Jonathan seeks Senate’s approval for $7.9b loan

http://www.thenationonlineng.net/2011/index.php/business/36846-jonathan-seeks-senate%E2%80%99s-approval-for-%247.9b-loan.html

President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday sought the approval of the Senate to borrow $7,905,690,000,00 for funding major projects in the country.

A perhaps naïve question for the Economy Doctor, Ngozi Iweala since she’s the one apparently driving all these loan mania: what exactly are oil revenues being spent on with all these loans that have already piled up since her Great Return?

My other question is for the president as he is the one whose presidency would go down as the person who ruled Nigeria during a particularly terrible period when he ceded the power to run the economy to a representative of those who benefit from Nigeria’s economic destruction:  President Jonathan, do we really need all these external loans that will further impoverish your own people and do you need them to “create employment opportunities”?

Oyo State to begin dredging of 23 rivers

http://www.thenationonlineng.net/2011/index.php/news-update/36859-oyo-begins-dredging-of-23-rivers.html

Governor Alhaji Abiola Ajimobi,

I was happy after a long holiday to find Ibadan supplied with many big bins for trash deposits.  It’s a far cry from what happened during the last administration’s woeful neglect of the city which must have more than 50 percent of the state’s population, if truth be told. 

There were two issues that I’d wanted to write about since my return but things calling for attention in Nigeria never seem to abait:

I received several SMS and a few emails about your administration using law-enforcement agencies to harass young women who wore “indecent” clothings.  Do not go that way because 1.  You cannot legislate morality as I once wrote when legislators at Osun during Brigadier Oyinlola’s administration went the same route. 2.  Oyo State is not a state peopled only by Moslems. 

The second matter concerns Elizabeth Road at Ibadan that has now apparently been abandoned while I understand plans are afoot to build an overhead bridge at Mokola Roundabout.

While we all know the despicable state of the last administration on public works, governance must be a continuous succession.  If Gov. Akala failed to complete a project, you should make it a priority and people will know who completed which projects. 

While our people are a long-suffering lot, they are quick to come to conclusions – and I do not blame them.  People are already saying you’d rather start your own projects on which you can collect your own “cuts”. 

The rivers to be dredged story in today’s NATION will definitely bring development, etcetera but we must prioritize.  The government must spread development throughout the state as the dredging would do but you must work on completion of projects earlier started by your predecessor or the state would be eventually filled with scattered carcasses all over the place.

A legacy is earned through achievements and not through all those billboards that have now become the vogue all over the country.