honestly, on the path Nigeria is on, I see nothing but a downward spiral where a certain portion of the populace get richer while the rest get poorer. What sort of magic can Yar'adua pull even if he wanted to? Isn't it human beings that rigged him to power? Did they rig him to power for the people's benefits? Hell no, big headed clowns like Iwu must eat, so their servant is in power to provide food. Chris Uba did it to Ngige and Adedibu did to Ladoja and now Alao-Akala, people do not rig elections so they can serve the people, they do it so they can enrich themselves.

We don't have an acceptable census, no trustworthy statistical database, people don't have a clue how economic and organizational systems work.

I'm sorry Mr. Viga, unless there is a quick turnaround, its all a downward spiral. Honestly, what sort of positive can come out of a Government that was rigged into power and whose top officers are off the IBB era (guys like Kingibe and David Mark)? Don't we know what these characters stand for? Why should we be surprised when they loot?

@Topic

My idea of progress is not 'going online' and accusing many people of the mistakes they made (or I think they made).

My idea of progress is not debating the often incendiary issues of tribalism, marginalisation and regional militancy.

My idea of progress is not 'judging' the other man for his actions when I dont know the shoes he is wearing or the journey he has been on to get where he is.

My idea of progress is not making everybody see and agree to my point of view but making everybody move in an agreed progressive direction.

My idea of progress is personal.
It is about personal EMANCIPATION.
It is about being my own most passionate critic.
It is about looking at where I have been and where I want to go then making plans on how to get there.
It is about rationalising my contribution to humanity and taking stock of what I have done with what life and humanity have given.

I believe that any discussions on progress in Nigeria should be about everybody taking stock of themselves and their contributions to the Nation.

NOT the trend some people have adopted (even) on this thread.

First of for Nigeria to move foward, we have to be de tribalized. I would suggest the following ways to reach this goal.
1. Abolish this method of zoning everything. Let the best man win and the most competent get the job throughout the nation.
2. Forget the WAZOBIA thing. This obviously makes the minority groups feel left out.
3. Uniform infrastructural development
These three steps will go a long way to make every Nigerian reasonably proud and have a sense of belonging. When this has been achieved, every other thing will follow i.e corruption. Once corruption is checked, u can be rest assured that there will be no limits to what we can achieve as a nation.

Well sorry I think you idea is wrong

A responsible country is responsible to the citizenry whether they are good or bad mannered.
That is why there are government policies to rehabilitate people with anti-social behaviour, that is why it is important to have good schools that will build leaders of tomorrow.

@angel101
I beg to disagree with you.
Success is inherent ie. it is 'inside' each and everyone of us. Forget the tribalism argument. What somebody does to you or does not do for you is just by the way.
You dont believe me? Ask yourself, do people succeed under the so called bad conditions in Nigeria. Are there millionaires who count their money in dollars and pound? Do they live outside the effects of your so called tribalism?
The simple answer is yes.

So that should be your goal - Success against all ODDS.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said amongst many things - If a Man make a better mouse trap, the world will beat a path to his door step. Whatever you do, even if it be sweeping the streets do it so well that even the angels above would hail and say what a wonderful street sweeper you are.

The world it also is said stands aside for a man who knows where he is going.

Forget unfruitful pursuits - You can not change the world. You can only change YOUR WORLD.

Individual and Personal emancipation is the secret.

What are you doing with the little you have? That is the only question you have to answer.

ijogbon:

Success is inherent ie. it is 'inside' each and everyone of us. Forget the tribalism argument. What somebody does to you or does not do for you is just by the way.
You don't believe me? Ask yourself, do people succeed under the so called bad conditions in Nigeria. Are there millionaires who count their money in dollars and pound? Do they live outside the effects of your so called tribalism?
The simple answer is yes.

So that should be your goal - Success against all ODDS.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said amongst many things - If a Man make a better mouse trap, the world will beat a path to his door step. Whatever you do, even if it be sweeping the streets do it so well that even the angels above would hail and say what a wonderful street sweeper you are.

The world it also is said stands aside for a man who knows where he is going.

Forget unfruitful pursuits - You can not change the world. You can only change YOUR WORLD.

Individual and Personal emancipation is the secret.

What are you doing with the little you have? That is the only question you have to answer.

Gbam! Gbam!! Gbam!!! Well said! One of the best responses I have read in ages. Preach it brother, pre-ee-each it!!

As a practical solution to start digging the country out of the menace of corruption, young educated and conscious Nigerians ought to come together in every ward, local government and state, to form non-profit, government-watch organizations. These organizations will promote government awareness among the people. Monitor and expose government corruption and ineptitude. As many as such independent organizations that can be formed all over the country, the better. This will avoid corruption of a few such organizations, as is the case now, by the government.
If every local government has genuine young conscious Nigerians really dedicated to see the rule of law function, I sincerely see a future where the population become more aware to exert pressure on the government to perform. Courts will be more emboldened if they know that they have popular support to issue bold decisions against arbitrary government actions. We've seen a glimpse of a few such decisions in the past year.
To reiterate, this idea of government watchdog is not a new concept in Nigeria but they've been few, concentrated in major cities and not very effective. We must break the cycle of inept leadership by reducing the massive corruption involved. There is no magic wand to democracy and good governance. The people must become actively involved and be ready to sacrifice.

Viga,
I have taken this stand of yours some time in the past but was fraustrated out of that way. The more I reason out to know why this country is in the current state, the more it dawned on me that some ''so called influential people'' just want things to continue like this to satisfy their selfish interests - never mind that such interests could be ethinc inclined. And like Donzman said before me, I don't think we sincerely, as a nation, want to progress as things stands. Reason?

Someone listed out one of the big reasons in his/her words: The fear of the Truth

When issues bordering on national matters are brought to the fore, the typical Nigerian (the ones that feel they are the owners of this country) fear to face the truth - even when it stares them in the face! For the records, I did not mention any tribe here. We went to Abuja for the Constitutional Debate where we felt everyone can voice out what it is that's causing grief in his/her domain. Credible as the exercise did turn out to be, the fear of the truth made the rulers of the land not to implement the outcomes of that wonderful discourse. Rather, it was thrown into the wastebin of history! When some segments of the country, who knows they have been contributing to the nations purse at the expense of their own comfort and wealth brought the attention of the rulers of the land to the marginalisation they are experiencing, they were outrightly ignored! In fact, the other segments of the country used that ''opportunity'' to spell out how they too were being marginalised by the central govt - even when they know they're contributing nothing to the national purse.

Taking a look at the current trend of event in the land, and where the ship of state is being led, I can only hope and pray that we will be one indivisible country in the next 20 years.