U.S. congratulates Nigeria's acting leader

The United States on Friday congratulated Nigeria for maintaining democratic principles after Vice President Goodluck Jonathan assumed executive powers in the absence of President Umaru Yar'Adua.

Washington is the first major foreign power to publicly comment since Mr. Jonathan took over as acting head of state on Tuesday to fill a power vacuum left by Mr. Yar'Adua's more than two month absence for medical treatment in Saudi Arabia.

"The U.S. government congratulates Acting President Goodluck Jonathan," U.S. Ambassador Robin Saunders said in a statement.

"We believe that the principles of democracy have been served well in Nigeria through the leadership shown by the National Assembly, the Governors' Forum, several ministers and the courts in finding a way out of the political impasse."

The OPEC member is a major supplier of crude oil to the United States.

Parliament has recognized Jonathan as acting head of state in an effort to end uncertainty that has threatened to paralyze government business in Africa's most populous nation and reignite violence in the main oil region.

The fact that there was no formal transfer of power for more than two months had led to doubts over who was in charge and raised the prospect of the worst political crisis since the end of military rule more than a decade ago.

The country's powerful state governors, former military heads of state, the opposition and some members of the judiciary had all called for Yar'Adua to formally hand over.

But the Jonathan's assumption of power without a formal letter to parliament from the country's ailing president has no precedent and is not explicitly backed by the constitution.

Some opposition politicians and senior lawyers have argued that the move as illegal.

U.S. Ambassador Saunders said it was now important for Nigeria to organize credible national elections due in 2011.

The polls that brought Yar'Adua to power in 2007 were so marred by voter intimidation and ballot stuffing that they were deemed not to be credible by observers and legal challenges undermined his authority in the early part of his term.

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President Jammeh meets American Actor Rockmond Dunbar

President Jammeh meets American Actor Rockmond Dunbar
5th February 2010


The President of the Republic, Sheikh Professor Alhaji Dr. Yahya Jammeh last Friday received in audience the American film actor, Rockmond Dunbar at his office in Banjul.

Rockmond is one of Hollywood's hottest up and coming artist. Many people consider him one of the industry's most talented actors. He has attracted viewers on the small screen staring as the tough, mysterious inmate "C-Note", on the hit fox series (Prison Break).

He is also known for his leading role as 'Kenny Chadway'. A true renaissance man, he hypnotizes his audience not only theatrically, but in all realms of art. Remarkably enough, Rockmond also boasts of writing, producing and directing titles to his credit.

After meeting with the President, Mr. Dunbar told journalists that he had long discussion with the Gambian leader about bridging the gap between Africans and African-Americans. He revealed that he has two ideas that he is going to put together with the help of His Excellency the President who has given him his approval. Mr. Dunbar added that he is going to bring some features, put some projects together which Gambians will enjoy.

He commended the Gambian leader describing him as a generous person and a real servant of God.


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Inaction paves way for more bloodshed

Nigeria: Inaction paves way for more bloodshed, observers say

If the Nigerian authorities fail to punish those responsible for the latest inter-communal violence, they are only paving the way for further bloodshed, say human rights advocates, historians, politicians and religious leaders.

“Outbreaks of intercommunal violence are likely again unless the government takes swift action to hold perpetrators to account and address the root causes,” Human Rights Watch Nigeria researcher Eric Guttschuss told IRIN.

In the latest violence, which erupted in Plateau State on 17 January, at least 326 people were killed and tens of thousands displaced.

Guttschuss pointed out that following 2001 violence in Plateau's capital, Jos, in which some 1,000 people were killed, several hundred more died in ensuing clashes between Christian farmers and Muslim pastoralists across the state.

Dead-end investigations

Several judicial inquiry commissions have been set up to look into violence, but their findings have not been acted upon or even made public, Plateau State senator Dan Tom told IRIN.

A hearing into earlier killings in Plateau was held in late 2009 but nothing came of it, he said, adding that several suspects were arrested but later released, setting a bad precedent.

“The reports of these commissions must be [made public] and people should be punished for their involvement,” Tom told IRIN.

Roots

If Nigeria's deadly unrest is to subside, the government must go after not only perpetrators but also causes, observers told IRIN.

Though the violence manifests along religious lines with Christians and Muslims fighting – a majority of those killed in the latest violence were Muslim; mosques and churches were burned – the unrest is driven by political tensions over power and resources, Tom said.

