page 6
Standard newSpaperS
FeBruary 4, 2010
N AT I O N A L & I N T E R N AT I O N A L N E W S Ruling expected on Nigeria's Absent President Special to the NNPA from the gIN (gIN) – Nigeria’s cabinet has been ordered to decide within 14 days if the hospitalized President Umaru Yar'Adua is fit to lead the country. President Yar’Adua has been in Saudi Arabia for two months, receiving treatment for a heart condition, but has not officially transferred power to any another official. The order by the Federal High Court came in response to a law suit brought by opposition activist Farouk Adamu Aliyu who asked the judges to remove the president over his failing health and for failing to abide by the provisions of the constitution. His lawyer Bamidele Aturu told the BBC that the judgement was a "victory for democracy". Yar’Adua’s predessor, Olusegun Obasanjo, also urged the national leader to step down. "If you take up a job, elected... and then your health starts to fail you and you will not able to deliver, to satisfy yourself and satisfy the people you are supposed to serve, then there is a path of honour and path of morality," he said in his first comments on Mr Yar'Adua's health. Mr Obasanjo handpicked Mr Yar'Adua to succeed him but the pair have since fallen out. He denied that he had been irresponsible when choosing his successor, AFP news agency reports. On Thursday, more than 1,000 people gathered in Lagos to protest against Mr Yar'Adua's prolonged absence. Some carried signs saying: "enough of the offshore president, and A people's constitution now."
Liberia's President Sirleaf to Seek a Second Term in 2011
Special to the NNPA from the gIN (gIN) - Africa's first democratically elected woman president, Liberian President ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, has announced she will run for a second term. "I know where we are today, I know where we ought to be tomorrow and I know how we will get there," she told a joint assembly of MPs gathered this week for her annual message. The news caused loud grumbling among opposition politicians. Charles Brumskine, who came third in the 2005 presidential poll, said he was concerned about Mrs Johnson-Sirleaf's age. “I think she's reached the limit of her capacity," he told the BBC's Network Africa program. Brumskine called the 73 year old President Sirleaf’s government “new wine in old bottles”. Meanwhile, in Miami, Florida, closing arguments are set for Jan. 29 in a suit against the son of former Liberian president Charles Taylor. Charles “Chuckie” Taylor, Jr. has been sued by five torture victims who were set on fire, held in chest-high pits of filthy water and repeatedly sexually assaulted during the years of civil war in neighboring Sierra Leone. The 32-year-old Taylor, a U.S. citizen born in Boston while his father was a student there, is already serving a 97-year prison sentence for violating U.S. anti-torture laws while he commanded an elite paramilitary unit in his father's war-torn government. Finally, 24 Liberians will be deported this month from Columbus, Ohio, including a grandmother who had resided in Columbus for 20 years. Married to a Liberia-born U.S.-citizen, Bernice Bryant leaves behind a 14 year old son, three adult children from an earlier marriage, and a 1-year-old granddaughter. "I'm not bitterly angry at the U.S., but I'm disappointed," said Sunny Bryant, who will accompany his wife to Liberia and remain there until the end of January. "This is not like every immigrant's story," said Bryant's attorney, Ken Robinson, "but it should serve as a signal that our immigration system is fundamentally flawed.” Sadly, an article on the deportation in the online Columbus Dispatch received over 400 responses from readers, mostly unsympathetic. “The law is the law,” “bye bye granny” “enough already” and “the law is the Law,” were typical of the reader postings.
VASILOPITA CeLeBRATeD IN PAPPAS’ OFFICe WITH ORTHODOX CHURCH LeADeRS AND DIgNITARIeS Photo caption: Vasilopita, the Christian Orthodox celebration of a miracle of hope and faith, was observed in the office of Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas. Clergy and lay leaders of the Orthodox community of Chicagoland, along with several consuls general, attended the celebration of “Basil’s Bread,” which dates to the Fourth Century when a bishop, St. Basil the greek, had gold coins baked in bread for his poor flock. Those who found a coin in their bread were “lucky,” a tradition which continues today in Orthodox homes worldwide. His eminence Bishop Iakovos, Orthodox Metropolitan of Chicago presents the Treasurer with the first slice of bread. From left: Bishop Iakovos, Treasurer Pappas and State Treasurer Alexi giannoulias.
Rwanda A Model for Haiti, Says U.N. envoy Paul Farmer Special to the NNPA from the gIN
(gIN) – With a distinguished record of service bringing medical care around the world, Paul Farmer, U.N. deputy special envoy to Haiti, assessed the current delivery of aid to earthquake victims during a brief radio interview broadcast this week. “Coordination is very difficult, as I'm sure you have seen already. There are so many balkanized, fissured groups trying to do good, that it is very difficult for the government or the U.N. or any organization to coordinate them. And then I said delivery because it seems to me, having worked here a long time, that delivery is always the stumbling point. “In the first couple of days, we tried to focus our efforts on trauma, orthopedics, the acute -- the needs of people who were injured in the event, in the earthquake. But now we're going to have to have rehab medicine, a lot better post-op nursing.
“But the real challenge is going to be rebuilding here in Port-au-Prince and further south. And you are going to have to have a massive rebuilding of public health infrastructure now, hospitals, clinics, health posts. And that's going to require significant investment of capital, human capital, but it's going to create lots of jobs, rebuilding safe hospitals and safe schools… we have to also regard that as a chance to create jobs. That’s what's needed most jobs.” “Now is a time to rethink public infrastructure, rethink the city. I mean, as you have seen, -- you can't have two, three million people living, you know, in such densely packed area.” When asked about a successful example of the kind of rebuilding he's prescribed for Haiti, Dr. Farmer had a ready answer: Rwanda, torn by genocide and civil war, now stable and even sending aid to Haiti. Farmer, co-founder of Partners in Health (Haiti), and Inshuti Mu Buzima (Rwanda) is recommending a 10-year rebuilding program for Haiti.
Kenyan Schools to Lose U.S. Funding Special to the NNPA from the gIN
(gIN) - Some $7 million in U.S. aid to primary schools in Kenya has been suspended, pending an investigation into fraud claims, according to the U.S. ambassador. The US move comes a month after the UK government pulled out of the project when $1 million in donated funds to the education Ministry were reported missing. Kenya is ranked as east Africa's most corrupt country by the group Transparency International. "Those culpable for the fraud should not merely be sacked; they should be prosecuted and put behind bars," said U.S. Ambassador Michael Ranneberger, speaking to the American Chamber of Commerce in Kenya. Kenya introduced free primary education in 2003 - and schools were quickly swamped as more than one million children enrolled who had never been to school before. Unicef says the primary school population jumped from 5.9 million in 2002 to 7.6 million in 2005. Most of the funding for primary education comes from government coffers.