If you grant a man unchecked power you will in due course discover his true character. And if you grant him absolute impunity, he will gladly showcase the most evil aspect of his values.

Since its founding in 1948, Israel has been granted both unchecked power and absolute impunity and its current Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has become the dreadful personification of that hypothetical man. I shall spare you the second-hand trauma of listing or hyperlinking graphic video footages of the sadistic genocide that you, like the rest of the world, may have been watching in real time. Suffice to say, there is not a single article in the Geneva Conventions or laws of war component of the international law mandated to maximize protection of human rights and minimize human sufferings that Israel has not belligerently violated.

With heart-wrenching and hauntingly graphic video footages of Palestinian children being starved under captivity, children being dug out of the rubbles by the bare hands of family members and volunteers, Gaza became a theatre where the sobriety of our conscience, sincerity of faith, and independence of our intellect are tested.

Six months into the genocidal war on Gaza that is likely to become a regional war, Zionist politicians, media groups, think-tankers, and their Arab cronies audaciously talk about what they refer to as “the day after” scenario. What an irony.

On the other hand, some pragmatic high-profile Zionists are openly expressing their concerns for the survival of Israel and how the raging global tide of anti-Zionism may turn into an anti-Semitic fervor that could ultimately subject the Jewish communities around the world into collective dangers. The concern is real since the global public opinion of Israel and the decades long consensus on the Zionist cause has been nose-diving. The global moral outrage against the Zionist regime has reached a global momentum of epic proportions.

Tides Are Turning

Recently, an unprecedented intelligence community report casted a doubt on the strategic soundness of Netanyahu’s leadership and the viability of his stated objective of eliminating Hamas. Soon after that, the highest ranking Jewish-American official, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, went public with his frustration over Netanyahu’s reckless and rogue attitude. A staunch Zionist himself, Schumer rebuked Netanyahu and described him as someone who is an obstacle to peace; someone who “lost his way” who is only interested in saving himself at Israel’s expense. So, he did the unthinkable: he called on Israel to hold new elections.

But Netanyahu is just one part of the complex death engine driving the on-going genocide.

The Two-State Mirage

While Biden and Secretary of State Blinken keep talking about a two-state solution as an option, Netanyahu and his government made it unequivocally clear that they are pursuing an exclusively Jewish state. A Jewish supremacy status that will reject both the two-state and the one-state solution that ensures equal citizenship rights.

For the latter to become sustainable, it would require a competition at the ballot box, a Truth, Reconciliation, and Justice Commission, De-Zionification laws, financial restitution to the Palestinian farmers and other victims of the long repression, dismantlement of the nuclear power under international supervision, and a Holy Sites Guardian Commission that is made of the three monotheistic faiths.

Power of Resilience

Everything that we consider today ordinary or conventional was at one point in time considered something unfathomable or impossible. Examples are too many to count: fall of the Berlin Wall, crumbling of the Soviet Union, science and materialism outpacing humanity, man sprinting 100 meters in less than 10 seconds, US’ abrupt departure of resource-rich Afghanistan.

If you live long enough you are bound to witness God’s transcendental law or how He rotates His blessings—in this case peace, power, and prosperity—between people. Men conquer lands, people, wealth, and consolidate powers to build empires that reach great heights only to see them decompose or crumble down under the weight of their arrogance and lack of introspection.

For the first time in the human history, an AI system generates targets for Israel’s military for ‘maximizing’ the number of attacks while bypassing any moral restraint or the innate human tendency for empathy and sense of remorse.

The Zionist project has reached a dead-end. It has declared itself a perpetual pariah within a community of nations that, by and large, abide to a set of rules that is known as international law. The Palestinian people are in their homeland. They can neither be entirely eradicated nor forcefully cleansed them have proven to the world their unbreakable commitment to their cause and their intergenerational spirit of resilience as they would liberate themselves from the shackles of the Israeli oppression or die trying it. 

Political Pit-bulling

Let me start with this seemingly ironic and politically controversial proposition: Regardless of the International Court of Justice’s ruling and what the looming criminal charges of International Criminal Court may undertake Israel will not stop its campaign to complete its flagrant genocide against the Palestinian people. The only way to stop Israel is to dismantle the system that sustained it.

The Cabal, Not The Lobby

Throughout history, brutality has been the settler colonialists’ preferred instrument of political, social, and economic domination. attaining political domination. Once the foundation for domination is laid out, it is sustained by systematic luring of greedy capitalists and the morally corrupt. There are many examples around the world.

How did the Zionists create global consensus on Israel’s victimhood?

