Photos: Excitement As Ireland Based Group Donates Borehole To Community In Ogun

In its bids to tackle the challenge of portable water in Abeokuta, the Ogun state capital, a Republic of Ireland based group, the Association of Ogun Indigenes in Ireland, AOSI has inaugurated a borehole project for the community.

The Association also provided a power generating sets to power the borehole.

Speaking at the inauguration of the borehole, the President Mr Alani Idowu noted that the project would address the challenge of hygienic water the community is facing over the years.

Mr Idowu added that Association of Ogun Indigenes in Ireland, AOSI is committed to supporting the government through its Corporate Social Responsibility Initiatives.

The community in their response expressed appreciation to the kind gesture of the association for deeming it fit to come to the aid of the community, relating how tough it had been to have access to hygienic water in the area.

ANA Blasts Wike for forcefully taking over ICC L, Says He’s Pitching Tinubu’s Administration Against Citizens

A Northern group under the auspices of Arewa New Agenda (ANA) blasted the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Barrister Nyesome Wike as an intruder who is having vested interest in the political space of 2027.

The group said the dictatorial nature of Tinubu shown today with forceful takeover of International conference center (ICC) which is under the management of their leader, Sen. Ahmad Abubakar MoAllahyidi and incidentally is the Managing Director of Integrated Facility Management Services Ltd (IFMSL) – the contracting firm managing ICC was a pure disgrace of the tenets of democracy.

The group in a press conference in Abuja cautioned President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to be wary about his political maneuvers that is pitching a tent of political allies to work against him.

Prof Usman A. K, ANA’s Deputy Chairman addressed journalists on behalf of the group and reiterated that Wike is depicting the government of Tinubu in bad light and creating confusion where none exists.

According to him Minister Wike is an unrepentant member of the PDP who placed a curse on himself should he leave the PDP.

” Being in the main opposition party, he might as a presidential candidate of his party, be pitched against Tinubu in the 2027 presidential election. Undermining the Tinubu administration the way he is currently doing therefore would, in such scenario, serve him well.”

Usman described the administration of the FCT Minister as a Nepotism as a “Knight in Shining Armor”: Minister Wike’s Naked Dance in the Village Square.

He said ANA is known with a routine public engagement in support of the Tinubu Administration- going back several months before, during and after the 2023 Presidential election.

But he however said today’s press conference is caused by a worrisome dimension that crept into the body-politic of the Tinubu administration and is eating deep like a cankerworm into the fabric of the nation destroying trust between the people and the APC led Federal Government.

The statement of the press conference reads as follows:

“The name Nyesom Wike has become synonymous with controversy and un-guarded pronouncements not-minding whose ox is gored and what the larger consequences may be. This summarizes the character of the person who sits as the Minister of the FCT in the current administration. As an outsider in government, ordinarily this man should have been the humblest man in this government with a pleasant disposition and kind words. This unfortunately is not the case. The case is that Wike is projecting himself as the lord of the manor and a knight in a shining armour driven by nepotism, conceitedness and narcissistic posturing.

“The Arewa New Agenda is not new to you gentlemen of the press. You will recall that long before the electioneering process for the 2023 general election took firm roots, ANA, in the spirit of fairness, has been in the forefront of projecting northern values of fairness, trust and friendship and rallying support of northern Nigeria for Tinubu. Data from the last six election cycles indicates that the north control 73% of votes that makes anyone President in Nigeria. Arewa New Agenda helped in getting majority of these votes for president Bola Ahmed Tinubu in the last Presidential election in the country.

ANA is on record to have convened series of dialogue sessions to support key policies of the Tinubu Administration such as poverty reduction, peace and peaceful coexistence, removal of oil subsidy and benefits of the renewed hope agenda.

“ANA has been engaged in the support and promotion of good policies and actions of the Tinubu Administration under the leadership of our convener, Sen. Ahmad Abubakar MoAllahyidi who incidentally is the MD of Integrated Facility Management Services Ltd (IFMSL) – the contracting firm managing the International Conference Center in Abuja (The ICC).

“The minister of the FCT, in his usual element, recently took to the media saying he has revoked the management contract of the ICC and threatened to shut it down. This action of the minister is irregular, devoid of due process and without regard for fair hearing.

