11/26/2006
column Last week, I took time off during the conference of the African Studies Association in San Francisco, to meet with a representative of the new Biafra movement in the Bay area. He had agreed to meet me, and we had to talk. I wanted to understand his mind" this medical doctor" What is the guarantee, given the apparent conditions, that a new Biafra would not reproduce all the contradictions of the current nation? How could the Diasporic leadership of the new Biafra movement seduce young Igbo men and women with talks of liberation, who get routinely killed by the Nigerian government, while these stay in the secure space of exile, safe from the torture and the bullets? I needed to know, especially in the backdrop of the news report on 30 MASSOB activists who were tortured to death while in police custody, as was reported in the Tribune newspapers of November 9, 2006.11/21/2006
London - There was a mild drama in London yesterday when about 15 men burst into the Queen Elizabeth Conference Centre in Westminster, to disrupt the formal launching of the Heart of Africa project of the Federal Ministry of Information.11/09/2006
Oyo - South-west Presidential campaign of Ebonyi State Governor, Dr Sam Egwu, recieved a boost yesterday at Ibadan, Oyo State, when the strong man of Ibadan politics Alhaji Lamidi Adedibu, said the next President of Nigeria should come from the South-east.11/02/2006
Lagos - The gale of impeachment sweeping across the states anchored in Anambra State yesterday, with the House of Assembly sacking Gov. Peter Obi. Deputy governor, Dame Virgy Etiaba is to take over as governor. Daily Champion gathered that the Mike Balonwu led assembly sat for some minutes yesterday and pronounced Obi guilty of financial misconduct and abuse of office, after receiving a report from the 7-member panel that investigated the allegations against the governor, yesterday.11/02/2006
opinion This week, four Scottish oil workers returned to Britain after being seized from an Exxon Mobil compound in the Niger Delta by gunmen seeking a £21m ransom. Earlier this year, local militants stormed a Royal Dutch Shell facility, prompting the oil giant to pull out hundreds of workers and close down wells. Ike Okonta looks at the structure and origins of one of the militias based in the area. He argues that the MEND militia is not an organisation in the formal sense of the word, but an idea, underlying the slew of youth movements that began to proliferate in the Niger Delta in the late 1980s. This article is the second part of a three-part series. The first article, entitled 'Niger Delta, Behind The Mask' (www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/38005 was published last week.11/02/2006
Lagos - Confusion reigned in Anambra as the State House of Assembly yesterday impeached Gov. Peter Obi, directing that the deputy governor, Dame Virgy Etiaba should be sworn in as the new governor. However, Obi who insisted he was still the governor, described the said impeachment as an act of criminality, illegal and unconstitutional, while Dame Etiaba rejected the offer of being sworn in as governor, saying her loyalty remains with Obi.11/01/2006
Lagos - AS the battle for the 2007 presidency hots up, the Igbo Youth Movement (IYM) has called on state governors from the South East geo-political zone angling for the position of vice presidency to drop their ambition.