While the Israel Lobby may not be “a secret, clandestine cabal” that directly engages in the undemocratic tactics of stifling any discussions that might lead to criticism of Israel, the colorful international Zionist movement that established it is a different story.

The ‘fat lady is singing’ for this tragic opera that started with genocide and is about to end with suicide.  Israel must be saved from itself. It is time for political exorcism to expel its evil spirits of hubris, genocide, and impunity.

Since Israel’s sadistic genocide campaign made much of their land uninhabitable, Palestinians of Gaza must be allowed to migrate inward into the occupied land. Meanwhile, the UN Security Council should mandate a diverse transition committee made of independent-minded former statesmen and diplomats to pave the way for the exodus process.

Zionstan should be accepted as the newest member of the UN body in an expedited process. Once established, Zionistan should be disarmed for 76 years which symbolizes the longest and the most ruthless systematic genocide in modern history. This will be both an important history lesson and a deterrent for future generations.

Such extraordinary step is necessary for the following reasons:

To end the on-going genocide that could not be stopped with the Geneva Conventions or any other component of the international law or by diplomatic, economic, and social pressures.

To save Israel from itself- a looming civil war, and to prevent any unfair collective blame that stamps genocide or the G-letter on Jews everywhere. Let us not forget the fact that some of the most vocal activists promoting the Palestinian rights and exposing the genocide regime’s atrocious, above the law criminality are Jews.

A Miracle To Dispel Calamity

April 13 is a day that will be remembered for generations to come. It was a day in which Iran launched a revenge attack on Israel using a massive number of cocktail armaments of drones, ballistic and cruise missiles intended to assert profound military confidence and last warning to the war-deranged Israel.

The Curse of the Eighth Decade is a phenomenon of internal turmoil that led to the demise of two sovereign Jewish kingdoms. Many in Israel are seriously discussing how the hubristic repression and rogue governance of the Netanyahu government is leading to the demise of the Jewish people.

Iam not from Kogi State, but I have strong opinions on former Kogi State governor Yahaya Bello—as most Nigerians do. There is no doubt that few politicians in Nigeria are as universally reviled and despised as Yahaya Bello because of how he turned governance into a violent infant play, denuded it of even the faintest pretense to sanity and respectability, and developed an uncanny capacity to incite raw rage in people.

That’s why there is mass excitement in Nigeria over his current travails with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. Most people see his fate as a richly deserved karmic retribution for his eight years of incompetent, anger-arousing, profligate, and terroristic governance in Kogi State, the consequences of which transcended the bounds of Kogi State.

He began his tenure as governor as the symbol of hope for youth inclusion in governance. But he soon became a byword for recklessness, malfeasance, ineptitude, incivility, violence, and the greatest betrayer of the youth constituency. He shouldn’t have been governor—or, for that matter, anything in politics.

He had no guardrails on his tongue. Like a spoiled, over-indulged, ill-bred, and uninhibited child, he blabbered whatever inanities caught his febrile fantasies with no care for consequences. He insulted elders at will, humiliated traditional rulers who dared to show some independence, ridiculed civil servants, and terrorized opponents with full-strength viciousness— as if he would remain the governor of his state forever.

He even nicknamed himself—or was nicknamed by his flunkies—as the “white lion.” But when the EFCC came calling, the “white lion” transmogrified into a pitifully frightened, yellow-bellied chicken. Now the white-lion-turned-chicken is fluttering and hiding like he has gone insane.

A wanted notice has been issued for him by the EFCC, the Inspector General of Police has withdrawn all police officers assigned to guard him, and the Nigerian Immigration Service has placed him on its watchlist. I can’t wait to see him brought to justice for all the crimes he committed while he held sway as the governor of Kogi State.

In a 2022 article, I described him as an ignorant, incorrigibly petulant child who was trapped in an adult’s body, who was destroying the littlest semblance of decency left in government in Kogi State, and who thought he could democratize his infantilism nationwide by seeking to be president.

According to several Kogi State civil servants, Bello didn’t pay full salaries for most civil servants for most of his tenure as governor, yet he is being hunted by the EFCC for allegedly laundering up to 80.2 billion naira, presumably the money he should have used to pay the salaries of workers.

Bello signaled from the inchoate stages of governorship that he wasn’t in it for anything other than personal enrichment and aggrandizement. In less than one week after he was sworn in as Kogi State governor on January 27, 2016, according to a May 13, 2016, Premium Times’ investigation, Bello approved N250 million naira for himself as “security vote” and another N148 million to “furnish” and “renovate” his office. At that time, Kogi State workers hadn’t been paid their salaries for months.

