9ja's Oracle

There is no doubt that Igbos who survived the civil war will be bothered about the current agitation and demonstrations for Biafra; and it is quite obvious that those who are out in the streets are those who have never experienced war. One can commend them for their 'bravery' but I think they do need to sit back and think more about what they are doing and are asking for; these are my reasons: Their leader’s base: Nnamdi Kalu is based in the United Kingdom and has always boasted about not having a Nigerian passport. Since he can travel to the US and other parts of the world, he does have a passport and that is most probably the UK passport. He isn't based in Nigeria and perchance his lies eventually lead to war, he most probably wouldn't be in Nigeria not to talk of Eastern Nigeria to fight alongside his brother-agitators. It is also a curious case that most of those who are educated and who support the current agitation for Biafra all appear to stay abroad. W

On the 30th of May 1967, the late Lieutenant-Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu declared the Republic of Biafra as a secessionist state from Nigeria. This sparked off the Nigerian civil war that lasted from 7th of July 1967 until January of 1970. Fortunately or unfortunately, at the end of the war, Biafra was not to be.  It is no news that Nigeria as it is was born out of the selfish desires of the British for easier control of their interests across the different regions of the country with oil being the most important, and as it were the Nigerian Government was backed militarily by the British in their quest to retain the oil rich Biafran region. The truth is that if Nigeria had no oil, or if the bulk of the oil was found elsewhere but the southern region, or if the southern region had made Shell/BP a better deal than they had with Nigeria, Biafra would have been in existence today. The agitation for Biafra in Ojukwu’s time was mainly as a result of the massacre of Easterners

I know, I know!! The Oracle seems to be talking too much these days abi? Anyway, in my last divination, I talked about how APC's disrespect of the PDP cost them a say in who became the President and Deputy President of the Nigerian Senate. I also briefly mentioned a number of arguments and opinions about the emergence of Saraki and Ekweremadu as Senate President and Deputy Senate President respectively. One of these arguments was that the elections-ab initio-was unconstitutional; an argument initiated by a Senior Advocate of Nigeria in the person of Robert Clarke on Channels Television. Clarke stated that it was wrong for those who nominated and elected Saraki and Ekweremadu to justify their actions by claiming that the 57 senators-elect present at the time were more than enough to form a quorum in line with the "quorum rule" in the Nigerian constitution. He argued that the "quorum rule" was meant for Senators who have been inaugurated and for the purpose

Yesterday, the Nigerian Senate elected their principal officers and we saw Senator Bukola Saraki of APC emerging Senate President and Ike Ekweremadu of PDP his deputy. A lot has been said about this election: some hail the PDP for their political savviness, others say PDP merely saw a chance and took it; some say APC has sown the seed of disintegration amongst themselves, others accuse Saraki as being a traitor; some say that what happened and the current situation of things in the Senate House is healthy for the growth of our Democracy, others say it was illegal for voting to have commenced without the 51 APC Senators-elect who went for a meeting as summoned by President Buhari...they argue that it was wrong to assume that section 54 (1) of the Nigerian constitution was applicable in yesterday's scenario as the Senators were yet to be inaugurated. The said section reads: "The quorum of the Senate or of the House of Representatives shall be one-third of all the members o

I was having a chat with some of my mates on the 30th of March 2015 as the Nigerian Presidential election results were being announced. I must point out that amongst us, there were the pro-Buharist and pro-Jonathans and as expected, there was a whole lot to disagree on. But one commonality was the expectation of violence...most of us had that sense of foreboding even when the results appeared to be heading Buhari's way. The thinking was that down South-south violence will emanate.  However, I felt differently...I told them that if Buhari wins, there will be no violence because Nigeria's southerners would rarely get violent for political reasons. Yes, there may be pockets of agitations here and there...they will not tarry and will certainly not turn into a full-scale upheaval. I, however, said it wouldn't be so should Buhari lose the election as the Northerners would definitely agitate. Well, it happened as I envisaged... Asari Dokubo and other Southern elements who huff

Prior to the Presidential elections, I took time to reflect on the two major contenders - President Goodluck Jonathan and General Muhammadu Buhari; to state what I expect from either of the two if elected; and to say why I shall support one instead of the other. Well, that election has come and gone and GMB emerged winner. I congratulate him just as I congratulate GEJ, Jega and all Nigerians who contested and/or voted during that election. I intend to share with you my reflection on all that played out during and after the presidential elections...but today, I shall concentrate on the ‘impact’ of the elections on the Igbos. The Igbos dominate the south-east geopolitical zone which is made up of five states: Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo States. The main regional political party in this zone is the APGA with PPA trying to find its footing. The APGA had been in control of Anambra for 3 consecutive tenures. It was under the APGA that Imo’s present Governor (Rochas Okorocha) w

 3. Irregular Electric Power and Unemployment Goodluck Jonathan Tackling unemployment and irregular electric power is basically an issue of policies backed by strategies; same goes for improving the economy, educational sector, transportation sector, healthcare delivery, etc. Goodluck Jonathan, to his credit, 'restored' the moribund Nigerian Rail system although there is still a long way to go; under his watch our economy is said to be the largest in Africa; this has however been contested by economists who believe that current economic statistics paint a false and glorified picture of Nigeria's true economic state. Under GEJ, power generation hit 4500 megawatts in 2012 -the highest since 1999; however, latest reports show that just about 3,346 megawatts is generated currently. This is despite having an installed capacity of between 6, 000 to 7,000MW which is by the way too meagre to serve a population of 170 million Nigerians. The generation of power below i

2. Corruption Goodluck Jonathan: "Ordinary, common stealing Nigerians will start shouting corruption", "If I arrest all corrupt Nigerians,who will run the government?"...these are rather hilarious quotes attributed to GEJ but which I personally cannot verify as true. However, they are in tandem with GEJ's ideology as it concerns fighting corruption.  GEJ believes that corruption is best fought,not by prosecuting and treating corrupt officials harshly but by making it difficult for them to derail.  To do this, he has touted the use of Information Technology and changes in the way the Government engages in businesses. Examples are the Growth Enhancement Support Scheme which provides direct support to farmers thereby cutting off middlemen who may steal from it and Project Aquila which is an e-loading process of petroleum products that has been introduced in order to prevent the diversion of loaded products by truck drivers. There are also changes in pension