“It is more a question of ethnicity than religion…a struggle for political control between the indigenous Berom ethnic group, [mostly Christian], and the Hausa, [predominantly Muslim]."

Many Hausa are not considered natives of the state and cannot access state privileges – a nationwide problem that is particularly palpable in Plateau State.

The issue of natives versus settlers was exploited when tin mining developed in Jos in 1904, drawing in mainly Hausa migrants and pushing mainly Berom natives to the town’s outskirts, Adam Higazi. researcher with Oxford University, told IRIN. From here Christian groups asserted exclusive rights over local and state political positions, power they have consolidated over the years, he said.

Tensions have mounted recently partly because Hausa communities in Jos North are vying for more political power in parts of Jos, Tom said.

Higazi said discrimination remains strong. “The state government is very discriminatory in its practices, notably in the exclusion of so-called settlers from state politics, and its views towards the recent violence in Jos are one-sided, defined by religious orientation and ethnic prejudices of those in power,” Higazi told IRIN.

“My family has been here since 1909,” Jos Imam Sheikh Ibrahim Ismael told IRIN. “But my children cannot access scholarships to further their education. They are second-class citizens."

Senator Tom said ethnic discrimination is a nationwide problem and the federal government must take the lead to resolve it.

A draft bill has been issued to bring an end to the practice of favouring indigenous groups but it has made no progress in Parliament.

The federal government must also push state authorities and civil society representatives to set up a mediation panel to help foster peaceful relations among ethnic groups, Higazi said.

An impartial investigation into the latest events must also be set up said HRW, and its recommendations be followed up and made public.
Hope?
HRW's Guttschuss said he is encouraged that several public officials have recently talked publicly about the need to tackle impunity, recognizing that it fuels the fighting.

Plateau senator Tom is optimistic. “I’m very hopeful things will change for the better in Plateau State because Hausas and Beroms don’t have any other country but Nigeria….We can’t continue killing ourselves and destroying our homes.”

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More horrors found in Nigeria

More horrors found in Nigeria




Jos, Nigeria - Muslim volunteers discovered on Friday that sectarian violence in central Nigeria this week extended beyond the long-restive city of Jos and into the burned shell of what used to be a small village near it.
Both Christians and Muslims died during the violence that began on Sunday in the central Nigerian city once known as a prime tourist destination in West Africa. The nonprofit group Human Rights Watch puts the death toll among both religions at more than 200. More than 5 000 people have been displaced.
However, as Muslim volunteers arrived in the village of Kurujantar - about 30km south of Jos - they found corpses shoved three-at-a-time into sewer pits, pushed into communal wells and scattered in bushes. One volunteer held up the charred body of an infant that lay inside a cardboard box.
Nearly all the mud-walled homes in the one-time mining town suffered fire damage or had been destroyed. The central mosque, where residents say both the young and old sought refuge during an attack Tuesday, sat burned, ashes spread across the floor where the faithful once prayed.
Community leader Wardhead Umaru Baza, 58, said on Friday that more than 300 were dead from the violence, which lasted seven hours. He said he hid in a hole as rioters armed with new and locally made firearms shot residents in the mostly Muslim village.
His causality figure could not be independently verified. Volunteers there said they had collected the bodies of about 100 people since the attack, though more likely remained.
Sectarian violence in this central region of Nigeria has left thousands dead over the past decade. The latest outbreak came despite the Nigerian government's efforts to quell religious extremism in the West African country.
Jos is located in Nigeria's "middle belt," where dozens of ethnic groups mingle in a band of fertile and hotly contested land separating the Muslim north from the predominantly Christian south.
Conflicting accounts
There are conflicting accounts about what unleashed the recent bloodshed. According to the state police commissioner, skirmishes began after Muslim youths set a Christian church ablaze, but Muslim leaders denied that. Muslims say it began with an argument over the rebuilding of a Muslim home in a predominantly Christian neighborhood that had been destroyed in November 2008.
Baza said the police did not heed the community's call for help in the wake of violence in Jos, leaving the townspeople at risk.
Baza said he didn't know where his wife was. "Maybe she's dead," he said, wiping a single tear.
Even in Jos, volunteers discovered the charred body of one victim Friday in the Anglo Jos neighborhood. Resident Adamu Bala, 22, said rioters rampaged through the Muslim neighborhood Monday after police warned the residents to flee. Bala escaped, but attackers killed his 32-year-old brother and set his body on fire. Burning of corpses is considered desecration in Islam.
On Friday, graffiti written in burned charcoal left after the attack praised Jesus Christ as "the mighty man in battle" and declared the neighborhood "New Jerusalem." However, it couldn't be determined who wrote the slogans - or when.
During Friday prayers, Jos central mosque Imam Balarabe Daud told followers that the Quran forbade the killing of innocent people and warned "hell fire" awaited those who led the violence that has engulfed the city. He called on those praying to cooperate with the Army soldiers now manning makeshift road blocks throughout the city.
Major General Saleh Maina, who is overseeing the security operation in Jos, warned that anyone violating the city's dusk-to-dawn curfew would be harshly dealt with. Maina also asked anyone with weapons to turn them over to authorities - something that could be unlikely in a city where gunshots still echo during the night.
As the sun began to set on Friday in Kurujantar, volunteers carried bodies with a cheetah-print blanket to a large grave dug in front of a destroyed home. Abdullahi Wase, 52, watched as his wife's body tumbled into the hole. Two of his sons, ages 19 and 5, remain missing.
"I cannot even shed tears anymore," Wase said.
But as volunteers shoveled the clay-red dirt in the grave, he turned away and wept.