Bello’s spokesman at the time by the name of Kingley Fanwo said the raiding of the state’s treasury in the name of security was justified because Kogi had become the seedbed of crime as a result of its location.

“It is public knowledge that Kogi State has been contending with serious security breach for the past 10 years,” Mr. Fanwo said. “As a result of the location of the state as gateway to many states of the federation, the state drifted into a criminal hotbed. Also, years of gross maladministration and blinding embezzlement has left the youth bare, exposing them to all sorts of criminal activities to survive. Kogi became a haven of robbers and kidnappers.”

That was the start, which most people ignored. Everything went downhill from there. The man didn’t even pretend to govern. He presided over a stealing bazaar.

In 2020 when COVID-19 raged and most people were caught in a complex web of uncertainties and anxieties about the new infectious disease, Bello chose to become a abhorrent, ignorant conspiracist and the conduit for all sorts of wild, crazed, dangerous, fringe chatter about the disease.

Yet, although he openly questioned the existence of COVID-19, he fed fat on it like the vampire that he is. The Premium Times of March 26, 2021, reported that Bello spent 90 million naira in 2020 to purchase COVID-19-tracking software that cost only 30 million naira.

“The software, approved by a COVID-19 sceptic, Governor Yahaya Bello, was for tracking coronavirus cases in the state,” Premium Times reported. “However, the software is no longer functioning as the developers said they had a contract to host it for only one year.”

It’s impossible to chronicle Bello’s in-your-face financial malfeasance in a newspaper column. Not even a book-length narrative is sufficient to do justice to how much Bello financially bled and sucked the blood of Kogi State.

The man’s daring electoral terrorism is another issue that has earned him well-deserved loathing in Nigeria. This is a man who commanded his toadies to dig deep ditches on roads (that were built with billions of naira) just to stop voters from a part of the state he knew won’t vote for his candidate from being able to cast their votes.

According to Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, at the time the senatorial candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for Kogi central, “We woke up this morning to the news that Yahaya Bello has instructed the excavation of all access roads to my hometown. My hometown is cut off from Obangede community; it is also cut off from Eika. And right now, I am in front of another road which was just excavated, thereby cutting me out of travelling out of my hometown.

“What this means is INEC would not be able to [access] certain communities, especially my hometown. What this also means is if Yahaya Bello and his APC goons decide to attack me and the good people of Kogi central in Ihima community, it will be impossible for the DPO to get across to this place. That means I, Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, my fellow candidates, and supporters are trapped. We have no way out because Yahaya Bello has dug gullies.”

This is a vile and detestable vermin who should never have been allowed to get anywhere close to governance, much less be a governor. He is an excellent specimen of how not to be a governor—or, in fact, a human. I have not the littlest drop of sympathy for him.

Given the peculiarities of the Nigerian political environment, it seems likely that he is in trouble with the EFCC only because he has fallen out of favor with the president or his henchmen. I honestly don’t care.

More than anything, though, Bello’s troubles exemplify the transience of power and the imperative for humility when you wield it.
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Twitter: @farooqkperogi

Indeed, as they say – power is transient. Before May 29, 2023, no one in the legislature, in their wildest imagination, would have dared take such an action to probe the all-powerful former Governor, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai . More so, that even those that vehemently promoted and defended the collection and utilization of the loans are today singing crucify him. No doubt also, unless being naive or playing the ostrich, one cannot divorce political undertones from what is happening. Albeit, this is a welcome and commendable development. Particularly, that the State Assembly, especially the opposition, has found its oversight voice.

It all started by an outcry by an opposition member, Hon. Henry Marah, House Committee Chairman on Information, NGOs and Development Partners; followed by My Governor Mallam Uba Sani’s revelation during a town-hall meeting; then a motion by Hon. Yusuf Mugu, Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), another opposition member; and now the setting up of an ad-hoc committee to probe the last administration over financial transactions most especially loan collection, utilization and abandoned projects.

It is difficult to fathom how the Assembly’s probe will yield any result without also investigating the role played by key members of this current administration, starting with My Governor Mallam Uba Sani.
Recall that it was reported by Daily Post that when the former Chief of Staff to former Governor Elrufai appeared before the Senate Committee on Foreign and Local Debts, the current Governor my Governor, then a Senator, was quoted to have risen in defense of the loan collection by stating, “Distinguished colleagues, I am seeking your cooperation for approval of the loan. Kaduna State government is doing well in infrastructure and this will go a long way.” My Governor was further reported by Vanguard Newspaper that he should be held responsible.