Minister Wike in purporting to terminate the management contract between IFMSL and Abuja Investments Company Limited (AICL) exhibits ignorance of what the ICC as a global standard Event Centre stands for. The ICC is the No. 1 event center in Nigeria. It is the go-to venue for international organizations having events in Nigeria. At the time of Wike’s purported revocation of Integrated Facility Managers management contract of the ICC, a number of international organizations have booked the ICC for their events. These bookings are for the whole year ending December 2024. The threat of the Minister to close down the ICC has impacted negatively on these bookings which are third-party contracts with clients locally and internationally. The threat also hampers international business; drives away foreign investment and kills growth and business prospects at a time the country needs these the most.

It is worth noting that the facility managers of the ICC – Integrated Facility Management Services Ltd, has remolded the ICC to meet global standards. By IFMSL remolding of the ICC, the Centre is now a flexible venue that can be customized to client’s specifications. The facility depicts opulence and refined aesthetics of the modern world.

“In the circumstance, it is very distressing hearing Wike saying he is going to renovate the ICC when no assessment has been carried out and no performance audit has been done in the ICC. As it stands today, the ICC is in its best form delivering first class and five-star services to its clients. To embark on a so-called renovation at this time is to engage in a wasteful exercise. If it is not broken, why mend it?

“We hasten to state that the ICC is managed by Integrated facility managers under a subsisting management contract with Abuja Investment Company ltd, that has provisions on how the contract could be terminated. Without recourse to the management contract provisions on termination, the FCT Minister took to the air announcing he has terminated the contract. This action of the minister is irregular, against fair hearing and the rule of law and unhelpful to the Tinubu administration. Simple: The FCT Minister cannot do what he is threatening to do because it is against the law, fair dealings and has no place in governance and service delivery.

The FCT Minister’s despotic and nepotic profiling of the north, going after the businesses and social interest of individuals and groups that are Bonafede APC members is unhelpful to the Tinubu administration and paints the picture of one undermining his master in a veiled effort to feather his political nest against 2027.

“By his actions, Minister Wike is pitching the Tinubu administration against Nigerian citizens by depicting the government in bad light and creating confusion where none exists. Minister Wike is an unrepentant member of the PDP who placed a curse on himself should he leave the PDP. Being in the main opposition party, he might as a presidential candidate of his party, be pitched against Tinubu in the 2027 presidential election. Undermining the Tinubu administration the way he is currently doing therefore would, in such scenario, serve him well.

“By this we will go any length to seek for justice and fight for our rights. We are party men and women who supported this government against all odds yet what we see now is a show of hatred for those that love Tinubu and our Great. We can’t accept these charades.

Afero Farmers protest displacement from Government allocated farmland in Lagos by Nigerian Military

…Ask Lagos State government, House of Assembly Speaker, well-meaning Nigerians to help them recover lost investment

A group of Nigerian Corporate farmers from the Diaspora and Nigerian Farmers, has protested their displacement from their corporate farms which produces crops and animal worth millions of naira on a daily basis.

Speaking during a protest at the Lagos State House of Assembly, Chairman Afero/Eluju Mowo/Mutaku commercial farmers, Wale Oyekoya, said they had a dream of building a better Nigeria and for this, they brought back their life savings and foreign investment to invest in Nigeria.

Oyekoya said: “Those dreams were crushed when on the morning of the 11th day of December 2023, in a brutal display of violence and utter carnage during the late season rains around 11:15 am that day they were violently invaded and brutally attacked by elements of the Nigerian military.

“We are not cutlasses and hoes farmers, we utilise the latest in mechanised machinery and equipment imported from China, US and France and practice farming on a Commercial scale thereby contributing to a large percentage of crop production to the Country and to Lagos State.

“The Nigerian Government in its wisdom instructed the Nigerian Army, the same Army supported by the taxes paid by the very same farmers, to redeploy its resources from protecting the territorial integrity of Nigeria to attack its Nigerian citizens and the soldiers mercilessly taunting the farmers with the fact they cannot do anything because there will be no repercussions and they will never be held accountable for their actions.

“There was no letter of warning, phone call, Memo demand or indeed any correspondence that the farmers have done anything wrong or even that they should vacate the land. Even a declaration of war generally requires some sort of warning nothing of sort took place.

“Instead the Nigerian Military, men whose salaries and livelihoods depend on taxpayers’ money beat the living daylights out of the hand that feeds them. This is really what the Security Vote is now being used for.

“This is why we Nigerians pay our taxes. So that we can be terrorised, tortured and mocked by the very people whose livelihoods we are sponsoring.

“The government is always asking for foreign investors, but who wants to invest in a country where one day you are carrying out your farming activities to prepare for the Christmas and New Year festive sales, with Billions of Naira worth of your life savings, the next day you are running for your life and dodging bullets as if you are in apocalypse IV!