Nigeria fighters deny oil raid

Nigeria fighters deny oil raid

Nigeria's main armed group has said it was not directly responsible for the sabotage of an oil pipeline that forced Royal Dutch Shell to shut down three pumping stations in the oil-rich Niger Delta region.
The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (Mend) said they did not attack the Trans-Ramos pipeline that is run by Shell's Nigerian subsidiary.
"Mend was not directly responsible," the group said in an email to Reuter’s news agency on Monday.
"It was certainly a response to our order to resume hostilities by one of the various freelance groups we endorse," the statement said.
Shell said on Sunday the sabotage had caused some oil to spill into the Niger delta's creeks and that it was in the process of recovering spilled crude.
"We are monitoring the situation and will issue a statement [on our investigation of the sabotage] when appropriate," Lieutenant-Colonel Timothy Antigha from the joint military taskforce responsible for policing the Niger delta, said.
On Saturday Mend called off a three-month-old ceasefire in the Niger delta and threatened to unleash "an all-out assault" on Africa's biggest oil and gas industry, saying it could no longer trust the government to negotiate demands for greater control of the region's natural resources.
Mend's threat to resume hostilities could not have come at a worse time for Nigeria.
Umaru Yar'Adua, the Nigerian president, has been in hospital in Saudi Arabia for more than two months and has failed to formally transfer powers to Goodluck Jonathan, the vice-president, raising fears of a constitutional and political crisis in the country.
Selling out
Shell said on Friday it was selling its stake in three Nigerian onshore oil licences.
The oil company said it remained committed to Nigeria and the move was part of its "active management" of global interests, but some analysts believe the decision will have been coloured by the country's political environment and continued insecurity.
Peter Voser, the chief executive of the Anglo-Dutch company said recently the company no longer relied on Nigeria for its growth.
Yar'Adua was the driving force behind the amnesty programme last year which saw thousands of armed fighters hand over their weapons.
Community leaders had warned his prolonged absence was stalling the programme and forcing former fighters to re-think their participation.
Attacks by armed fighters and disgruntled community members on Nigeria's oil sector in the past few years have prevented it from producing much above two-thirds of its capacity, costing the country about $1 billion a month in lost revenues.

News Briefing from the Archive

News Briefing from the Archive

Political news:

• West African peace at stake, Ban.
The recent resurgence of unconstitutional changes of government and other undemocratic practices in West Africa, especially the situation in Guinea, could have negative implications for peace and stability in the region, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has cautioned....Read more:http://bpm-west-africa.blogspot.com/2010/02/news-briefing.html

Economical Development:

• Cape Verde:
Cape Verdian economy withstands global economic downturn
The Cape Verdian economy "adequately withstood" the global economic downturn of 2009, thanks to a safe economic management and robust foundations that led to "strong" growth rates, according to the report of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) released in December last year.

In analysing Cape Verde's economic development by the yardstick approved in July 2006 and extended by one year in June last year, the IMF said the global financial crisis had little impact on the Cape Verdian financial sector and that despite a slight drop, "the international reserves are still adequate".....Read more:http://bpm-west-africa.blogspot.com/2010/02/news-briefing.html