Similarly, the current Deputy Governor, Dr. Hadiza Balarabe, equally chaired the Infrastructure Development Policy Council that oversaw the execution of the Urban Renewal Projects and other projects across the State. This means the Assembly’s ad-hoc committee will need to also invite the Deputy Governor, alongside her predecessor Chair of the Policy Council, the former Commissioner of the State Planning and Budget Commission and Chief of Staff, Sani Abdullahi Muhammad Sani Dattijo, in the last administration. Not to forget the three sole administrators of the metropolitan authorities under whose watch many of the projects were executed.

The role played by the 8th and 9th Assembly should also be looked at. The loan was secured under the former Speaker, now Commissioner of Housing, Dr. Aminu Shagali during whose tenure as second term Speaker the first drawdown in 2019 was passed through a supplementary budget. Interestingly, the current Speaker was a member of the Assembly. Even though the immediate past Speaker has denied any willful role in the loan, he was equally a member and was at the helm of affairs during the utilization of the loans. Some members of the 10th Assembly were also members of the 9th Assembly, the question will now be, why did they not demand for accountability then?

Curiously, one wonder in the news report only one individual, Jimi Lawal, was mentioned as regards those to be investigated. This is not unexpected considering the influential and overbearing role he played in the last administration. Many are of the opinion that he is in the know of all the dealing that happened under the Elrufai administration. It is believed, if Jimi goes down, Elrufai will also go down. Lest we forget, the current Commissioner of Finance was the Accountant General of the State. She should also have some questions to answer if the past administration is to be probed.

The Ad-hoc committee should not forget to invite all the Heads of the Kaduna Public Procurement Authority, former and incumbent, to ascertain the extent of compliance to the Public Procurement law and guideline in the utilization of the loans. Likewise, the Office of the Auditor General of the State and Kaduna Anti-corruption Unit under the Ministry of Justice.

Finally, do the ad-hoc committee members have the independence and capacity to carry-out such a very sensitive and intellectually tasking responsibility? Aside from the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, the member representing Kawo has strong ties with Bello El-rufai and the majority leader got to her seat through the benevolence of Mallam Nasir Elrufai likewise that of Doka/Gabasawa Aminu Lawal.

Bako, a civil activist writes from Kaduna, Nigeria 

By Linus Akor, PhD

It will amount to attempting the impossible, to fittingly and adequately capture whom Arc. Chief G.Y, Aduku was during his remarkable sojourn on planet earth. This is because describing him precisely will mean leaving out some of his unique and uncommon attributes. Like the proverbial elephant, one can only say the much he knew and felt of him from the perspective they have encountered the quintessential architect. For want of time and space, I will only chronicle for posterity, a few of the numerous and didactic life –transforming experiences I had and shared with Arc. Gabriel Yakubu Aduku.
I recall with nostalgia my first meeting with him in 1995 at the N0. 2 Ali Akilu Road Corporate Headquarters office of Archon, Nigeria, the professional architectural firm which he co-founded and nurtured to greatness. I, in company of Messrs. John Aduku and Joseph Edegbo had visited him to share some thoughts on sundry political issues. In the course of the visit, Mr. John Aduku introduced me to Arc. Aduku as his cousin, who had graduated with a First Class Honours Sociology degree from the Usmanu Dan Fodiyo University, Sokoto. There and then, he told the duo of John Aduku and Joseph Edegbo that he was engaging me as his Media Assistant!
I was lost for words as to what an Architect would need a Media Assistant for. It was later, that he confided in me that having reached the peak of the architecture profession, he desired to give back to humanity by venturing into politics. Then began the journey with Arc. G.Y. Aduku, into the murky waters of Nigerian politics. I traversed the length and breadth of Nigeria with Arc. Aduku to attend numerous political party engagements either in the Democratic Party of Nigeria (DPN) or the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Even though he did not realize his ambition to fly the flag of the PDP as its Kogi State gubernatorial candidate in 1999, Arc. Aduku, a loyal party member, remained with the party, at a time that it was easily convenient for others to cross carpet to other political parties in pursuit of stomach infrastructure! He remained a committed and active member of the PDP till the end.
As one of his close aides, I recall that Arc. Aduku’s political career literally reached a crescendo in July 2007 when he was appointed Minister of State, Health, by the late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua. Upon assumption of office, Arc. Aduku immediately hit the ground running with private sector driven innovative ideas on how to move the health sector to its desired level within the shortest possible time. Unknown to him, his speed and vision were not in synch with that of the senior minister who never hid her disdain for the junior minister. In fact, shortly after the swearing in ceremony, the senior minister openly wondered “what an architect is doing in the ministry of health”. That negative mindset marked the beginning of what turned out to be a very frosty relationship between the two ministers. It is on record that several strategic meetings in which Arc. Aduku would have made valuable inputs were held without his knowledge. In fact, it took a presidential intervention for the senior minister to purge herself of such pettiness. Despite the toxic working environment, Arc. Aduku, forged ahead with an unyielding determination to make a success of his assignment. One of such opportunities to show case his exceptional acumen came when the then President, appointed him to Chair a presidential committee with a mandate to carry out a forensic audit of abandoned projects in all primary health centres across the country. He and his team not only completed the assignment in record time, but also received presidential applause during the report presentation ceremony.