“We sold off our successful companies, investments and houses from all over the world to invest in this our country Nigeria, We used the money to finance, fencing, designing farmland, landscaping, commercial fish ponds, piggeries, poultries, rabbitries, cattle ranches, hydroponic and greenhouse farms of different foods and cash crops for exports and local consumptions, snail pens, general abattoirs, etc. and invested sophisticated mechanised agricultural machines, preservative and processing electronic equipment, electricity generating plants, farmhouses, irrigation machinery, only to have it all callously destroyed not by brigands, bandits or Boko Haram but by the same Nigerian government that claims to be seeking foreign investments, claims to be trying to alleviate the food crisis when that could not be further from the truth.”

Oyekoya said they got the land legitimately from Lagos State Government. As a law abiding citizens, we reported the military invasion to the govrnment in December and on January to the the governor and Speaker of the House and nothing has been done and we are loosing investment money daily as the military men will not allow us to enter into our farms and their workers and the military men continue looting our properties and crops on a daily basis. He noted that they have been on the land allocated to them by Lagos State undisturbed for the past ten years peacefully and commercially farming their crops and raising their animal till the military invasion in December 2023.

“We had no idea when we were allocated parcels of land by a Lagos State Government that the land belonged to the military government and who waited patiently for us to set up and operate for over 10 years before sending various soldiers to take up combat positions all over the farmland and alleging the land belongs to the Nigerian Military.

“They started firing bullets at the farm workers who were running for cover and anyone they got hold of they beat up indiscriminately women, small children, and teenagers, some of our customers were flogged with horsewhips and relieved of their personal belongings.

“They went on to destroy crops, plants and hundreds of millions of nairas worth of imported farming equipment, stealing livestock, breaking down the walls erected for protective covers of the farms effectively decimating and disbanding the whole business enterprise of farmers on over 300 acres of land.

“To give you an idea of the scale of destruction the Vatican which is a whole country with embassies all over the world rests on 200 Acres of Land.

“Anyone can go there now and they will find the Nigerian army there on the Afero Farmers farmland to date because this was a government-backed initiative and this was further corroborated by the Senior army officer that led the invasion Brigadier General Ememe from 81 division, who categorically confirmed it.

“We, like you, used to believe that there was once a country called Nigeria, one in which the Nigerian army was not above the law. Today it has been emphatically been made clear to us that is not the case.

“There was no need for the Federal Government to take the path of violence and intimidation. They did it because they can and they could. We were not aware that the inflationary food prices were part of the government policy and agenda.

“They should simply have told us that they want to keep food prices high, they do not want us to invest our hard-earned money and expertise in Lagos State and we would happily have gone to another country where our investment would be appreciated.

“We, the Afero farmers had previously relied on the assurances of the Lagos State Government to grant it Allocation documents, survey plan, and Certificate of Occupancy and put it in exclusive possession and ownership of the State’s owned land with the further implied assurance that it will enjoy peaceful holding and use of the said land, we agreed to the aforesaid new location as part of the expected compensation although very far off from its displaced Afero community.

“We have lost billions in investments and many of us are facing financial crisis as we had to borrow money when our original investment was taken over by Lagos State ostensibly for public good but we later discovered it was parcelled up and used as housing estates.

“In this circumstance, we no longer see Lagos State or Nigeria as a safe investment destination but more as the Wild Wild West Africa that they have shown themselves to be. We want ALL our money back and we want our land back and we want Justice.

“This has been a learning experience the wealth of which we will ensure that all our brothers and sisters in the diaspora are emphatically made aware of. Nigeria is a country that is hostile to foreign investment and no foreigner should risk investing here as they could lose not only their investment but also their lives.

“We are tax-paying citizens with voters cards and to our shame and abject disappointment we voted for this government, and for this we apologise to our Nigerian Brothers and Sisters both in this country and in the diaspora. We were sold a dream and like you we bought it.

“You could be next. What is there to stop it from happening to you? You too could be sitting in your house or your farm and then the Nigerian Army will invade, beat up your wife, your workers, laugh in your face whilst destroying your property. They will collect taxes from you from your hard-earned money claiming it is for for security vote but instead it will be used to grab your property and terrorise you.

“We therefore ask members of the general public, and other Nigerian officials who have a conscience to have pity on us and assist us to get our money and land back. We have learned a hard lesson from this Nigerian Government and we shall never forget it,” he said.