The most recent World Bank Report, The World Development Report 2011: Conflict, Security, and Development, released on Monday (April 11) has called on governments and international agencies to shift focus from poverty alleviation, health and education to securing stable government, justice and police reform.

I am sitting in a hotel in Abuja, watching the television, in keeping with the restrictions on movement in the capital on election day.  I flip between local stations (NTA and AIT) and CNN and listen to whatever presenter seems most enthusiastic.  I’m restless and I flip channels nervously.  The tension is palpable.  But it’s positive.

I will vote for Mr. Goodluck Jonathan not because of his presidential campaign or his promises but simply because amongst the field of all the candidates in the race he has shown a character and demeanour that is truly presidential and very unflappable.

As you deliberate on the future of Nigeria and whilst we decide who should take us forward, read this!  I liked it. What do you think?

As 2010 comes to a close and yet another year passes by in the world of Nigerian politics, it is safe to say that whilst other regions of the country have made a huge impression on us, Ndigbo have remained where they were in the preceding years.

Nowhere nearer their goal of achieving the Presidency of Nigeria.

Someone rather cynically suggested that maybe Black Africa, bar South Africa, should be allowed to burn. Subsequent to any Scorched Earth approach will be the natural rebuild of the sub continent was his rationale.

There is something to be said for the nature of the Black African and the leaders that emerge from within.

I may have reason to a-Mend this headline someday but for the moment, the question has to be asked.

Personally, I am weary of the attempt to turn the allegations in the report by World Tribune into some anti-Gusau propaganda. Granted, I do find the report more than a little skewed in its analysis of expected voting patterns and its not-so-well disguised attempt to be anti-Jonathan and pro-Gusau, yet it must worry any thinking Nigerian that rather than debunking the story and asking for specific evidence to support the claims, the response of the President and his people has been more of diverting attention from the allegations by blaming someone or others they think has or have relationship with the authors simply because that guy or these others are now opponents within the President’s party!

Indeed, reading through the supposed presidential refutation as released by the President’s Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Mr Ima Niboro, one comes to the scandalous conclusion that its strongest point is that “if it is about calumnious material, then there are others who have more to fear, including rattling skeletons in dusty cupboards, than President Jonathan would ever have”. What the bloody hell is that? Doesn’t that look, walk and quack like blackmail? Is it a rebuttal to say there are more bribe givers or more people with things to hide? Is that the same as telling us that no, such a thing never happened and is not happening? Isn’t it implied clearly in that statement that Jonathan has something to hide, but thinks it is great defence to say that some other person or persons behind this report have more to hide? Or does he think his position as the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, the most important individual and institutional totem of the nation, is the same with those he’s pointing at?

And frankly, what is all that crappy talk about Jonathan’s “widely anticipated victory at the PDP primaries”? Anticipated by who and who and on what basis? Don’t they know that such a statement actually supports the report? Are they not invariably telling us that they are working towards an already prepared answer? Was a credible poll conducted nationwide or within the PDP to reveal that expectation? I mean, if on one hand you are claiming that delegates are yet to be identified, how did you arrive at the expectation of victory? Is such a declaration certified by ghosts? Yet, the truth is that the party congresses have even been concluded in most states and in fact, the PDP is now telling INEC it wouldn’t be able to repeat the exercise in some states that they have adjudged as not properly conducted. Indeed, most of the delegates who are delegates by virtue of their positions within the party and government from local government to federal levels are already known, so this whole idea being put out by government that they are yet to be identified is less than quarter truth! Fact is only a number of others would be added to the institutionally ascertained delegates by election or selection later. That of course raises another important question. Why are some or all of these known delegates not coming out to say he or she did not collect Jonathan’s bribe? The only reasonable conclusion one can reach from their resounding silence is that they are scared of being exposed, as they may not know what the authors of the report have on them! No one wants to put his head above the parapet!

The key issue here is that there is a specific allegation against Jonathan, not disguised, point-blank! Is it true that he has been distributing money to delegates as alleged? If not, say so and show evidence to the contrary! If you need the accusers to support this claim with more specific facts or supposed facts, call them out on this and let’s roll! But to base their “rebuttal” on an attack on Gusau or others and woollily accuse people of calumny is akin to someone accused of stealing responding to the effect that the friends of the accusers are enemies!

In the main, I’m just weary of those advising Jonathan and what they come up with most of the time he’s under the cosh! Whether we want to accept it or not, this report, no matter how prejudicial, has deep effect on the image of our nation and the electoral process, considering all the promises made by Jonathan. Of course, some of us have already written off any semblance of a free and fair election taking place, because we have decoded the Jonathan agenda already from his various actions; but at this level, he should be seen to be robustly debunking this type of stuff, if for nothing else, to protect the image of the country. This is a burden he needs to discharge and he needs to do so now.

Kennedy Emetulu writes from London

The road to economic hell is paved with low prices mandated by governments’ good intentions. Despite the fact that Russia was one of the world’s biggest wheat growers, its citizens had to queue for hours for bread in the early 1990s as the command economy of the Soviet Union finally seized up. Trucks to move wheat or bread were often broken down.

With great disaffection and regret we have arrived at what should have been a period of patriotism, collective joy, temporary economic boost for a nation of 150m people.

Easy like Sunday morning? Just when you thought it would be an easy Sunday morning another one hits you in the face!

It is an indictment of our society and country when we have to deliberate so long on the causes and effects of frog-hopping on one spot.

I‘m reading that the Federal Government of Nigeria has granted 10% equity to Oil Producing areas for Oil related businesses . This is a bold initiative particularly in the context of the recent Amnesty initiative of the Federal Government.

Power in Nigeria is about control of oil. Any threat to that control undermines the power brokers.

With prevailing realities, there is no gainsaying that Nigeria has failed as a nation since independence.

Much has been said, written and/or inferred in giving credit to whosoever may deserve it, for the developments in Lagos as compared to any other state in Nigeria.

Acting President Goodluck Jonathan gave a slight insight to his intentions during a recent visit to the United States. This statement has raised a lot of debate and is here for us to decipher. Watch the interview in our Video of the Day.

Now it is getting really interesting. After weeks of boring allegations and counter-allegations, theories and conspiracy theories, real voices and fake voices, signatures or no signatures, the Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria stands up and you all will be better advised to pay attention.

There is always a huge price to pay for commitment of one’s life to a cause. The price may come in form of a loss of time, effort, resources and sometimes life as we know it.

If change were to arrive in Nigeria, it would have to be inspired and driven by a large population of a people who are fed up with the roller coaster ride that they have been on, over the past few months in particular.