Shortly after that assignment, events literally took a turn for the worst for the minister as detractors peddled unfounded allegations against him, all in a bid to smear his hard earned reputation. Part of the allegation that was sold to the EFCC and embraced by the anti-corruption agency was that the Senior Minister and Arc. Aduku, had in December of 2007, misappropriated unspent funds of the Federal Ministry of Health, instead of retuning same to the government coffers, in violation a presidential directive. To make way for thorough investigation, Arc. Aduku, in a rare display of integrity and patriotism, resigned his appointment and challenged the trumped up charges against him, from the High Court through the Appeal Court up to the Supreme Court where he was eventually given a clean bill of health.

I am deeply touched and amazed by the fact that despite the enormity of the conspiratorial setbacks, tribulation, humiliation, gang ups and injustice that he suffered in the course of his service to the fatherland, Arc. Aduku as an exemplary man of peace and faith, never begrudged his traducers but forgave them in the true spirit of a devout and devoted Christian. His life is a big lesson in humility. He was simply a cypress among pliant shrubs!

Even though death has physically separated the Amana-Ogohi 1 Ata-Igala from us, we are none-the-less, consoled by the fact that he lived a fulfilled and exemplary Christian life. His children – Uneku, Adaji, Ibe, Achi and Ibro, should be proud to have had him as a worthy and accomplished father.

In summary, I wish to say without any equivocation that Arc, Chief Gabriel Yakubu Aduku was the best gift to humanity because nobody who encountered him while he lived, has ever remained the same.

Abooo, like St. Paul in his letter to Timothy 4:7, you have fought the good fight to the end; you have run the race to the finish line and have kept the faith. Good night!
Dr. Linus Akor
(Former Media Aide to Chief G.Y. Aduku)

By Joseph Edegbo

It is with a heavy and grieving heart that I write this Tribute in memory of a colossus and an icon of hope for the Igala nation and land.

Apart from being an alumnus of Okene Secondary school which he served as the patron of its Old Boys Association, I came closer to Arc. (Chief) Gabriel Yakubu Aduku through my professional calling, journalism.

Within the last 40 years or thereabout, I was Chief Aduku’s Media anchor in Kaduna, through whom he related with my professional colleagues.

Our last conversation with Arc. G. Y.Aduku, was few hours to his 80th Birthday in the US, when I and Dr. Linus Akor fed him back on the final copy of the birthday advertorial for his endorsement before publication.

Little did I know that a mighty iroko was about to fall to cause unease in the forest.

Chief Aduku and Wife, Lydia cutting the Birthday cake

On a larger scope, late Arc. (Chief) Gabriel Yakubu Aduku was passionate about the unity, progress and development of Igala kingdom.

He was deeply saddened by the divisions within the land and was working hard to overcome them before his sad and tragic death.

An epitome of peace, Chief Aduku was the architect of among others, the relative peace enjoyed in Kogi East during the Nov. 2023 Gubernatorial election when the Igala nation spoke with one voice, a scenario described by all, as the greatest legacy of the late elder Statesman.

His uncommon humility and unusual simplicity laced with sincerity of purpose, singled him out as a leader like no other, who had his doors widely open to all Igala sons and daughters, irrespective of which part of Kogi East one comes from.

One thing that is crystal clear, is that late Chief Aduku was on a mission to make Igala Kingdom great again, through his commitment to peace, unity and progress.

His tragic passing, therefore poses a great challenge to our leaders of thought who would want to step into his big shoes.

May the Almighty God give the immediate family, His Royal Majesty, Atta Igala and all of us, the strength of mind and heart to bear the great loss.

Elder Joseph Edegbo, JP is the Managing Editor of AFRICA PRIME NEWS